Finch by Jeff VanderMeer by Jeff VanderMeer

Author:Jeff VanderMeer [VanderMeer, Jeff]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2010-09-29T11:27:46.638000+00:00

2

n hour later, Finch stood on the ridge and stared down. Far below, .the dull blue snake of a canal. Two detectives in a boat. Slowly making their way northeast. Finch was about three hundred feet above them. Wyte was a large shadow with a white face, the boat a floating coffin. Dapple had been reduced to a kind of question mark. Not a good place to be. Anyone could've been on the ridge, looking down. Lucky for them it was just him.

A steep hillside below Finch. Made of garbage. Stone. Metal. Bricks. The petrified snout of a tank or two. Ripped apart treads. Collapsed train cars pitted with scars and holes. Ragged, dry scraps of clothing that might've been people once.

A dry smell hung over it all. Cut through at times by the stench of something dead but lingering. He'd been here before, when it had just been a grassy slope. A nice place. A place couples might go to have a picnic. Couldn't imagine it ever returning to that state.

The weather had gotten surly. Grayish. A strange hot wind dashed itself against the street rubble. Blew up into his face. Off to the northeast: the Religious Quarter. A still-distant series of broken towers, steeples, and domes. Wrapped in a haze of contrasting, layered shades of green. Looking light as mist. Like something out of a dream from afar. Up close, Finch knew, it reflected only hints of the Ambergris from before, the place once ruled by an opera composer, shaped by the colors red and green.

The canal led into the Religious Quarter, but Wyte and Dapple would have to disembark much earlier. Their objective lay just outside the quarter.

Finch's gaze traveled back down the canal, toward civilization. Zeroed in on a series of swift-moving dots some two hundred feet behind the boat. Dark. Lanky. Angular. Using the bramble on the far side of the canal as cover. Partials. Trailing Wyte.

Stared down at the story unfolding below him with a kind of absurd disbelief. Swore under his breath. Took the measure of the Partials down the barrel of his Lewden Special. But it was a long shot. Literally. He lowered the gun.

Maybe Wyte knew about the Partials? What if they were providing support? No. Blakely would've mentioned that. Blakely would've told him about Partials. Probably sent to make sure Wyte did as he'd been told. Was the Partial with them, or was he back at the apartment guarding a dead man?

For a moment, Finch just stood on the ridge, under the gray sky. Watched with envy the wheeling arc of a vulture like a dark blade through the air.

Easy to turn away. Heretic didn't expect him to be there. Wyte didn't know where he'd gone. Finch could say he'd been investigating some other lead. Could go back to the station. Forget he'd seen any of this. Wait for them to get back. If they came back.

Bliss: "It isn't what you find out that's going to keep you alive. It's where you're standing .

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