Lights in a Western Sky by Roger Curtis

Author:Roger Curtis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
Published: 2018-08-06T16:00:00+00:00

Muntjac

Christopher’s morning had not been kind. First it was Alice from the almoner’s office, stepping uninvited into the notional space around the table that was barred to all but himself when an autopsy was in progress. Then there was Bertie, his assistant, clattering about on the second table, saw and chisel in hand, as if he were in a calypso band. Fortunately there were no police today. Time, then, for one more body before lunch with Alice.

Though the instruments were already laid out for him, he rearranged them – unnecessarily, as he always did – in accordance with that tiny manifestation of autism known only to his family. He called for Bertie to help him pull out the drawer and together they manoeuvred the ice-cold cadaver onto the stainless steel table. Then he remembered it was the one with the curious history.

It was clear the man had died through asphyxiation caused by vomit blocking the airways. What had caused that was not immediately apparent. It was a while after he started probing the stomach contents that he found it, the object that would transform his day: a tiny glistening ball hardly larger than a pea that dropped from his forceps and tinkled across the steel surface before coming to rest on what he saw was one of its many faceted surfaces. It first crossed his mind that the object was a perfectly cut diamond, so brightly did it refract the light from the lamp above, but on closer inspection there was no doubt it was metallic. He looked up once to see Alice gesticulating at the partition window, then waved her away and put it from his mind that they had agreed to lunch together.

Under his magnifying lens the object was not just a simple sphere. The colour of each of the many facets was distinctly unique and beneath the surface of each he believed he could see – although sense was probably a better word – tiny oscillations in the refracted light. A cloud began to form before his eyes, followed by a throbbing at each temple. But that was just the beginning.

No-one saw – not even Alice – that when they lifted him from the floor the metal sphere rolled as if propelled by its own energy along the gully and into the drain, from which – although of course no-one looked for it – it was never recovered.

Exactly a week later Christopher – or rather his cadaver – suffered the indignity of being autopsied on the very same table. And then Bertie took Alice for lunch.

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