Saturday, March 14, 2009

My Mystery Story Begins

Ah, being here in Puerto Vallarta I have so much time on my hands that I have begun to read mystery stories. So many I have decided to write one of my own. Please feel free to add your comments so that I can incorporate them.

Chapter One - The Start

I kneeled on the rubber mat that I brought from WallMart. It was only $3.95 and intended to be used in a bathtub. But is served my purpose well. The little suction cups clinging to the mud of the swamp where I waited for my prey.

I lined my titanium sights that I had coated with mud to prevent any glare and triangulated off Venus, low on the horizon, and Mars, hovering over the full moon. Adjusting for the wind, about ten miles an hour out of the east, estimated by the size of the waves in the bay, and adjusting for the tide, full at this time, I alingned the sights of my 357 magnum loaded with a bullet of my own design, a spent 45 casing with a double fill and capped with a soft copper scored head that would fragment on impact, on the white face that was framed in the window. A window frame hand-crafted by an artesian slave who lived here in Charleston two centruries ago. His mother was Alice and she had been ravaged on more than one occasion by her cruel master.

Oh, and for breakfast I had an omelette made with two egg-whites, some ham I cut off of the hind quarter of the one hog I still have left. The others having left, for some reason. I curdled the whites in an unfiltered olive oil I brought back from Spain and then gently folded in the ham and a bit cheese I made myself.

When I sensed the wind and the tide were just right I squeezed the trigger, hand fitted to my own finger by a craftsman who is also now dead, and a draw down to less than one half a gram of pressure. I sucked in my wind, held my breath, squeezed, and said Click.

Now was not the time. There would be another. I would be back.

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