(1995) The Oath by Frank Peretti Read Free Book Online Page A

know if it would tell you anything . . .”
    “What did you see?”
    She sighed and finally looked at him. “I don’t know what to tell you, Dr. Benson. I’ve never been in this kind of situation, investigating with someone who’s so close to the victim.”
    “Tracy, I’m up here for a reason. I won’t ask you a question if I’m not ready to hear the answer, okay? Now I need the information.” Actually, he wasn’t sure if he was ready to hear the answer, but he had to hear it, needed to hear it. He steeled himself.
    She looked at him for the longest time and then answered quietly, slowly, “We only found half.”
    His thought processes stopped. He sat motionless. She was looking at him, waiting, trying to gauge his response.
    His voice wouldn’t engage. When it did, it came out a hoarse whisper. “Half? Only half his body?”
    She nodded.
    His mind filled with shocking, ghoulish questions. Which half? Which way was he divided? So where’s the other half? He felt as if he might vomit. He sat there dumbly, not knowing how to proceed. He hadn’t been ready to hear the answer after all.
    He made a concerted effort to reorient himself and tried a rephrased version of the question. His voice was stronger now, and he hoped it didn’t betray the turmoil he felt inside. “Well,” he said slowly, “I’ll have to know eventually. Just tell me what you found.”
    He could tell this was misery for her.
    “Go ahead.”
    Her words hit him with the force of a blow. “We found—we found the left arm detached at the shoulder, several feet away, still in the shirt sleeve—”
    He felt his stomach turn. Quit it!
    She slowly, reluctantly lifted her hand to her left shoulder. “And everything above this line—” She slowly traced a line downward, across her torso to her right hip. “—was gone.”
    LEVI COBB read the leaflet in silence, then reread it, digesting the news.
    “Happened last night,” said Jerry Fisk, another sheriff’s deputy, “up on Wells Peak.”
    They were standing by the gas pumps in front of Levi’s old garage. Jerry had just arrived in his patrol car and had a stack of the pink leaflets to spread around town and post in the windows of the businesses. Normally, Levi and Jerry would be telling stories and playfully exchanging insults. Today that was impossible.
    “So,” Jerry continued, “we’re spreading the word, warning people, trying to find out if anybody’s seen anything.”
    Levi asked, “Who was it?”
    “Oh, nobody from around here.” Jerry took a quick glance at some notes in his pocket. “He was a photographer from Oak Springs, a guy named Cliff Benson. He and his wife were camping up on the Staircase Trail and apparently a bear attacked them in the middle of the night. The wife tried to fight it off with a hunting knife . . .” His words trailed off.
    Levi looked up from the leaflet to examine Jerry’s face. There was something in Jerry’s tone that didn’t fit. “What?”
    Jerry stuffed the notes back in his pocket just for something to do. “Oh—it was bad, that’s all.” He glanced around, a little short on words, then lowered his voice as if someone might be listening. “It’s not my official role to be telling you this, but . . .Tracy Ellis helped bring the body down, and she says the whole upper half of it was gone. It’s missing—just chomped right off.”
    Levi turned pale and sank into an old folding chair by the front door. He sat there, staring at the ground, muttering to himself. Jerry didn’t ask Levi to speak up. When Levi muttered, it wasn’t meant to be heard. He just had to mutter.
    Jerry shed his official role as a deputy for a moment. “Just between you, me, and the gas pumps, I’m having some trouble with this one, and I think Tracy Ellis is, too. We’re not sure what Collins will do.”
    “Collins?” Levi asked, raising one eyebrow. “You think he’ll want to make waves over this?”
    Jerry shrugged. “We’ll see. We’ve had