Well, that’s not entirely true. Can something be kind of true? I mean, at the moment I wished I hadn’t looked, but after I examined it more closely, I was of two minds. My mother used to use that phrase a lot. My father would always reply that he only needed one. Getting back to the thing Tor dragged out from under the deck – I guess I’d have to say that I was glad for part of what it was and horrified at the other part. That’s not kind of true. It’s absolutely a true statement. Score one for clarity.

I knelt down and looked at it. Okay, I admit I jumped back a little after my first glimpse. I grabbed a big stick and, scrunching my face, poked at it. Best guess, originally 145 lbs and maybe 5 feet 9 inches, or 8 or 6. It was hard to be sure. It looked like the body had been buried long enough for the clothes to decay which, in the climate I lived in would take longer than, say, the tropics. Then again, I’m no mortician.

What looked like it had been some sort of bag was stuffed in the mouth of – oh – for the sake of my sanity I’d begun calling him Simon. Giving him a name preserved my humanity (and his) to my way of thinking. The bag was nearly decayed, so its contents were visible. I looked around at my neighbor’s yards to see if anyone was watching me. Fortunately, no one was out. Who knew what was behind the curtains, but as far as I could see, there didn’t seem to be any activity. And really. If I hadn’t been up close, I would’ve thought it was a big pile of dirt. I hurried into the house for a baggie, then out again, and stuffed it full of the decayed bag’s contents. Laying the baggie carefully on the deck’s railing, I grabbed my gardening gloves and shoved the body back under the deck as well as I could.

I know. I should have called the police. But here was the problem. The bag had a decent amount of money in it; money I wasn’t altogether sure I was ready to part with without some consideration. I coaxed Tor into the house and hosed him off in the tub, but not before pouring the gold coins into a mixing bowl and covering them with the white vinegar I’d gotten a week before to clean my washing machine. It’s a good thing I procrastinated.

Once Tor was cleaned up and I was, too, I gave him a second breakfast and sat down to think this through. Whoever had buried the body there must have buried it before the deck was built because it would’ve been nigh unto impossible to do it flattened out underneath a structure. I started thinking about who had owned the house before me. It was known as the K house, I think because whoever built it had a name starting with K. Once upon a time people probably called it by name, but by the time I came along, it had become just K. I tried to recall what I could of the person who owned it before me.

She was actually, a sweet woman, big-boned some would say, and a little bookish. It was by now close to noon. I got up to make myself a sandwich. Don’t judge. I’d washed and I was hungry. And as I was spreading mayonnaise, my thoughts drifted back to the first time I had met the previous owner. I’d seen an ad on Craigslist for an end table and had come to take a look at it. She’d invited me in, and we actually had begun something of a friendship of convenience. Every once in a while she’d call me to do something for her – burn a leaf pile or change her furnace filter – and then we’d sit down to tea and cookies and she’d send some home with me. I’m not much of a baker, so it was a nice little perk.

But as I was thinking about it, I remembered that she hadn’t always had a deck on the back of the house. I remembered it because the first time she’d had me over to manage the burning leaf pile for her, I’d thought to myself that it was too close to the house. I’d even told her so. It was after that she’d burned them farther back. Huh.

to be continued . . .

****************************************************************************************************

Image: Pixabay through Pexels.com