Once Buried

She reminded herself of her earlier impression – that he was charming and likeable.

At first he probably feigned surprise at finding the young woman at the bottom of this hole. He may have even given the woman the impression that he’d help her get out.

She trusted him, Riley thought. If only for a moment.

Then he’d begun to tease her.

And before long, he began dumping wheelbarrows full of dirt down on her.

She must have screamed when she realized what was happening.

So how did he respond to the sound of her screaming?

Riley sensed that his sadism fully emerged. He paused from his task to throw a single shovelful of dirt in her face – not so much to stop her from screaming, but to torment her.

Riley shivered all over.

She felt relief as that feeling of connection began to slip away.

Now she could get back to looking at the crime scene with a more objective eye.

The shape of the hole seemed odd to her. The end where she was standing was dug in a pointed wedge shape. The other end reflected that same shape, only inverted.

It looked like the killer had gone to a certain amount of trouble about it.

But why? Riley wondered. What could it mean?

Just then, she heard Bill’s voice call out from somewhere behind her.

“I’ve found something. You’d all better come over here for a look.”

Chapter Seven

Riley whirled around to see what Bill was yelling about. His voice was coming from behind the trees off to one side of the path.

“What is it?” Chief Belt called out.

“What did you find?” Terzis echoed.

“Just come here,” Bill yelled back.

Riley got to her feet and headed in his direction. She could see broken-down brush where he had left the path.

“Are you coming?” Bill called out, starting to sound a little impatient.

Riley could tell by his tone of voice that he meant business.

Followed by Belt and Terzis, she waded through the thicket until they reached the small clearing where Bill was standing. Bill was looking down at the ground.

He’d found something, all right.

Another piece of erosion cloth was stretched over the ground, loosely held in place by small pegs at the corners.

“Good God,” Terzis murmured.

“Not another body,” Belt said.

But Riley knew that it had to be something different. For one thing, the hole was much smaller than the other, and square in shape.

Bill was putting on plastic gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints on whatever he was about to find. Then he knelt down and gently pulled the erosion cloth away.

All Riley could see was a circular piece of dark, polished wood.

Bill carefully took hold of the wooden circle with both hands and pulled it upward.

Everybody except Bill gasped at what he slowly brought out of the hole.

“An hourglass!” Chief Belt said.

“Biggest one I ever saw,” Terzis added.

And indeed, the object was over two feet tall.

“Are you sure it’s not some kind of trap?” Riley warned.

Bill rose to his feet with the object, keeping it perpendicular, handling it as delicately as he might handle an explosive device. He set it upright on the ground next to the hole.

Riley knelt and examined it closely. The thing didn’t seem to have any wires or springs. But was anything hidden beneath that sand? She tilted the thing to one side and didn’t see anything odd.

“It’s just a big hourglass,” she muttered. “And hidden just like the trap on the trail.”

“Not an hourglass, exactly,” Bill said. “I’m pretty sure it measures a longer period of time than an hour. It’s what’s called a sand timer.”

The object struck Riley as startlingly beautiful. The two globes of glass were exquisitely shaped, connected together by a narrow opening. The round wooden top and bottom pieces were connected by three wooden rods, carved into decorative patterns. The top was carved into a ripple pattern. The wood was dark and well-polished.

Riley had seen sand timers before – much smaller versions for cooking that counted off three or five or twenty minutes. This one was much, much bigger, over two feet tall.

The bottom globe was partially filled with tan sand.

There was no sand in the upper globe.

Chief Belt asked Bill, “How did you know something was here?”

Bill was crouching beside the sand timer, examining it attentively. He asked, “Did anyone else notice something odd about the shape of the pit on the trail?”

“I did,” Riley said. “The ends of the hole were dug in kind of a wedge-shaped manner.”

Bill nodded.