Slickrock Paradox Read Online Free PDF Page B

shoulders. “Looks like we’ll be turning you over to the feds,” Willis said to Pearson, only half joking.
    THE HALF-MILE WALK down Courthouse Wash was a solemn, painful trip. Silas, assisted by Willis and Baton, limped his way forward. He had no memory of crawling from the confluence of the wash with Sleepy Hollow the night before, nor could he remember passing out again in the darkness of the canyon, to be awakened by the anxious young couple a few hours earlier.
    What he could not forget was what he had found. He was certain it was her.
    It took more than half an hour to travel the distance he might walk in ten minutes on a healthy foot, but when the morass of the flood came into view, they all stopped. “Jesus, Silas, you’re a goddamned lucky fellow. You could have been killed,” said the chief ranger. “You were in that?”
    â€œYeah. I guess I rode it for a mile or more.”
    â€œGuess?” asked the sheriff.
    â€œDon’t remember. Think I hit my head.”
    â€œLet’s have a look at what you’ve found, shall we, Mr. Pearson?” asked Taylor.
    â€œThere.” Silas pointed to the earthbound cottonwood. The Sheriff’s Department had partitioned off the core crime scene area with yellow tape, strung between a patch of willows and some rabbit brush.
    Agent Taylor stepped forward. “You say the flood came down this way?” Behind him agents Unger and Huston were beginning their preliminary walk-around of the scene.
    â€œThat’s right.”
    â€œHow far up were you?”
    â€œPretty much at the top. There’s a box a ways up, just past a spring that is tucked in along the canyon wall.”
    Taylor pushed his hands into his pockets and looked around him, taking note of the sheer cliffs of Courthouse Wash. On the walk down the wash he and Sheriff Willis had agreed that the FBI Evidence Response Team would provide support for the recovery of the body.
    â€œOkay, Mr. Pearson,” Taylor said, looking Silas in the eye. “Let’s see the body.”
    Silas pointed toward the log. “She’s over there.” Taylor turned and motioned for the two members of the team to begin. They stepped past the assemblage of men and walked toward the log.
    Unger slipped off her pack and opened the top and pulled out a hard-shell black case. She took out a small handheld digital video recorder and turned it on. Beside her Huston removed a camera and began to take photos of the mouth of the wash and the area surrounding the log. When he was done, Huston looped the camera over his shoulder and took out a sketch pad and made a drawing of the area. “We’re going to want to extend the crime scene perimeter back at least another hundred yards up Courthouse,” he said. “With the flood moving everything around, we don’t know what’s evidence and what isn’t.”
    Meanwhile, Unger focused her video camera on her companion, who spoke into the lens: “August seventeenth, Special Agent John Huston, location Courthouse Wash, Arches National Park . . .” He looked at this watch. “9:42 AM . Present are . . .” When he had finished the introduction to the video, he said, “Okay, let’s go.”
    He and his companion approached the log, recording their short walk. “Mr. Pearson,” said the first agent, “reports having dragged himself from this scene after sustaining injuries during the flood.” Silas watched as they slowly approached the skeletonized arm.
    The lead agent sunk up to his shins in the mud and quicksand. “Goddamn it.”
    â€œWhat’s the matter, Agent Huston, get some mud on your shoes?” asked Taylor.
    â€œVery funny.” Huston turned to look at Taylor, then continued to record his observations. “From where I’m standing, I can see depressions in the mud that lead to and are adjacent to the protruding radius and ulna.