Tortoise Soup Read Online Free PDF Page B

cornflowers daintily dancing along its edge. A water glass, cleaner than any to be found in my own kitchen cabinet, sat nearby. Balanced on its rim was another fly, patiently waiting for food.
    I walked back into the hall, where my next stop was Annie’s bedroom. An old walnut dresser stood inside, virginally draped in a swathe of hand-crocheted ivory lace. Carefully arranged on top were tiny photographs lovingly displayed in antique brass frames. Each photo portrayed a beautiful young woman whom I assumed to be Annie. The photos appeared to be from the 1940s, though none contained the desert as a backdrop. In some Annie beamed at the camera, holding a small dog in her arms. Other photos, yellowed with age, showed her gazing up at a handsome young man adoringly. Still others portrayed her alone, an air of melancholy lingering about her.
    As I held a photo of Annie, a whiff of a scent intruded—tinged with the distinct, sharp odor of ammonia. But something else was mixed in as well: the nauseatingly sweet stench of decay. I took a deep breath, and the stench reached down inside me, its fingers twisting teasingly at my stomach while numbing my brain. Tiny pinpricks of perspiration broke out on my face and over my body. I licked my lips, rough as an emery board against my tongue, to taste a salty residue of sweat.
    For the first time, I became aware of how deathly still the house was. The only sounds were that of my own blood pounding through my body and the persistent buzz of flies, their maddening hum hanging like an off-key chorus filling the air.
    My feet moved woodenly out of the bedroom as I continued my search. I passed a room Annie must have used as a study. A rocking chair sat in reproachful silence; on its needlepoint seat lay a copy of
Pride and Prejudice
, a bookmark napping between the last pages that had been read. A wooden case against the wall held a treasure trove of books. On any other occasion I would have perused Annie’s choice of reading material, curious as to how she filled her time, living all alone in the desert. But the air had grown more and more putrid, urging me on.
    By the time I reached the end of the hall, the smell was so intense that I began to gag. But what I saw appalled me even more: an army of black flies buzzed angrily outside the last door, covering every inch of its frame. I glanced down and stepped back with a gasp as I saw where the insects were coming from. Hundreds of winged black bodies swarmed in the gap where the door met the floor, crawling over one another in a mad fight for space. Steeling myself, I pulled my shirttail out of my pants, held the fabric up over my nose and mouth, and gingerly pushed the door open with the tips of my fingers. Immediately, wave after wave of droning insects descended upon me like an angry tsunami crashing out of control. I shrieked and blindly swatted the air in a vain attempt to drive them away, covering my head and turning my back as the irate mob flew over and around me, filling the hallway beyond as they headed for the front door.
    Only after the roar had died down to a low hum and I could once again breathe did I dare turn and face the awaiting tableau. The overwhelming heat in the room, mixed with the origin of the stench, nearly flattened me as I stared in horror. The remains of a badly decomposed dog lay rotting on the wooden floor of the bathroom. Covered with flies, what little was left of the body was filled with a frenzy of other bugs gorging themselves on the feast. But it took a moment for my brain to register what lay beyond that.
    A grinning skeleton sat in an empty bathtub. Its mass of silvery hair, still attached to the skull, flowed down to cover bony shoulders like a finely spun veil. It looked like a white sheet had been thrown over Annie’s remains, in either a grisly attempt at modesty or a perverse joke. But then the sheet began to move. I rubbed my eyes and took a deep breath, my heart pounding like a fist against my