The Twelve Gauge of Christmas

By P.A. Gardinali

"It was the old bastard, all right; laying by the fireplace, contorted in an unnatural pose. The streaks of blood ran down from the mantelpiece, which he had likely grabbed in a desperate escape attempt."

A homage to my favorite noir writer of all times. Set in an alternate reality, just slightly less bizarre than ours

• Language: English
• Publisher: P.A. Gardinali
• Release date: Dec 26, 2009
• ISBN: 9781452304212

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The Twelve Gauge of Christmas

P.A. Gardinali

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2009 P.A. Gardinali

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I scratched my beard. It felt like two days growth, but it was more likely four. And here I was again, on Christmas Day. The ranking brass that should have normally rushed to something like this were too busy with their families and celebrations. Luckily for them, I no longer had a right to any of that. I looked around the room. People moved in and out, doing their job, performing the last rites, talking on their cell phones, taking pictures and notes, all while stepping carefully around the body.

It was the old bastard, all right; laying by the fireplace, contorted in an unnatural pose. The streaks of blood ran down from the mantelpiece, which he had likely grabbed in a desperate escape attempt. The blood pooled around his body, seeping through the seventies shaggy carpet. Bright red on dark, quite festive, if you ask me, but still in the back of my throat I felt the acid souvenir of the scotch I had liberally used to wash Christmas night away.

The radio crowed some nonsense. One of the CSI guys, Dave something, murmured a curse under his breath, digging around with tweezers in the wooden mantelpiece. Looked like everyone was in a foul mood today. Except me, of course. I hadn’t been expecting anything at all: not this Christmas, not any of the recent ones. And a big fat nothing I received. So it was all good. I repeated my mantra to myself, since no one else seemed to be paying attention. "Set your expectations low enough, and you’ll never be disappointed."

I took some additional notes on a legal pad, and drew a quick sketch of the room, the position of the corpse, arrows pointing to possible evidence and other relevant details. Just something