LITMIR.BIZ

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call from his cell phone, with a Wal-Mart calling card that still had plenty of minutes left on it. His number would be blocked anyway, but this was just a little more insurance. And of course, there was no need to worry about the ping off the local cell tower. No, he himself had designed the phone’s encrypter to cloak all his calls in and out of the carriage house just in case. Yes, for as much as The Sculptor hated technology, he had resigned himself long ago that he would have to master it in order to complete his work. And so, after a quick search online—a search with a rerouted IP address, of course—The Sculptor muted the television and placed his call.

      “Thank you for calling the WNRI Channel 9 Eye-Team Hotline,” droned the recorded voice on the other end. “Your call is important to us, but due to the heavy amount of traffic at present, your wait time to speak with an investigator is approximately—se-ven mi-nutes.”

      The Sculptor refreshed his computer screens; whistled Scarlatti’s Sonata in D Minor as he read the headlines on the Drudge Report and CNN.com. While he had been tidying up his studio, a spokesperson for the FBI had confirmed with the Associated Press that the body of missing Boston Rebels wide receiver Tommy Campbell, as well as another unidentified person, had been found on the property of a wealthy businessman in Campbell’s hometown of Westerly, Rhode Island—blahdy-blahdy-blah, details to follow in a press conference at 5:00 P.M.

      That’s good, The Sculptor thought. A little over two hours to plant the seeds; a little over two hours to make sure the press would ask the right questions come conference time.

      The broadcast on the Fox News Channel switched to an aerial view of Dodd’s estate, and as the line of FBI vehicles snaked down the driveway, The Sculptor could make out the handful of agents and state troopers who still littered the scene. His Bacchus, however, was gone—already on its way to the medical examiner’s office, no doubt. The Sculptor shivered with excitement, felt his nipples grow hard at the thought of the FBI analyzing his work, of them dismantling his exhibit and deciphering the connection between his Bacchus and Dr. Hildy’s Slumbering in the Stone. Yes, it was only a matter of time before everyone would begin to understand the message behind his work; only a matter of time before everyone would begin to finally wake up.

      The Sculptor knew, of course, that the media and the FBI would soon brand him a serial killer, for like Michelangelo himself, his contemporaries did not have a name for what he really was; could not begin to grasp the depth of his tortured soul—that fountain of love and anguish, of beauty and divine insight from which his genius flowed, and from which his artistry craved release. Yes, they would think him a monster; would group him with other monsters and misinterpret his work as some demented, selfish pursuit in the vein of a Dahmer, a Gacy, or a Nilsen. The Sculptor had understood that from the beginning; had long ago resigned himself to the fact that only after his death—perhaps hundreds of years after—would the true nature of his artistry be fully comprehended by everyone.

      Everyone, that is, except Dr. Catherine Hildebrant.

      Yes, here in the present, only one person possessed an understanding, a genius on par with his own. And that person would soon become his mouthpiece—the vehicle through which he would get his message out to the world; the vehicle through which The Sculptor would wake them all from their slumber.

      “Eye-Team Hotline,” said the voice on the other end of the phone—a deep, male voice that The Sculptor immediately found alluring.

      “Greetings,” said The Sculptor. “And congratulations to WNRI and the Eye-Team for being the first to break the news on the discovery of Tommy Campbell. Judging from the amount of time I had to hold the line, I assume your operation there in Providence is being flooded with calls about the case, am I correct?”

      “What can I do for you, sir?” said the voice impatiently—an impatience that The Sculptor found endearing.

      “Perhaps you should be asking what I can do for you,” chuckled The Sculptor. “You see, my friend, as a reward for WNRI’s tenacity, I would like to offer you some information pertaining to the case—a tip, as those in your line of work are apt to call it.”

      “May I have your name?”

      “If it’s all right with you, my friend, I would like to remain anonymous. Surely that is par for the course on a day like today—a day when a lot of tidily-squat about what’s what must be clogging up the pipes down there at W-N-R-I.” The manner in which The Sculptor sang the station’s call letters, like a cheesy radio announcer, had the unintended effect of irritating the investigator on the other end.

      “Look, pal, we got a lot going on down here. I don’t have time today for nonsense—”

      “Now, now, let’s not get testy. I could always call one of your competitors, and just think what your superiors would do to you if they found out you turned your back on perhaps the biggest story in your station’s history.”

      “All right,” sighed the investigator, unimpressed. “What have you got for me?”

      “The FBI has brought in an expert to assist them with their investigation of Tommy Campbell’s demise. Her name is Dr. Catherine Hildebrant—H-I-L-D-E-BR-A-N-T—and she is a professor of art history at Brown University.”

      “I’m sorry, you said art history?”

      “That is correct. This can easily be confirmed by a quick tour of the school’s Web site, and if you hurry—that is, if you’re a real go-getter like that pretty redhead on the beat—you can confirm for yourself Dr. Hildebrant’s involvement in the case. An unmarked FBI vehicle, a black Chevy Trailblazer I believe, will soon drop her off at her place of residence. If you review your latest footage of the crime scene, you’ll be able to see the truck exiting the property. From what I can tell, the good doctor left Watch Hill not even ten minutes ago, and unless our friends with the Federal Bureau of Investigation have more goodies in store for her today, I expect that the same Chevy Trailblazer will put her back at 311 East George Street in about forty to fifty minutes—depending on traffic, of course.”

      “You said 311 East George Street?”

      “I most certainly did.”

      “Why would the FBI be consulting an art history professor?”

      “The bodies of Tommy Campbell and his companion were found in that wealthy banker’s garden painted white like marble and posed upright in the form of a classical sculpture. Michelangelo’s Bacchus, to be exact.”

      “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”

      “I’m sorry, I cannot. Hopefully, the powers-that-be at W-N-R-I are smart enough to record their hotline. Therefore, I suggest you review the tape and that footage and get a reporter over to Dr. Hildebrant’s house as soon as possible. The arrival of the black FBI vehicle will be confirmation that I’m not full of poop.”

      The Sculptor hung up. His pulse had quickened—not because he was worried about getting caught; not because he was excited about all those pointed questions he imagined the press would soon be asking the FBI. No, The Sculptor’s heart knocked at his chest because of his conversation, his flirtation with the man on the other end of the hotline—a man whose voice had aroused him greatly.

      Indeed, The Sculptor was already erect—could feel the hard nakedness of his penis pressing against the underside of the desk. And like a blushing-pink Pria-pus he sauntered over to the mortician’s table. From the space underneath, he unfolded a three-sectional arm, at the end of which was attached a small, flat-screen television. The Sculptor maneuvered it into place—adjusted the arm so the screen hovered about three feet above the head of the mortician’s table—and then uncoiled the accompanying cables. He laid them carefully on the floor, plugging one into the wall and the other into a monitor on his computer desk. The screen above the mortician’s table at once flickered into life, its image the same as the monitor before him. The Sculptor minimized the CNN.com Web site and double clicked on one of the desktop icons—a marble hand holding a bowl titled “Bacchus2.” The screen went blank for a moment, and then the countdown began—thirty seconds, grainy black and white that The Sculptor had designed to look like

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