The Balloon Man Read Online Free

a dash for the house.
    With all that joyful noise outside, the library felt almost too quiet when Max unlocked the door. He made sure that the Kelling
     jewels were still hiding behind Thackeray and stood pondering. The more he thought about it, the more peculiar the situation
     appeared. How had the rubies got there? Those velvet cases hadn't been there when he'd first entered the library. He couldn't
     have missed seeing the necklace; its baroque extravagance stood out among the sleek modern shapes of plastic arid silver like
     an alligator in an aviary. One of the guests must have slipped the parure onto the table while he wasn't looking, shoving
     aside the surrounding appliances and bibelots to make room for it.If another guest had seen the anonymous donor, he or she would have assumed a last-minute gift had been delivered in person.
     There didn't seem to be any point in asking whether anyone had observed such a thing. He couldn't even remember who had been
     in the room or when, and a good number of the visitors had been people he didn't know. Maybe Egbert would remember something.
     He'd have to have a long talk with Egbert, and with Sarah, but not until after the newlyweds had left and the guests departed.
     His wife would consider even the miraculous reappearance of a lost family treasure unimportant if it spoiled Tracy and Mike's
     big day. Especially this treasure, with its miserable memories.
    He was about to return to his duties when he became aware of a faint but unpleasant odor. It hadn't been there when he'd locked
     the room. Had someone had the gall to leave a bag of garbage under a table or in a corner? Max took a flashlight from the
     rack in which Sarah kept a few extras in case of downed power lines or other mishaps that people who live close to the sea
     are used to, and began prowling. The increasing pungency of the smell led him to the desk. There was something there all right,
     tucked away underneath, between the pairs of supporting drawers. Max bent over to inspect it more closely. He wished he hadn't.
     Even through the double-thick, man-size plastic bag that covered it, who could mistake the shape and smell of a decaying human
     body?
    Max felt along the outside of that gruesome heap, hopingto convince himself that it was not that of a human form or what was left of one. Then he did the only thing he could do under
     the circumstances and picked up the telephone.
    “This is Max Bittersohn at Ireson's Landing, and I need an ambulance right away.… No, were all fine; it's the corpse I've
     just found under my wife's desk that's giving the trouble. Do me a favor and keep the siren mute if you can. We've got about
     a hundred guests and relatives attending my nephews wedding, and—What the hellf”
    The corpse had moved. Max was more or less accustomed to bodies, but he had had a hard morning. He jumped back, dropping the
     phone, and watched open-mouthed as a man crawled out from under the desk, shedding the black plastic bag like a moth emerging
     from a cocoon. Moths don't look like much when they first emerge, and neither did this individual, who was extremely unlikely
     to spread gorgeous wings and waft off into the blue. He made Max think of a ferret. Brooks Kelling could probably come up
     with a more interesting ornithological comparison, but ferret was what came to Max's mind. Some kind of rodent, anyhow. The
     man was of medium height, skinny as a rail, with a long pointed nose. The hairs under the nose might have been meant to be
     a mustache, but there weren't many of them, and they twitched like a rat's whiskers when he talked.
    “Sorry to cause all this trouble, Mr. Kelling—I mean, Mr. Bittersohn—but I'm not dead. It's, er, my brotherwho's dead, at least I think he is, but he's not here, so, er, we don't need an ambulance, though it was very kind of you
     to—”
    “Shut up,” Max said. He picked up the phone, which was squawking agitatedly. “Cancel the ambulance,