—Darwinism Refuted http://www.darwinismrefuted.com
1. Evolution is one of the most strongly supported theories in all of science. It is nowhere near a theory in crisis.
2. This claim has been made constantly since even before Darwin. In all that time, the theory of evolution has only gotten stronger. Prior to the development of evolutionary theory, almost 100 percent of relevant scientists were creationists. Now the number is far less than 1 percent. The numbers continue to drop as the body of evidence supporting evolutionary theory continues to build. Thus, claims of scientists abandoning evolution theory for creationism are untrue.
—Creationist Claims http://www.talkorigins.com
ONE
1
Gregor took one of the two police officers and walked around to the back of the house. Part of the reason for this was practical. Those gunshots bothered him. There was no gun in this case, and the Hadley house was far too close to town to be a suitable site for hunting. It was the kind of detail that made him think, again, of that first kidnaping case, the kind of detail that made him feel that there was something right in front of him that he wasn’t seeing. Part of the reason for this was psychological, however, and Gregor was old enough to admit it. He needed to be away from Dale Vardan. It was ironic; it had been his idea to bring the man in to begin with, and he still thought that they needed a state police presence here in light of what had been happening. Dale Vardan, though, being who he was, provided only one advantage: the long-term cover of showing that they had done the right thing when they knew they were getting in over their heads. Unfortunately, the man tended to make the floodwaters surge higher.
The ambulance would take the body to the hospital. Somebody would autopsy it there. Gregor was not worried about the autopsy. He expected to find that Shelley Niederman had been bludgeoned to death, just as her friend Judy Cornish had been, just as Annie-Vic Hadley had almost been.
“It’s something to do with the house,” he said.
The state police officer, walking beside him, turned. “Did you say something, Mr. Demarkian? I didn’t catch it.”
“It’s something to do with the house,” Gregor repeated. “Whatever is going on here. There’s something in that house, or about it in some way, that’s serving as the catalyst for these crimes. Which means that whoever it is didn’t get what he or she was looking for yesterday. That is, assuming that what’s being looked for is an object that can be taken in or out.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Demarkian. I’m afraid I don’t follow.”
“I’m not sure I do either,” Gregor said. “What’s your name?”
“Ralph. Ralph Tammaro.”
“And people call you Ralph?”
“People call me Tammaro, mostly,” the man said. “I never much liked the name of Ralph. What do you think is in the house?”
“I don’t know, exactly,” Gregor said. “My best guess is that it’s something in all those papers in the dining room, something Annie-Vic Hadley was working on. I asked Lisa Hadley—that’s the old woman’s grandniece, I think. Anyway, she wasn’t able to tell me anything that was very helpful. Maybe I’ll go down there in a minute and look through them myself. She did say there was nothing on the table that had anything to do with Creationism and evolution, though.”
“Oh,” Tammaro said. “The lawsuit. I keep forgetting about it. I don’t know why. It’s on the news every day.”
“Well, it’s going to be on the news even more after this,” Gregor said. “If you thought the publicity was bad to begin with, just wait until the cable news networks decide they’ve got a crazed Creationist serial killer on their hands.”
“Is that what this is? A crazed Creationist serial killer?” Tammaro looked doubtful.
Gregor looked up the hill at the back of the house, then down the hill again toward the house and town. There were quite a few trees in back, a little wooded area, but it was in no way a forest or the start of real country. Gregor could see another house farther up the hill, although he couldn’t see it very well.
“Let me ask you something,” Gregor said. “Did either of you see anybody in this stand of trees? Anybody standing around, anybody walking, anybody running?”
“No, we didn’t,” Tammaro said. “And I think we would have.”
“So do I,” Gregor said. “But look at the area here. It’s not large, but it’s large enough so that it’s unlikely that somebody could have fired a gun and then gotten out in time so that neither of you saw anything. Not unless whoever it was was right up against the back of the house, and even then it’s something of a climb down to town going this way.”