The Outrage Page #2

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This one wakes me up.

Who is this man?

He's a thief and a liar.

It's best

to stay away from him.

That's old news.

If I hadn't been a thief or a liar,

I wouldn't have lived this long.

Please forgive me, sir.

I've been living in this

horrendous tunnel for so long

that I forgot my manners.

My only companions

are these corpses.

Their families

dumped them here.

Me and the vultures

took care of them.

I've become an accidental undertaker

in this hellhole.

Did I hear correctly

that you're going to disrobe?

I have a spare tuft of hair

from one of the corpses.

It's nice and flowing, isn't it?

You can have it

so you can fool people

that you've a nice head of hair.

Do you want it?

If you get to know these corpses,

you'll find them very likeable.

They just lie here.

They don't gossip.

They don't steal,

they don't harass others

and they don't get into a fight.

The only drawback

is that they stink so bad.

Though maybe not as bad

as some living people.

He's as rotten as

the three witnesses in court yesterday.

As rotten as me?

That's an achievement!

So tell me,

what happened yesterday?

Spit it out!

A man was murdered.

Men are murdered every day.

It's not that simple.

It's how it happened,

and how the testimony went in court.

You heard it too.

So the monk stood in court too?

He was a witness.

So was I.

You? Why?

I found the body.

- Really?

- Yes.

Where?

In the grove,

east of the city wall.

It was late afternoon,

and it was so damn hot.

I was sweating like a pig

in that forest.

So I waited until evening

to go collecting some wood.

I saw a shawl like those used

by aristocratic ladies.

I was puzzled how a shawl

had got stuck in a branch.

There shouldn't be any woman

in that forest.

Then I saw a silver hairpin

on the ground.

Then I saw the dead man...

eyes bulging, mouth agape.

It was horrifying.

I started running through the thicket

until my legs were all scratched

and bloodied.

I found the guards

and I told them what I saw.

So yesterday they asked me and the monk

to testify as witnesses.

And what have you

got to do with this?

He saw them both.

Both?

So there's also a woman?

Yes.

The woman was the wife

of the murdered man.

I walked past them

yesterday morning

near Dong Yen Valley.

The man was dressed regally

like a noble warlord.

He had a sword with a silver handle,

and a bow slung across his back.

The woman was on a palanquin

veiled by a curtain

so I couldn't make out her face.

What happened was terrifying.

It shouldn't have happened

to them.

How was he killed?

He was stabbed right through.

But they couldn't find

the murder weapon.

Didn't you see it?

Are you crazy?

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