The Taxidermist
The Taxidermist
By
Eric Bonholtzer
From the second he’d laid eyes upon him, Carl had thought that there was something strange about the taxidermist. And that was before he’d found the severed finger. The proprietor of The Stuff of Legends Taxidermy was a short bulbous wreck of a man, an ogre-like figure who sported a fiery red 80’s mullet and several days of unshaven stubble. His markedly unkempt appearance made the taxidermist seem deformed, the man’s stomach bloated beyond belief. The taxidermist had abnormally plump fingers, surprising given his trade, and Carl couldn’t help but feel an instant repulsion. When Carl entered the shop with his prize hunted buck in tow, he had almost turned around and left when he saw the man behind the counter. A strange sense of unease had filled him at the sight, but after driving miles with a dead deer in the bed of his truck and there was no way Carl was going to turn back just because of some simple misgivings.
“When do you, uh, need it by?” The taxidermist asked. Carl noticed the hesitancy in his voice.
“Phil, right?” Carl inquired, glancing at the name tag and trying to appear genial, although he just wanted to be away from the odd little man. “Look, this is a prize kill here. I need it ASAP.”
“Well, there are other people I’ve been attending to…”
Carl stood a head taller and outweighed the taxidermist by at least forty pounds and he was getting ticked. “You know, I really couldn’t care less about them. It’s not every day you bag a stag like this. This has gotta go by my fireplace. This is a showoff piece, not some lousy tourist fish.”
The little man behind the counter did not seem in the least bit frightened by Carl’s tone. “I’m sorry, but like I said, I have other things I’m working on and I really can’t…”
Carl’s earlier disquiet was now dulled now by anger, and the hunter in him took to the fore. “Look. I don’t like you and I really don’t care what you have going on. You’re the only taxidermist in this town and I didn’t come up here all the way to hunt just to have to drag my kill back home. It’ll be ruined. So, why don’t you just get on it for me? Okay?” He leaned over the counter and seized the man’s collar in his meaty palms.
For a faint instant it seemed as if the little bald man was going to lash out violently, a mad look in his eye, but then it was gone, replaced by mild acquiescence. “Whatever you say. The customer’s always right.”
With these simple words, the taxidermist effortlessly extricated himself from the Carl’s grasp in a move that surprised the large hunter. The taxidermist then walked over to the slain stag and hefted the huge buck over his shoulder, all the while seeming to exert no strain. It was a feat that made Carl a little jealous, still aching from the strain it had caused him when he had brought the buck in.
Carcass in hand, the taxidermist was nearly in the back room when Carl raised his voice to speak. “Hey, Phil, how..”
The man made no response, either not hearing or not caring, as he disappeared through the door.
Perturbed at the strange sequence of events but satisfied with the way things had turned out, Carl found a promising looking wooden chair and reclined in it, waiting for the taxidermist to get back an estimate on time and price. If Carl had not gotten up to grab a hunting magazine off the taxidermist’s counter, he probably wouldn’t have noticed the finger. It was sitting in plain view, as if it were something as innocuous as a discarded cigarette butt, like a discarded trinket to be given no more thought, but until that moment the hunter hadn’t even noticed it. Now, Carl nearly screamed, turning a ghastly pallor. There was no doubt it was a human finger, dried blood congealed just below the second knuckle.
Carl knew instantly something was very, very wrong and his hunter instincts took over. Withdrawing his large, ever-present fixed blade, Carl wished he had a gun handy. The thought of running for help crossed his mind, but Carl was a tough guy. He wanted answers and that was what he was going to get, even if they came from a taxidermist skewered on the end of his knife. Silently, cautiously, Carl crept toward the back room, a strange sense of exhilaration filling him, as thoughts ran through his head that he was doing what he loved best: hunting. Only this time the prey was human.
As he made his way back, Carl found the room empty, the taxidermist nowhere to be seen. He couldn’t help but feel the eeriness when he saw the absurd emptiness of the room. No animals adorned the shelves, no trophies were tagged and ready to be collected. There were only a few small decomposing animal corpses lying on a stainless steel workbench, but they appeared neglected, as if they had not received care in a long time. Strange machines cluttered the room and although Carl had never set foot in a taxidermist’s workshop before, they seemed a bit elaborate, excessive, considering the obvious lack of business.
Carl took one slow step followed by another as he desperately tried to stay silent. The room seemed deserted, and his hunter’s instincts put him on edge. Several parts of the workspace were bathed deep in shadows thrown by the various pieces of machinery, giving the odd little man ample places to hide.
Slowly, Carl made a circuit of the room, constantly on guard. The eerie lighting, florescent illumination coming unknown sources, caused the hunter to jump at things that weren’t there.
At one point he screamed, “Aha!” thrusting his knife into a pool of shadow only to hear the resounding clamor of a utensil tray as it clattered harshly to the floor. The ominous reverberation seemed like a cacophonous roar to the hunter‘s ears. Carl shivered, feeling like he was hunting ghosts.
Taking more hesitant steps into the darkness, Carl spied the outline of a door. It appeared to be an entrance to some kind of storage room or freezer, and Carl grinned a little, his fear seeming to melt away as a thick coat of adrenaline enveloped his body. The hunt was back on. Carl was so intent on the new room that he failed to hear the cabinet beneath a workroom sink slowly open.
Carl pulled back the storage room door handle and peered inside. The space was dark, darker than the previous room, and Carl fumbled for a light switch. When he found it, the faint illumination of a single hanging bulb flickered momentarily. Carl nearly dropped his knife in shock, when he saw what filled the storage space.
The room was packed, and it seemed to Carl as if he had somehow stumbled upon a repository from the Twilight Zone. Icy tendrils of fear clutched his stomach, the bile rising in the back of his throat as he took in the scene. They looked like statues covered with cloth, but their shapes were undeniable and there was little doubt as to what they could be. But Carl knew he had to be sure. He had to know that it was not his overactive imagination playing tricks on him. Hesitantly, Carl reached forward, his hand shaking, and thoughts filling his head that he should have gone for help.
Nothing he could have envisioned in the dark recesses of his mind could have prepared him for what he saw when he pulled back the tarps. His knees went weak as his assumptions solidified into fact. What stood before him was a human being, a stuffed trophy of human flesh. The complexion of the dead man was waxy and the embroidery on the employee shirt said “Phil”. Two pinholes showed where a name tag had been removed, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out that this was the true taxidermist.
Carl had only a split second to think as he heard a laugh behind him. He was so startled he lost his balance, falling backward and dragging several of the stuffed dead bodies down on top of him. They clattered to the ground and Carl found himself immersed in stiff flesh, desperately trying to extricate himself.
“So, now you know my secret.” The odd little man stood silhouetted in the doorway, a broad smile creasing his face. Rage boiled inside Carl as he dug his way out of the bodies, pushing aside the corpse after corpse. Fear filled him as he noted each body he pushed aside seemed to be that of a hunter.
As if reading his unvoiced thoughts the strange taxidermist impersonator answered, “You have your prizes. I have mine. You call yourself a hunter. I’m the true hunter. And now you can be a part of my collection.” With that the light in the room died as the door swung shut with a resounding finality, the last thing Carl hearing was the faint turn of the lock sliding into place.
Eric Bonholtzer 1500 words
916 W. Foothill Blvd., Unit B © Eric Bonholtzer
Monrovia, California 91016
(626) 482-9615
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