An Eye for Death

by Glenn Trust

  “No, Barry, I can’t.” She shrugged as if pondering a dilemma. Eventually, old Barry would find some help and he would talk. Fear of her threats would fade with time. She knew this. “I could take you with me.” She paused as if considering the possibility.

  Barry nodded. “I won’t cause any trouble, I promise.” He smiled to assure her that he would be a good boy.

  “Thing is, I can’t take you with me either, not where I am going,” she said with a sigh. “You see, I have an eye for death.”

  “For death?”

  “Yes.” She nodded sadly. “Sometimes I let my emotions get the better of me like today, just now with you, but then I know in my heart what I have to do. I have an eye for it. It’s a talent, you know. Something I’m good at knowing … when someone has to die.” She shrugged. “When there’s no other way. You know when it’s absolutely necessary.”

  “But it’s not …”Barry shook his head.

  Before his mouth could form his next words, the girl’s hand raised. The sharp crack of the pistol was deafening in the car. A hundred yards away it was a loud pop. Beyond that, muffled by the thick fields of corn, it was unheard.

  Sinking to his knees, Barry fell backwards. Striking him in the center of the chest, the single bullet had cut the aorta. Had there been any medical treatment available, it would still have been too late. Barry would be dead in less than two minutes. He seemed to sense this as he fell back.

  The smell of the rich, black earth and the grass all around him was pleasant. He counted the grass stalks that extended above him to the sky. His lips moved with each number as he counted. He heard the car drive away over the dirt trail and then it was gone. It no longer existed. The girl no longer existed.

  Lying on his back, he didn’t feel like moving. He couldn’t remember ever moving. The beautiful grass rose above his head. The stalks waved in the light breeze, back and forth across the deep, blue sky. A dark cloud seemed to pass in front of the sun and cast its shadow over him. It was the crow, returning to its perch in the top of the cottonwood.

  His eyes followed and found the trunk of the old tree. It was a good tree, solid and old. Its gray lines led his gaze upward. Save for the crow, the tree was empty, stripped bare. The empty branches spread above him. Beyond was the blue sky. It went on forever.

  38. Epilogue

  “Hey, Sarge!” Stan Knudsen stood and led the squad room in a round of applause and back slapping. “Welcome back!”

  Gathering around him as he walked in, all of the troopers wanted to shake his hand and give him a slap on the back. He was a hero. The man who fought the desperate fight in the dirt, saving the young girl and ending the crime wave of the man the press had called the ‘Backcountry Devil’.

  Paul Sorensen survived his ordeal with Luther. Eight months after the incident on County Road 102, he returned to duty with the Iowa State Patrol. Five surgeries to repair muscle and tissue loss and extensive physical therapy, had made him ready to hit the road again. But extensive blood loss from the struggle in the dirt that day had reduced oxygen flow to the brain, and his memory of the events was hazy. The girl in the car had been nothing more than a silhouette through the glass. Try as he might, he could not remember the rental truck or the man driving it.

  The man in the Toyota, Luther, was later identified as Everett Albert Stimple. Having served seven years in Lincoln County, Arkansas at the Cummins Unit of the Arkansas Penitentiary, Stimple had been paroled from his armed robbery sentence. He left the state six days after parole and went on a multi-state crime spree, always targeting rural victims and managing to avoid detection until his encounter with Paul Sorensen and Stan Knudsen.

  The decision to move east on I-80 into the more heavily traveled and populated areas of the Midwest puzzled investigators. Many believed that had he headed west and disappeared into the backcountry of Colorado, Wyoming or Montana he could have continued his rampage, or at least remained undetected for months, maybe years. Whatever caused him to travel east on I-80, back into the lion’s mouth, so to speak, made his confrontation with law enforcement almost inevitable. Investigators decided that, while Stimple was an extremely dangerous man, he was not the sharpest tack in the box.

  Piecing things together and retracing his path, they were able to determine that after being paroled he was involved in at least six armed robberies and a murder in Arkansas, in addition to the murders in Kansas and Nebraska. It turned out that Everett Stimple was not a nice man and no one was really going to miss him.

  *****

  “Good God-a-mighty, what’s that?” The older man in coveralls nudged the young man driving. “Over there.”

  “Where, Pop?” The man driving looked like the older man, thirty years younger.

  “There.” Holding his arm out the open window of the pickup, he pointed with his finger. “Thereabouts, see it? Under that big cottonwood.”

  “Son of a bitch. Looks like one of them trucks you rent and move things in.” Slowing the truck to a gentle stop in the gravel, the young man peered through the dusty window. “Yep, that’s one of ‘em. It’s a rental truck.”

  “What the hell’s it doing way out here, I wonder.” The man nudged his son’s arm again. “Pull down the fence row here. Let’s see what’s up.”

  Five minutes later, waiting patiently while his son leaned over the wire fence and puked his guts out, Peter Kurtson looked down sadly at the form on the ground. Lying on his back, the man stared up through the trees, not that he would have seen much. Birds had been working on his eyes, leaving two brownish red concave holes in his face. He was well beyond seeing.

  Having served in Vietnam, Kurtson knew what the stain on the front of the man’s shirt meant. He scanned the ground, looking around for a gun, thinking it might have been a suicide. He knew that things like that happened. It only took a minute for him to determine that the man on the ground had not taken his own life.

  “Petey, call the sheriff on your cell phone.”

  Pulling himself away from the wire fence, the pale younger man took the phone from his pocket and dialed. Thirty minutes later, a dozen vehicles lined the little dirt road, parking away from the crime scene.

  Arriving at the scene an hour later, Stan Knudsen confirmed that the truck appeared to be the same or similar to the one he had seen pulling away as he pulled up behind Paul Sorensen’s car on County Road 102. He noted that the car was missing from the carrier hitched to the rear.

  It took investigators a couple of hours to confirm with the rental company that the driver of the truck was Barry Broomfield from Atlanta, Georgia. He was two days overdue with his rental and they wanted to know who would be responsible for the additional charges. They were not happy when the sheriff advised them that the truck and everything in it were being impounded as part of a murder investigation. As far as the additional charges, the sheriff had told them with a grin that they were going to have to check with a higher authority as Barry Broomfield was no longer on this earth.

  The rental company could not provide information about the missing car, but the investigators were able to track down Broomfield’s family in Atlanta. Barbara Broomfield confirmed tearfully that that the missing car was a burgundy colored Nissan. For a time, investigators were very interested in her relationship with her ex-husband but soon realized that it was unlikely that she had been involved in her husband’s murder. She had no motive. Broomfield had left her plenty of money. There was no evidence of another woman, ruling jealousy out. Broomfield had not told her about his personal odyssey across the country until he was gone. These facts made Barbara Broomfield’s involvement in her ex-husband’s death very remote. Her one final, tearful question to investigators about her husband was to ask if the alimony check would still be sent electronically from his bank.

  *****

  Two weeks after Barry Broomfield’s body was discovered under the cottonwood tree, the Nissan was found in a parking garage at Minneapolis - Saint Paul Airport. Taking the security camera
tapes from the garage area, terminal and gates, it took another two weeks of tedious review to get a glimpse of the young woman who had parked the car. Tracing her movements through the airport they determined that she had bought a series of tickets on different airlines to various cities in the United States. The woman used the ID and credit cards of one Lauren Pierce from Syracuse, Kansas to purchase the tickets and meals as she traveled, but Lauren’s parents confirmed that the woman in the security videos was not their daughter.

  The last stop on the woman’s circuitous airplane journey was Spokane, Washington. From there the trail went icy cold.

  *****

  A week after investigators hit a dead end in the Broomfield murder case, two young men fishing from a johnboat along the banks of the Arkansas River in Ford County, Kansas came across a bundle washed up on the shore. Beaching their small boat to investigate they found the badly decomposed remains of Lauren Pierce.

  The local sheriff tied this back to the missing person report in Syracuse and eventually to the Broomfield murder in Iowa. Autopsy and forensics investigation showed that she had been alive, nose, mouth, arms and feet duct taped when she went into the water.

  There was no evidence to identify her murderer, but investigators did discover that the disappearance of Lauren coincided with the escape of one Alice Trent, twenty-five year old white female from a lock-up in a nearby county. In jail, awaiting trial for assault on her ex-boyfriend, the pretty, blue-eyed inmate had won the confidence of the corrections staff and been made a trustee. She was assigned to janitorial work in a county building when she walked away.

  Alice was familiar with jail, having been in and out numerous times for petty thefts and minor assaults. The attack with a knife on her boyfriend as he slept was the most serious charge she had faced. A guilty verdict would land her in the Women’s Prison in Lansing. Other inmates had heard her vow that she would never do time there. Shortly after, she walked away from the county building in a pair of coveralls left by the regular janitor in a closet.

  Investigators on the Broomfield case felt that she resembled the woman in the surveillance camera videos from the Minneapolis - Saint Paul Airport. And that was as far as the investigation went.

  The Pierces received the body of their daughter and held a closed casket funeral. They received no answers. They were left only with their questions.

  ****“How you doin’?” blinking wide blue eyes at the man at the bar, the young girl smiled broadly. “You need a friend tonight?”

  Resting his gaze on the blue eyes, he let it move down over her breasts to the curve of her ass seated on the barstool. He returned the smile with a nod. “Always lookin’ for a friend, girl.”

  Smiling softly, she turned the iced glass in her hand in circles on the bar top leaving wet rings, and said shyly, “That’s good. I’ll be your friend…if you want me to.”

  End… Or Not

  Keep Reading and see the ending that lead to the Blue Eyes Series

  Alternate Ending – The Blue Eyes Series

  When this novel was first published as An Empty Tree, I received a great deal of comment from readers who felt that the demise of Mr. Broomfield was much too cold and heartless, especially since he was such a likeable character. Truth be told, I hated to see Barry go like that myself. Also, I had been looking for a way to write a series with a strong female protagonist and Alice Trent was the perfect fit. So, here you go, for your enjoyment is the Alternate Ending of An Eye for Death that became the centerpiece and Book 1 of The Blue Eyes Series.

  Oh, and for you purists out there, take a deep breath. This is, after all, fiction, I listened; I heard…and I can make the ending anything I want. Sit back and enjoy. Best - Glenn

  35. Barry Was Going To Drive

  Relieved now that his bladder was emptied beside the Iowa cornfield, Barry Broomfield headed back to I-29 and his South Dakota farmhouse. Red and blue lights flashed a mile or so ahead on the country road.

  It seemed an unusual place for a traffic stop, he thought. There wasn't any traffic.

  Curious, he slowed the truck as he approached. As he came even with the police car and the Toyota he wished he had picked any other road in the state, in the world, to stop and relieve himself or better yet, just stayed on the interstate and pissed his pants.

  He froze, shocked by the ferocity of the struggle in progress before his eyes. He assumed that one of the struggling men on the ground was a police officer. The blood and the two men wrapped so tightly around each other as they struggled made it difficult to tell which one it was.

  Barry Broomfield was no hero. A helluva fine salesman, yes, but he was not the confrontational sort, preferring compromise and negotiation to resolve disagreements. To him, disputes were puzzles and a key to solving the puzzle always existed. You only had to find the key that satisfied the disputants’ needs and turned a profit for everyone. Over the years, he had proven himself to be expert at finding the key to those puzzles.

  What he saw before him was no disagreement over the price of microchips. His foot tensed on the accelerator, and he almost drove on to call for help. He was no fighter, and the men fighting on the side of the road were engaged in a life and death struggle.

  One of the heads on the ground, the one on the bottom, turned towards the truck. The eyes were desperate. He opened the door and stepped into the roadway.

  It was life-changing, the quintessential crossroads moment. Stay in the truck, leave, find help, the man on the bottom would die, but Barry would live and would be the same Barry as always, unchanged, except for the fact that he deserted a dying man, which in a sense, made him partly responsible for his death.

  Descending to the pavement changed all of that. For once, he became different, involved, part of whatever happened there in the dirt beside the road...and he was scared shitless.

  Immobilized, he stood, feet glued to the asphalt with no idea what to do. An agonizing, hesitating moment passed before he took an uncertain step towards the struggling figures on the ground. The head on the bottom spoke to him.

  “The girl...” Paul managed to whisper between gasps. “In the car...the girl...get her out...”

  It was all he could say as he tried to hold onto the knife arm of his attacker. The presence of the truck and its driver gave him hope. Hold on just a little longer, a few minutes, or seconds even might be enough.

  Barry blinked as if the movement of his eyelids processed the words. He realized that the man on the bottom, speaking to him was the police officer. He could make out the badge through the blood covering his uniform. Like a computer that has finished processing data, Barry moved into shocked action.

  He ran across the roadway to the old Toyota parked in front of the trooper's car. There was no girl in the car.

  The sounds of the two men struggling on the ground grew in intensity. Something inside said he should help the officer. At the same time, he was relieved for the instructions to help the girl.

  As he crossed in front of the car to the passenger side, he found her, on hands and knees thrashing around in the grass and weeds that filled the roadside ditch. She turned and looked at him.

  “Help me find it!”

  He had never seen eyes so clear and blue. It startled him. He expected fear, terror, tears. The eyes were expectant, excited, reasoning. The girl seemed much more composed than Barry, and she searched on her knees for something in the grass.

  He ran to her, reaching for her arm. She pulled it away.

  “I said help me, damn it!” Her eyes flashed up at him and then returned to the ground, her hands pushing and pulling at the vegetation.

  “Come on! Let's go! We need to get some help,” Barry pleaded. This was not good, he thought, not good at all. This was scary. The girl wasn't coming. He felt like he was in a bad slasher film where the script called for the victims to run towards the boogeyman with the knife instead of away to safety.

  “Let's go!” he said to the girl trying to move her in the directi
on of the rental truck. “Hurry!”

  “Get your ass down here now!”

  Barry dropped to his knees in the grass and weeds. “Wh-what are we doing? We have to go.”

  “The gun. Find the gun!”

  By chance, he found it immediately. It surprised him when he touched it. He separated the grass and exposed the Glock lying in the dirt. The girl reached for it.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Come on.” Gun in her hand she scrambled out of the ditch

  She stood a few feet away from the two men on the ground, pointing the gun at the twisting mass of bloody flesh struggling before her. Without a clear shot, she realized that shooting one would be the same as shooting both.

  “Get him off.”

  “What?” Breathless, Barry climbed from the ditch to stand at her side.

  “Get over there and see if you can separate them. I'll cover you with this.” She motioned with the pistol's barrel.

  The cop's strength was fading. Luther's grew with each passing second, the struggle seeming to recharge and fill him with a reserve of power. He worked at getting the blade between the seam where the front and back panels of the protective vest came together, trying to push the blade into the officer's side.

  Paul gathered what strength remained and twisted to fight off the attempt to penetrate the vest. He could smell the grunting man on top, feel the drops of sweat fall from the man's face onto his own.

  Behind them, Luther heard the driver of the truck tell the girl to hurry. He knew he had only seconds to end the struggle. There were now two witnesses to eliminate. In the distance, he could hear sirens.

  Barry froze. The man on top tried to work the blade into the officer's side. The trooper struggled feebly trying to turn his side away from the penetrating knifepoint. How could he separate them?

  “Get moving!” the girl shouted.

  Too frightened to think, his body moved, reacting to what lay before him and the pistol in the girl's hand. He covered the ten feet to the men on the ground in a waddling jog and tackled the man on top, bowling him over and off the officer.