Black Bird

by Greg Enslen

  But from the moment he had grabbed her, he had known something was wrong. The woman’s clothes felt strangely layered, too thick for what a normal person would wear, even if it was April and rain was in the air. He had thrown her down behind the dumpster and straddled her, starting to unbuckle his pants, but she was much stronger than she had first appeared, and she pushed him off.

  As she did, she groped into her ratty jacket and pulled out a gun.

  Amused, he’d struck out savagely and slapped it from her hand, but by then he could hear the metallic clatter of approaching footsteps, running.

  He punched her hard, dead in the face. He felt her nose break under the blow, and blood streamed down her face.

  Jack leapt up from the deep shadows behind the dumpster, glanced out of the entrance to the alley and saw several men running towards him, including the now too-familiar face of Sheriff William T. Beaumont. They were coming from every direction, managing to cut off all of his escape routes.

  Except one.

  Jack ducked around the corner of the building to the brightly lit front of the Food Town supermarket and dashed through the automatic doors, upsetting a woman’s cart of groceries as he went by. Diving around the checkout counters and surprising several other plain-clothes police officers, employees, and shoppers, he ducked around a display of canned peas and headed for the back of the supermarket. Jack knew that almost all supermarkets had loading doors of some sort in the back for deliveries, but he just prayed that Beaumont wasn’t so smart this time. A few moments later, Jack found the doors marked EMPLOYEES ONLY in the frozen food section and dove through them.

  Beaumont and the others burst into the store, ordering all of the civilians outside. As the frightened decoys and employees streamed out, the deputies fanned out and each of them took a row, slowly searching, guns drawn. Most of the young cops were very scared and angry; one of their own had been hurt outside, and now she was with them, refusing Beaumont’s’ orders to go to the hospital and have her nose and face looked at. They each searched their rows carefully, but each came up empty. In a few short, silent minutes, they met at the back of the store and Beaumont saw the two heavy metal doors, still swinging slightly. He stopped his deputies with his outstretched arms.

  He glanced around and motioned to three of the deputies. “You, you, and you. Go outside and around back. Secure any outside doors, and DON’T let him past you.”

  The three deputies scurried off. Beaumont and the rest of his deputies, including the female deputy that Jack had punched in the face, slowly made their way into the storage area of the supermarket, guns drawn. It was a vast, dark area, much darker than the public part of the market, and it seemed the entire space was crammed to capacity with hundreds of ominous stacks of large cardboard boxes. A thousand places to hide, a thousand shadows to watch out for. The deputies fanned out again and searched the storeroom, this time even more warily, moving slowly towards the large loading doors in the rear. The doors were standing wide open, and the other three deputies waited on the raised concrete platform outside, their breath steaming in the cold night air.

  Nothing.

  Beaumont was not pleased. He stepped out through the back doors onto the raised concrete platform, striped with yellow and black paint to help the drivers back their huge trucks up to the rear of the supermarket.

  “Are you sure nobody went out past you?” he turned, asking one of the three deputies. The other two deputies just looked down at the pavement, suddenly finding the concrete and weeds around their boots very interesting. Neither of them had ever seen Beaumont this angry before, and it scared them a little.

  The deputy Beaumont had addressed swallowed hard. “Very sure, sir. Nobody came out of there.”

  Beaumont looked around for a moment and then looked past the nervous deputies, seemingly almost through them, and then stepped quickly towards them. One of the deputies flinched as he stepped out of the Sheriff’s way.

  Beaumont pointed off the concrete platform in the direction behind the deputies. “Maybe he got out before you guys got around here. If he did...” His voice trailed off as he looked out at a small group of cookie-cutter houses behind the supermarket, separated from the loading area at the back of the supermarket by a wide stretch of grass and scrub, rain-soaked and muddy. The sheriff was completely unaware that he was standing ankle-deep in a good-sized puddle of rainwater that had pooled on the concrete.

  He turned to his deputies. “Two of you, stay here. The rest, come on!” He leapt down from the raised concrete platform and took off at a dead run, and the deputies hurried to catch up, chasing their Sheriff across the soggy field.

  Jack waited another two or three long, tense minutes after he had heard the sheriff order his men away from the loading doors, and then he slowly crawled out of the large cardboard box he had been hiding in. His legs had cramped up pretty badly from the odd position he had been in, and as he climbed out, he fell, catching himself but at the same time accidentally jostling a carton of canned pineapples. The carton tipped over and fell loudly to the concrete, spilling its contents, and cans of fruit rolled off down the aisle and hit boxes and cartons. He froze in his tracks for several seconds, but when he didn’t hear any noises or the sounds of someone coming to investigate, he carefully stepped over the scattered cans and moved a few steps to a place where he could see outside.

  The two deputies stood just outside the loading doors on the raised platform, guns drawn, one on either side of the doors. They were looking out across the field, in what had to be the direction of the other deputies. He knew that the loading doors were his only way out, just as sure of that as he could be of anything. If he stepped one foot out into the civilian part of the supermarket, he’d be seen. If he was stupid enough to try and walk right out the front doors, he’d probably be mobbed by civilians and beaten to death.

  The sheriff and his other deputies had headed off across the field - he had heard at least that much. Maybe, just maybe, he could...

  He went back and picked up one of the cans of pineapples and, trying to judge distances in the darkness of the storage area, carefully heaved it across the room, listening to it make a loud sound as it clattered against a stack of cases of sodas stacked on the far side of the room near the loading doors.

  One of the deputies turned his head and peeked inside the doors, listening intently for a few seconds. After he heard nothing more, he turned back to his partner. “What do you think that was?”

  The other blinked. “I dunno. Probably nothing.”

  Jack gritted his teeth, felt around for another can, and heaved it in the same direction.

  The second cop heard it this time and looked at the first, nodding his head. “Go check it out.”

  The first deputy, his face suddenly serious, cocked his revolver and headed in. He slowly, carefully checked each of the aisles of the storeroom, but saw nothing. As he was turning to leave, something odd caught his eye.

  Cans. Lots of cans of something, some kind of fruit by the way the label looked. Had those been there before?

  Jack crept slowly up behind the deputy, another can held high over his head. He brought the can down hard and struck the deputy in the back of the head with one of the can’s metal edges. The deputy crumpled to the ground, his gun clattering loudly to the concrete.

  “Winslade?” The other deputy glanced inside, trying to see his partner. “Winslade, what was that?”

  Jack grabbed for the gun and crouched behind a case of root beer, watching the deputy enter, approaching. He glanced over at the other fallen deputy, and even in the relative darkness he could see a spreading stain of red already beginning to paint the concrete floor around his head.

  Had the light been any brighter, an observer might have seen a distinct glint in Jack’s eyes, or detected the faint smile on his face.

  Beaumont turned sharply as he heard the second ‘POP’, echoing loudly across the wide, soggy field.

  Deputy Norma Jenkins, her face st
ill bloodied and her nose rudely plugged with odd bits of tissue, had also heard it. “What was that?” she asked Beaumont, her heart pounding in her chest like an animal wanting to get out. She knew exactly what the sound had been, but she couldn’t force her mind to think about it. Jasper Fines had hit her, and she had gotten a very good look at him. Maybe too good of a look - now, it seemed, she just couldn’t get his face out of her mind.

  Beaumont’s face seemed to flicker, like a TV changing channels. His expression shifted quickly from one of hopefulness, through surprise, to one of anger. And fear.

  “Those were gunshots. Back at the Food Town. Round up the men.” Before he even got the last words out, he took off sprinting across the field, but a voice in his head told him that it wouldn’t really matter. No matter how fast he ran, it wouldn’t be fast enough.

  Deputy Norma Jenkins watched him go, and then yelled for the others.

  Jack grabbed the second revolver from the hand of the other fallen deputy and dove out of the loading doors, jumping off the concrete ramp and running at full speed across the field, away from the sheriff and his deputies. He knew he had only seconds to get to cover. An eighth of a mile, maybe, and he would be in another residential neighborhood next to the supermarket. He could even see lights in several of the windows. Jack had a hunch, or maybe it was some kind of dark instinct, that told him that all or most of the Liberty Police Department was in this field right now with him, and if he could make it away, he would be home free. He just hoped that the gunshots hadn’t been heard.

  As he ran back towards the supermarket, Beaumont saw a darkened figure bolt out of the loading doors and race off towards a different subdivision of cookie-cutter houses, dashing for freedom.

  It had to be him. Even at this distance, he knew it had to be him.

  “Stop!” Beaumont shouted, but the figure ignored him.

  Beaumont leveled his gun and fired once, twice. Even though he was running at top speed, he saw the shots bring up sprays of water and mud on either side of the fleeing figure.

  Jack stopped in his tracks and turned in Beaumont’s direction and Beaumont clearly saw the glints of moonlight off of the twin barrels of the revolvers in the Killer’s hands. Beaumont suddenly knew that his deputies were dead.

  The Killer raised the guns and pointed, firing four quick shots, twice from each gun, alternating. The first three went wide and useless, but the fourth struck Beaumont squarely in one uniformed leg just above the knee, taking him down.

  Jack smiled for a moment as he saw the sheriff crumple and fall to the muddy ground, and then he turned and ran.

  But that had been a week ago, a long week of desperate hiding, of sweat-soaked shivering nights holed up in drafty barns. Chased by Beaumont and his deputies and their mangy, stupid dogs.

  Dogs. Braying, howling.

  Jack bolted upright, dazed for a moment. Cursing, he was amazed that he could doze off in the middle of a something like this. It was so nauseatingly quaint, being chased though the backwoods by packs of dogs and armed deputies, and here he was, lying on the wet ground, waiting for them to come and find him.

  Or maybe he was waiting for some unseen director hiding behind the dark trees to step out and yell “CUT!”

  He jumped up, grabbed his green duffel bag and raced out of the clearing, heading east towards the highway.

  But the dogs were not close yet, not nearly as close at he’d initially thought, and making a lot of noise. Almost too much noise. But why would they be making that much noise? You would think that their handlers would be as quiet as possible, to try to sneak up on him and catch him. If they hadn’t been making so much noise, they probably would have caught him, back there in that clearing.

  why are they being so loud, part of his mind wondered

  He wasn’t being chased; he was being driven.

  Up ahead, probably where the Interstate and Highway 132 met up, Sheriff Beaumont was waiting for him, probably with a really big gun.

  Jack smiled. He just had to keep his cool, keep his head about him, keep on thinking straight and not get stupid. He knew there was the big interstate highway out east of town, running north and south. He also knew that he was traveling parallel to Highway 132. If he could make it to the Interstate and get past Beaumont and his men, he could catch a ride with a trucker or somebody and be on his way out of this godforsaken place.

  Liberty. The name of this stupid little town was carved into his memory - he wondered if he would ever forget this place. Or this Sheriff.

  Jack rounded another thick group of trees and saw that the ground sloped roughly up to a roadside, rain running down it in a hundred little rivulets. It looked wide and flat, at least six or eight lanes - it had to be the Interstate.

  As he cautiously approached, a car passed, the sound loud and hollow and dead in the rainy night. He could hear the sounds of water being splashed up by the passing tires. He dared not stop a car - it was far too easy to mistake a police car for a regular one. Besides, he was looking for a truck to stop. Truckers were less likely to be concerned about the local authorities and their problems, especially truckers that made their money by taking the long hauls in the shortest amount of time. Like Jack, they were just passing through, moving on. Never looking back.

  After the car passed, he slowly climbed up the embankment. It had to be the Interstate - the road was a six-lane, three lanes in each direction stretching off both ways into the gloomy darkness, separated only by an uneven patch of grass and gravel. Up further north, about a half mile by his best guess, the Interstate would cross Highway 132, and even further north, nearer to D.C., the highway stretched out to four and even, at times, five lanes wide, but that much pavement would have been useless here.

  He crested the top of the hill and began crossing the highway. Jack was about ten steps out onto the road when red and blue lights splashed the trees around him. Looking to his left, he saw a police car round the curve about a mile to the north, speeding toward him.

  It was coming very fast.

  Jack hesitated for a moment, but it felt like an eternity. Jump back over the embankment he had climbed up, or try to make it to the other side before the cop car got here? The embankment was so steep; he could be hurt jumping off of there. Funny if he rolled all the way to the bottom and broke a leg or something.

  Instead he ran, sprinting across the wet road, his boots slapping at the rainy surface as the car sped closer. They sounded so loud, the chains now jingling crazily. He felt twenty feet tall in the approaching headlights.

  Jack Terrington had just reached the grassy median and started across it when his foot caught on some uneven asphalt in the median, sending him sprawling. His bag went flying and he landed with a hard ‘thump’ on the muddy grass of the median. The wind was knocked from his body, and he lay gasping for air, the rain spattering to the ground around him.

  He started to get up, but instead he lifted his head up and saw the police car racing toward him and he stayed down, staying glued to the ground, willing the cops to ignore the dark shape he made on the median. The car came closer and he buried his face in the mud, ignoring the disgusting squishing sound, and laid as flat as he could.

  The police car, its lights flashing and spinning lazily, raced past him, and did not stop, or even slow. He couldn’t see it but he heard its passage, and when it was gone, he looked up, seeing the twin red taillights as they disappeared into the distance.

  Luck, again. He would’ve never made it across the road without being spotted, even as heavy as this rain was coming down. A lucky fall, sending him into this shallow depression, had shielded him from discovery. Just like his luck at realizing that he was being driven instead of chased - tonight he was getting very lucky.

  He stood slowly and wiped mud and water from his face and clothes. He retrieved his duffel bag and headed across the northbound lanes of traffic, reaching the far side of the road without any more problems and, scrambling down the opposite embankment and back into
the woods, he turned south. His mind was made up now - he could head north and get away from all of this trouble, but he had to end it all, here, tonight. The Sheriff needed to pay or he would hound him forever, sending out APB’s and manhunts and announcing Jack’s presence to the entire world. And Jack wanted to stay unknown for a long, long time.

  Jack skirted the tree line that edged the highway, working his way south, following the patrol car. Chances were good it was headed for a roadblock of some sort, and hopefully, the Sheriff would be there, waiting for him. The dogs had been making a lot of noise, driving him east, and if Jack hadn’t taken that slight northern detour, he would’ve come out on the Interstate a little ways south of here. That’s where Beaumont had to be - Jack knew it - but it surprised him that Beaumont hadn’t planned his trap better. Jack had thought Beaumont was smarter than that.

  Beaumont sat in the back seat of his police cruiser, thinking. He was also playing his flashlight over the map of Liberty and the surrounding area that was spread out across his lap, but his mind was a million miles away. Actually, his mind was only about twenty miles away. He was thinking about his young wife and the little child slowly growing inside her.

  She was so beautiful, basking in that glow that some pregnant women seem to enjoy, and his joy at the baby’s impending arrival was rivaled only by his pride in his wife - the pregnancy had been an unexpected, and long overdue, surprise. Grace Beaumont was not supposed to be able to have children.

  The doctors had not been so overjoyed, though, saying that she was not as strong as they wanted and that the delivery, sometime in September, would probably be difficult for her. Very difficult. They said that she needed to be careful over the next few months.