Now dressed and ready to head out the door, Sam prepared himself for the manhunt ahead. It was going to be a cold night. Everything would be okay so long as the escapee wasn’t …
“It’s Rhody Turner!” Lance barked over the phone. “He was in sick bay and was able to get through a crawl space above the drop ceiling and chisel through the block wall. The other inmates were causing commotion to help cover the noise. They are still brewing it up right now as you can hear.”
The news was too much for the sheriff to fathom. His one shot at breaking the cycle of murders was gone hours before Rhody was going to tell all when it came to the secret of the old Red Dog.
“One inmate!” the sheriff yelled at the jailer. “All I ask is that you keep one inmate safe and sound for me for one night and what happens? How in the world could you let Rhody Turner get away? Of all the inmates, why did it have to be Rhody Turner?”
“I’m sorry sheriff. We were short staffed,” Lance responded. “You pulled off one of our jailers to help on that surveillance thing you all were doing and we had another jailer call in sick with the flu.”
The sheriff ground his teeth together, realizing the cracker box jail provided to him by the county was more to blame than anything. He slammed down the phone and headed to the jail.
Sam found the jail and surrounding areas lit up like Christmas when he arrived ten minutes later. Officers were just completing their sweep of the area around the jail. Aside from his pants, they found no trace of the escapee. That left the blue sedan as the most likely mode of departure for the fugitive.
“We know that car hasn’t left the county,” Bo said as he briefed the sheriff on the progress of the manhunt. “We radioed ahead to Pickett County. That’s the direction the sedan was heading. They had officers standing by on their side of the lake and never saw a car by that description enter their county.”
“So he’s still in Castle County?” Sam asked. “Or so we believe anyway?”
“It would appear so, sheriff,” Bo said. “The question is, where he is hiding out?”
“The real question is who helped him,” Sam pointed out. “He had help from the outside. If we find out who that was then I think we figure out where he’s hiding out.”
That’s when Rhody’s statement during their meeting at his cell that afternoon struck him.
“He was getting a call from a girl,” Sam declared as he snapped his fingers. “He mentioned he was getting a call when I talked to him. I bet that’s what we’re looking for.”
The jail kept electronic records of calls coming in and going out of the facility. The records included recordings of both sides of the conversations between inmates and the callers. Sam suspected the call Rhody received contained references to the pending escape and perhaps clues as to the identity of the woman.
“Pull that recording,” Sam ordered. “I want to hear it right now. Perhaps it will shed some light as to where our boy is hiding.”
Bo headed down the hall to the computer bank and logged into the central system where the records were stored. He returned ten minutes later to find the sheriff and several of his staff looking over a map of the county.
“Sheriff, we have a problem,” Bo declared with an odd look on his face.
“Problem? What kind of problem? We have enough problems already. We can’t have any more problems,” Sam said, on edge given recent developments.
“It’s not there,” Bo revealed.
“What do you mean, it’s not there?” Sam asked as he stood up from the map. “It has to be there.”
“I mean it’s gone, sheriff,” Bo responded. “The audio from the whole afternoon is missing.”
“But how can that happen?” Sam asked.
He had always assumed the program to be secure.
“Well, it’s a server-based system that can be logged onto just like any network so long as you have a password,” Bo said. “It seems someone logged onto the system and deleted the entire file for this afternoon.”
Stunned by what he was hearing, the sheriff was determined to get to bottom of things. He could feel himself about to lose control.
“So this was an inside job?” Sam boomed. “I want to know who logged in and I want them in my office right now! Heads are going to roll!”
Bo looked nervously around the room as his face took on a slight shade of red.
“Can we trace whose password was used to do it?” Sam asked.
“Um yes, we already know,” Bo said nervously. “It was yours, sheriff. Whoever did this signed in to the system using your password.”
Sam stood speechless, exasperated by the revelation, his staff joining his silence. They were all afraid to speak up, sensing the sheriff was about to blow his top.
The awkward silence was broken moments later as Kendal burst in the room. He paused just long enough to eye the unusually quiet group before blurting out his business.
“There’s a car in the water down at the Bottomless Pit,” Kendal revealed. “A witness said it went off the Castle County side a few minutes ago.”
Silence still hung momentarily over the group as they looked at the excited investigator.
“It was a blue sedan!” Kendal exclaimed.
This time he got a rise out of the lawmen. The sheriff was able to step back from the edge of rage. There was a ray of light at the end of the tunnel.
“Is it still there, I mean on the surface?” Sam excitedly asked.
“No. According to our witness it sunk pretty fast but they have a good location where it went under,” Kendal noted. “It was Mitch Reagan who saw it.”
Some people called Mitch Reagan a fishing nut while others just called him a nut. The retired rocket scientist spent most of his waking hours either on the lake or talking about going to the lake. If there were any justice in the world, the lake would be named in his honor once he died. However, so long as the fish were biting in Castle Lake, Mitch Reagan would likely live forever.
While Sam didn’t realize it, he had caught a break courtesy of Mitch Reagan. Had he not decided to take to the lake on the coldest night in years to try one of his deep water lures, the car would have likely stayed in the depths forever with no one the wiser.
Mitch developed the lure himself and had been aching to try it. The lure, he explained to those who would listen at the neighborhood bait shop near his lake house, was developed for deep water fishing during cold weather. And, what better night to test out his new invention than on Castle Lake on a night the mercury was supposed to hit single digits?
That was what brought him under Hurricane Bridge. He had fished for about an hour and decided to get out of the wind and snow for a moment to pour himself a cup of hot coffee from his thermos. It was at that moment he heard a car approach above him. However, instead of crossing the bridge as he anticipated, it sounded like the car had stopped just short of the bridge. That, Mitch thought to himself as he sipped his coffee, was odd since all that was up there was a sheer cliff with no access to the water. However, before he could dwell on the subject he heard the car start back up. Then, much to his surprise, he heard a noise above him. A second later he heard a loud splash only a few yards away from the bridge, the splash close enough to spray him with the frigid water of Castle Lake.
The old fisherman pulled out his spotlight and illuminated the form in front of him. The light caught a blue sedan as it quickly slipped below the water. Its windows were all rolled down from what he could see. Despite being surprised, since one doesn’t see a car fly off a sheer cliff every evening, Mitch actually considered how unusual it was for a car to have all of its windows down on such a freezing evening.
His consideration didn’t last for long as the car submerged like a diving submarine, remaining on the surface for only a couple of minutes. It did remain afloat long enough for him to tell there was no one inside the car’s interior as he motored closer to the sinking car before it slipped under the black water for what would be a lengthy decent. He reckon
ed someone was dumping a stolen car since driverless cars aren’t common things.
The water in Castle Lake was part of a reservoir system meaning depths reached well over one hundred feet in some areas. The particular area where Mitch saw the car enter the water was a place many fishermen called the Bottomless Pit due to the depth of the water there. Some areas below the bridge were rumored to be as deep as two hundred feet. Whether the depth was rumor or fact, the Bottomless Pit had seen its share of incidents over the years, most having to do with daring divers who risked life and limb to leap from the arch bridge. At its high point, the bridge spired eighty feet above the lake making for a dangerous jump even for a professional cliff diver. The bridge claimed several lives over the years, amateurs learning one wrong move meant death when diving from such a height. The bridge, despite a newly installed safety railing system, had been the scene of a handful of suicides over the years. Some nicknamed the bridge Lover’s Leap given the grieving lovers who had said farewell to the cruel world by jumping from the bridge’s heights. The bridge had even been the scene of a murder, well, at least the disposal of a pair of murder victims who had been tossed from the top of the bridge, bricks weighting their legs.
It took divers and recovery personnel the better part of a week to find the bodies that were submerged nearly one hundred feet down even after a snitch told them exactly where the bodies had been dumped over the side of the span. The Bottomless Pit definitely presented issues, especially during the dead of winter and during a snow storm which was only going to increase in intensity.
“I need your boats in the water first thing this morning,” Sam yelled into the phone as he motored toward Hurricane Bridge.
On the other end of the line was John Bray, director of the local rescue squad that specialized in water recovery operations.
“It’s not even getting past freezing tomorrow, sheriff,” Bray replied.
He wasn't keen on paging out his men on such a bitterly cold day given the fact it was a recovery not a rescue operation.
“I say we do it first of next week," Bray suggested. "It should be a little warmer then.”
Sam knew he couldn’t wait that long to determine if his escapee was in the submerged sedan so he turned the screws on the rescue squad director.
“I need that car found and pulled out of the lake immediately, if not sooner," Sam declared flatly.
“I don’t see what the rush is, sheriff. It ain’t like it’s going anywhere,” Bray continued. “I mean it gets real cold on that lake, plus it’s going to be snowing.”
“John!” Sam began. “If I don’t see those boats in Castle Lake as soon as the sun comes up this morning then I’m going to get on the horn and I’m going to call in one of those professional recovery teams to do it. Then, when you come in front of the county commission asking for money in the budget next year for the rescue squad, I’m going to point out we already spent it paying someone else to do your job.”
“You don’t have to threaten me, Sam,” Bray responded indignantly. “I’ll round up the boys. We’ll be there.”
Meanwhile, back at city hall, Glenn listened from his raised third story window to the sound of sirens. He wondered with a deep sense of dread if their plan had been foiled. What was happening out there? From the sounds of sirens and the glow of emergency lights, it seemed like the end of the world. Had Bart succeeded in his mission to dispose of Stevie’s body or had he been discovered? Was he implicating him in the crime, perhaps even confessing to their indiscretion long ago? Why hadn’t he heard from Bart?
The minutes seemed to pass like hours as he waited for word. In the meantime, the mayor took time to clean up any tell-tale evidence that a body had been hidden in his office for an entire day while he lingered at city hall. He also figured his office could use a good airing out since Bart so easily detected the smell of death when he visited there earlier in the evening. The open window was providing him an ear to his city as well as importing fresh air to flush out any smell of rotting flesh that was hanging in the room.
The mayor noted a second round of sirens about thirty minutes after the first group circled the city. The first group seemed to come from the direction of the county jail while the last group seemed to be heading to the west in the direction of Pickett County. Did it have something to do with Bart or was it merely something like a wreck or fire? If only Bart would answer his phone he would know. On the other hand, as mayor he could call one of the city officers and ask but then he didn’t want to attract suspicion, especially if the sirens had something to do with Bart.
Tired of waiting after maintaining his vigil for nearly two hours, Glenn decided it was time to head home. Perhaps he could raise Bart later and find out how things went. For now he was going to bid farewell to the office where he had waited all day to ensure no one discovered Stevie hanging in his closet. While he often spent a lot of time in the office, this had been his longest day ever at city hall. He would be glad to get home and take a load off in his nice warm bed. The cold from the open window was starting to chill him to the bone. He could contact Bart just as well from his home as he could from the office through the magic of cellular phones. There was no reason to wait for his cohort’s return in the same office where a body had hung all day. The mere thought of it gave the mayor another chill.
“I’m out of here,” Glenn said to himself as he grabbed his coat and headed for the door.
His egress was halted in its tracks, however, when he heard movement down the dimly lit hall moments after locking his office door.
“Is someone there?” Glenn asked with his voice shaking. “Hello, anybody there?”
The mayor stood and listened for a few moments before convincing himself that the sound was a figment of his imagination. He figured he had a right to hear noises given the day he just endured. Anyone would be jumpy after spending a day locked in the same room as their friend’s decaying body.
Glenn continued down the hall toward the elevator as he pulled on his overcoat. It was frigid outside and he didn’t want to catch his death of cold.
His potential cause of death, however, came into question at that very moment as he heard movement in the stairwell located just steps away from the elevator. Someone was coming up the stairs from the bottom floor. Who would be inside city hall at this hour? Glenn had made sure all the doors were locked, double-checking them himself since he didn’t want a secretary or custodian to surprise him as he was tossing Stevie’s body out his office window.
Glenn hoped against hope the elevator was waiting just on the other side of the door. There was one set of stairs and one elevator that served the old building so his options for a quick exit were limited since the stairs were occupied by whoever was coming up. He knew the chances were whoever was making their way up the steps was friendly. Perhaps it was even a police officer checking on the building.
But, there was that place in the back of his mind that reminded him there was a killer on the loose and that he was a likely target. Law enforcement may not have connected him with the incident at the old Red Dog but he supposed the killer had done his homework and knew he was amongst the guilty.
The mayor’s hopes were dashed when he pushed the elevator button and heard the cart activate from down below. His continued pressing of the button did nothing to accelerate the slow elevator’s arrival. Meanwhile, he could hear the footsteps round the second landing and continue toward the third floor. He couldn’t afford to wait for the elevator. He needed to get away now.
His keys! The mayor fumbled through his pocket for his keys as he began walking quickly toward his office. The footsteps reached the landing outside the third floor. Just as he anticipated the door to be thrust open, the footsteps stopped. The momentary quiet didn’t discourage Glenn from sorting through his keys to find the one to open his office.
“There it is,” Glenn said to himself as he found the key and started to insert it in the lock.
His rush to refuge, however, w
as placed on hold momentarily by his curiosity. He knew he had heard footsteps in the stairwell. There was no way, even in his present state, he dreamed that up. But why did they just stop? Perhaps he would call out once before cowering in his office for the rest of the night hoping the old wooden door would protect him from whoever was outside.
“Hello, anyone there?” Glenn called out. “It’s Mayor Satterfield here.”
Glenn slipped the key in his lock just in case. However, his question was answered by complete silence.
“I said is anybody there?” Glenn asked in a louder voice.
This time, much to his chagrin, his question was answered not by a voice, but instead by a presence. The door at the end of the hall flew open.
He couldn't believe his eyes! It was a man without a face! A form dressed in black, a dark man, his face completely covered or missing, had burst through the door. The scene was surreal as the being seemed to move at almost superhuman speed as he rushed down the corridor toward the mayor.
Glenn couldn’t move. His feet were paralyzed with fear almost as if they were stuck in cement. What was in the thing’s hand? It was a scythe! The Grim Reaper was coming to get him! He was going to collect his head just like Eddie’s!
Finally able to gather his senses and muster movement, he twisted the key but in his rush he snapped the key off in the lock, leaving the key chain in his hand and the rest of his office key jammed in the lock. He was a sitting duck! If only the door to the conference room were open next to his, he might avoid being hacked to pieces. It was his only chance.
Luck was with him as he lunged for the knob. The door swung open, allowing him to duck inside as the form raised the blade over its head preparing for his decapitation.
Glenn felt the creature slam its weight against the other side of the door just as he reached and locked it from the inside. He was safe, at least for the time being. He could call for help from his temporary refuge.
Red Dog Saloon Page 14