Joe was in the conference room, updating the board, when she heard the last two shots. She had been around guns long enough to recognize that they were different from the ones she had heard previously. That made her curious enough to look out the back window.
Agent Bradley was walking toward the side of the building, and on the range she saw Jim frozen like a statue. The look on his face told her something significant had just happened, and she was dying to know what it was. Seeing Jim hurry towards the station, she left the conference room and met him at the back door.
“What’s wrong, Sheriff?” she asked.
Jim didn’t hear her. He was stone faced as he walked past her back, then into his office where he collected the report and photos, then stuffed them into the envelope. Looking out the window, he saw Alan’s black Corvette merge into the now heavy traffic. It is a crazy thought, he said to himself. Even if it were true, no one would believe it. Jim turned and rushed out the office and towards the front door.
“Sheriff! I need to talk to you!” Joe exclaimed as Jim rushed past her for the second time.
“There’s no time for a meeting,” Jim said, sarcastically. “I’m in a hurry.”
“Sheriff!” Joe said as she threw her arms up in frustration.
Jim thought better of it and stopped at the door. “I have to get out to Buck’s place,” he said thoughtfully. “Meet me out there and we can talk all you want.” He then pushed the door open and left.
“Men!” Joe exclaimed as she was left in the hallway with her hands on her hips glaring at the front door. “Always running off like the cavalry!” After a moment, she calmed down and decided to finish updating the conference room. But first, she wanted to know what had happened on the range and she headed for the back door at a trot.
At the range, she walked around slowly looking for anything unusual. Jim had left a pile of brass at each target. Jim was a pretty good shot but out of practice, she could see from his results.
The targets at twenty, thirty, and forty feet each had some loose, lazy shots as well as a few nice ones near the center. There were only two brass casings in front of the target at fifty feet. This was where Jim froze.
She bent down to examine the casings. .44 magnum. Jim owned a 357. These had to be from Agent Bradley’s gun. She looked at the target but didn’t see anything. Dropping the casings, she walked out towards the target. As she approached it, she saw the bullets plain as day in the bull’s eye.
Wow, she thought. Her jaw dropped open as she ran her fingers over the holes. Now that was good shooting. Looking around some more, she saw nothing else out of the ordinary. Hmmm, she thought. Jim must’ve just been impressed by Bradley’s shooting skills. She shrugged her shoulders and didn’t give it another thought as she walked to the station.
Back in the conference room, she pulled evidence from the box and laid it on the table. Taking down the photo of the tire tracks, she replaced it with the ones of the shoe prints. She then turned her attention to the chalkboard list and stared at item one.
Someone, with a pick up truck and trailer, loaded something from the barn. She knew that person was Jim and she was sure he didn’t kill Buck. It didn’t matter why he was out there, she knew there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for it and the timing of his trip with that of the murder had to be purely coincidental.
She picked up the eraser and with one decisive stroke, swept item one clean. Since her revelation in the parking lot, she had time for calm reflection and had come up with the reason why Jim hadn’t told anyone the truth. By nature, Jim was a controlling person, she knew. He wouldn’t be able to control the investigation or influence its direction if he was in any way under suspicion. That’s why she had to keep it a secret and help him cover his tracks.
She recalled what a professor had once told her. The human mind tends to ignore the obvious, if the obvious is one they wouldn’t generally consider to be an option. Like the car theft case she had studied some years back.
Everyone blamed a young, homeless, high school drop out because he was found carrying a crowbar. Nobody suspected the nice old lady next door who baked fresh apple pies, even if she was seen driving a different car every week. But in that case as she was sure it would be in this one, the criminal’s time would eventually run out.
After a while someone always figures it out. Once all the other options have dried up, people will revisit the obvious. The other deputies must have noticed something familiar about the tracks, but hadn’t yet put it together as she had. She had to buy Jim some time. She had to refocus everyone’s attention on the true target.
She looked again at the board. Item four, Finger prints on cup. She gasped. Oh my gosh, she thought. They must be Jim’s, too! She hurried out of the conference room to Milhouse’s file cabinet. She knew where he kept everything. Opening it, she removed the folder labeled
D.B. Cooper Case
That’s got to go, she thought, then got a new label from the drawer, put it over the old one and wrote– Henderson Murder Case. She then opened the file, removed the pages pertaining to the fingerprints, then put the file back in the cabinet.
She had no idea Milhouse had already given the prints to Bradley. Rushing back to the conference room, she stuffed the prints and tire track casting and photo into the bottom of her evidence box. After placing other items on top, she placed the box in the corner of the room where she stacked other evidence boxes on top of it. There, it’s buried, she thought. Back at the board, she grabbed the chalk and eraser and made revisions.
Two people staked out victim’s home.
They came down the hill to the barn.
Shooter kills victim.
The two escape.
She looked at the list and nodded in agreement, then gazed around the room for anything else out of place. Her eyes rested on the now buried evidence box, and she wondered if by hiding the truth she was doing something unethical. No, she finally decided. She was just ensuring that the pertinent facts came to the forefront and the irrelevant ones were left behind. She checked her watch, it was almost eight o’clock. Time to get out to Buck’s and talk to Jim. She quickly turned, walked out of the room, then out the front door.
* * * *
Chapter 17
Puzzle Pieces