Mind's Eye - Part 8
Despite Mildred's claim of no fast food places near Prime Hook, she managed to find someone to deliver sandwiches and soft drinks to the station before Jarod and Neil returned. The assortment of sandwiches was incredible, from tuna to and ham to one Jarod found new, intriguing and delicious - corned beef. It was definitely sliced beef, but there was no corn in sight. He made a note to research its history when he got a moment.
A small stream ran behind the station. Neil headed out the door, inviting Jarod to join him at a picnic bench that had been placed along the bank. The water rippled joyously over the rocks, tumbling down into some unseen river miles away. Case sat on the table of the bench, resting his feet on the seat.
"Thanks for the backup today," he said, finishing a bite of his sandwich.
Jarod nodded. "My pleasure," he said.
"I guess it's no secret that ninety is a hard place for me to go," Neil said hesitantly.
"I think it would be hard for anyone, given what happened there."
Neil took another bite, chewing slowly. "She was a good cop, a good friend. She treated people with respect."
"That's not always easy with some of the people you meet on this job."
Neil's reverie returned. "She could talk her way out of any bad situation. It wasn't like she didn't have a temper. I'd seen that plenty of times. Deb was just real good at what she did."
Jarod was silent for a moment, unsure of whether or not he should say the thought that occurred to him. He knew it would sound like an accusation. "You loved her."
If Neil was startled, he did not show it. He looked straight ahead at the water, lost in the roiling rhythm of the cascades. "Some days, more than life itself. We grew up together, had the same interests, loved a lot of the same things. When she met Luke, – that's her husband – she fell for him head over heels. Now me? I was mostly happy about that, and I wanted her to be happy. Luke's a good man, but he hasn't spoken to me since Deb's funeral."
"Does he blame you for what happened?"
"I blame myself. I should have been there. I would have known Stoltz was on the rocks."
Jarod's senses perked at the statement. He knew Neil's secret, but now was not the time to reveal it. "The state investigators don't think anyone could have known."
The words seemed to pass over Neil's head. "It took everything I had not to kill Stoltz once I found him."
"You broke his jaw," Jarod pointed out with a faint amusement he could not deny.
An ironic smile formed. "He's lucky I didn't break anything else. I've never before wanted to take a human life. That night, I had my hands around his neck. All it would have taken was a simple twist, and he would have been dead."
"But you didn't."
Neil gave a grunt. "No, I didn't. I could just hear Deb telling me how wrong it would have been. Her voice was in my head at that moment, so I took him into custody like she would have."
"They awarded you a medal for that."
"Yes, they did," he answered deliberately, his voice trailing off again.
The doors to the ranger station opened in a flurry. Mildred came out in a rush. "Captain, you have an urgent call on line two. It's the state calling," she called to them.
The moment seemed to slow as Neil processed her words. Urgent calls were generally bad in nature, especially to the captain of a park. "I'll be right there, Mildred," he hollered back.
Neil heaved a deep sigh, as though mustering the energy to take whatever was coming down the pike. He and Jarod returned to the station where Neil took the call at his desk.
There were murmurs of conversation, but nothing was said from Neil's side of the call that revealed the nature of the emergency. When he finally hung up, his face looked blanched and a thin sheen of sweat formed on his upper lip. He slumped back in his chair and wiped at his mouth.
Mildred and Jarod stood there expectantly, waiting to hear the news. It was something bad.
"Neil," Mildred said with apprehension, "what's wrong?" She was caring yet resolute.
He looked at them both, scarcely breathing. "Peter Stoltz escaped from the Delaware State Pen this morning."
"Oh my Lord," Mildred breathed, her hand rising to her mouth in shock.
"They're not sure where he's at, but they think he might make it back this way." Neil thought for a moment, regaining his composure and allowing his training to take over and quell his shock.
"Mildred, I want you to call every shift and get them in here for a briefing at five this evening, and I mean everyone. Jarod, I'm going to need you to help me coordinate patrols in the hills. The state police will be handling the roads, but they can't cover the park systems."
Mildred was already moving at Neil's command. "The terrain maps are in the back room, Jarod," she said, heading back to her desk.
As Jarod walked past Neil's desk toward the storage room, he glanced down and saw a picture of Deb Warren and Neil, together in uniform, patrolling along the ocean at Prime Hook. Thinking no one was watching, Neil's hand reached out and touched the frame, touching it with affection and what was undoubtedly fear.
Jarod left Neil alone and proceeded to the maps. He pulled out the series that covered the boundaries of Prime Hook and began studying the layout of the park from a cartographer's perspective. He soon had a better understanding of where everything was, including Old Home Road and how Carl Homer's property related to the refuge. The lines of his property ran adjacent to an area a mile and a half southeast of the bluffs of site ninety. The rest was a plateau of thick forest where Neil's into which Neil's suspect had disappeared earlier in the day.
The patrol route would not be difficult to establish. Unimproved hiking trails would provide some of the passages through the lower portions of the park. The higher elevations, the ones that ran above the bluffs, would require observation by rangers suited to climbing and navigating the dense woods.
It about an hour, Jarod had his game plan. He presented it to Neil just before the five o'clock meeting with the other rangers of the station. There were six others Jarod had not yet met. Neil took the liberty of a mass introduction at the start of the meeting, explaining Jarod's previous assignment and his current task with the terrain maps.
"As you all know by now, Peter Stoltz escaped from the Delaware State Pen this morning. He wounded two guards in the escape. They're both in critical condition. The state police think he's headed up this way to get to the bigger cities where he can get lost, like DC or Baltimore. He'd been talking to other inmates about coming back here as soon as he got the chance. They've asked us to be on the lookout for him, as this is the last place he struck."
Last? Jarod's senses perked again. There was no mention in the state police file that Stoltz had committed any other crimes outside of his shooting Warren in Hook. Where had Neil gotten that information?
Neil continued. "I don't need to tell you the man's capacity to kill. He aims for cops. So, I want everyone to have vests, and with plates if you have them. We'll do radio check-ins every half- hour, and no one goes out alone. I'm hereby authorizing the use of shotguns in the patrol cars."
He sat on the corner of Mildred's desk, as Jarod had. "I don't have to tell you how critical it is we stay alert until Stoltz is back in custody. For the time being, I'm not going to clear the park. Stoltz may not even be in the area. We're not taking any chances, though. We have some reinforcements coming in from Maryland to help us patrol the area and to give us some sleep time. They'll be here in the morning."
One of the young rangers in the back of the group raised his hand. "Neil, just how sure are they he's headed this way?"
"They've already had some sightings of him. It looks like he tracking toward our coast. No one's guaranteeing he'll show up here, but we're sure as hell not going to get caught with our pants down."
The rest of the meeting was logistical, sending each patrol team to their designated areas.
"Jarod," Neil said finally, "you're our resident tracking expert. You're with me. We'll take the bluffs to the south."
"Yes, sir," Jarod responded.
Together, they set out for the area behind site ninety, each man knowing that if Stoltz returned to the area, he'd likely return to the scene of his crime. If he did, they would be there to greet him, to finish what he had started.
The long days of summer were nearing an end, but the sun remained as a dim light in the west as they rode to the southern tip of Prime Hook. While Jarod drove, Neil checked his Taurus nine-millimeter and chambered a round.
Jarod gave a surreptitious glance at Case. Neil's collar was dark with perspiration, a product of nerves and stress.
"You okay?"
Neil holstered the gun. He gave a sharp look at Jarod, one laced with streaks of vengeance. "If he shows, I'm going to be there. And this time," he said with conviction, "we'll play by my rules, not his."