Sweat woke up at dawn. It took a few seconds before he remembered Matt was dead.
He lay in the deer blind contemplating what more he could have done, but just as quickly put his feelings aside. He would deal with those later. The hunt was still on and he needed to move.
Sweat headed north down a hill and around a swamp, following a path into a field that appeared to have been recently logged. More woods led him past a small brook to the edge of a farm, where he found a trail that led him to a makeshift wooden ship—a prop assembled in Memorial Recreation Park by members of a local theater group, the Ekrub Players.[39]
Another trail brought him to another farm field, where he found something that struck him as rather odd: a hole in the ground about seven feet deep and twelve feet across, where a large TV box, an old vacuum cleaner, and several plastic bags of clothing had been placed. Sweat jumped in to have a look around. He came across a brown shirt with the words “Church of Burke: Doing Whatever It Takes to Connect People to God.”
He took the shirt and had just climbed out when he heard the sound of an ATV from down the trail. Seeing no other place to hide, he slid back into the hole, curled up, and sat under the TV box until the four wheeler passed.
For the next seven miles Sweat headed northeast. He stopped once for lunch (a quarter stick of pepperoni he retrieved from his pack) and again at the edge of the Little Trout River. He paused only a moment before he heard voices carry through the wood.
Pulling his hood over his head, Sweat peered from behind a tree. The river cascaded down to a pool where several people were playing in the falls. From his hiding spot, he watched them leave as more people arrived. One pretty woman whose pink swimsuit hugged her curves posed for a photo. She was so close to where he sat that he wondered if he had been captured in the frame.
Hours passed before he set off again, continuing north toward the town of Burke. Once far enough away from the falls, he got out his map and decided to follow Finney Road west toward Route 11—the same highway he and Matt had planned to take to Mexico.
• • •
Jeff stood over the body of the sheriff’s deputy, who continued to flail. One of Dave’s bullets had pierced the man’s belly. It seemed the others had missed, their shell casings scattered across the asphalt.
Jeff pointed his 9 mm Khar at the cop.
BANG.
An unexpected thud made Jeff look down. The weapon’s magazine had released, falling to the ground.
Jeff bent down and picked up the cop’s Glock. He aimed its barrel at the face of the sheriff’s deputy and shot again at point blank range.
BANG. BANG.
Shawn froze.
Jeff walked coolly over to the patrol car and took the keys out of the ignition. He then popped the trunk and began to rifle through the deputy’s belongings. He swiped the arrest forms and traffic flares and stashed them in the stolen truck.
Shawn ran out toward the Honda, opened the back door, and jumped in. He sat glued to the seat of the car, unable to process what he had just seen as he looked out the passenger window at Kevin Tarsia’s limp body.
“I want to get out of here,” he thought. “I don’t want to be here, I don’t want anybody to know we’re here, let’s get out of here, let’s go before anybody finds us, maybe we gotta chance to still get out of this.”
[39] Ekrub is “Burke” spelled backwards. The theater group is based in Burke, New York.