J.D. Stone and the Case of the Bloody Knife

I didn't get too much new information from Victor or Vic Drummond. They both knew about Victoria and Brent's affair. Neither much cared for the mechanic, the shame of having a Drummond cavorting around with a person of such lowly status brought shame upon the family name.

Victoria did confide to her brother that Brent and her relationship was fiery in and out of bed. Their passions ran hot in both directions. Often after a passionate roll in the sack, they would both be at each other's throats. The two would often scream and throw objects at each other before Brent stormed out of the house.

The two met because Brent loved to hike up and down the Country roads nearly every day. It was his way of burning off steam and relaxing after a hard days work at the garage. Every day Victoria would see Brent hiking past her house in his sweat suit with the small backpack on his back. They started talking one day and one thing led to another.

Brent claimed that he always left his clothes and backpack in his truck. He never locked the doors because he believed nobody would break into someone's property in a small town like Swimmer's Lake. He worked everyday except Sundays and Mondays from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the garage. Occasionally, his boss called him in if there were an emergency because he was that good and fast.

Brent's friends and neighbors did not add too much more about Brent and Victoria's relationship other than what Vic had offered. They did mention that recently Brent proposed to Betty. Betty had a jealous streak in her that could lead to violence. She had a couple of assault charges on her record while she lived in Missoula when she beat up her rivals to former boyfriends.

After that, everything rather dried up. Floyd did not have any new evidence other than the blood found on the knife was definitely Victoria's and the blood on the sweatshirt belonged solely to Brent. Harris was unable to find any new evidence on Victoria's body that could help things out either.

We were pretty much at a stonewall. I had to keep Brent behind bars because the evidence, no matter how strange and circumstantial, still pointed to Brent as the prime suspect. The judge did offer bail at $500,000 but the only people with that kind of money were the Drummonds, and they had no desire to see Brent walking the street.

After a week of nothing, Dan rushed into the office. He was excited as he nearly flew over to the desk. The excitement nearly burst the poor boy. However, he did keep his voice down when he spoke to me.

"Sheriff! I found it!" he pumped his head up and down with that goofy smile on his face. His hat nearly flew off his head as he spoke. "I've got the evidence we are looking for."

My jaw dropped in disbelief. I climbed out from behind the desk and led Dan further away from the cells. "What did you find?" I asked in a low voice.

"Follow me," Dan waved for me to follow as he took off like an excited puppy out the door. I had no choice but to follow. Dan led me out to his patrol car.

He opened the back door to his black and white and pulled out some clothes. "Look sheriff. I found these alongside Upper Country road. They were hidden in a tree, but I found them."

"Are you sure they are what we are looking for?" I asked skeptically. Dan wasn't known for his abilities to sniff out clues.

"Yes sir, look they are covered in blood." I looked more closely and I noticed dried blood all over the clothes. "And sheriff look." Dan reached into the backseat again and pulled something out. He nearly waved them under my nose in excitement, "Gloves!"