Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 43, No. 7 & 8, July/August 1998
- Автор: Alexander Gary, Crawford Dan
- Год: 1998
- Язык: английский
- Год: Dell Magazines/Crosstown Publications
- ISBN: ISSN: 0002-5224
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 43, No. 7 & 8, July/August 1998». Краткое содержание книги:
“ ‘Inmate at Beechwood Correctional Institution Goes Berserk and Kills Officer and Twenty-four Inmates.’ Wow! Nice headline.”
“How about ‘Staff Mutiny at Beechwood Correctional Removes Warden, Corrects Dangerous Policies’?”
“It would be nice,” Frieda said wistfully, “if they would tell us the reason we’re keeping Greene so we could at least be working together on it instead of running around in the dark trying to protect ourselves from both enemy and friendly fire. What a bass-ackward way to run a prison, she redundantly repeated one more time again.”
“Shall we walk through the house so I can stick my ugly puss up against Greene’s porthole?” Hendricks asked. “Give him something to dream about.”
Another uneventful night, almost. Frieda was walking the halls, counting again, at four in the morning. She shone her light into Greene’s room and didn’t see him. There was a mound in the bed, but the rule said that the officer must see skin. Frieda followed the rule religiously. No one would trick her into thinking he was asleep when he was actually gone. She opened the door and reached in, pulling the blanket toward her. Nothing was under it but pillows. She turned on the light and backed out, closing the door, then ran down to the office. She called Ron Aiken, wishing it were someone she could count on, and asked him to send Hendricks right away. She hung up before Ron could comment or question.
Otis was standing outside the office door. “Be careful, Fred,” he said softly. “We’ll back you up if the badge don’t get here in time.”
“Thanks, Otis.”
“Greene be on the move.”
Frieda nodded and went upstairs. How on earth does Otis know this? she wondered. She checked Greene’s room again. It was as she had left it. Pillows. She opened the closed bathroom door, forgoing her usual courteous knock that allowed a man using the facilities to call out his room number rather than have her walk in on him. The light was off. She flipped it on. Willis lay on the floor, his blue and white striped bathrobe raised, exposing his buttocks.
Blood dripped from his nose and ear. His face was scraped and bruised. More blood was smeared on his buttocks. As quiet as it was in the building at night, Frieda had heard nothing. She checked the toilet stalls and shower. Except for Willis and herself, the bathroom was empty. Moving around so she faced the open door, she felt Willis’s neck for a pulse, getting her fingers bloody in the process. Thank goodness, he was alive. She pulled a sock from his mouth. No wonder he didn’t make noise. Greene must have cornered Willis, stuffed the sock in his mouth, and pounded him until he went unconscious.
Frieda stifled the urge to hunt for Greene. Alone she would be no match for him, and she didn’t want Otis and the others to have to come to her rescue. She was on the phone with Lieutenant Fuller when she heard the outside door open and close quietly. Thinking that Greene must be leaving the house, she was startled when Hendricks came into the office.
“Greene has beaten Willis up and is hiding somewhere,” Frieda said softly. “Unless he took off while I was upstairs.”
“He didn’t,” Otis said, standing in the office doorway. “He ain’t come down.”
“Okay then. Unless he went out a window, he’s upstairs someplace,” Frieda said. “Shall we look? You go one way, and I’ll go the other?”
“Fine,” Hendricks said. “I’ll take the back stairs. Turn on all the lights you come to.” He stepped down to the front door and turned on the entry light.
Frieda got the TV room and hall lights. She crept quietly up the stairs, clutching her flashlight, wishing for the first time that it were bigger and heavier. At the top she turned on the stairway lights and then flipped the hall switch. The fights came on, went out, and instantly came on again. Hendricks must have flipped the switch at his end the same time she did. She looked both ways and stepped into the hall. She saw only Hendricks. He motioned that she should open doors and turn on lights in every room. She threw a door open, reached around the jamb to turn on the light, and moved on to the next room, to those at the end of the hallway, then down the opposite side. She saw Hendricks stop in the bathroom doorway for a minute and look in at Willis. At Willis’s room Frieda motioned for Hendricks to join her. She heard the lieutenant come in downstairs with at least one other officer, judging from the noise they made.
Frieda stood against the wall on one side of Willis’s door, Hendricks on the other side. Hendricks threw open the door and flipped the light switch. Greene burst out of the room toward the stairway, stopping short when he saw the lieutenant coming up. He spun around to go the other way. Hendricks moved into his path. Greene tried to push past, and the two men struggled. Greene threw a punch and broke away, sprinting toward the far stairway.
John was standing in the hall outside his room. Otis stood in the open doorway that led to the stairs. Greene charged toward Otis and bounced back in surprise, cursing Otis, who leaned against two mop handles, holding them crossways against the door jamb at the level of his buttocks. Greene hadn’t seen them, and they had halted his forward movement without breaking.
Greene raised his fist to throw a punch at the grinning Otis, but John slid an arm around his neck and pulled him backwards, off balance. The lieutenant and the officers moved in with handcuffs and hustled Greene away.
Hendricks looked at Otis and John. “First time I ever saw cons helping the law bust another con,” he said.
“We swat flies,” Otis said, “no matter who they bitin’. This be for Willis.”
“Thanks a lot, guys,” Frieda said. “Hey, pretty clever, Otis.” She indicated the mop handles he was holding.
The ambulance attendants arrived and examined Willis. As they prepared to turn him to lift him onto the stretcher, Frieda said urgently, “Wait. Before you turn him, please see if there’s any foreign object inside that might damage him when he’s moved.”
They gave her a look that made her feel dirty.
“Please,” she said again. “The one who did this might want to sodomize Willis but isn’t likely to do it in the usual way.”
While she was talking, an attendant put on surgical gloves and examined Willis’s rectum. He carefully removed a wooden dowel about twelve inches long. He sealed it inside a plastic bag.
“Oh, poor Willis,” Frieda whispered.
“Thanks, man,” Hendricks said.
The attendants lifted Willis onto the stretcher and slipped soft cuffs around his ankles and wrists. “Procedure,” they said, seeing the anger on Otis’s and John’s faces.
Frieda and Hendricks nodded and followed the men downstairs.
“Poor Willis,” Frieda said again when the ambulance had gone.
“He deserves a medal,” Hendricks said, “for getting Greene out of here. I’ll get him a Certificate of Appreciation. A membership in the dragonslayers’ club. He’ll like that.”
“Your eye is getting colorful, Don.” Frieda took a wad of paper towels and wet them with cold water. “How long do you think our good fortune will last?” she asked. “Oh my gosh! You have to give your reporter the story now.”
“All hell should break loose.”
“We’ll probably all get canned,” Frieda said.
“Then the Inlet would have another good story.” Hendricks picked up the phone and dialed an outside number. “Austin,” he mouthed.