“And if they can’t pay him back, he breaks their legs.”
Zack watched Sandini’s face fall and instantly regretted his sarcasm. Despite Sandini’s having stolen twenty-six automobiles and having been arrested sixteen times before he was twenty-eight, there was something endearingly childlike about the skinny little Italian. Like Zack, he was a trustee, but his sentence was up in four more weeks. Sandini was cocky as hell, always ready for a fight, and he was intensely loyal to Zack, whose movies he’d loved. He had a huge, colorful family who visited him regularly in the prison yard on visitors’ days. When they discovered Zack was his cellmate, they were awed, but when they found out no one ever came to see him, they forgot about who he was and adopted him as if he were a close relative. Zack had thought he wanted to be left alone, and he made it clear to them by making himself scarce and pointedly ignoring their overtures when he absolutely couldn’t get away from them. It was a futile effort. The harder he tried to shut them out, the more persistently they surrounded him in their laughing, loving group. Before he realized how it happened, he was being hugged and kissed by rotund Mama Sandini and Dominic’s sisters and cousins. Dark-haired toddlers with lollipops and sticky hands and heart-rending smiles were plunked on his lap while their olive-skinned mothers chattered about the affairs of Dominic’s enormous family, and Zack tried helplessly to keep track of all their names and simultaneously keep an alert eye on the lollipops that inevitably ended up getting stuck in his hair anyway. Sitting on a bench in a crowded prison yard, he had watched a chubby Sandini baby take its first uncertain steps and stretch its arms out to Zack, not to any of the Sandinis, but to him for help.
They enfolded him in their warmth and when they left, they sent him Italian cookies and smelly salami wrapped in grease-stained brown paper twice a month, like clockwork, just like they sent to Dominic. Even though it gave him indigestion, Zack always ate some of his salami and all of the cookies, and when Sandini’s female cousins started sending him notes and asking for autographs, Zack dutifully responded. Sandini’s Mama sent Zack birthday cards and admonishments about being too thin. And on those rare occasions when Zack actually felt like laughing, Sandini was invariably the cause. In a bizarre sort of way, he was closer to Sandini and his family than he’d ever been to his own.
Trying to negate his last damning remark about Sandini’s future brother-in-law, Zack said with admirable solemnity, “Now that I think about it, banks aren’t much better. They throw widows and orphans out on the street when they can’t pay.”
“Exactly!” Sandini said, nodding emphatically, his good humor restored.
Realizing that it was a relief to set aside his agonizing worry about eventualities in his escape plans that he couldn’t control, Zack concentrated on Sandini’s news and said, “If your mother didn’t object to Guido’s profession or his jail record, why wouldn’t she let Gina marry him?”
“I told you, Zack,” Sandini said gravely, “Guido was married before—in the church—and he’s divorced now, so he’s excommunicated.”
Straightfaced, Zack said, “Right. I forgot about that.”
Sandini returned to his letter. “Gina sends you her love.
So does Mama. Mama says you don’t write to her enough and you don’t eat enough.”
Zack looked at the plastic watch he was allowed to wear and rolled to his feet. “Haul ass, Sandini. It’s time for another prisoner count.”
13
JULIE’S ELDERLY NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBORS, THE Eldridge twins, were seated upon the swing on their front porch, a favorite vantage point that enabled them to observe most of their neighbors’ activities along a four-block stretch of Elm Street. At the moment, the two spinsters were watching Julie toss her overnight bag into the back seat of the Blazer.
“Good morning, Julie,” Flossie Eldridge called out, and Julie jerked around, startled to find that the two white-haired ladies were already up and outside at 6 a.m.
“Good morning, Miss Flossie,” she called softly, dutifully turning toward them and walking across the damp grass to pay her respects. “Good morning, Miss Ada.”
Although they were in their middle seventies, the two ladies still looked remarkably alike, a resemblance that was reinforced by their lifelong habit of wearing identical dresses. However, there the similarities between them ended, for Flossie Eldridge was plump, sweet, docile, and cheerful, whereas her sister was thin, sour, domineering, and nosy. Gossip had it that when Miss Flossie was young, she’d been in love with Herman Henkleman, but that Miss Ada had put a spike in the couple’s marital plans by convincing her submissive sister that Herman, who was several years younger than Flossie, was interested only in Flossie’s share of their modest inheritance and that he’d squander it all on liquor and make Flossie into the town laughingstock to boot.
“It’s a beautiful morning,” Miss Flossie added, tugging her shawl around her against the crisp January air. “These mild days that happen now and again certainly make winter seem shorter and easier, don’t they, Julie?”
Before Julie could answer, Ada Eldridge got directly to her primary interest: “Are you going away again, Julie? You just got back a few weeks ago.”
“I’ll only be gone for two days.”
“Another business trip or is it pleasure this time?” Ada persisted.
“Business, sort of.” Ada lifted her brows, silently demanding additional information and Julie yielded rather than being rude. “I’m going up to Amarillo to talk to a man about donating some money to a school program.”
Ada nodded, digesting this information. “I hear your brother is having trouble finishing Mayor Addelson’s house. He should know better than to hire Herman Henkleman. That man is a complete ne’er-do-well.”
Suppressing the urge to glance at Miss Flossie to see how she reacted to this condemnation of her alleged former sweetheart, Julie said to Ada, “Carl is the best builder this side of Dallas, which is why Mayor Addelson’s architect selected him. Everything in that house has to be custom-made. It takes time and patience.” Ada opened her mouth to continue her inquisition, but Julie forestalled her by glancing at her watch and saying quickly, “I’d better get on the road. It’s a long drive to Amarillo. Bye, Miss Flossie, Miss Ada.”
“Be careful,” Miss Flossie admonished. “I heard a cold front’s coming through here tomorrow or the day after, from up near Amarillo. They get an awful lot of snow up there in the Panhandle. You wouldn’t want to get caught in a blizzard now.”
Julie smiled affectionately at the plump twin. “Don’t worry. I have Carl’s Blazer. Besides, the weather forecast says there’s only a twenty percent chance of snow up there.”
The two elderly ladies watched the Blazer back out of the driveway, then Miss Flossie gave a wistful little sigh. “Julie leads such an adventurous life. She went to Paris, France, with all those teachers last summer, and she went to the Grand Canyon the year before. I declare, she travels all the time.”
“So do hobos,” said Ada in an acid voice. “If you ask me, she ought to stay home and marry that assistant pastor who’s sweet on her while she’s still got the chance.”
Rather than put herself through the pointless misery of a verbal confrontation with her strong-willed twin, Flossie did what she always did: She simply changed the subject. “Reverend and Mrs. Mathison must be very proud of all their children.”
“They won’t be if they discover their Ted spends half the night with that girl he’s going around with now. Irma Bauder said she didn’t hear his car pull away until almost four o’clock in the morning two nights ago!”
Flossie’s expression turned dreamy. “Oh, but, Ada, they may have lots to talk about. I’ll bet they’re already in love!”
“They’re in heat!” Ada snapped back, “and you’re still a romantic fool, just like your mama. Papa always said so.”
“She was your mama, too, Ada,” Flossie cautiously pointed out.
“But I’m like Papa. I’m nothing like she was.”
>
“She died when we were babies, so you can’t be sure.”
“I’m sure because Papa always said so. He said you were a fool, like her, and I was strong, like him. That’s exactly why he gave me control of his estate, if you recall—because you couldn’t be trusted to look out for yourself, so I had to look out for both of us.”
Flossie bit her lip, then she cautiously changed the subject again. “Mayor Addelson’s house is going to be a showplace. I heard he’s going to have an elevator.”
Ada put her foot against the porch and gave the swing an angry shove that set it rocking and creaking. “With Herman Henkleman on the premises, the mayor will be lucky if his elevator isn’t wired to his commode!” she countered with stinging contempt. “That man is a hopeless good-for-nothing, just like his daddy was, and his daddy’s daddy, too. I told you he would be.”
Flossie looked down at her plump little hands lying folded in her lap. She said nothing.
14
ZACK WAS STANDING BEFORE A small shaving mirror above the sinks in the showers, staring blindly at his reflection, trying to tell himself that Hadley wouldn’t change his plans again today, when Sandini hurried in wearing a look of suppressed excitement and threw a cautious look over his shoulder into the hall behind him. Satisfied that no one was lurking within hearing, Sandini moved close and said in an elated whisper, “Hadley sent word he wants to leave for Amarillo at three o’clock! This is it!”
Tension and impatience had been eating Zack alive for so long that he could hardly adjust to the fact that the payoff was actually here: Two long years of pretending to go along with the system, of becoming a model prisoner so they’d make him a trustee with all the attendant freedoms—all the months of planning and scheming—they were finally coming to fruition. In a few hours, if the delay hadn’t caused irreparable damage to his arrangements, he’d be on the road in a rented car with a new identity, a minutely planned itinerary, and plane tickets that would lead the authorities on a wild-goose chase.
At the sink beside him, Sandini said, “Jesus, I wish I could go with you. I’d sure like to be at Gina’s wedding!”
Zack bent down and splashed water on his face, but he heard the suppressed excitement in Sandini’s voice and it scared the hell out of him. “Don’t even consider it! You’ll be out of here in four weeks,” he added, yanking a towel off the rack.
“Yeah,” he said. “You’re right. Here, take this,” he added, holding out his hand.
“What is it?” Zack asked, wiping his face. He tossed the towel down and looked at the piece of paper in Sandini’s outstretched hand.
“This is Mama’s address and phone number. If things don’t work out like they should, you get your ass to Mama, and she’ll get you to my uncle. He has connections everywhere,” he boasted. “I know you’ve had your doubts about whether he’ll come through for you, but in a few hours, you’ll see that everything’s waiting in Amarillo, just like you want. He’s a great guy,” Sandini added proudly.
Zack absently rolled down the sleeves of his rough white cotton prison shirt, trying not to think about anything now except each moment as it happened, but his hands were unsteady when he tried to button his shirt cuffs. He warned himself to calm down and concentrate on the conversation. “There’s something I’ve wanted to ask you for a long time, Dom,” Zack said cautiously. “If he’s such a ‘great guy’ and he’s got so many ‘connections,’ why the hell didn’t he pull some strings to keep you from doing hard time in here?”
“Oh. That. I made an innocent mistake, and Uncle Enrico thought I needed to learn a lesson.”
Sandini sounded so chagrined that Zack glanced up at him. “Why?”
“Because one of the cars I stole the last time belonged to him.”
“Then you’re lucky you’re still alive.”
“That’s what he said.”
Tension strangled Zack’s laugh.
“He’ll be at Gina’s wedding. I sure hate to miss that.” Changing the subject, he said, “It’s a good thing Hadley likes people to recognize you when you drive him around. If you had to keep your hair as short as the rest of the cons, you’d be a lot more conspicuous when you’re outside. That little bit of extra hair you’ve got is gonna—”
Both men started as another trustee walked into the showers and jerked his thumb to the door. “Get a move on, Sandini,” he snapped. “You, too, Benedict. The warden wants his car in five minutes.”
15
GOOD MORNING, BENEDICT,” HADLEY SAID when Zack knocked on the door of the warden’s residence, near the gates of the prison compound. “You’re looking as grim and unpleasant as usual, I see. Before we go,” he added, “take Hitler for his walk around the yard.” As he spoke, he handed Zack a leash that was attached to a large Doberman.
“I’m not your damned butler,” Zack snapped, and a slow, gratified grin spread across Hadley’s smooth face. “You tired of enjoying my beneficence and the freedom of a trustee? Are you getting an itch to spend some time in my conference room, Benedict?”
Mentally cursing himself for letting his hatred show on a day when he had so much to lose, Zack shrugged and took the leash. “Not particularly.” Although Hadley was only 5’6” tall, he had a giant-size ego and an urbane manner that disguised a streak of sadistic, psychopathic viciousness that was known to everyone except, apparently, the State Board of Corrections, who either didn’t know or didn’t care about the high mortality rate attributed to “prisoner fights” and “attempted escapes” at his facility. The “conference room” was the prison acronym for the soundproof room that adjoined Hadley’s office. Prisoners who displeased him were brought there kicking and sweating in real terror, when they left, they were carried out either to solitary, the infirmary, or the morgue. He got a sadistic thrill from making men squirm and grovel; in fact, it wasn’t Zack’s good behavior that caused Hadley to make him a trustee, it was Hadley’s ego. The little warden got a big kick out of having Zachary Benedict at his beck and call, waiting on him. Zack thought it pleasantly ironic that it was Hadley’s ego that was finally providing him the means for his escape.
He’d started around the corner of the house when Hadley called, “Benedict, don’t forget to clean up after Hitler.”
Zack retraced his steps, jerking the snarling dog with him and got the miniature shovel Hadley kept beside the front door. He buttoned his jacket and looked up at the sky; it was cold and the sky looked leaden. It was going to snow.
16
SEATED IN THE BACK SEAT of the car, Wayne Hadley tucked his lecture notes into his briefcase, then he loosened his tie, stretched his legs out, and exhaled a satisfied sigh as he looked at the two trustees in the front seat. Sandini was a petty crook, a skinny wop, a nothing; the only reason he was a trustee was because one of his crooked relatives had clout with somebody in the system, and that somebody sent word down that Dominic Sandini should be a trustee. Sandini provided no amusement, no diversion, no prestige for Hadley at all; there was no pleasure in baiting him. Ah, but Benedict was another story. Benedict the movie star, the sex symbol, the rich tycoon who used to have planes and chauffeur-driven limos. Benedict had been a world-class big shot, and now he waited on Wayne Hadley hand and foot There was justice in the world, Hadley thought. Real justice. More importantly, even though Benedict tried to hide it, there were times when Hadley could pierce his thick skin and make him squirm and yearn for what he couldn’t have, but it wasn’t easy. Even when he made Benedict watch the newest movies on videotape and the Academy Awards on television, Hadley couldn’t be sure that he’d hit a nerve. With that pleasant goal in mind, Hadley cast around for the right topic and randomly decided on sex. As his car braked to a stop at a traffic light near his destination, he said in a tone of pleasant inquiry, “I’ll bet the women begged to get into bed with you when you were rich and famous, didn’t they, Benedict? Do you ever think about women, about how they used to feel and smell and taste? You probably didn’t like sex that much. If you??
?d been any good in the sack, that beautiful blond bitch you were married to wouldn’t have been getting it on with that guy, Austin, would she?”
In the rearview mirror, he watched with satisfaction as Benedict’s jaw tensed slightly and he erroneously assumed it was the sex talk that got to him, not Austin’s name. “If you ever get paroled—and I wouldn’t count on my recommendation if I were you—you’ll have to settle for hookers when you get out. Women are all whores, but even whores have some scruples, and they don’t like dirty ex-cons in their beds, did you know that?” Despite his desire to maintain a facade of smooth urbanity at all times around the scum who were his prisoners, Hadley perpetually found it difficult to restrain his temper, and he felt it begin to erupt. “Answer my questions, you son of a bitch, or you’ll spend the next month in solitary.” Realizing his control had slipped, he said almost pleasantly, “I’ll bet you had your own chauffeur in the good old days, didn’t you? And now, look at you— you’re my chauffeur. There is a God.” The glass midrise building came into view, and Hadley sat up taller, straightening his tie. “Do you ever wonder what happened to all your money—whatever was left after you paid your lawyers, I mean?”
In answer, Benedict slammed his foot on the brake and brought the car to a teeth-jarring stop in front of the building. Swearing under his breath, Hadley collected the papers that had slid onto the floor and waited in vain for Zack to get out. “You insolent son of a bitch! I don’t know what’s gotten into you today, but I’ll deal with you when we get back. Now get your ass out of the car and open my door!”
Zack got out, oblivious to the biting wind that whipped his thin white jacket off his shoulder but concerned about the snow that was falling in earnest. Five more minutes and he’d be on the run. With a mocking flourish, he jerked open the back door of the car and gestured wide with his arm. “Can you get out on your own, or shall I carry you?”