Masters of Noir: Volume Four

by Lawrence Block

  He reached out and scooped up Leon's margarine, buttered a sandwich with it.

  Leon looked at him sadly.

  There was a commotion behind them, aways. The rifle-guards on the balcony stiffened at the rail, raking the place with their guns. Leon said: “What happened?"

  A screw yelled: “Shut up, you! No talking in the mess hall,” and poked Leon in his back with his swagger-stick.

  Macalay said: “Somebody passed out. The stinkin’ food they give you, you never know if it's to be eaten or if it's already been eaten. It's a mystery somebody doesn't pass out every meal."

  Nobody but Leon heard him say it.

  The doors to the yard opened and two white-shirted trusties with a stretcher came in, trotting. The chug-chug of the infirmary's old ambulance could be heard outside the door.

  A gentle wind ran across the mess hall. Lefty let a breath of it go at Macalay. “Jock lost his lunch. He passed out."

  Macalay said: “A lunch like this ain't much loss.” And he thought that with Jock laid up, Hanning became unquestionably his meat. It was up to him now.

  The mess hall trusties served rice pudding.

  5.

  The P.K. assigned Macalay to the concrete block plant. It was rough work; pick up a shovel of cement, heave it in the hopper, follow it with a few shovels of sand, a few of gravel, one of stones and turn and do the same thing to the mixer on the other side.

  It was work that left your arms trembling long after you were on your cot in the cell with the lights out and the radio earphones turned off. Macalay was the only man in the yard who had to tend two mixers at one time. His bad shoulder nearly killed him at night.

  He heard Jock was in the clay-brick yard, unloading kilns. That wasn't bad work, if the screws let the kilns cool before you had to unload them. He heard they didn't with Jock. The P.K. was still riding both him and Jock.

  Then he heard that Hanning had been given a job in the office, filing papers for the P.K.

  That night he wrote a letter to Miss Billie Martin, Box 1151. He had to make an effort to remember the number.

  Two days later he was hauled out of his cell right after lunch and told the P.K. wanted him.

  Even though he knew what it was about, he felt the old thrill of fear go through his stomach and the small of his back. He didn't even like to hear about the P.K. anymore; the P.K. was the cons’ favorite conversation piece.

  But this time there weren't screws in the office; it wasn't even the same office. It was the one where the P.K. did his front work, a pleasant place with a trusty typing away at a desk, and the P.K. behind a bigger one, with a bookcase behind him, full of books on criminology and penology and institute management which he had never read.

  Opposite him was Inspector Strane. He looked around as Macalay came to attention, his heels clicking.

  The P.K. said: “All right, Macalay. At ease. The Inspector here has some questions to ask you."

  Inspector Strane said: “No use taking up your time, Mr. Odell."

  Odell, that was the P.K.'s name. He had another of those triangle things on this desk, like he had in the other room, the room that was plain and slick, so blood wouldn't stain anything.

  The P.K. said: “I like to cooperate."

  "And I appreciate it. But I would like to talk to Macalay alone now. If we could just have a little room to talk in, a cell, anything."

  "I ain't likely to put a city police inspector in a cell. You g'wan an’ use my other office. You want somebody to take notes?"

  "No.” Inspector Strane had not looked at Macalay. “You can't get anything out of a convict if notes are being taken, Mr. Odell."

  "You can't get anything out of Macalay anyway,” the P.K. said. “He's one of the worst troublemakers in this can. I wisht you'da framed a more docile guy to send here."

  The Inspector was as stiff-backed as ever. “I don't frame people, Mr. Odell."

  "That was a joke,” the P.K. said. “Just a joke. Okay, Strauss, take Inspector Strane over to my other office, take Macalay with him. You don't have to stay with them, jus’ make sure Macalay don't have a shiv on him. I don't want any cops getting killed in my stir."

  The screw, Strauss, saluted. He snapped his fingers at Macalay to rightabout-face; Macalay did. The Inspector followed them out. The P.K. said: “You guys on the cops don't have any idea what we gotta put up with. You see the best side of them, when they still think they maybe are gonna beat the rap."

  When they were alone, Macalay stood at attention in front of the P.K.'s desk.

  The Inspector, behind the desk, said: “All right, Mac, all right. Break it off."

  Macalay said: “Yes, sir."

  Strane's eyes widened. Then he nodded, slowly, and began sliding the desk drawers open, slowly, smoothly, as though he'd once been trained as a second-story man. He found the mike in the middle drawer, left-hand side. He sat staring down at it for a moment, and then slowly grinned. He took his hat—his good felt hat—and jammed it down over the mike. Then he shut the drawer again. “There,” he said. “Sit down, Mac."

  Macalay sat down. Inspector Strane pulled two thin cigars out of his pocket, handed one of them to Macalay, took a flask off his hip and a box of breath-killers, and put those on Macalay's side of the desk. “Okay,” he said, “let's have it. You getting anywhere?"

  "Sure. I'm making concrete bricks now. It's better than chipping boilers or washing pots. It's not as good as being in the shoeshop, where I was."

  Strane's lips thinned. “Knock it off, Macalay. Quit clowning."

  Macalay reached out and took a drink from the flask. The taste of free-world liquor brought him all kinds of memories; and for a minute he was afraid he was going to cry. He bit his lip and said: “I've been in The Hole, in solitary, twice. It pretty near got me."

  "So now you want out. You know I can't—"

  "No. No. I don't want to get out."

  The Inspector sat up a little straighter. He looked almost angry. “What did you want to see me about?"

  "I want to be transferred to the laundry."

  "You got me down here for that? Why, I can't—"

  "There's somebody I got to get next to."

  "Why?” The old voice cracked like a whip.

  "This guy was Russ’ buddy. He's on the office force and he got there by squealing on me. He goes through the laundry every day for a check."

  "You've gone stir-crazy! You think I'd help you kill a man, even a con? You think Principal Keeper Odell wouldn't know he had to keep you apart?"

  "He's a sadist,” Macalay said. He finished his liquor and reached for the breath-killers. “He'd like to see this Hanning hurt. He'd like to see me hurt, too. He'd like to see every con hurt. This Hanning was Russ’ buddy. You know Russ is dead? I take it, you know that."

  Strane nodded, watched Macalay chew the breath-killers.

  "I was getting somewhere before I got into The Hole,” Macalay said, “and to go on, I'll have to work in the laundry. I tell you I'm onto something good."

  "You got guts,” Inspector Strane said. “I'll be damned if I don't want to see this work out for you."

  "Thanks,” Macalay said bitterly.

  "Stop and think, will you? What am I going to tell Odell? I got no reason to ask him to transfer you."

  "You're not much help."

  Strane swore. “And you keep your hands off that Hanning."

  "I'll get to him,” Macalay said. “I have to."

  The P.K. laughed. “He's a real dyed-in-the-wool lowdown con,” he said. “They never talk. Supposed to be a first offender, but I've sent out tracers. I'll bet you he's served time in a half a dozen other places."

  Macalay stood at attention.

  "He's not your favorite prisoner, eh?” Inspector Strane took out a cigar, handed it to the P.K.

  "I got no favorite among the cons,” the P.K. said, heavily. “A nestful of snakes, the whole bunch. I'd like to pump poison through the cells."

  Strane said: “Well
, if there weren't any criminals, we'd both be out of jobs."

  The P.K. chuckled his heavy, belching chuckle. “A thought. Need this boy any more, Inspector?"

  "No,” Inspector Strane said. “But think it over, Macalay."

  "Hold that boy outside, Strauss,” the P.K. said. “I want to talk to him.... “

  Strauss snapped his fingers at Macalay, who about-faced and marched out with the guard. Outside, Strauss sat down on a bench, staring at the convict-clerks; Macalay started to sit down next to him. Strauss snapped his fingers. “Attention!"

  After awhile Inspector Strane came out, putting on his hat. He never glanced at Macalay, standing stiffly at attention.

  One of the clerks, a little nance Macalay couldn't remember seeing before, was giggling at him, for no apparent reason. By the time the P.K. sounded his buzzer, Macalay was considering violence.

  Strauss snapped his fingers again—he was really a natural to turn out just like the P.K.—and Macalay marched back into the office, stood at attention in front of the desk.

  After awhile the P.K. looked up. “All right, Strauss.” He waited till the screw had left. Then his sour gaze went up and down Macalay. “So you didn't tell that city dick anything."

  "No, sir."

  "Pretty anxious for you to talk. Wanted me to bribe you."

  "Sir?"

  "Give you a laundry job so you'd talk. Yah! Why should I? What did these cops ever do for me, except send more renegades in here to make me trouble? I wouldn't do a city inspector a favor if he paid me!"

  Macalay waited. So Strane had tried and it hadn't worked. So—

  "Yeah!” the P.K. snarled again. “I never liked you, Macalay. I don't like cons, and you're the worst kind. Aren't you?"

  "I don't know, sir."

  "But I got you trained,” the P.K. said. He ran a finger over the desk, inspected it for dust. “You don't talk to cops, and that's because I trained you. You're a real con, now. You know what that inspector gets a year?"

  Macalay felt very tired. He said: “No, sir."

  "Twenty-three hundred bucks more than I do. And he gets to go home at night, not live in a lousy stir. And he gets to go to dinners with all the big shots in town, and get up an’ make speeches about how we're putting down crime, an’ all."

  Apparently the P.K. hated cops as well as cons. Macalay wondered how he felt about civilians. Probably hated them, too, because they didn't have to take state jobs. Probably hated himself for that matter.

  "Yeah,” the P.K. said, “that inspector sure went off with a bee in his high hat. You, Macalay. I'll transfer you, but where I want to transfer you. You think you got brains enough to hold down an office job?"

  "I could try, sir,” Macalay said, and held his breath.

  "Yeah. I'll have you transferred. You start tomorrow. Can you type?"

  "Yes, sir.” This was too damn good to be true.

  "Good, boy, good. A big boy like you in with the fags. Be nice."

  Macalay nodded imperceptibly. The sadistic sonofabitch wanted to see him and Hanning tangle. He wanted to see two cons knife one another. His own perverted pleasure was all the sonofabitch ever thought about.

  6.

  The office job was okay. Only the P.K.'s office—the fancy one where he did not interrogate prisoners—was air conditioned, but there were fans in all the clerical rooms, and, as winter came on, heaters. There were washbasins where the convict-clerks could wash their hands if they soiled them on the carbon paper; there were pots of coffee sent up from the kitchen whenever they wanted them, because the office staff could do a lot for the other convicts, could transfer their cells or their work-assignments.

  Several of the clerks were punks, pansies, girl-boys; these were the various phrases the prison world used to describe them. They flirted with the normal men on the convict-staff, and two or three couples of clerks were “married.” Of course it was a cinch for a clerk to see that he shared the same cell with his beloved. But in addition to all this, they were cons. Especially vicious ones. The limp wrists and the wiggling behinds didn't make you forget that.

  The arrival of Macalay, a new man in the office, had given the pansies a great big old thrill, as Macalay put it to himself. One of them had presented him with a personal coffee cup with his name painted on it in the fluid they used to correct mimeograph stencils; another had put flowers on his desk, and a third had given him a chair pad, hand-knitted.

  But when he didn't respond to their attentions, the girl-boys relaxed back into routine, and left him alone. Quizzically, he noticed that inside himself he rather missed the fuss they'd made over him, and, shuddering, he told himself he had to finish this up quick, make his play before he slid down the easy chute of convict thinking.

  So he concentrated on Hanning.

  It was a thing he could do well—hate Hanning. The convict part of him and the copper part of him could hate Hanning equally.

  Hanning didn't bat an eye when he found Macalay in the office. He didn't allow himself to be stared down. What Hanning might be cooking up for him, he had no way of knowing. But he was wary, even as he knew Hanning to be wary of him.

  He found out something right away: Hanning was “married” to one of the file clerks. Somehow or other this surprised Macalay; it changed his opinion of Hanning from sheer hatred to something pretty close to contempt. Still, he worked on how he could put this information that he'd uncovered about Hanning to use.

  For two weeks he didn't speak to the squealer. Then the time for the annual report to the Governor came up, and the office staff were put on overtime. It meant they had to eat dinner, at least, in the office, while the rest of the population got supper in the mess halls. The P.K.'s whole career depended on those reports; if anything went wrong with them, the Warden might stop writing his book, the Deputy Warden might stay home for a while, and the P.K.'s life would be wrecked. So nothing was too good for the clerks who made out the report.

  Macalay searched and searched, and finally found an opening. There was a nice little thing in the annual mess report he could use. But, instead of going right to the P.K. with it, he waited. That night he took his supper plate over to Hanning's desk. “Hi, boy."

  Hanning looked up, startled, his face an angry white.

  "I don't want these mashed potatoes,” Macalay said. “I'll swap them for your string beans.” Macalay made the swap quickly with his fork. Then he pulled up a chair and sat opposite Hanning. He said: “Brother, I was sure out to get you.” He forked overdone beef into his mouth. “When a guy first gets out of that Hole, he's like an animal. Hell, man, if you hadn't yelled, I was gonna do it myself. You probably saved my life, yellin’ when you did."

  Hanning was getting back to normal. “Well, yeah, that furnace. We'd've all croaked in a little while, and the P.K.—he woulda found some way of covering up."

  "That's right,” Macalay said, and went on eating. “You holding that against me? You know—about Russ?"

  Hanning shook his head, his eyes glistening with relief. “That bastard?” he said shrilly, in his eagerness to square things with Macalay.

  Macalay dropped it then, but he kept on talking to Hanning once in awhile—just casually for a couple of days. At the end of that time he gave Hanning's sweetie—they called him Piney—a knitted muffler Leon's mother had sent him.

  Then Macalay went to the P.K. He was very careful to stand at attention while he talked. “Sir, about the mess hall report."

  The P.K. growled, but it wasn't the growl he'd used at previous interviews. This one took place in the polite office, too. “What about it?"

  "I notice the Principal Keeper says that food costs went up three percent in the last year."

  "Yeah?"

  "I went over to the library and looked it up. Overall food costs in the country went up eight percent. Instead of apologizing, the prison can claim an actual reduction in costs of five percent."

  The P.K. looked pleased. But he hated to be nice to anyone. “Yeah?” he sa
id. “I can claim it, but can I make it stick?"

  "I want to make a chart on it. A graph."

  "Hey, that's all right. Yeah, you do that."

  "I'll need some help. I'll have to go talk to the steward, and the chief cook. Get the real dope. Make it look professional. I could do it myself, but it'd take me a week. Two guys could get it all done in half a day."

  "Okay. Take any of the clerks you want."

  So the next morning found Macalay and Hanning in the kitchen. Macalay had worked it smoothly; Hanning's last suspicion was gone. He should have known all along that a squealer would also be yellow. Hanning behaved like any other greedy weakling let loose in the kitchen; went around nibbling stuff, bumming coffee, flirting with one of the fry-cooks till he got a steak broiled in butter.

  The kitchen activity was rising to the noontime peak. Lunch had to be gotten out; three thousand cons had to eat. Nobody paid any attention to anybody else.

  Macalay got a piece of rag out of his pocket; it was used to dust typewriters, but this one was fresh. He slipped a boning knife from a butcher block, wrapped the rag around the handle, moved it up and down a couple of times to remove prints, and palmed it under the clipboard he was taking notes on.

  He said: “Hanning, you got to help me a couple of minutes."

  Hanning was talking to his friend, the fry-cook. “Aw, Mac ... “

  "You've goofed off all morning. I'll have to bring one of the other clerks back with me after lunch if—"

  "All right, all right."

  Macalay led the way to a meat box. If Hanning had any suspicions left, they must have disappeared when he saw how casually Macalay let him take the rear. They walked into the box, and Macalay gestured with his pencil hand; the other held the clipboard and the knife. “We gotta make a count of those carcasses,” he said. “You go along and call out to me, lamb, beef, pork, whatever they are. Only take us a minute."

  Hanning stepped forward towards the chilled meat. Macalay kicked the heavy vault door shut, and put the pencil in his pocket.

  He said: “Turn, Hanning. Turn and take it."

  Hanning turned, his mouth open to say something. Then he saw the knife, and his mouth stayed open. But the color ran out of his face. He was standing by a big side of mutton, and his face, which had been the color of the red meat, ran down the scale until it just matched the suet.