From the Chrysalis: a novel

by Karen E. Black

  Hurting more children, she thought. “So Dace is jubilant, I suppose?” she said aloud, furious there was nothing she could do without exposing both Dace and Rosie.

  “Your sarcasm—I can see it’s a family trait. Well, he’s a little under the weather, I admit, but that’ll pass. He’s tough. It’s not the first time something like this has happened to him. My dear, he’s only twenty-four and he’s already spent almost six years in jail. After we got the verdict—it only took the jurors a couple of hours yesterday—he stopped speaking to me. We wondered what had happened to you. You’d never missed before. In retrospect, I’m glad you weren’t there. And I believe D’Arcy was glad, too. He looked … ashen, although of course he never said a word. He didn’t make a sound.”

  “My God. I wasn’t there!”

  “Liza, there was nothing you could have done.”

  “But I’ve got to do something! Please, Mr. Gold. I’ve got to see him. Is there no way?”

  “Oh Liza, I’m so sorry. It’s not in my power, young lady.”

  “It’s Judge Silverton, isn’t it? He couldn’t get him on a murder rap because you had something on him,” she reluctantly conceded. “But he’s still calling the shots.”

  “Maybe,” Gold demurred. “He’s a powerful man, at least in Maitland.”

  “Oh, c’mon. Several people heard him in the lunchroom at the courthouse talking off the cuff. He said Dace was a vicious punk then, and he’s a vicious punk now. What does “then” mean? Was he talking about that school?”

  “I don’t know, Liza, but there’s another problem. Those prison guards carry more weight than we realized.”

  “So he’s screwed Inside or Out?”

  “Now, now, I wouldn’t say that. He’ll be fine as long as he doesn’t do something, uh, rash, like attack one of the guards or try to escape.”

  “Escape?” she echoed doubtfully. “Yeah, maybe he could go after Silverton.”

  “That would be very foolish indeed.”

  “My God, do you really think Dace is a cold-blooded killer? That he would execute that creep?”

  “My dear girl, of course not. I … sorry, that’s my other phone ringing. I’ve got to go.”

  “Well, go then,” she said dully.

  “Listen, Liza, all he has to do is watch his back, keep a cool head and he’ll be all right. He’ll do that, won’t he? As long as you’re there for him? I’ll get him to write you a letter when he’s feeling better. You mustn’t worry. The moment he comes around we’ll launch our appeal.”

  “Great,” she said, reaching over and double-locking her door in case she started yelling. She didn’t want anyone coming in to find out what was going on. “Another letter,” she added listlessly. “Well, put it in the mail.”

  After Gold said good-bye she left the phone off the hook, pinned a brown wool blanket over her window and went to bed. The phone stopped buzzing after a couple of minutes. Thank God Janice was away. She felt like a Victorian lady with an opiate addiction, but nothing induced her to move, not even when somebody came to say Joe was on the hall phone or Mel was calling long distance. She thought about taking the train to see Mel in Trenton, but in the end she didn’t dare. No way she could face Mel now.

  She had no way of knowing if Uncle Norm and Rosie were at home or out celebrating at a local pub as Dace lay on a cot, rigid with shame because he had sold himself out. But she guessed.

  Dace must have seen this one coming, but he hadn’t been able to steer clear. Stupid. It made him sound almost hapless, everything he was not. But in the end it was just like he’d predicted. Unless he wrote a book or went on radio talk shows—or she did—people were always going to think he got away with murder, weren’t they? For the rest of his life. Or longer. His name would always be linked to the beating and torture of the two men who had died during the Maitland Penitentiary Riot.

  Chapter 33

  Wanting and Wanted

  Even though she knew they wouldn’t let her see Dace, Liza petitioned the prison. She also wrote or called everybody she knew with even the most remote connection to his case, but she had no luck. She briefly considered confessing that she was pregnant, wondering if that would help, then decided against it.

  Hubert Gold was unsuccessful. Based on his experience, he said Dace and his so-called fellow conspirators would probably remain in Segregation for at least a year. Nobody was in a hurry to let them out. Of course that meant no visitors. A year! Liza sobbed, then raged. By now, all she wanted was some assurance he was all right, that he wasn’t going to stick himself or maybe several guards with a knife. And to be with him one more time. Oh how she longed for that: his eyes, his arms, his hands, his lips … It had been so long since she’d touched him. I used to want so much. Babies, books, bikes, a great love affair and a chance to write.

  She wrote him several letters—I’m not going anywhere until I know you’re all right—and every night when she went to sleep, the same dream came.

  The door, a metal weave with dime-sized holes, opened and closed behind her with a bang. A furtive little man let her in. Strange, he didn’t look like a guard. “Twenty minutes,” he said, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet like a squirrel. “I’m not really one of them. That’s all I can risk.”

  Dace stood by a space-saver sink, the smallest one she’d ever seen. Its chief virtue was that it was almost new. The pipe under the sink leaked a little.

  “Liza?” he said, his face almost lost in his hair and beard. “Are you really here? Or is it my imagination? How did you get in? What did you have to do? I must be seeing things. This whole place is just one big mind fuck.”

  She crossed the floor in two strides, pushing herself into his chest until he had no choice but to hold her in his arms. “Don’t ask,” she whispered, her mouth brushing against the skin under his unbuttoned shirt. “What’s this? This cut on your chest? It looks like it’s getting infected, it’s all—”

  “Savage. It was Savage. He has a little pen knife he likes to play with. One time he almost cut off … My God, you must be real. You’re crying again and you shouldn’t. Do you know what that does to me?”

  “I’ll stop,” she promised, “if you—”

  “If I what? Good God, girl, I haven’t showered in two weeks. You smell like a flower and your hair is growing out like a weed. It’s going to be halfway down to your bum again by June.”

  If you only knew, she thought guiltily. Even her pubic hair was growing, exceeding all expectations, curling down between her legs. It’s the baby, she almost blurted. “I don’t care. How are you going to … What are you going to do?”

  “What do you think? Everything I can,” he said, sinking with her until they sat on the floor, her legs wrapped around his waist. “I know how to play their games. Don’t ask for anything. Watch my mouth. Answer in monosyllables if I answer at all. Don’t worry. I’ll wait this out and stay calm.”

  “But the guards are striking for overtime, none of the prisoners have gone back to school or work and you’re stuck in here. The Spectator says there’s going to be another riot. Dace? Dace, you’re shivering. Why the hell is it so cold in here?”

  “Some people hope there’s going to be another riot here and the guards are doing their level best to provoke one, but I’ll kill the bastards rather than go through that again,” he vowed, burying his face in her hair.

  “But you just said you were going to stay calm!”

  “Yeah, yeah, and what are you going to do, Liza?”

  “I don’t know,” she said miserably.

  “Yes, you do. You can write a book. Better still, we’ll write a book together if I ever get out. A kind of family affair.”

  After a couple more phone calls, a letter finally arrived on December 21, courtesy of Hubert Gold. It was one page long. Although Dace was only allowed out of his cell one hour a day, he had joined another inmate committee to keep from going crazy. Well, people’s committee, he amended. Following the riot, the use of t
he word inmate was deemed a pejorative term. Nothing else had changed except there was a big master plan in the making. Not to worry though. Because even if the pigs were trying to destroy them, he would make out just fine.

  It is snowing. The wind whistles and the temperature is 9 degrees. The night is black and I am surrounded by the enemy. But my mind is quick. My muscles are hard. My knife is sharp and my heart is full for you, my darling. So you mustn’t worry about me. I’ll make out just fine. I pledge my undying loyalty. Liza, I love you so.

  Brief joy and utter despair. Life, love. Her life, his love.

  Love, she thought. It’s not enough. It’s you, you, I want, no matter what.

  But that couldn’t help him. Instead, she wrote,

  Darling, you’re not just fine! You’re a dead man if you don’t get out of there soon. You with all your muscles. Please keep writing me. In fact, you can do better than that. Do what we talked about all the time, but take real good care.

  You can keep sending mail to this address because I’m not going home for Christmas, although I might visit a friend. Not Janice, though. Too much work to do and too many decisions to make.

  Chapter 34

  Christmas Day

  Maitland to Trenton, Christmas Day, 1972:

  “What did you talk about all the time?” Hubert Gold demanded when he finally got through to her on Christmas Day. It was about 5:00 p.m. and the almost dark had socked her in. She sat at her desk, methodically working through a box of Whitman’s chocolates and flipping through a calendar for the New Year. The baby was due the first day of summer in June 1973.

  “What?”

  “What stupid bonehead thing did you urge him to do?” Gold spat.

  Liza closed her eyes, took the phone off her ear and pressed it against her neck. Gold must be calling from a party. She could hear background noises over the faint, suspicious buzzing on her line: music, the tinkle of glasses, the explosive guffaws of men, the high pitched sound of women’s laughter. They sound like birds, she thought. For a moment she almost wished she were there. Anywhere but here.

  “Miss Devereux—Liza—are you still there?” he pressed.

  “What are you talking about? What do you mean?”

  “The Pen phoned me. He’s escaped, you little idiot!”

  Liza’s heart almost stopped. She got up from her chair so fast that she backed into her waste paper basket, toppling it over. So he had, he had! My God, he was fast. But no, not necessarily. He had been planning this for ages.

  “Wh-when?”

  “An hour ago. Held up the prison doctor for his uniform, locked him in a closet, put on his clothes, walked out the door, then just hopped into the man’s car, pretty as you please.”

  Liza had always believed she would be overjoyed to finally get such news. But right now all she felt was terror. She put her hand over her heart, wanting to make sure it still beat. Maybe he’d been safer in prison. At least then she had known where he was, and now…

  Maybe he had a shiv, though. My knife is sharp for you, my darling. Cute. She’d thought he meant something else, but maybe … Oh God, where was he?

  “Why was he seeing the doctor?” she asked, stalling, trying to think. “And where was his guard?” As if that mattered, now that Dace was outside somewhere, running down a track where he could be hurt, where somebody might try to stop him, where he might end up dead.

  “How the hell do I know? No, wait now. They said that he had an infected cut.”

  Of course, she thought, remembering her dream. It was Savage, she almost said, fear overcoming rage.

  “Needed a penicillin shot. They’ve already had one unfortunate incident where an inmate died from a small cut on his finger. Oh, well, never mind that. There was some kind of Christmas party going on and all the guards are working to rule right now.”

  “So this happened—this afternoon?” she asked. A quick glance outside the window to her left revealed no cop cars in the parking lot, though they could have been hiding out back, near the garbage dumpsters. She wouldn’t put it past them. There was only one thing to do. She had to get out of there fast.

  “As if you don’t know, you little …” Gold stopped and took a deep breath, sounding as if he were unable to go on until he was back in control, the way he should have been, the way he would have been, in a court of law. “The police are waiting for him in Toronto. Scared the shit out of your mother. Probably figured you’d be home for Christmas, but then the Warden read me your letter over the phone. I’m surprised they haven’t contacted you yet. Too busy securing the border and the roads, I suppose. But they’ll be there any moment. My advice is that you be more co-operative with them than you are with me, Missy. The cops won’t fool around with you, not when there’s an armed and dangerous man on the loose.”

  “Well, I was going to visit Uncle Norm today, but I was too … uh … sick,” she huffed, holding the phone out from her ear with her left hand and reaching far enough with her right to retrieve a soft, zippered bag from under her bed. She had left some folded laundry on her desk, which she tipped into the bag. She had only five bucks to her name, though. She could feel it with her fingers, folded in the back pocket of her jeans.

  Mel, she thought frantically. I’ll hitchhike to Trenton if I have to. He’ll keep me, and it won’t be the first place the police look. No, they’ll come here. They’ve already checked Toronto and when they find my room empty, they’ll go to Uncle Norm’s, if they haven’t already. Should she drop by the farm? No, Dace would never risk going there.

  Jesus, Gold was still talking. The man went on and on, talking about responsibility, asking her why she hadn’t taken up some more worthwhile cause. The Vietnam War, the seal hunt, even Women’s Lib. What the hell was wrong with young women these days? In the sixties, they’d … If she’d been his daughter, he’d …

  She couldn’t answer. Say something, she ordered herself. “I had the phone off the hook until just now,” she managed. “I was going to call my mother.”

  Gold snorted with disgust. “You took your phone off the hook on Christmas Day?” he asked skeptically.

  Yes, she thought, because nobody I wanted to hear from was supposed to call. “Oh God. You don’t think Dace tried to call me, do you?”

  “Look, Missy, I really don’t appreciate you dissembling with me.”

  Not that she could blame him for this attitude, but she was getting pretty tired of it. “So where did they think I was hiding him?” she demanded. “At my mother’s place? Maybe under the diving tower at Christie Pits?” She looked wildly around the room for her shoulder purse. Ah, there it was, right on the floor by her feet.

  Huey, somebody coaxed in the background, it’s Christmas!

  “Where is he, Miss Devereux?” he hissed, all patience spent.

  “I haven’t a clue,” she said, pondering how much more she could say. She wanted desperately to confide in someone, but Gold was a liability. She stuffed her arms into her maxi-coat after letting the phone drop for a moment so she could dart into her closet. He’d turn his client in, post-haste, for the sake of his reputation and all that.

  What had Dace done? Ditched the doctor’s car in the lake and gotten a ride in a truck? There were so many trucks on the 401. When they’d been on their bikes they’d weaved in and out, reckless and stupid, but oh, so fucking brave. The only way to live, they’d said. Christ, she wished she were on a bike right now. If he were headed for the Falls, he’d probably follow the highway past Trenton and Toronto …

  “Well, that’s funny, considering you can practically read his mind,” Gold said sarcastically. “Or so he’s always said. You know, I can’t help him if I don’t know where he is. And if the police get to him first there’s no telling what they’ll do. Last week they shot an unarmed fifteen-year-old who was driving a stolen car.”

  He’d fled at 4:00 and now it was 5:00. There was no way he could have gotten to Toronto yet. So where the hell was he? Freezing his ass off in some farmer’
s barn? God, she hoped not.

  And where did he think she was? Would he risk going to Mel’s? Maybe. He knew Mel lived in Trenton. A slight detour. How difficult could it be to track down a doctor’s son?

  Liza, I love you so.

  Surely he would try to leave her a note. Surely he wouldn’t just go, a man like him.

  “You’re trying to scare me, Mr. Gold,” she said, snapping off her desk lamp and staring out at the empty parking lot. Jesus, a car was coming down the hill. A long, dark car. A Crown Vic. Even from the ninth floor window she could see there were at least two adults inside—males, she bet.

  “You’re damn right I’m trying to scare you.”

  “He was as good as dead in prison. The guards would have killed him,” she whispered, glancing frantically from the window to her locked door. Good God, what was that noise? Was somebody already in the hall? Everybody except the janitor and maybe a few international students had gone home. Stupid. If she had visited with one of the Asian students today, like a good girl, she might have been able to hide in their room.

  “There are some Christmas carollers at my door. I gotta go,” she said, dropping the phone. She hitched both bags over her shoulder with one hand and gathered a fold of her long coat with the other so she wouldn’t fall flat on her face.

  “Listen, Liza,” Gold shouted, his voice so loud she could hear him even though she was almost halfway out her door by then, heading for the back stairs. “If he comes to you, and you know he will, do the right thing. Turn him in. That’s all you can—”

  Her legs felt so stiff. Run, she told herself, run! Down nine flights of stairs, out behind the garbage cans, then follow the stream to the other side of town. Careful, careful, watch your step. The baby …

  By herself, she had walked along the stream many times, dreaming, so she knew how to get to the highway from there. It might take a while, but there was no other way.