Out of Sight

From the covered crawl space beneath the prison chapel to the grass just beyond the razor wire perimeter fence. They had been digging since before Christmas with their hands and a broken shovel, using scrap lumber from the construction site of a new wing being added to the chapel to shore up the walls of the tu

What were they doing, making out in the bushes? That wasn't Chino's style, so Foley the fight fan said, "Don't tell me about it 'less you want to." And Chino said that time to his Anglo friend, "You want to go with us?"

Foley said he didn't want any part of it-only three feet of crawl space underneath the chapel, pitch-dark in there, maybe run into fucking mole rats face-to-face. No thanks. He'd said to Chino, "Don't you know you're digging through Everglades muck? I've talked to people. They say it's wet and'll cave in on you." Chino said, yeah, that's what people thought, but the tu

Foley said to Chino that Christmas Day, "If I caught on, how come none of the hacks have?"

Chino said, "I think they believe like you no one can dig a tu

It was that day Chino said they were going out Super Bowl Sunday, when everyone would be watching the game, six o'clock.

But now they were going out five days early.

"You finish ahead of schedule?"

Chino looked toward the fence along the front of the yard, between the administration building and the gun tower close to the chapel.

"You see what they doing, those posts out there?

Putting up another fence, five meters on the other side of the one that's there. We wait until Super Bowl Sunday they could have the second fence built and we have to dig another nine ten days. So we going soon as it's dark."

"During the count."

"Sure, and when they get the wrong count," Chino said, "they have to start over. It give us some more time to get out of here. You want-I mean it-you can still come."

"I didn't help dig."

"If I say you can come, you can come."

"I appreciate the offer," Foley said, looking toward the fence and the visitors' parking area just the other side, a few cars in the front row facing this way, not twenty yards from the fence.

"And it's tempting. But, man, it's a long run to civilization, a hundred miles to Miami? I'm too old to start acting crazy, try a stunt like that."

"You no older than I am."

"Yeah, but you're in shape, you and little Lulu." Foley winked at the queer and got a dirty look for no reason.

"I ever make it out it won't be in state clothes or no idea where I'm going. Shit, I'm fairly new here, still feeling my way through the system."

Chino said, "You do okay, man. I'm not going to worry about you."

Foley put his hand on the little guy's shoulder.

"I wish you luck, partner. You make it out, send me a postcard."

Some of the newer white boys doing time for drugs called home just about every day after noon chow. There they were lined up by the phone outside the captain's office. Foley went in to put his name on the list, came out and went to the head of the line saying, "Fellas, I got an emergency call I have to make.

Y'all don't have a problem with that, do you?"

He got hard looks but no argument. These boys were fish and Foley was a celebrity hard-timer who'd robbed more banks than they'd been in to cash a check. He gave talks at AA meetings on self-respect, how to stay alive in here without taking too much shit. If you saw it coming, hit first with something heavy. Foley's choice, a foot or so of lead pipe, never a shank, a shank was crude, sneaky, it put you in the same class as the thugs and hogs.

No, what you wanted to do was lay the pipe across the guy's jaw, and if you had time break his hands with it. If you didn't see the guy coming you were fucked, so keep your eyes open. It was about all you could tell these fish.

A woman's voice accepted the charge, Foley's ex-wife now living in Miami Beach. He said, "Hey, Adele, how you doing?"

She said, "Now what?" Not with any kind of attitude, asking a simple question.

Adele had divorced him while he was doing seven years at Lompoc in California and moved to Florida. Foley never once held it against her.

They'd met in Vegas where she was working as a cocktail waitress in a skimpy sequined outfit, cut low on top and high up her legs from the crotch, got married one night when they were both feeling good, and it was less than a year later he went up to Lompoc. They hadn't even kept house, so to speak. A few months after he got out, Foley came to Florida and they seemed to pick up where they'd left off, drinking, going to bed… Adele telling him she still loved him, but please don't talk about marriage again, okay? It made Foley feel guilty that he hadn't been able to support her while in prison, and it was this feeling that got him sent up again. He robbed a Barnett bank in Lake Worth, intending to give Adele the entire proceeds-show her his heart was in the right place-but was caught and ended up at Glades doing thirty to life. It meant, the way sentencing worked now, he'd be here at least twenty-four years before he was eligible for parole. All on account of wanting to be a good guy.

He said to Adele, "You know that Super Bowl party? They changed the date. It's on tonight, six o'clock."

There was a silence on the line before Adele said, "Didn't you tell me one time calls aren't monitored?"

"I said not as a rule."

"So why don't you come right out and tell me what you're talking about?"

"Listen to Miss Smarty Mouth," Foley said, "out there in the free world."

"What's free about it? I'm looking for work."

"What happened to Mandrake the Magician?"

"Emil the Amazing. The kraut son of a bitch fired me and hired another girl, a blonde."

"He must be crazy, want to trade you in."

"Emil says I'm too old."

"To do what, watch pigeons fly out of a hat? You have that cute, amazed look down cold, in your little assistant magician outfit. You'll hook up with another one before you know it. Run an ad. Anyway, not to change the subject," Foley said, "but the reason I called…"

"I'm listening."

"It's today instead of Sunday. About six, like only a few hours from now. So you'll have to get hold of Buddy, whatever he might be doing …"

Adele said, "And the one driving the other car."

"What're you talking about?"

"Buddy wants to use two cars."

"You said he might."

"Well, he's going to, so he got this guy you know from Lompoc. Gle

Foley didn't say anything, picturing a young guy who wore sunglasses all the time, even watching movies.

"Cute but seedy," Adele said, "has real long hair."

But none on his body. Foley remembered the guy in the yard always working on his tan. Gle

"You met him?"

"Buddy thought I should, just in case."

"In case of what?"

"I don't know, ask him. Gle