Inmate 1577

66

February 1, 1963

Alcatraz

MacNally sat in solitary confinement-D-Block, the Hole, Seg, the Treatment Unit…whatever they chose to call it-and wept. He had much time to consider his actions, his choices, his life. During the past two weeks, after being returned to the cellhouse, he had come to realize that it was highly unlikely that he would ever see Henry again.

It was a painful thought, as painful as the intense headaches he had been having on a near-daily basis. He wondered if Henry had gotten the letter that he had given Ralph Finelli to mail.

He hoped he never saw Finelli again, because if he did, he wasn’t sure he would be able to contain the welling anger he felt toward him. Not only had he violated his confidence in reading his letter, but he had apparently told prison officials about his plans to escape.

There would be a trial, he was told, when he was medically cleared to participate. He had met with a defense attorney, who told him that the evidence against him was inconclusive at best. It appeared that his accomplice, Reece Shoemacher, had murdered Officer Taylor, and that comported with the statement that MacNally had given while in the hospital.

Nevertheless, charges were brought, including conspiracy, assault, and escape. These were likely to result in added years to his sentence. How much remained to be determined.

In the meantime, prison officials had sentenced him to five years in solitary. He was unsure what that really meant, because he had heard a rumor from another inmate in the hospital that Alcatraz was due to close soon. That meant he would be transferred to a penitentiary somewhere else in the country. If true, he would welcome the opportunity to get as far away from this place as possible.

As he sat on the cold metal floor in D-Block’s steel-encased Strip Cell-the mattress was removed in the morning and returned in the evening-he was alone with these thoughts, which were as dark as the cell. He was only supposed to be here for forty-eight hours, but as the days mounted, MacNally asked the lieutenant for permission to move into one of the regular cells in the Hole. He had yet to receive an answer, nor was he surprised. At best, he was involved in the murder of one of their men, and at worst he had committed the act himself. He did not expect to be treated well, let alone fairly.

The clanking of the solid metal D-Block entrance gate grabbed his attention. Even locked away behind a steel door, he could hear that someone had entered the area. A moment later, rusted metal hinges creaked and a slice of light cut into his room. He swung a hand up to his face to block the blinding glare. After spending days in the dark, normal light stung as painfully as if he’d looked directly into the sun.

A man blocked the entrance and MacNally lowered his arm. No, two men. William Anderson, captain of the guards, and an officer MacNally knew from his time in Industries: Carson Eldridge, who was holding what looked like a letter.

Anderson reached for the envelope, but Eldridge moved it out of his reach. “All I’m saying is, let me give it to him.”

“Stay out of this,” Anderson said. “That’s an order.”

Eldridge’s shoulders slumped and he handed the document to Anderson, who snatched it away.

Anderson flicked his wrist and tossed it into the cell, several feet from where MacNally was seated. “Happy reading, asshole.” He started to close the steel door, but Eldridge caught it before it shut.

“Lock it up,” Anderson said, then walked off, his shoes squeaking against the slick, polished concrete floor.

Eldridge kept the door open an inch, then looked over his shoulder in the direction of his retreating boss. Through the slit, he said, “I’m sorry, MacNally. I didn’t think it was right for you to find out this way.”

“Find out what?” MacNally pushed himself off the cold floor and walked toward the envelope. As he bent down, he looked at Eldridge for an answer, but the officer was not offering any further information. “Can you turn the light on?”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“But I can’t see anything,” MacNally said as he tore open the flap. “At least tell me what’s inside.”

Eldridge sucked his bottom lip, then averted his eyes. “Your son. He jumped from a bridge, committed suicide. I’m sorry. Really, really sorry.”

MacNally’s eyes glossed over. His hands trembling, he pulled out the letter. A torn newspaper article drifted to his feet, as well as another, smaller, envelope. He stood there staring at the items that had fallen.

MacNally bent down slowly and picked them up. With moist, trembling hands, he slipped the letter out of its torn envelope. It was the note he had given to Finelli. All he could make out in the scant light was a postal service marking: “Return to Sender.” Behind it, a newspaper article’s large headline screamed at him. Boy Jumps to Death from Bear Mountain Bridge.

“No!”

The guttural, pained cry from a man whose life had reached the low of lows, from a man with weightier regrets than a human being was equipped to endure, echoed throughout the cellhouse.

MacNally threw himself at the bars. Eldridge, a tear evident on his cheek, flinched. And then he slammed the door shut.

MACNALLY’S WAILING CONTINUED UNABATED. After twenty minutes, Anderson pulled open the outer steel door. His lieutenant, Donald Wright, and a senior officer, Edgar Newhall, stood at his side. Wright turned on a water hose and blasted MacNally in the chest.

MacNally fell back to the ground, but fought his way to his feet, dodged the stream, and then charged the bars. He ran into them at full force-and continued screaming, a tirade fueled by anger and guilt and the short-circuiting neurons that now comprised his damaged brain’s electrical system.

The water hose only fueled his rage.

“Open it up!” Anderson yelled behind him. “Bring him upstairs,” Anderson said to Wright and Newhall. “He needs to be chilled out.” The door was racked open seconds later.

The men unfurled a white sheet and charged MacNally, swiftly enveloping him and tightly winding his torso, arms and hands, in the cloth. Newhall stuck his foot behind MacNally’s leg and brought him down hard to the cement.

While on the ground, the two officers snapped leg irons around his ankles, then pulled him upright and led him into the main cellhouse, into the dining hall and up the steps to the hospital.

But MacNally continued to thrash and yell, making it an adventurous journey-with the three men twice nearly tumbling backwards down the staircase.

They yanked and pushed and got him down the hallway, where they hung a right into a spacious, white-tiled room. Wright pulled while Newhall pushed, and they got him over to a free-standing white porcelain bathtub that stood against the wall, beneath a large window.

As they moved him to the edge, MacNally saw that it was filled with ice cubes. Suddenly, something slammed against the back of his knees, and MacNally’s legs buckled. The officers guided him into the bed of ice and held him down.

Newhall brought his knee up to MacNally’s chest and rested his full weight there. Wright did the same below, across his legs.

The cold was achingly painful-and eventually numbing. Finally, MacNally felt his anger fading, the draining tirade waning. His breathing slowed, and as he eased his body into the ice, he began to shiver.

“That’s it,” Newhall said. “We call this the chill out. You calm down, we’ll get you out, warm you up, and take you back to your cell.”

As he lay there, the fury seemed to melt from his body, replaced by sorrow and the realization that his only family-Henry, his son-was dead. The sadness he felt brought him back to Doris’s death. Seeing her lifeless, bloody body lying on the kitchen floor was life-altering and emotionally shattering. As bad as that was, this seemed worse.

“Kill me,” MacNally said as his teeth chattered.

Wright turned to make eye contact. “What?”

“Kill me. Choke me, stab me, shoot me. I don’t care. Just put me out of my misery.”

Wright looked at Newhall, who was frowning. Pathetic, his face said.

“Believe me,” Wright said. “After what you did to Taylor, a lot of guys would be happy if we did end your sorry life. But some think that’d be a mercy killing. No. You’re gonna do your time, imprisoned like some goddamn rabid animal, facing your punishment like a man, you fucking slug.”

MacNally closed his eyes and he shivered, tears flowing freely, warming his skin.

Minutes later, as he began losing consciousness, Wright’s voice roused his mind.

“Let’s get ’im out. He’s done.”

The two men pulled MacNally out of the tub. Another officer entered the room holding a wool blanket, and they began unfurling the sheet. His arms and hands were free, but his body was trembling.

The rage welled up yet again, and he began swinging wildly. He connected with Wright’s jaw, sending the man back against the radiator beneath the window.

The officers slammed MacNally facedown into the tub, then shackled his arms with handcuffs.

“I’m fucking done with you,” Newhall said. “MacNally, you just bought yourself a ticket to the Bug Room.”

They yanked him from the tub, then dragged him down the hallway, hung a right into a narrow corridor, and up three steps into an area with tan-tiled walls. The third officer swung open a thick door to their left, and Newhall and Wright shoved MacNally into the eight-by-eight room. He went sprawling face-first to the floor.

MacNally rolled over and lay there on his back: tiled walls, a glass-block window, and a hole in the corner to use as a toilet. That was it.

The men slammed the thick door closed and locked it.