Out of Sight

FOUR

Foley watched the Pup creep up the aisle toward the front of the chapel, eyes on the floor, no doubt listening for sounds from below. Sure enough, he said, "I don't hear nothing."

"They're not digging now, Pup, they're done. Six of 'em in the tunnel as we speak, ready to go." Foley thought of something he might need to know and said, "What do you say when you're reporting a break?"

"That's an amber alert," Pup said.

"You sure they're down there?"

"I saw 'em duck into the crawl space."

"Where's the tunnel come out?"

"Second fence post from the tower out there. Go on, take a look."

Pup turned his back, walked up the aisle and across the front of the pews to a window. Lights in the compound reflected on the glass and turned the shades a dirty yellow. Pup said, "I don't see nothing there."

Foley, picking up his jacket with the two-by-four baseball bat, moving through the pews to the window aisle, said, "You will directly. Keep watching."

Pup said, "They's nobody in tower six this time of day-if they do come out."

Foley said, "You think they don't know that?" moving up behind Pup, seeing the guard shirt stretched tight across the man's back, a lot of heft to him. Foley let his jacket slip to the floor; he held the two-by-four in his left hand now, down against his leg.

Pup said, "There some car headlights out there…" Now he was pulling his radio from his belt saying "Jesus Christ…"

Saying into the radio, "Man outside the fence! By tower six!"

Nothing about it being an amber alert-too excited. Foley edged in closer to see the car headlights in the parking lot shining on the fence, a dark-blue car and a white one behind it that had to be Buddy, bless his heart. Foley on his toes now looking at freedom, feeling it-man, right there-as the Pup was identifying himself, saying this was Officer Pupko and where he was, sending out the word too soon, before Foley was ready. He saw a figure by the fence now, lit blue in the headlights, as Pup was yelling into his radio, "I'm looking at him, for Christ sake!"

Foley took a moment to remind himself not to hold back, to follow through. Hold back, you make a mess. He got the angle he wanted, stepped in like he was going for a high hard one and laid the two-by-four smack against the side of Pup's head.

Dropped him clean with the one swing, bounced him off the window frame and down without a sound coming from him.

Foley took another look outside, saw two figures now by the fence, before he stooped down to get Pup undressed. Undo his shirt buttons and then roll him facedown, the Pup alive but dead weight. Man, it was work getting the shirt off, Pup not helping any. Foley quick put it on over his T-shirt. He heard a car horn blowing now, somebody leaning on it, maybe Buddy trying to tell him something. Like come on, move. He saw he wouldn't have time for the pants; he'd have to chance his prison blue wouldn't be noticed in the dark. Foley squared Pup's cap, too small for him, tight over his eyes, picked up the flashlight and slipped out the front door into the ficus bushes.

Karen had the court papers in her hand, ready to get out of the car.

She saw prisoners still coming in from the athletic field, passing left to right in her view, all of them some distance from the fence. She opened the car door…

Wait a minute.

One of the guys, a figure she hadn't noticed before this moment, was right by the fence. Close enough to touch it. The guy crouched… or on his hands and knees. Karen popped on her headlights again and saw him clearly.

Not crouched.

The guy was coming out of the ground.

On this side of the fence.

Reaching down now as head and shoulders appeared and another one came out of the ground.

Right in front of her. Not twenty yards from the car. Two guys breaking out and no siren or whistle going off, prisoners still crossing the compound, not even aware…

Karen leaned on the horn, held it down and saw the two guys by the fence, both Latins, looking into her headlights, poised there for a moment before taking off in the dark, down the fence that ran along the athletic field. By the time the third one appeared, came out of the hole followed by another convict on his heels, Karen was out of the car.

Buddy didn't see them right away. The woman commenced blowing her horn and that got him sitting up. He still didn't realize the break was on until the woman was out of the car and he saw her looking off to the left, along the fence. By the time he saw the two cons they were running away from the fence, cutting across the road that came in from the highway, the two all of a sudden in a spotlight beam that angled out from the tower at the far end of the athletic field, the spotlight following them, its beam holding, and now the sound of rifle reports were coming from out there, the guard in the far tower trying to gun them down as they ran for an orange grove and disappeared from sight.

When Buddy looked for the woman again she was right in front of him-her blond hair in his headlights, long slim legs, hell, a girl-at the trunk of her car raising the lid.

Buddy's first thought, She's gonna put a con in there, help him escape.

He watched her duck her head in the trunk and come out with a bolstered pistol, what looked like some kind of automatic.

Jesus, even ready to shoot their way out.

But then she threw the pistol in the trunk, ducked in there again and came out this time racking a pump-action shotgun.

Buddy watched her hurry to the front of her car and raise the shotgun, looking off, but the two cons were gone. Now a whistle was blowing inside the compound.

Buddy saw convicts in there gathering, looking this way, hundreds of them bunched in groups, but no hacks in sight. He told himself he'd better get out of the car, be ready. Whether he wanted to or not.

Once he was out he saw the girl, still by the front of her car, had the shotgun on two more cons, both filthy dirty, standing by the hole they must've come out of, the girl telling them to get their hands in the air. She sure as hell wasn't here to help anybody escape. So who was she? Buddy could see the two cons making up their minds, couple of Latinos, already edging away-shit, they'd come this far. They looked out at that spotlight sweeping around in the dark, then looked the other way, along the fence toward the main gate, to see armed hacks coming out on the run, and that decided it for the two cons.

They took off toward the road. Buddy saw the woman, this good-looking girl in a short skirt, put her pump gun on them and knew she couldn't miss, but she didn't fire. No, the hacks coming from the main gate, five of them with rifles and shotguns, they beat her to it, opened up all at once and kept firing and Buddy saw the two convicts cut down as they ran.

The hacks were looking this way now; they couldn't miss seeing the girl standing there in her headlights, but they didn't bother with her-Buddy realizing they knew who she was. They were more interested in the hole the convicts had come out of. Now they were standing by it peering in, edging closer with their weapons ready, then all stepped back at once, bumping into each other.

A head appeared wearing a guard's baseball cap, head and shoulders now coming out of the hole, the guy saying something to them, his face beneath the cap smeared with muck, shaking his head now, excited. One of the hacks was speaking into his radio. Another extended his rifle for the one in the hole to grab the barrel and get pulled out. But the one in the hole kept yelling and pointing out at the dark, toward the orange grove. Finally when the hacks moved off they checked the two convicts they'd shot, kicked at them to see if they were still alive and then kept going, and the one in the hole climbed out.

Buddy knew it was Foley, taking his time now to put on a show, standing with his hands on his hips like an honest-to-God hack, that serious cap down on his eyes. Buddy moved up to his headlights, raising his arm and waving at Foley to come on, and saw the girl turn enough to put the shotgun on him. Buddy raised the palm of his hand to her saying, "It's okay, honey, we're good guys." Buddy wanting to appear calm, wanting to believe he'd have no problem with this cute-looking blonde-maybe a probation officer, though he didn't think probation officers were ever armed.

She said, "What're you doing here?" Not so much asking, putting it to him the way cops did when they were already pretty sure of what you were doing. She glanced around to include Foley. She knew, all right, but with the two of them to watch was too late making her move. She saw Foley coming at her filthy dirty, like a creature out of the swamp, giving Buddy time to take her around the neck. She fought him, jabbing him in the gut with the butt end of the shotgun, before Foley got in there to wrench it from her grip. They dragged her to the rear end of the Chevy, the trunk lid still up, and crouched there as some hacks came running along the fence past the dark gun tower and crossed the road toward the orange grove. Pretty soon they heard bursts of gunfire, then silence.

Foley said, "I bet that's all the hacks they send out.

Otherwise nobody's left to mind the store."

Buddy said, "Why don't we talk about it later."

He turned his head to see Foley and the young woman staring at each other in the Cadillac headlights, neither one seeming mad or scared, Foley saying to her, "Why you're just a girl. What do you do for a living you pack a shotgun?"

She said to him, "I'm a federal marshal and you're under arrest, both of you guys."

Foley kept staring like he was giving the situation serious thought, deciding now what to do with her, Jesus, a U.S. marshal. But what he said was, "I bet I smell, don't I?" And then he said, "Listen, you hop in the trunk and we'll get out of here."