"Agree." Nat opened the phone, dialed information, and got the number, which rang and rang. Then the Saunders's answering machine came on, catching her short. It was a man's voice on the recording, and she realized it was Ron Saunders's. Shaken, she waited to leave a message, but the machine was full. "No answer," she said, uneasy. "I'll keep calling. Sooner or later, I'll get through."
"She must be avoiding the press calls." Angus puckered his stitched-up lip. "If you want, I'll stop by the house and tell her on my way back from the prison."
"So you're really going?"
"Of course. I've gotten threats like that before. It's an occupational hazard. Most of them are from landlords. Those guys are power trippers of the first order. That's why Donald Trump is the way he is. It's not the money, it's the ownership of the planet."
"What if I went with you?"
"Why?" Angus's expression turned grave.
"I want to see what's going on out there. Check it out. It's all so fishy, and I care about Barb." Also, I'm feeling a little Nancy Drew.
"That wouldn't be staying out of Chester County."
"No, but it's daytime, and I'm with you."
"I don't like it."
"You're not the boss of me."
Angus smiled. "What will Mr. Greco say?"
"He isn't, either." Plus, I won't tell him.
"I promise to protect you better this time. I have to."
"Why?"
Because you're my friend, and I don't have that many.”
“Aw. How about Deirdre?" Angus rolled his eyes, and Nat got up to go.
Chapter 17
The day was cold and overcast, but the drive still starkly beautiful, the white snow and black trees washed with gray by a pewter sky. Angus spent most of the ride on the cell phone, and Nat tried again to call Barb Saunders, but had no luck. She'd try calling again later rather than going over there. She didn't want to barge in yet. She focused instead on the scenery, trying not to think about Barb Saunders or the phone call last night. She had as much right to be in Chester County as anybody else. Not that she didn't check the outside mirror—a few hundred times.
Angus pulled up to the entrance, and Nat could see that the prison was back to business as usual. They didn't have to produce their IDs for Jimmy, who was back in good humor. In the parking lot, families sat in minivans with the engines running, waiting for visiting hours. Angus parked, and they walked in the cold up the driveway, now unobstructed by mobile crime labs or black sedans. They waved to the marshals and entered the prison the way they had that first day, going through the sally ports. Nat left her camelhair coat in the locker room before they entered the prison proper.
Tanisa met them with her characteristic smirk. "Well, I'll be damned. You lived, freak."
"So did you!" Angus scooped her up in a bear hug, and she left the floor, kicking her black work shoes.
"Oh hell no! Put me down!"
"Thanks for the jacket," Nat said, hugging her impulsively.
Tanisa reared back, laughing. "I'm on the job, white people! What the hell's got into you?"
"We're happy, that's all," Nat answered. "I would've brought the jacket back but I didn't know I was coming out here today. I'll get it to you."
Tanisa waved her off. "Don't think on it! It's a present to you, girl. I heard what you did to try and save Ron. That was above and beyond."
"Thanks."
"I'm feeling so bad about him." Tanisa locked the door behind them, shaking her head. Her hair fishhooks peeked out from under her cap. "He was salt of the earth. I couldn't take off to go to the funeral this morning and now I'm hearing about the burglary. You believe that?"
"Terrible."
"I feel so bad for Barb and the kids. How much can a woman bear?"
Nat thought of the dark bedroom. "Do you know her?"
"Met her coupla times. Real nice. Went to pay my respects last night, but she was sick upstairs."
Angus said, "I'm just happy you made it through, Tanisa. I was worried about you."
Hmph. Take more than a few shit cans to break me down."
"What do you mean? "You didn't hear that? How they started the mattresses on fire?"
Tanisa wrinkled her nose. "Been saving up their shit for God knows how long and threw a match into it. Nasty! What if they had that damn bug that was going around, the one that kills you? They tried to throw burning shit at me, I'd throw it right back—and add some of my own!" Tanisa's smile vanished. "Anyway, we're back in business. Who you seeing today, Angus?"
"Willie Potts."
"I think he's waiting on you. I'll go see." Tanisa escorted them through the metal detector, and in a minute they'd pass into the secured section of the prison.
Nat felt her stomach tense in the heat and smelled the close, antiseptic smell. In a second, they'd be in the wide hallway, just a few paces from the classroom where Buford had attacked her. She steeled herself and followed Angus past the control center, then stopped. Everything was different. The hallway had been completely reconfigured. It had been narrowed by half, and a bright white wall blocked off the corridor through which she'd run to find Saunders. The new hall ran the length of the prison. Nat stood, stymied, and identified a new smell. Fresh paint.
"Where are the staff offices?" Angus had already spun around, his confused expression mirroring hers.
"This is where the hallway used to be." Nat ran a hand along the wall, then looked at her fingerpads. Drying white paint dusted the whorls on her fingertips, like fingerprints in reverse. "They've walled off the way to the room where Saunders and the inmate were killed."
"Oh, yeah, they're remodeling," Tanisa said, returning with an inmate. He looked about twenty-five years old, a slight African American man with his hair shorn close to his head.
"Hey, Willie," Angus said quickly, shaking the man's hand. "Why don't you go sit down, and I'll be right over."
"No sweat." The inmate left for an informal meeting area near the classroom.
"Tanisa, didn't there used to a hallway here?" Nat asked.
"Yeah, but it's gonna be a new set of staff offices. It was gonna be Phase Two but they moved it up to Phase One. The muckety-mucks musta wanted their new offices sooner."
"When did they change the schedule?" Nat asked, just as she spotted Machik walking toward them down the skinny new hallway. His dark suit jacket flew open as he walked, but his striped tie remained in place, under its musical clef.
"Angus! Natalie!" he called out, waving to them.
Tanisa turned. "Hello, sir," she said as he approached.
Angus shook his hand. "Kurt, what happened to the old staff offices?"
"Hello to you, too." Machik turned to Nat. "How's your cut, dear? Improved, I hope."
"Great, but I'm as confused as Angus. Where's the room where Ron Saunders was killed? Is it behind this wall?"
Machik maintained his smile. "It's being rebuilt. It'll be a set of offices, a suite. When it's all finished next year, we'll have two new pods, an enlarged infirmary, and three new classrooms."
"So the room we were talking about yesterday doesn't exist anymore?"
"I suppose not. They got back to work yesterday."
"Because of the riot?"
"It was a disturbance."
Persistence pays.
"Not at all, it was always part of the plan."
"Phase One or Phase Two?" Nat asked.
Machik's eyes narrowed behind his glasses. "How do you know those terms?"
Nat thought fast. She didn't want to get Tanisa in trouble. "I'm a builder's daughter. Greco Construction, ever hear of it?"
"Why, yes, I have," Machik said, surprised. "Well, that's my family. Most construction has a Phase One, which includes framing, piping, electrical, HVAC, and a Phase Two. Dry-wall, primer, paint, and the like. Phase Three is flooring, carpeting, the details. They're practically terms of art."
Tanisa's eyes shifted from Nat to Machik and back again.
"Phase One," Machik answe
red.
Why is he lying? "If they demolished yesterday, I bet the rug with the blood on it is still in a Dumpster. It's blue."
"I believe they emptied the Dumpster this morning." Machik frowned. "I fail to see why you're so interested in this issue."
I'm interested because you're lying. "Two men were killed in that room. I know. I was there. It's a crime scene."
"Natalie, Ron Saunders's murder was a tragedy for us, the first of its kind at this facility. My wife and I, as well as the warden and his wife, Elena, attended his funeral this morning. Now we have to move on. We have a prison to run. This was a crime scene, but the murderer is dead. There's no one to prosecute." Machik stiffened. "We have another crime scene in the RHU—which, by the way, we are preserving, for at least another day or two—and that's where we're devoting our resources and efforts. Understand?"
"I understand," Nat answered, but she didn't. She didn't understand why Machik would lie about the scheduling of the construction, or why they'd want to cover up the room in the first place. None of it made sense. She said, "Did you hear that Barb Saunders was burglarized?"
"Yes, I did. Terrible shame." Machik turned to Angus. "Now. Angus. If you're here for Willie Potts, he's waiting for you. He's got to be back in his cell in fifteen minutes."
"Why?" Angus frowned. "We just got here."
"We're moving him." Machik checked his watch. "Folks, I've got work to do. Tanisa, please show Angus and Natalie to Mr. Potts."
"Yes, sir." Tanisa motioned to them.
Angus turned to Machik. "Joe Graf in today?" he asked.
"No. He deserves the day off, don't you think?"
"Sure," Angus answered, meeting Nat's eye.
Chapter 18
“Sorry about the delay, Willie," Angus said. He introduced Nat and set down his accordion file on a white Formica table, one of six built into the painted cinderblock wall. The tables stuck out in a line, and at each were plastic bucket chairs on either side, more fast-food restaurant than prison except for the uniformed CO. standing against the far wall.
“"Sail right," Willie answered, nodding. He sat behind a wrinkled manila folder. "How's your lip, Angus?”
“Fine. Where were you during the riot?”
“Hiding under my desk."
They laughed, and Angus turned to Nat. "Willie works in the processing room, which used to be across the aisle."
Willie added, "They got us down the hall now, trying to hook up all the computers. It's crazy. All those wires, like spaghetti."
"Why they stripping you out, Willie?" Angus asked, as he opened the folder, went through the papers, and pulled out an affidavit.
"My cellie's having some problems with the Mexicans."
Angus turned again to Nat. "A strip-out is when they take all the inmates belongings out of his cell, either to search for contraband or move him. I think I told you they move the inmates around, to cut down on gang rivalries. No chance for a fight, but no chance for a friendship, either."
"I'm my own friend," Willie said. "That's the best policy."
"I hear you. Okay, we don't have much time. I prepared this affidavit along the lines we discussed. It's what you told me last week. Why don't you read it and sign it?" Angus slid the paper to Willie, addressing Nat again. "Willie was picked up for his second DUI and is just about to finish up his stint."
Willie looked up. "I got eleven days left."
"He completed the alcohol rehab program here and now he teaches it. He's been clean and sober for how long now, pal?"
"Six hundred and eight days."
"Congratulations," Nat said, wondering what it was like to count your life in days. Days of sobriety. She was lucky, addicted only to books.
"We're filing an appeal for Willie on Friday, to get him pardoned, so his record won't show his DUI conviction. His experience in the office qualifies him for a number of jobs on the outside, but he needs to get his driver's license back so he can drive."
"This looks great, Angus. You got a pen?"
"Hold on." Angus rose and said to Nat, "Excuse me. Be right back. They're not allowed to have pens, and neither are we."
"Sure." Nat shifted as he left, then realized she was sitting alone with a prison inmate. Two days ago, this would have scared her, but after the riot, it didn't. Ironic. "So, you must be so thrilled to go."
"I can't wait. See my wife and kid, my grandmom." Willie beamed. "But I got no regrets. This place did a lot of good for me, and so did Angus. He helped me get the job in the office. I learned Microsoft Word and Excel, too."
"What do you do there?"
"I keep all the records, so they know when everybody's bit is up. and also infirmary visits, dental, write-ups, what have you."
Write-ups. Where had she heard that term? Then she remembered. Graf had said that just before the riot, he and Ron Saunders had had the inmate in to talk about his write-up. "What's a write-up?"
"When we get disciplined, say. They write us up."
"Do you, in the office, get a copy of a write-up each time an inmate is disciplined?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Please, call me Nat. How does that work?"
"The CO. fills out a form and gives it to me through the window in the processing office. I log it in, and that's it." Willie shrugged his shoulders, knobby in his thin T-shirt.
"Then the CO. tells the inmate?"
"No, the other way around. The inmate gets the write-up first, before the CO. gives me the other two copies. I log it in and file one in the disciplinary file and the other in his inmate file."
Nat tried to remember what Graf had said. "Then does the CO. talk to the inmate about it?"
"Sometimes. They bring him to the security office, make sure he understands what the deal is."
Hmm. "Do you remember seeing a write-up for an inmate who was killed during the riot?" Nat had forgotten his name. She'd been so focused on Saunders, no other death mattered.
"Ramirez?"
"No."
"Upchurch?"
"Yes. Did you get a write-up for Upchurch, maybe the same day of the riot or the day before?"
"I don't think so, off the top of my head.”
“Do you usually remember the write-ups that come in?”
“Mostly. This ain't that big a place. No gangstas except in RHU."
Nat remembered something Graf had said. "Did Upchurch ever get written up for marijuana?"
"Upchurch, a write-up for weed?" Willie squinted, confused. "I don't remember that. He got written up for insubordination, runnin' his mouth."
Why would Graf have lied about that? "Did he get written up for insubordination right before the riot?"
"I don't remember, not off the top of my head."
"Did he get written up a lot for insubordination?" Nat thought back. Graf had said Upchurch was a troublemaker.
"All the time."
"By Ron Saunders?"
"No." Willie glanced behind him, but the CO. stood well out of earshot, against the wall in the corridor. "Upchurch had no problem with Saunders. It was Graf used to write him up. Graf was always in his grille."
Whoa. "More than the other C.O.s?"
"Oh, yeah. Picked on him."
"How do you know that? Did you know Upchurch?"
"No, he wasn't in my pod. I knew his name on account of his write-ups, from Graf."
"How do you know that Graf picked on him, and not the other way around?"
"Most of these C.O.s, they're all right." Willie checked over his shoulder, then leaned closer, lowering his voice. "But if Graf was the one got killed, nobody woulda shed a tear."
"So why would Upchurch kill Saunders and not Graf?" Nat whispered, but just then Angus returned with Tanisa and a male CO., interrupting the conversation.
Angus handed Willie the pen. "You got a minute to sign. They need you at your cell."
Rats! Nat bit her tongue. Angus had the worst timing in legal history.
"Okay." Willie accepted the pen and signed h
is name.
"Do you have any questions?"