wire mesh. Each one had a desk-high shelf, a plain chair, a telephone. The front of each looked out into another room that also had desks and chairs and phones. Other convicts sat at the little desks and talked to friends, relatives, lawyers, on the other side. Above the cubicles, there was a huge schoolroom clock with a sweep second hand.
Clive Trunks sat on the far side of one of the cubicles, number five, waiting for Parker. It was the first time they had seen each other since the meeting in Clive’s office.
“Can I go talk to him?” he asked the guard.
“That’s what you’re here for. You have ten minutes.”
The guard closed the gate while Parker walked over to number five. He sat down, facing Clive, who pointed to the phone. It was a black handset, scuffed and oily, with a thin cable that disappeared into the wall. There was no dial. Parker picked it up and Clive picked up his. The connection was fuzzy, a tenuous link with freedom at best.
“Hey there,” Clive said, and it occurred to Parker that almost anything he had opened with would have sounded patronizing.
“You come here to say I told you so?”
“No. Not at all. I came here to tell you how sorry I am. That, and to tell you that I’m out here for you, if you need help.”
That was pretty much the line. Not too many places to go to from there. “I got life,” Parker said, because he felt he had to say something.
“That’s what I understand. But I’ve been talking to some people, we’re talking about your condition, using it in appeal.”
“The insanity plea?” Parker laughed.
“It’s a sleep disorder, there may be some precedents. And anyway, you can get parole if you work at it, Parker. It’s not impossible. You can volunteer in the infirmary, teach ready. They know you’re not the prison type.”
“Sure, they’ll be happy to parole a guy who killed his own wife with a pair of hedge clippers, Clive. Maybe I’ll be out when I’m seventy. Great.”
“Oh God, I’m so sorry it had to come down to this.”
“Do you want me to tell you you were right, Clive? Is that what you want to hear?”
Clive looked hurt through the reinforced glass. “I… guess I didn’t want to hear anything. I’ve got to get back to the hospital, Parker. Take care of yourself, okay?”
Clive put his phone back on the hook, and the line went dead in Parker’s ear. He sat there, still holding the receiver to his head, as he watched Clive get up and walk out of the room.
When he had gone, Parker stood up and went back to the cage door. The guard studied him.
“That was fast,” he said as he opened the gate.
“Nothing’s fast in this place,” Parker said. They began walking down the corridor.
“Don’t much like it here, you sayin’?”
“Don’t like it at all,” Parker told him. He thought what was happening to him must be very much like a bad dream.
The End
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