“Guard or inmate?”
“Inmate. I won’t name him.”
The warden crushes out his cigarette in the ashtray on his desk. “I can make you tell me the truth, Martin. You have plenty of privileges I can revoke.”
“I’ll lose more than privileges if I tell.”
He smiles again, then chuckles. “See, this is why you’ve gotten so far in here, Martin — you understand the place.” He rubs at his jaw and looks out the windows. “I know it wasn’t another inmate. Looks to me like a club did that, and I’ll assume the guard of mine that took it upon himself had good reason. You want to tell me different?”
“No, sir.”
“All right. Let’s walk you on over to the infirmary. Doc will tell me when we can expect you back to work.”
“Yes, sir.”
I reach for my shirts.
“Best keep those off.”
I ball them up in my left hand and let the warden lead me out of his office, through the lobby, down the corridor to the cell house, and then into the yard. It’s hard to walk, my feet refusing to lift off the ground. The office folks stare. The guards stare. Outside in the yard, the men stare. My arm dangles. The sun is hot on my exposed skin. The warden is using me as an example, I’m just not certain of what. Maybe it’s credit he wants. If the men think he’s done this to me — one of his trustees — then he must be willing to do any sort of horror to them. I might be walking through here shirtless for the guards, a warning to keep their hands off me, or it could just as easily be an invitation to do the same, to make more of these marks.
The chapel is past the infirmary, and I am glad I don’t have to face Chaplain. He has words for every occasion, and I am in no state to hear them.
Nurse Hannah is there to greet us. “My goodness. What’s happened this time?”
“Got attacked, sure enough,” the warden says. “And a misunderstanding got him a stint in solitary. I’d like him fully evaluated.”
“Yes, sir.”
“All right, then,” the warden says. “Get yourself healed, Martin.”
Hannah leads me back through the room of beds. I count four men, then five, a sixth toward the end. They all look sick, ravaged by some great disease.
“It’s disappointing to see you back so soon,” Hannah says, and I agree.
MY second parole hearing has arrived — second trip to the infirmary, second hearing. I am running a circuit, passing through the same points over and over. There is only one change. Unlike my first hearing, I have no expectations for this one. I will match my voice to that of the balding man. I will not hope.
Guards lead me through the same corridors, and the same guards heckle me on my way through.
“Been stripped of those trustee ranks, have ya, Martin?”
“You a threat, now?”
“Should I be scared?”
“Parole board,” one of my guards says, and the others switch their tone. A few of them wish me luck.
“It’s only his second one,” the guard on my left says.
“Ah, well. Luck to you anyway, Martin.”
My right arm is still bound to my body — I have orders from the doctor not to move the limb for a month — an obscene lump under my shirt, my right sleeve slack and empty.
The balding man is balder now. He still takes up the center seat at the table in the room, and the man on the right seems to be the same one as well. The man on the left is most certainly new, a great beast of a man with hair sprouting from his shirt collar, climbing his enormous neck. He, too, wears the customary dark blue suit.
“Please take a seat,” the bald man says, and I lay my left hand flat on my thigh and sit up tall. The bald man delivers the same opening script, and I tell him — again — that it makes sense. I understand that this board does not doubt my guilt, that they are trying to assess only whether I am ready to return to society without endangering the public.
Again, they review my crime. I see George Haskin’s face before and after his electrocution on the pirated lines I ran. I hear again the figures of money I stole. I see Sheriff Eddings on our porch.
“I’m sorry, Roscoe,” he says, opening the car door for me.
“I see you’ve been working with Deputy Warden Taylor and the prison dogs, is that right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How do you like that work?”
“I find it enjoyable.”
“Can you see yourself continuing it outside of Kilby?”
“No, sir.”
“Why is that?” the new man asks.
“All due respect, sirs, I don’t imagine there’ll be much need for prison dogs outside of Kilby.”
The large man laughs unexpectedly. “Right enough.” He turns to the bald man. “What kind of outside training is dog work giving them?”
“Tracking skills,” the bald man says. “And animal husbandry.” He is defensive, and the large man looks skeptical.
“You’re still working in the library as well?” the large man asks.
“Yes, sir.”
“And do you see yourself continuing that work?”
Again, I tell them I will organize my father-in-law’s books.
“You’ve suffered injuries since your last parole hearing,” the large man says. “Do they have any lasting effects?”
I point to my right arm hidden away under my shirt. “The doctor doesn’t know what the range of motion will be once it heals. I have a fourteen-inch scar up the center of my abdomen and another scar on my leg. Both of them still hurt when I run.”
No one gets paroled their second time. There doesn’t seem much point to try.
“What about psychologically?” the large man asks. He has taken over the bald man’s job.
I find too many obvious questions here and have no idea what this large man would have me say in response. I’m unclear what constitutes a wholesome psychological reaction to physical violence. Had George Haskin lived, what would his psychological reaction be? Anger? Relief at having lived? Regret? I could tell these three men that my injuries have done little more than everything else in this place, that they are just one more piece, like the wall and the mess and the heat in the cell house. My injuries are not more or less than the dust in the yard and Yellow Mama and Ed’s boat and that damn lighthouse. I did not expect the injuries, but they did not surprise me, and so, I could tell this board that they did nothing, that their impact was neutral, that they were a decent dinner one evening or a painful sermon one Sunday morning or the sounds of the dogs giving chase.
My scars ache and my shoulder, but that is a response to a question I’ve already answered.
“There’s been no psychological effect, sir.”
The large man starts to speak, but the bald man interrupts, “If we were to grant your parole today, what would you do to become an upright member of society?”
“I would go home and help my wife run the farm her father left us.”
“You wouldn’t seek out electrical work?”
“No, sir.”
“Why not?”
“Because I couldn’t get electrical work, sir.” I don’t know if he remembers giving me this answer in my first hearing.
“Any other questions, gentlemen?”
I expect something more from the large one, and at least one word from the silent fellow, but both of them decline. The guard leads me to the bench in the lobby, and I watch the clerks go about their filing and typing. The warden’s office is directly across from us, and I picture him in there smoking.