Terror at Hellhole (17 page)

He wished that this tower was two-storied so that he could get a better view of the slough. Maybe after the new yard was completed, he could increase its height by making this a squad room, and adding another story.

He watched as Carugna climbed out of the waist-deep grave, and Print jumped in to take his turn at digging while the morning droned on. Allison and Frettly stood a short distance on either side of the grave, well out of reach of the tools if the convicts tried to overpower them.

Suddenly, his thoughts were shattered by the chattering of the new Lowell gun in the main tower, and he spun around to look at the revolving muzzles spouting flame toward the cemetery a hundred yards below.

On the last day of his life, Alexio Carugna's terror-stricken mind still betrayed him. During the past two weeks it had emitted danger signals where none existed, constantly provoking him to jump and cringe at the slightest sounds. Yet, when the Great Moment arrived, he was unprepared for it. Sleep escaped him to the extent that he became a hollow-eyed neurotic, obssessed with death by crucifixion.

After the garroting of Dalton Powers, he could not bring himself to attend Sunday chapel services in the mess hall because the makeshift pulpit for the visiting preacher had a wooden-cross design tacked to the front of it. Nor would he touch any of the adobe walls surrounding the prison yards, or look up when he walked near them.

Seldom did he emerge from his neurotic stupor to talk intelligently, and just as seldom did his cell mate, Hedgemon Print, attempt to converse with him beyond simple amenities.

Carugna sat on a lower bunk, his arms hanging between his knees when Allison rattled his heavy key ring against the bars of the door. Having spent a sleepless night, the noise brought him out of his gloomy reveries. Somehow he felt better today.

“Print. Wake up,” he said. “It is time to eat.”

The Negro on the top bunk rolled over onto his side to look down at his Mexican cell mate in surprise. This was the first time Carugna had spoken without prompting in several weeks.

“You ready to eat now?” Print asked, the sound of Allison rattling other cell bars still audible as he moved down the corridor shaking doors.

“Sí
. Today I am hungry.”

“'Bout time you is,” Print growled. “All you been doin' is mumble-jumblin' you
Dios
.”

Carugna turned brown eyes at Print. Strange, he thought, but today things looked brighter, nor did he feel as jumpy. He wet his dry lips, then ran a hand through his greasy hair. The inner fear was gone and he felt relieved.

Carugna rose to his feet and followed the large man from the cell. In the dining hall he ate hungrily, not looking right or left as usually did when he was in a crowd. He had just laid down his fork when Harplee's big hand dropped on his shoulder. Carugna stifled a cry, then dropped back on the bench when the guard restrained him, holding his shoulder.

“Easy, man,” Harplee said. “I have a job for you and Print.”

The guard took his hand from the Mexican's shoulder before nodding at Print. “I want you two in front of the carpenter shop right after breakfast. You're going to give Laustina his last ride, understand?”

Carugna shot Print a quick glance. The Negro's face was immobile for a moment, then he continued to chew.

At the carpenter shop, Harplee took the convicts inside to a back room. The body of Jake Laustina lay on a work table, his hands folded across his chest. “Get one of those boxes over here and lay it on the floor beside the table,” Harplee said, pointing to several coffins standing on end against a wall. “Then put Jake in it.”

A slight shudder went through Carugna when he took Laustina's feet, while Print raised the dead man's shoulders. He had never touched a dead body and the stiffness of the three-day-old corpse surprised him. And the eyes were still open.

Oh God, why hadn't someone closed Jake's eyes when he died? Then he recalled hearing that if a person died with his eyes open, they couldn't be closed unless an undertaker wired them. Fear began to creep into his system, and he cast furtive glances at the dead man who once had tried to kill him. Print hammered the lid into place while Carugna stood fidgeting.

“Put the box on that two-wheeled pushcart, along with a pick and shovel. Then you two stand by with the coffin at the sally port. The guard will let you out at nine o'clock sharp,” Harplee said. “Allison and Frettly will be outside the gate to escort you down the hill; and to make sure that you don't decide to run, there'll be a ten-pound lead bracelet locked around your ankle.”

Carugna helped lift the heavy coffin onto the pushcart, then loaded their tools. They wheeled the cart to the gate in silence, then listened to Allison and Frettly chat with the gate guard.

“Think there'll be any trouble?” the gateman asked.

Allison shrugged. “Don't know, but the old man is sure jittery. He's up in the south tower with Harplee. He's got four men hidden out there somewhere, that's all I know.”

Carugna looked at Print, the guard's talk gradually having a meaning for him. Someone was going to try to kill them while they were burying Laustina.

“Trouble? What trouble is there going to be?” he asked Print. “Is someone going to make a try at us?”

But Print never got to answer. “Shut up!” Frettly snapped. “No more talking.”

Carugna's eyes pleaded with Print for an answer, but he gave no recognition of the question. Carugna wiped a palm across his forehead, yet in spite of the heat he felt a chill tingle his spine.

“All right, let's go,” Allison called. The gateman swung one of the big gates open and waved them out.

A sudden quiet seemed to pervade the air when the pushcart moved along the east wall. Hot air suddenly enveloped Carugna; he began to breathe deeper, and a fear hovering in the pit of his stomach began to creep upward. His little eyes flicked back and forth, sensing danger as the tingling sensation in his spine began to climb. Why did he suddenly think of death? Wasn't he safe with Allison and Frettly walking alertly behind them, and hadn't the guard said that four other armed men were watching?

Safe from what—who? His mind spun—who was he afraid of? Yet deep inside, he knew otherwise—he had robbed and killed, ever sinning against God. And now he would pay for it.

Suddenly a shot cracked in the distance. Desperately he clutched the cart handle, not daring to release it for fear that he would run, then bullets from the two guards behind him would cut him down. Print's measured stride continued, and he dragged stumbling feet to stay with the cart.

“Madre de Dios
. It is a signal,” he gasped. He could feel the sweat running down the inside of his cotton jacket. His throat was rasping dry.

“Stop your mumble-jumble, Mex,” Print snapped. “Your God ain't got no business heah.”

“Cut the chatter, you two!” Frettly ordered loudly.

When Carugna realized that nothing had happened, he began to breathe deeper again. They stopped the cart, then Allison kicked the toe of his boot into the gravel. “Here's where you can plant him, so unload the box.”

Somehow he felt better when the work began; keeping busy kept his mind from the fear lurking in his gut. Print handed him a shovel and he began to scrape away at the gravelly ground. When Print had loosened a large rectangle of soil, Carugna began to shovel with a vigor. His mind flowed free and clear as his fears evaporated; and the toil began to tax his muscles while he threw shovelsful of dirt from the grave.

“Let me in there, now,” Print said. “You up to you waist now already.”

Perspiring, but glad for the change, Carugna scrambled out of the pit. He stood watching while Print jumped into the pit, then his eyes traveled to the guards who had moved back from the grave, not wanting to be within reach of the dirt the big Negro was throwing.

A steady popping sound rippled behind him and he turned. Paralyzed, he watched an advancing line of spurting gravel speeding at him before his mind recognized the danger.

“Madre de Dios!”
he screamed. Twenty chunks of lead hammered into his body, smashing him senseless into the grave on top of the crouching Negro.

Print held Carugna's body as a shield, keeping himself well below the edge of the grave while the firing continued.

“Down, down!” Allison cried. “The tower gun is goin' crazy!” He ran forward and threw himself behind a gravel mound, rifle to his shoulder. “We've got to stop whoever it is!”

Frettly yelled: “Cover me!” He raced forward while Allison fired four shots in rapid succession at the figure manning the Lowell in the tower. When Frettly reached cover, he signaled the other guard to move, then he sent protective fire at the sniper still churnng gravel from the edge of the grave.

Then suddenly a hush fell over the scene when the Lowell became silent. Acrid smoke drifted beneath the roof while cries from the main gate alerted other guards. Allison and Frettly, running up the slope to the tower, were joined by guards who had crawled from under the tarpaulins in the adobe yard.

Rifles at the ready, the two guards cautiously mounted the stairs to the tower, and slowly crept upward. Peering over the banister, Allison could see no one near the gun. He motioned Frettly to follow, then he stepped quickly forward. Wilkins lay on the floor moaning, both hands holding his head.

“What happened?” Allison asked. “You all right?”

Wilkin's hat lay under the Lowell gun's carriage and he reached for it, then sat up before he answered. “I'm all right,” he mumbled, “but I don't know what happened.”

“Stand back, stand back,” Harplee ordered the guards crowding the stairway when he and the superintendent pushed their way through the men milling around the dazed Wilkins.

Tarbow helped the man to his feet. “What happened? Who fired that gun?”

“I—don't know, sir,” Wilkins said. He winced when he tried to put on his hat. “I was keeping the new gun pointed at the burial cart just like you ordered. When they got to the cemetery, I drew a bead on them working. That's all I remember, sir.”

He felt the lump on his head and winced again. “Guess someone clobbered me from behind.”

Tarbow quickly moved to the railing and anxiously looked down at the cemetery. There was no movement there, nor could he see anyone. “What became of Print?” he cried. “Where is he?”

“Why he was still down in the grave,” Allison gasped. “I thought he got hit like Carugna, maybe killed. Anyway he was still in the grave when we left to get that gunner.”

Then Tarbow saw a guard, his rifle at the ready, moving in from the swine yard. Choking back a curse, Tarbow waved the men away. “Harplee, have someone take Wilkins to the doctor, then you and Allison come with me. The rest of you fan out and search the outer grounds for whoever was in the tower!”

The warden led Harplee and Allison in a brisk walk down to the cemetery. They found the bloody, mangled body of the Mexican convict lying humped at the bottom of the bloody grave.

“Dammit!” Tarbow growled. “Print got away during the shooting.” His eyes squinting against the sun, he looked toward the slough. “Where'd you say your other guard was posted?”

“Come, I'll show you.” Harplee stepped out rapidly, Tarbow and Allison walking in his wake. On the far side of the hill they found the unfortunate guard, lying facedown, the back of his head crushed. A bloody pick handle was in the sand at his feet.

“His rifle's gone,” Harplee said, shaking his head in disgust. “That means Print is armed. That pick handle is from the prison—see our brand on it?”

“Allison, you look around the slough,” Tarbow growled. “That shot we heard was some sort of signal. Ben, you form a group to go after Print. Take Chato with you, and I don't care if he kills the black....” He paused, then wagged his head. “I mean ... shoot to kill if you have to,” he amended his order.

“This place is
really
becoming a ‘Hellhole,'” Doctor Botts said. “Your man Hack died of a crushed skull, and the little Mexican was riveted from knee to scalp with lead slugs. That Lowell gun certainly made ground meat outa him.”

Tarbow sat with both elbows on his desk, his fingers steepled in his favorite position. “Evidently, when the shooting began all my men concentrated on the tower. Print probably escaped when the guards converged their fire on the gunner.”

He tapped his fingertips against his teeth before continuing. “Somehow, someone overpowered Wilkins, then fired at the convicts. I say that because both guards down there reported that the gunfire was directed only at the two prisoners at the grave. Only Carugna was hit, but he got the full blast.”

“What about your other man?” Botts asked. “The outlying guard on the hill?”

“Jose Carala?” Tarbow tapped his teeth with his extended fingers again. “Well—either Print got behind him while he was occupied and crushed his skull with a pick handle so he could take his rifle, or someone else did it. We found a pick head in the grave with Carugna, so I think it was Print.”

“Someone else?”

“Remember we were talking about the Quechans,” Tarbow said. “Well, there are two of them. Just before the pushcart carrying Laustina's body started down the hill, a shot sounded over near Gila Slough. Now I'm wondering if it was a signal. You see, a man located there could see the funeral cortege coming down the hill.”

“Why would a signal be needed?” Botts asked, not understanding the direction of Tarbow' discussion.

“A man hiding at the water's edge below the hill could not be seen, but neither could he see the funeral cortege when it started down the hill. If an accomplice signaled the start of things, then the man, particularly if he was an Indian, could scramble up that caliche hill and sneak alongside the guard barracks and creep up the tower stairs with little or no chance of being detected.”