The Escape Diaries (26 page)

If I escape
alive, I will pay the owners for every item I filched,
I assured Atticus,
easing myself back out into the main hall, hoping Muffin had managed to escape
and pick up my trail.

           
“Code
Nine,”
the loudspeaker dinned. “
Code nine.”

           
I
didn’t like the sound of that Code Nine. Translation:
An escaped murderess
is running amok.
Heavy footsteps pounded down a stairwell, someone yelled
from a nearby hall, and the loudspeaker kept squawking that damn Code Nine. I
darted into a hallway with a door at the end marked Emergency Exit Only: Alarm
will Sound
.
Opening the door would set off a buzzer. I might as well
send up a flare. Or, it might be a bluff. Sometimes nicotine addicts disarmed
the alarms so they could slip out for a smoke. I took the chance, pushed down
the handle.

           
Not
a peep! Slipping out the door, I found myself on a dark side street half a
block from a bus shelter, where a cluster of tired-looking hospital employees
waited glumly for the bus. I hurried over and joined them, trying to look like
just another working stiff heading home after a tough night of jabbing people
with needles.
  

           
A
bus was lumbering up the street toward us. Milwaukee’s cash-strapped transit
system had turned its buses into moving billboards. This bus was a rolling ad
for the upcoming BodyWorks
show. A skinless basketball player, all
exposed sinew and muscle, dribbled a ball toward the rear of the bus. Taking
the bus would be a risk. Drivers were probably watching for a woman fitting my
description. But if I walked the streets I’d be even more obvious.

           
So
mass transit by default. The bus hissed to a stop and people began shuffling
aboard. I hesitated, torn between my need to get away and my guilt at leaving
Muffin behind. Abandoning him was for his own good, I told myself. He’d be
returned to Vanessa, back to regular meals, grooming, and FedEx guys to
terrorize.

I missed him
already. Yanking up the jacket hood to shadow my face, I hunted through my
stolen tote bag for bus change. Suddenly I heard a bark from behind me, and a
moment later a small gray body was hurling itself into my arms.

           
“Oh,
you clever dog!” I hugged Muffin, kissed his nose. He licked my ear. I stuffed
him into my stolen tote and, keeping my head down, boarded the bus.

Escape tip #21:

Just because guys are wearing

white shirts and black pants, it

doesn’t mean they’re Mormon missionaries.

           
Muffin
no longer bore the slightest resemblance to Vanessa Vonnerjohn’s pampered
pooch. He was a street dog, with the dirt, scars, and attitude to back it up.
He had acquired a swagger. He was a stud. He didn’t need to nip ankles to prove
how tough he was. He only snapped at me once as I cleaned his wound and applied
the antibiotic cream I’d found in my pilfered tote bag. When he decided he’d
had enough, he squirmed out of my grip, jumped down from the restroom sink, and
began licking off the ointment.

           
I
caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror above the sink. I looked like I’d been
run over by a road grader. My pupils were still dilated from the drug, there
were bags under my eyes big enough to plant radishes, and my hair looked as
though it had been styled with a hay baler. I scrubbed the worst of the dirt
off with wet paper towels and mothball-smelling dispenser soap, but I still
looked like a person who slept in cars.

           
Actually
I
had
slept in a car. Last night we’d ridden the bus as far as the Third
Ward nightclub district, blended in with the revelers staggering out of the
bars, and skulked back to where I’d parked the car. Labeck’s Volkswagen was
still in the same spot, miraculously intact and undamaged except for a parking
ticket. I’d retrieved the Volks’s key and started driving, not sure exactly
where I was going and keeping an eye on the gas gauge, which was lingering near
E. My first impulse had been to flee to the safety of Labeck’s apartment, but I
deep-sixed that idea as too self-serving. He didn’t deserve whatever doom was
about to descend on me.

Eventually I’d
found a rough-around-the-edges neighborhood on the south side, where I’d shoehorned
the Volks in between a rusted low-rider and a ’98 Impala riddled with bullet
holes. Muffin and I had slept in the car for what remained of the night, then
had driven around until we’d found this restaurant.

George Webb
restaurants are a Wisconsin thing, like bubblers, stop and go lights, and
cheese that squeaks. George Webbs are
Nighthawks
territory—wide
plate glass windows, spinner stools, and solitary people drinking coffee at two
in the morning. Their menu is wall-posted and basic: hamburgers, chili-fries,
and the best breakfasts on the planet.

           
Washed
and ready for our close-ups, we left the restroom and headed for the lunch
counter. A sign clearly stated
Only Service Dogs Allowed,
but the
counter guy didn’t bat an eyelash when Muffin popped out of my tote bag and
hopped onto the stool next to mine. The guy took my order and five minutes later
set out scrambled eggs, bacon, and buttered toast, served up on that thick
white restaurant crockery that always makes food taste better. Muffin had a
cereal bowl filled with water, four sausages, and a waffle. Two cups of black
coffee cleared the lingering rohypnol cobwebs from my brain.

           
 
The only other customer in the place was
a hungover guy who was snoring, head down on the counter, with a newspaper draped
over his head. The newspaper headline read:
Mazie-mania Inspires Prison
Escape Reality Show.

           
 
The waiter and I both gazed up at the
wall-mounted television set, tuned to Channel 13. Natty in lavender shirt and
violet tie, Peter Polifka was anchoring the morning’s local news.
“A woman
believed to be Mazie Maguire was admitted to Milwaukee County General Hospital
early this morning,”
he reported, his voice quivering with excitement.
“According
to informed sources, Maguire was suffering from a drug overdose.”

           
I
could feel a dozen blood vessels in my brain exploding. They were making me
sound like a crackhead!

           
 
“A small dog was present in the
hospital emergency room,”
Peter Polifka continued, grinning to show that
this was all great fun
. “The dog, stolen from a local family, is a valuable
sh-shi
—
shits yu.”
Beads of sweat appeared on his forehead.

           
“
Sheet-sue!”
someone yelled from off camera. Was that Labeck?

           
“
Sheet-sue,”
Peter Polifka said with relief.
“A valuable sheets-sue, umm
. . .
”

He frowned at the TelePrompTer,
then hurriedly gabbled,
“A valuable sheet-sue bison fry. Maguire, eluding
hospital security, slipped out of the building and was last spotted on an
eastbound number fifteen bus. An anonymous donor has offered a
fifty-thousand-dollar reward for information leading to Mazie’s Maguire’s
apprehension.”

           
An
anonymous donor. Golly, who could that be?

           
“You
look like her,” the waiter said. He was gangly, with an oversized Adam’s apple,
and his white paper hat kept sliding down his narrow head. He pointed at the
television. “That Mazie Maguire.”

           
“Everybody
says that.” I tried to sound nonchalant. “I wish I was. I’d turn myself in and
collect the fifty K.”

           
We
both got a hearty chuckle out of that one. Actually, that wasn’t a bad idea.
Maybe I should
turn myself in, just explain to the police what had
happened:
See, Senator Stanford Brenner knocked me out with a drug, shot my
dog, tossed us in a trash bag, and buried me in a pre-dug grave.

           
So
who ya gonna believe? A.) a popular and respected United States senator working
hard to bring defense contracts home to his state, or B.) a husband-shooting,
car-stealing, dog-napping, drug-overdosing escaped convict?

 
          
Bear
would simply deny everything. Bear could have gotten the owners of the
Titanic
off the hook by claiming the passengers went swimming too soon after dinner. He
would claim I was suffering from dope-inspired hallucinations. He’d tried to
help me, but look what had happened—now I was flinging all kinds of
ridiculous accusations at him. The police were welcome to check out his house,
where the alleged assault occurred. Naturally Bear would have wiped my
fingerprints off every surface, dishwashered every molecule of my DNA off his
dinner plates, and gotten rid of the clothes I’d left in Charlene’s closet.

But I
still
had the snapshot, snugged against my belly. Apparently Bear had been too
revolted by my urine-scented undies to do a thorough body search before he’d
dumped me in the trash bag last night.

           
“You
got a dog, too,” the waiter said. “Like that Mazie Maguire’s dog.”

           
“Funny
coincidence, huh? But that dog on TV was a shih tsu. And it’s a boy dog. Mine
is a girl dog, and she’s a cockapoo.” Which sounded like what Muffin had done
on the sidewalk a few minutes ago.
        

“Looks like your
basic mutt to me,” the waiter said, handing another sausage to Muffin, who was
the three-thousand-dollar offspring of purebred shih tzus and bichon frises.
The waiter handed me the bill and I got out my stolen handbag. In case anybody
asked for my ID, I was Luella Parkhurst. I was African American, five feet nine
inches tall, and one hundred fifty pounds. I was an organ donor. I used
Luella’s hard-earned money to pay for our breakfasts, and then we scrammed.
Mazie and Muffin, on the lam.

           
Filled
with George Webb scrambled eggs and bacon, I felt a surge of energy and
confidence. The self-loathing and sense of loss I’d felt last night had
vanished, replaced with a cold, hard, revitalizing fury. I was
not
trash. I was not a worthless jailbird. I was a survivor, like Labeck said. And
Senator Stanford Brenner was a lying, cowardly, dog-abusing sack of shit. Bury
me, will you, Bear? I am going to bury you! I thumped the Volks’s steering
wheel for emphasis. I am going to bury you in such deep shit not all your
Brenner money will be able to dig you out.

           
First
step: find Constanza Arguello. I had no idea who Luis was, but my intuition
told me that he was the key to this whole puzzle. We drove past the address I’d
found on FonePhlip
last night, 1633 East Schiller Street. It was on the
south side of the city in the Bay View neighborhood, a three-story apartment
building dating back to the era when Moorish architecture was all the rage. I
parked two blocks away in front of Manny’s Barber Shop and was out of the car
before Muffin realized he was being left behind. Outraged, he set up a furious
barking. Luckily, this wasn’t the kind of neighborhood where barking dogs drew
attention. A Doberman was woofing nonstop in a backyard and a Yorkie was
yipping from a van across the street. Muffin was just one more voice in the
canine chorus.

           
Keeping
Luella’s jacket hood up to help conceal my face, I walked to the apartment
building. It was weathered red brick with black lacework balconies and high,
arched windows. The foyer door was propped open because a young Hispanic couple
and their kids were moving into the building. I waltzed right in with them,
thinking that I wouldn’t mind living here myself. It was sparkling clean, the
walls were painted cheerful pastels, and geraniums bloomed on windowsills.
Doors were open up and down the hallways and neighbors were chatting at the
mailboxes. Black, white, Hispanic, Asian—the place looked like a United
Colors of Benetton commercial.

           
Glancing
at the mailboxes, I found
Arguello
. Number twenty-four, on the second
floor. Heart fluttering with excitement, I climbed the carpeted stairs and
knocked on number twenty-four. No one answered. I knocked louder. Still no
answer.

Now what?

           
Footsteps
thumped on the stairwell and a small Asian woman emerged at the top of the
steps, puffing heavily, clutching half a dozen string shopping bags. Stooped
and gray-haired, she wore a long floral skirt and the sort of head scarf
favored by the local Hmong and Laotian women. Tottering down the hall, she
halted two doors down, dropped her bags, and fumbled for her keys.

I hurried over.
“Let me help you,” I said, bending to pick up the bags.

She shot me a
frightened look, perhaps suspecting I was going to run off with her bok choy
and cucumbers. Her hands shook as she jammed her key in the lock. I realized I
was scaring her. I’m shorter than almost everyone, but I towered over this
lady.