“What’s this?” MacNally asked as he took the magazine.
“Can you read that scrawl?” Carnes asked.
“Gone fishin’,” MacNally said. He looked up, his mouth agape. “Son of a bitch. The bastards made it.” It was their prearranged code phrase, a signal that one or more of them had reached land.
“Looks like it.”
Carnes slipped the postcard back in his pocket. “Except maybe Frankie. Word is a body was found floating off the island a week after the escape. Some freighter saw it and said it matched Frankie’s description, down to his clothes.”
MacNally sat down on his bed. “They fucked me over, Clarence.”
“I know that. And I also know they were cons, and cons do shit like that. You’re in goddamn prison, Mac. Accept it.”
“I’m here. I understand that. But I don’t accept it. Someday I’m gonna have my revenge.”
Carnes chuckled loudly. Too loudly. He stifled his outburst, glanced down Broadway, then said, “If it makes you feel better thinking like that, good for you. But you’re here for a long, long time.”
“Not if I can help it.”
Carnes eyed him, then looked off as an officer passed. When it was safe, he said in a low voice, “Don’t do anything stupid. If you drown, or get shot trying to get over the wall, it ain’t gonna do your boy any good, now, is it?”
“It’s not like I’m doing him any good being locked away in here.”
Carnes studied MacNally’s face, then nodded slowly. “You have any idea on how you’re gonna do it?”
The whistle blew, signaling the beginning of music hour.
“I had three months to think about it,” MacNally said. “If there’re two things I’ve got plenty of, it’s time and ideas.”
The sound of horns squealing and blowing echoed in the cavernous cellhouse. MacNally stood and moved close to the bars.
“I know a guy,” Carnes said. “I owe him for something. He’s got a big head start on planning something. And you know I’ve heard a lot of plans over the years. Had some myself, too. But this one…sounds like it could work.”
“Can he be trusted?”
“Always consider the other guy’s needs, Mac. He needs a partner. That’s his motivation. Till you get to the water’s edge, you’ll have value to him. I think you’ll be okay.”
“Name?”
“Reese Shoemacher. One of the negroes.”
“I don’t care if he’s purple, as long as he doesn’t screw me. What’s his plan?”
“He’s been assigned to the Culinary Unit for about a year now, so he spends a lot of time down in the kitchen basement. Mostly unsupervised time. Says he’s gonna go out the basement window. Been working on the bars for nine months with string, wax, and scouring powder-”
“A flexible file,” MacNally said. He nodded slowly. The scouring powder acts as an abrasive and when you wrap the cord around the bar, then keep pulling it back and forth, you cut through the steel.
“That’s the idea. Fills in the groove with soap and grease before he gets off his shift to hide it.”
“Why does he need a partner?”
“Most guys don’t escape alone; you need lookouts, help getting over fences, carrying your kit. Shoe was gonna go with another negro, Leonard Williams, but Williams’s supposedly got something else cookin’. I happen to know Shoe’s got a big hole in his plan-like what he’s gonna do once he gets in the water. And you’ve got experience with flotation devices.” Carnes grinned.
“Let him know I’m in.”
“I’ll bring you two together tomorrow, on the yard.” Carnes grabbed the handle of his cart, then winked at MacNally as he pushed off toward the next cell.
59
“Alcatraz,” Vail said. She sat down in front of Dixon’s laptop and started a search. “There’s been so much written about it that I have to think someone, sometime has listed the inmates that did time there.”
As she began pounding the keys, a male voice yelled, “Birdie!”
Burden turned toward the administrative anteroom, where an inspector was approaching with a notepad in hand. “Got something. Your vic, Martin Tumaco. Found in that flotation tank in ’95. Tumaco was a government doc-a Public Health Service physician-and a surgeon who worked on Alcatraz.”
“Alcatraz,” Dixon said. “We just found something, too, that led us there.”
“That’s not all. That other vic, Father Ralph Finelli-he was a seminarian back in ’60.” He consulted his notes. “Finelli unofficially worked at Alcatraz-Father James Raspa of that church you went to this afternoon-San Francisco de Asís-was the registered clergy on The Rock, but he brought along Finelli, his student, to get some experience working with some seriously bad dudes.”
“What happened to Finelli after that?” Vail asked.
“Became a priest down south. He’s done a series of interviews about his work at Alcatraz over the years. Talked about his relationship with”-another glance at his notes-“Jack Pallazo, and his work with two inmates in particular, Leigh Bosworth and Walton MacNally. MacNally is the one that stands out because Finelli considered his work with MacNally such a gross failure that he would’ve left the seminary if Raspa hadn’t talked him out of it.”
“Is Raspa still around?”
“That’s where we got this info. He’s retired, lives in Concord. He was very upset to hear about Finelli.”
“Great work,” Burden said.
“Now that we’ve got a place to look,” the inspector said as he backed out, “hopefully we’ll have more for you soon.”
“Check all the other vics,” Burden called after him. “Find out if there’s an Alcatraz tie-in. Inmates, correctional officers, support staff-anything.”
Dixon swiveled her seat toward Burden. “Before your phone rang, you said you thought you’d figured something out.”
“Yeah,” Burden said. He turned back to the PC and, while alternating his gaze between the screen and his pad, scribbled some notes. He walked over to the murder board and began reordering the male victim photos. “Those numbers, the ones written on the vic’s heads. I figured out what they are.”
Vail’s phone vibrated. She pulled it out and-Holy shit. She jumped up from her chair, which careened backward into the worktable. “New message.” She read it aloud: “I’m stuck between a rock and a hard place, in the middle of fucking nowhere. You have twenty-nine minutes.”
“The Rock.” Burden turned back to the board. “So those numbers. Putting them in order of kill chronology, they read: 37, 49, 35, 122, 25.” He held up his pad to check his information.
“And?” Dixon said. “I’m still not getting it.”
“Me either,” Vail said as she scanned the photos. “Spit it out, Burden.”
“They’re latitude and longitude readings. Of Alcatraz. I looked it up: 37° 49’ 35” latitude, -122° 25’ 23” longitude.”