SAMMIE?S EXCITED CRY jerked Becky upright from napping among the plane?s pillows. On the hard seat, Sammie no longer huddled dozing against her. ?Wake up!? Sammie demanded again, shaking Becky so hard she knocked their pillows to the floor. ?Daddy?s awake, he?s waking up.?
?Shhh,? Becky said, hugging the child against her, glancing around at awakened and annoyed passengers. Curious faces rose up from the seats ahead, looking back staring at them. Becky turned away, cuddling Sammie to quiet her. They had left Atlanta in midmorning, had already changed planes in Dallas, with two more stops ahead before they reached L.A., and every moment of the journey excruciating as they worried over Morgan
?He?s awake,? Sammie repeated, then, ?He knows. Daddy knows they found the money. He?s waking up and he knows. Oh, Mama .†.†.? The child?s face was alight, she hugged Becky hard.
?Shhh,? Becky said again, ?tell me quietly.?
?This is what it?s about,? Sammie whispered, sounding very grown-up, ?this is why they climbed the wall.?
Every night since Morgan and Lee escaped, Sammie had cried out in her dreams, afraid and often defiant; she had traveled with them all that long journey, not sleeping much, not eating well. But now, tonight, she seemed stronger. Now it was Becky herself who was shaken and clinging, who needed Sammie to hold her.
Around them passengers continued to stare and some to grumble. Mother and daughter were silent, their tears mingling against each other?s faces. When Misto pressed suddenly between them warm and comforting, Sammie put her arms around the ghost cat, too, and smiled contentedly at Becky. Everything was all right now, everything wouldbe all right. She hugged Misto. Whatshould be would be. Their life, despite the bumps and hurts yet to come, was moving on in the right direction, just as her good cat knew it should.
LEE WOKE AT dawn from a short nap on the empty bed, his wrinkled clothes binding him. He swung to the floor?and there was Becky sitting beside Morgan?s bed on the straight wooden chair.
The room was barely light. Morgan had turned on his side, Lee could see the rise and fall of his chest, see the IV tube swing when Morgan shifted his arm. He watched Morgan reach up and tenderly touch Becky?s face. Lee wanted to shout and do a little dance. Morgan was awake. He sat silently on the bed, looking.
Becky?s navy suit was rumpled from traveling, her eyes red from either crying or fatigue, her dark hair limp around her face. He saw no suitcase, then remembered that Storm had put them in a motel last night. Sammie lay curled up at the foot of Morgan?s bed, her head on a pillow so she could see Morgan, her blond hair tumbled across the prison blanket. He remembered how warm she had been the times he had held her, infinitely warm and alive. Sammie?s gaze didn?t leave Morgan. But slowly Becky looked up at Lee.
It was all there in her face, her pain from the long weeks when she didn?t know where they were or what was happening to Morgan, didn?t know whether he was alive or dead. Her relief when at last Storm called to say they had turned themselves in, relief that Morgan was alive?and then the phone call that he was injured, that the doctors couldn?t wake him. She looked at Lee for a long time in silence, then, ?Lee? How did you make him talk??
Lee smiled.?I had a piece of steel cable. After he hurt Morgan, I showed him how to tie a necktie.?
Becky thought about that. She didn?t ask any more questions. Lee knew the guards would have found cable marks on Falon?s throat. So far no one had hauled him into Iverson about it; he wasn?t looking forward to that confrontation.
Maybe Storm?s friendship with Warden Iverson had stifled such inquiries. He could only hope so. When he looked again at Becky, there was amusement in her eyes. He grinned back at her, rose, grabbed the clean clothes the orderly had laid out for him, and went down the hall to the shower.
When he returned, Sammie lay snuggled in her daddy?s arms, Morgan?s face buried against her shoulder. Becky still sat in the chair, her hand lying against Morgan?s face, below the bandage. Lee looked at Morgan. ?What did Falon hit you with, a brick??
?A sock full of something hard as hell,? Morgan said. ?Before I woke, you were talking to me. I kept reaching for your voice, trying to come awake, trying to make sense of what you were saying. Something about horses, about cattle. I kept trying to reach up to you, like swimming up through heavymolasses.?
?I figured you?d come awake when you got tired of hearing me.?
?You made Falon talk,? Morgan said. ?The money .†.†. they have the money? His prints .†.†. ?? He eased up against the pillows, lifting Sammie with him, holding her close. ?When do we go to court??
?Storm?s hoping for a transfer of jurisdiction,? Lee said. ?An arraignment out here, get it on the L.A. docket. You?ll have to be strong enough,? he said, ?so you don?t go to sleep in the courtroom.?
41
THREE HOURS BEFORE Brad Falon?s scheduled move from Terminal Island to L.A. county jail on the land scam charges, the federal grand jury in Los Angeles charged him with bank robbery, murder, assault, and attempted murder. He was taken into L.A. for a preliminary hearing, bail was set at twenty-five thousand dollars, and he was incarcerated, as planned, in the L.A. jail but on the new and more serious offenses. The land matter case was set over until the murder trial was resolved. While the L.A. docket wasn?t crowded, it took most of one week to select a jury. Falon felt he had a better chance conning a jury than a federal judge; he?d heard nothing good about this group of judges. Some called them hanging judges, hard-nosed and righteous men who would not understand the finer points of his character.
On the day of the trial Morgan and Lee were seated at the attorney?s long mahogany table below the judge?s bench. Morgan was a prime witness. He approached the table with the thick, heavy bandage covering the side of his head, walking unsteadily with his hand on the arm of an orderly, and with a deputy marshal following. Even riding in the official car from Terminal Island to L.A. had left him shaky, he was glad Lee was there beside him. Storm wanted Lee at the witness table to back up small incidents in the prison and to corroborate what Morgan might have told him. ?You both escaped from Atlanta to bring about this trial,? Storm said. ?Before this is over you?ll both be charged for that escape. You?ve put a lot on the line, Fontana, you have a right to be here.?
Two armed deputy marshals were stationed near the bench, three more behind the jury box. Lee watched Falon ushered in, his ankles and hands shackled. His hair was carefully combed, bushy at the sides, which accentuated his narrow face and close-set eyes. He was seated at the next table with his own attorney, facing the jury box. He had buttoned his prison shirt high at the throat so the angry red wounds didn?t show. Turning in his chair he looked smugly at Lee until his attorney, James Ballard, nudged him. Then Falon turned away. Ballard was a portly man with a shaggy fringe of brown hair edging a shiny bald head. He continued to whisper to Falon until Falon looked up at the jury, a bland and gentleexpression in his muddy eyes. He had pleaded not guilty on all charges: murder, bank robbery, assault, and the intent of murder.
The mahogany walls of the courtroom were hung with portraits of federal judges, some of whom, by their fancy attire, had lived in the last century. Some looked so tough they made Lee smile. Above the paintings, through the high windows, Lee could see snatches of overcast sky. He half expected to see a feline silhouette padding along the sill. But if Misto was present, Lee guessed he?d be comforting Sammie. In the visitors? gallery, she and Becky sat near the front. Becky sat very straight, one hand fisted tightly in her lap, her other arm around Sammie; Sammie pressed close, watching Lee and her daddy, her face white and still. Her dress was pale blue, smocked down the front as Lee?s mother would smock his sisters? dresses. The section was half empty. Looked like a few reporters, with their notepads, and a handful of old folks who might have gathered for the free entertainment.