Resolved Read Free Page B

dry-humping him right there in front of everyone, and all the white guys had dropped their weights and gone after him.
    Felix had picked up a weight bar and gone in, too. After that it got blurry. He remembers cracking some heads with it, before the screws came in and started whacking everyone they could reach. He touched his side, moved his left arm. It stung, but didn’t feel that bad. Someone had shanked him. He’d have to find out who and get even. Felix always got even and everyone knew it. It was one of his two main things, which was why no one had fucked with him after the first week, and now it was going on nineteen years here in Auburn. He was nearly forty-two.
    A face swam into his field of view. A thin, pale brown face, the color of a sandy dirt road, shaven-headed, beak-nosed over a cropped gray beard, with prison glasses glinting in front of wide-set intelligent eyes. The Arab.
    â€œHow do you feel?” the Arab asked. He had a soft voice, only slightly accented. The Arab had been the chief trustee attendant at the infirmary for at least ten years. The Arab wasn’t in a gang, not even in the Muslim Brothers, although he was an actual Muslim. Everyone left him alone for two reasons: one, you never could tell when you might have to go into the infirmary and hence find yourself in his power, and two, he provided dope for the whole prison. The doc was a junkie, and nodded off half the time. The Arab ran the place. Actually, three reasons. There was something about him, a look. The toughest cons, the yard bulls, could read it, and they treated the Arab with respect, and so, accordingly, did everyone else, including Felix. The prison records gave his name as Feisal Abdel Ridwan, which was somewhat true, and the crimes for which he had been sentenced as felony murder and armed robbery were also somewhat true. His actual identity and his actual crimes were kept secret, even from the prison authorities. This was part of the deal his lawyers had negotiated, to keep him safe, and to keep the information in his head on tap, should any of a number of U.S. government agencies wish to tap it.
    â€œOkay, I guess,” said Felix. “My head hurts. What the fuck happened?”
    â€œYou were knocked out, a concussion. Also you were stabbed, but the blade twisted against a rib and did not penetrate far. Would you like some pills for the pain?”
    â€œFuck yes.”
    The pills were produced, two tabs of Percocet. After swallowing them, Felix asked, “So I’m okay? No permanent damage, huh?”
    â€œNot to your body. Your legal situation is not so good, I am afraid.”
    â€œMy legal…?”
    â€œYes. The guard Daniels is dead. They are saying you killed him.”
    â€œThe fuck they are! That’s bullshit! Who’s saying I killed him, the niggers?”
    â€œNo, you were seen by several guards, apparently. Daniels was killed by a blow to the side of the neck, a blow from a naked hand. There are not many men who could deliver such a blow.”
    Without thinking, Felix looked at his hands. A heavy rind of callous ran along the edge of each. The knuckles barely rose above the thick hornlike skin that encased them. Felix had been a karate black belt before coming to the prison, and he had been scrupulous about practicing during his time here. That was his other main thing—his body and its effectiveness as a weapon. Had he killed Daniels? He wasn’t sure, although some details were returning now, as the drug relaxed him. The iron bar had been torn from his hands, and then he’d felt the jab of the knife. There were angry black faces all around him and he’d kicked and struck out at them. Someone had tried to grab him from behind and he’d whirled and chopped at a neck. Then nothing. That could have been Daniels. By then everything was a blur, the red haze of rage, sweat in his eyes. They couldn’t hold him responsible for that. It was Marvelle