Читать книгу The Payback Man - Carolyn McSparren - Страница 8

“IS RICK CRAZY to recommend you to that place? Are you crazy for even considering the job?” Dr. John McIntyre Thorn looked up momentarily from resectioning the flipped intestine of the young Great Dane who lay on the surgical table in front of him.

“Probably.” Dr. Eleanor Grayson watched carefully. Her specialty was large animals, but she never missed an opportunity to observe Mac Thorn’s surgical expertise with small animals. Not that the Great Dane was small—except in relation to a thousand-pound horse. Amazing that such a large man as Mac Thorn could work so delicately. She’d once watched him successfully pin the tiny broken bones of a sugar glider’s leg.

“So why are you applying for the blasted job?” Mac continued speaking but went back to his careful cutting. “Those men are dangerous. Oh, damn and bloody hell!” He picked up a section of intestine that had been hidden behind the original necrosis. As he worked to remove the necrotic tissue, he kept up a string of epithets aimed not at the dog but at the owners who had allowed the dog to suffer for twenty-four hours before bringing him into Creature Comfort Veterinary Clinic for treatment.

His longtime surgical assistant, Nancy Mayfield, raised her eyebrows at Eleanor. There was probably a smile to go with the eyebrows, but it was hidden behind her surgical mask.

Eleanor kept silent until Mac finally relaxed, allowed Nancy to irrigate and tossed the dead tissue into the waste barrel beside him.

“Well,” he asked, “why are you applying for the job?”

Eleanor sighed. “First, if I get the job, I can keep working part-time here at Creature Comfort. With Sarah Scott three months’ pregnant, you’re going to need another large-animal vet for as many hours as I can manage. Second, it’s a minimum-security prison, so probably most of the inmates are in for nonviolent crimes. Third, they’re starting their beef herd from scratch as a show herd for the prison farm. I’ve never done that before, and it ought to be a real challenge. Fourth, the stipend includes a three-bedroom staff cottage on the grounds, so I’ll have no rent to pay, and fifth, the pay is fantastic for part-time work. I can probably save enough in a couple of years to buy into a decent vet practice somewhere in East Tennessee.”

“Or here?” Mac glanced up over his magnifying glasses. “If Sarah wants to cut down on her hours after the baby is born, we’ll have room for another full-time partner. Sponge, Nancy, dammit!”

Nancy, whose hand had already been poised over the intestine with the sponge, didn’t bother to nod. At least Mac was an equal-opportunity offender. He cussed everybody—everybody human, that was. Never an animal.

“Okay. Let’s close this sucker.”

“Will he live?” Nancy asked.

Mac shrugged. “Lot of dead tissue, but with luck, he’s got enough gut left.”

The intercom beside the door crackled. “Eleanor?” The strangled voice of the head of the large-animal section of Creature Comfort, Eleanor’s immediate boss, Dr. Sarah Scott, came over the intercom.

“Yes, Sarah?”

“We’ve got a bloated cow over at the Circle B ranch. You mind taking it? I’m tossing my cookies every five minutes. Oh, blast!” The intercom switched off.

Eleanor began stripping off her gloves and scrubs. “Poor Sarah. I don’t think she planned on having morning sickness quite so badly.”

She went directly to her truck in the staff parking area at the back of the Creature Comfort main building. Sarah was probably in the bathroom. She’d confessed to Eleanor that she and her new husband, Mark Scott, vice president of operations for Buchanan Enterprises, Ltd., and financial manager of Creature Comfort, hadn’t planned to get pregnant quite so soon after their marriage six months earlier. Now the pair couldn’t be happier. Except for Sarah’s morning sickness. Everyone kept saying it would pass after three months, but so far she still spent at least an hour a day in the bathroom.

That put a strain on the large-animal staff of Creature Comfort, which consisted of Jack Renfro, a Cockney ex-jockey who knew everything that could be known about horses, their part-time assistant, Kenny, a senior in high school, and part-timers hired on an as-needed basis. Eleanor worked three nights a week and most weekends, and was on call when someone was needed to fill in.

Eleanor sped out the gates to the clinic, past the brass sign that read Creature Comfort Veterinary Clinic—Aardvarks to Zebras, and turned right toward the Circle B.

She drove as fast as possible along the back roads under big old oaks still not bare of leaves, although it was October. In West Tennessee, this close to the Mississippi River and the Mississippi border, the area usually stayed warm through Thanksgiving.

Indian summer would be a blessing if she did get the job at the prison farm. There’d be a great deal of work to clean up the old cattle barn and make it usable, as well as fences to be mended, pastures to be trimmed—a dozen major tasks that were easier in good weather. Once the cold rains came in November, working outside could be miserable.

Eleanor had one final interview at two o’clock for the position of veterinarian-in-residence at the new prison. Well, not new. That was part of the problem.

The prison had been run as a penal farm in the forties and fifties, then allowed to deteriorate while the prisoners were hired out as road crews.

Now that the farm was being reopened and recommissioned, the county was putting a significant amount of money into making it a model operation.

A real opportunity for a veterinarian. But so far, getting the job had been an uphill fight. Eleanor could not afford to be late for her interview. She knew that she was not the unanimous choice of the board, but despite the problems, she wanted the job badly.

She turned into the gates of the Circle B Limousin farm and prayed that the bloated cow would deflate fast and without complications so she’d have time to change from her coveralls and rubber boots before her interview.

“YOU DO SEE OUR PROBLEM, Dr. Grayson,” Warden Ernest Portree said.

“Absolutely. I don’t agree it’s a problem.” Eleanor sat across the conference table from the five male members of the prison governing board that had the power to hire her or not. She adjusted her body language, hoping she looked comfortable, open, at ease.

She felt miserable, hot, tired and exasperated. The bloat had taken longer than she’d hoped, and she felt thrown together and unkempt.

The small dapper man at the far end of the table chimed in. “When Dr. Hazard, who is, I believe, the managing partner in Creature Comfort, recommended you for this post, he said that you were an excellent veterinarian. He did not, however, mention your other attributes.”

Eleanor gave him a smile and tried to remember his name. “What other attributes?”

“You are a young and, may I say, attractive woman.”

She didn’t acknowledge the compliment. Actually it sounded more like an indictment.

The warden frowned down the table at his colleague. “Gender wasn’t in the job description, Leo. You wouldn’t want to get us in trouble with the EEOC, now would you?” His voice was tight.

“She will be working closely with a crew of convicts, some of whom have histories of violence.”

“But you have female guards,” Sarah answered. Violence? She’d been assuming these guys were behind on their child-support payments or heisted cars.

Leo What’s-His-Name said, “We call them correctional officers, Dr. Grayson.”

“COs for short,” Warden Portree added.

“I stand corrected. But you do have women. Young women. Several I saw on my way over here could be considered attractive.”

“They are trained for their positions, Doctor. You are not.”

“I am trained for the position of veterinarian. The job description said nothing about having experience as a correctional officer. Frankly, it didn’t say I had to look like a boot, either. It did say that I would be protected by your COs whenever I was working with the inmates. Was I mistaken about that?”

“No, no, that’s correct.”

“Also, I thought this was a minimum-security facility. Doesn’t that mean that the level of violent offenders is pretty low?”

“Not necessarily,” Warden Portree said. “When we’re completely full, we’ll have a good many low-level dope dealers and white-collar criminals, but even a murderer with a good attitude and a clean record in prison can be accepted if he is not considered a flight risk.”

“Oh.” Eleanor took a deep breath and sat up straighter. The seat of the wooden chair hit the backs of her legs midthigh. She tried to wiggle her ankles so that her legs would hold her when she stood up. “I still don’t think my age or gender is a problem.” She leaned forward. “Gentlemen, you are looking for a veterinarian who can set up and oversee this new beef cattle operation. You are also considering bringing in other kinds of feed animals in the future, and a rescue-dog program. Correct?”

“Yes, but—”

“I will be maintaining my present position as a part-time staff veterinarian at Creature Comfort. That gives you access to the top veterinary facility and staff in four states as my backup. It also gives you a ready source for jobs for inmates who are eligible for work release and have shown themselves capable and willing to learn.”

A fortyish man with thinning hair and gentle brown eyes leaned forward. The others wore jackets and ties. He wore jeans and a V-necked sweater. “We were introduced earlier, Doc, but you probably don’t remember all the names. I’m a doctor, too, psychologist and psychiatrist. Raoul Torres.”

Sarah nodded. “I remember you, Dr. Torres.”

“Most convicts are master manipulators. A majority of them have conned their way through life. They’ll fawn all over you and tell you you’re wonderful, and before you know it you’re smuggling in cigarettes for them and calling their lawyers to discuss early parole.”

“I’m not that naive, Doctor.”

“Don’t believe it. Some may even convince you they’re innocent. A lot of these guys can’t read and write. We try to teach them that skill at least while they’re here. A few are geniuses, but many have below average IQs. That doesn’t mean they don’t have street smarts, but nearly all of them have rotten impulse control. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t have committed robbery or stolen cars or even taken drugs. Just remember they see nothing wrong in using you to get what they want.”

“That’s a pretty grim picture, Doctor. Why on earth are you working with them at all if that’s the way you feel?”

“How can I help anyone I can’t diagnose properly? Many of these guys are close to being released back into society. If we can teach them impulse control, break the cycle of poverty, addiction and anger, and give them a skill needed on the outside, then maybe we’ll give them a chance for a decent life. Believe me, buying into the games doesn’t help anybody.”

“And in the meantime, we put them to hard work and help pay the expenses of keeping them,” Portree said. “Prison farms everywhere used to support themselves with market gardening and livestock. Then that theory went out of favor, but what goes around comes around. Several states now have very successful prison farm programs. Angola—about the toughest prison around—even has an inmate rodeo once a year to show the general populace what they’ve accomplished.”

“You want a rodeo?”

“Not immediately of course, and it probably wouldn’t be under your jurisdiction in any case,” Portree said.

“Mr. Portree, gentlemen, I can do this job. I am not going to get caught up in inmate intrigues. I will teach them to be cattlemen and horsemen—”

“Horsemen?” the man named Leo said. “Nobody said anything about horsemen.”

Eleanor sighed. “You have a choice. Either work your cattle from horseback or from four-wheelers or motorcycles. I don’t imagine you want your inmates to have access to motor vehicles. Horses are smarter, think faster than either men or cows, and go places four-wheelers can’t go. You can teach cows to come in on their own to eat, but if you have to move them any distance, you’ll need horses. I’d also recommend a couple of good herding dogs eventually.”

“She’s right.” This came from J. K. Sanders, a big, rawboned man with graying hair who sat beside Portree. “I got three or four old cutting horses out at my place I’ll let you have. They’re pretty much retired now, but you won’t be working them hard, and I think they’d enjoy the excitement.” He smiled at Eleanor, who nodded in return.

“This is getting complicated,” Portree said.

“It’s going to get worse,” Eleanor continued. “A commercial cattle operation looks fairly simple, but you want a prize herd, don’t you? Even a small herd of fine cattle gets complicated if done right.”

“We don’t want a large herd, Doctor,” Leo clarified.

Eleanor suddenly remembered that his last name was Hamilton—Leo Hamilton.

He went on. “We want an exceptional pedigreed herd that wins prizes at fairs, brings good prices at auction and shows off what a good job we’re doing. It’s to be as much a public-relations project as anything. We don’t expect to provide beef for an entire prison population. At least not initially, and perhaps never.”

“Then you need a few exceptional cows, preferably with calves at foot and pregnant again, and a really superb bull that will win prizes for you quickly. You can make money from selling his semen, as well as using it yourselves. You’ll have to change bulls every two to three years, otherwise you’ll have an inbred herd.”

“You know how to buy cattle?” The question came Sanders. Eleanor suspected he had probably bought and sold a few in his day.

“I haven’t done it in a while, and I’d be grateful for your assistance, Mr. Sanders.”

“Sure thing, little lady.”

Her mother had taught her that the way to make a friend or ally was not to do something for them, but to ask them to do something for you. This time it seemed to have worked. “If you agree, I’ll also enlist the help of the large-animal partner at the clinic, Dr. Sarah Scott. She’s an expert in breeds and breeding. Have you decided the breed you want?” Eleanor asked.

“We’re open to suggestions,” J. K. Sanders replied, “but my choice would be Beefmaster. I know a couple of excellent local breeders who’d let us have some stock at affordable prices.” He shrugged. “Might even donate ’em for the write-off on their income taxes, but we’ll have to pay a pretty penny for a good bull.”

“You do know they’re the largest breed of domestic cow,” Eleanor said.

“And one of the showiest,” Portree said.

“Your inexperienced men will be handling over a ton of bull.”

“Doctor, some of those guys could throw a bull over their shoulders and walk off with it. Besides, you’ve got the experience.”

“Even I cannot pick up a three-thousand-pound bull.”

“So you can’t handle it?”

“I didn’t say that. There’s not that much difference between a three-thousand-pound Beefmaster and a two-thousand-pound Brahma, except that the Brahma is probably a whole lot meaner.”

“Those are details we can discuss later if and when we decide to employ you,” Portree said.

“There is one thing that bothers me. Animals don’t work business hours. They often require care twenty-four hours a day, and most cows decide to calve at night. I know your prisoners sleep in dormitories in an inner compound. Will I be allowed to keep them at the barn when I need them? Nights, weekends?”

Leo Hamilton spoke up again. “The bakery begins work at three o’clock in the morning outside the compound. The mess-hall staff works weekends. We have a number of men who leave the prison each day for work release and return each evening. The men who are already here and the ones who’ll continue to arrive until we reach capacity are considered trusties. They are well aware that if they try to escape, they will be returned to maximum-security prisons and lose the good time that they have accrued.”

“So nobody tries to escape?”

“Occasionally,” Warden Portree said, “but not often, and we invariably catch them. The general rule among prison professionals is ‘three and three.’ Escapees are caught within three hours and within three miles of the prison.”

“So the men on my team will be able to work overtime?”

“When absolutely necessary,” Hamilton said. “They can be signed out by you or a CO and signed in again when they return.”

“I won’t abuse the privilege.”

“That’s all we ask,” Portree said. “Now, on to another subject. You know that a cottage on the grounds comes as part of the stipend?”

Eleanor nodded.

“It’s one in a row of overseers’ bungalows, built sometime in the forties. We’ve brought it up to code, but it’s not fancy.”

“I don’t need fancy.” She felt her spirits lift. Surely they wouldn’t be talking about housing if they weren’t going to offer her the job.

“You mind living inside the prison gates?” Torres asked.

“But outside the internal compound, right?”

“Yes. Just inside the perimeter fences.”

“There are five or six other cottages, aren’t there?”

“Yes, but not all occupied yet. We hope to have the work done—by inmates—by the middle of February. Then we’ll put the remainder up for bids to our top staff.”

“Good idea.”

“At the moment,” Torres continued, “it’s pretty lonely—only three or four others occupied.”

“I’m used to being alone. And I like being close to my charges. Besides, Creature Comfort is only ten minutes away by car, so it works out well.”

“All right, Doctor, what say we call you in a couple of days with our answer?” Portree asked.

Eleanor nodded and stood to shake hands all around. Raoul Torres winked at her and gave her a small thumbs-up.

She felt their eyes on her back as she walked out. The moment the door to the conference room closed behind her on their murmurs, she leaned against the wall and let out a deep breath.

“Did you get it?”

Eleanor felt Precious Simpson’s hand on her arm. Precious, principal of the general education program at the prison, had called her boss at the clinic, Rick Hazard, about the job posting in the first place.

“I have no idea.” She thought a minute. “Maybe.”

“Great. We’ll be neighbors. Those bungalows aren’t much, but it’ll be fun having another woman close by. Right now all I’ve got is a couple of crotchety old COs who don’t have any family.”

Precious was the warm, golden brown of a ripe peach, and wore her hair in tiny braids that hung down to her shoulders.

“I think Leo Hamilton really hates that I’m a woman and what he calls ‘attractive.’” Eleanor wrinkled her nose. “You’re a beautiful woman. How come he doesn’t worry about you?”

“Leo probably doesn’t consider my type beautiful.”

“Does being inside scare you?”

“Sometimes. A lot of the inmates they’re bringing in are huge. Most prisoners pump iron constantly. Sometimes when I’m walking in a group of them past the mess hall or into class, I realize I’m one woman among a bunch of convicted criminals who haven’t had a woman since they were sentenced.”

“How do you handle it?”

“Keep my eyes front, walk like I know where I’m going and don’t stop to chat. Then I duck into the staff common room, have a cup of coffee and shake for a while.”

“But you keep coming back.”

“Hey, the pay is great, the rent is free. But what keeps me here is the occasional success—like when some tattooed crack dealer reads Crime and Punishment and actually gets it.”

Precious walked Eleanor out to the staff parking area. As they stood beside Eleanor’s truck with Creature Comfort emblazoned on its side, a yellow school bus pulled through the gates and stopped by the administration building, a battered two-story brick building left over from the Second World War. The bus door opened, and a corrections officer stepped down and shouted to the passengers.

Their hands were cuffed in front of them, but they weren’t wearing leg or waist irons. They wore identical blue work shirts under jean jackets, jeans and running shoes.

“You’re right,” Eleanor whispered. “Most of them are enormous. My Lord, look at that one.”

A gigantic man, probably close to seven feet tall, who weighed at least three hundred pounds and all of it muscle, stepped from the bus and stood blinking in the sun. His skin was almost pure white—prison pallor. His white-blond hair was cropped so short it looked like peach fuzz.

“Move,” the CO shouted.

The big man shuffled forward obediently. From under his brows he noticed the women watching and smiled at them shyly. His eyes were pale blue. Eleanor thought he had the sweetest smile she’d ever seen.

Then she glanced at the man behind him. He, too, was tall and well built, but didn’t walk with that muscle-bound swing several of the others had. He didn’t have any visible tattoos and he carried himself easily. His gaze moved from side to side as though he was drawing his new surroundings in his head for future reference.

He looked straight at Eleanor. She caught her breath. So much anger, so much bitterness, so much grief. It was as though in that one glance she’d been able to see inside him. A second later he dropped his eyes and became simply another con shuffling along with the others.

“Move, you.” The CO dug the man in the kidneys with his baton.

She didn’t like that moment of recognition. She hoped he wouldn’t wind up on her team. With luck, she’d never see him again.