Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Falconer 124<br />
did. The din of the shouting only made his torpor more desirable,<br />
the noises worked on him like the blessing of some destructive<br />
drug, and he saw his brain cells like the cells of a honeycomb being<br />
destroyed by an alien solvent. Then Chicken set fire to his mattress<br />
and began to blow on the small flames and ask men to pass him<br />
paper to keep the fire going. Farragut barely heard him. They<br />
passed up toilet paper, hoarded announcements and letters from<br />
home. Chicken blew so hard on the flames that he blew out all his<br />
teeth—uppers and lowers. When he got these back into place he<br />
began to yell—Farragut barely heard him—“Set fire to your<br />
mattress, burn the fucking place down, watch the flames leap, see<br />
them coughing to death, see the flames shoot up through the roof,<br />
see them burning, see them burning and crying.” Farragut heard<br />
this remotely, but he distinctly heard Tiny pick up the phone and<br />
ask: “Red Alert.” Then Tiny shouted: “Well, what the hell did you<br />
tell me you got a Red Alert for when you ain’t got no Red Alert.<br />
Well, all right—I got them all yelling and throwing stuff around<br />
and setting fire to their mattresses, so why ain’t my cellblock just<br />
as dangerous as C and B? Just because I ain’t got no millionaires<br />
and governors in here don’t mean that my cellblock ain’t as<br />
dangerous as some other cellblock. I got all the boobs in here and<br />
it’s like a dynamite cap. I tell you they’re burning their mattresses.<br />
Well, don’t tell me you got this Red Alert when you’re drinking<br />
whiskey in the squad room. All right, you’re scared. So am I. I’m<br />
human. I could use a drink. Well, all right, then, but step on it.”<br />
“CELL BLOCK F UNDER RED ALERT. CELL BLOCK F UNDER RED<br />
ALERT.” That was ten minutes later. Then the door rolled open<br />
and they came in, eighteen of them wearing masks and yellow<br />
waterproofs, armed with clubs and gas cans. Two men got the hose<br />
off the rack and aimed it at the block. They moved clumsily. It<br />
could be the waterproofs or maybe they were drunk. Chisholm<br />
pulled off his mask and got the bullhorn. Chisholm was drunk and<br />
frightened. His features were all wrong, like a face reflected in<br />
moving water. He had the brows of one man, the mouth of