Hard News (Rune 3)

Oh, hell ... Boggs heard the slow footsteps of several men coming up the corridor toward that one door.

He knew Severn Washington was outside and he knew too that the big black man was as loyal as a friend could be in prison.

But that was a big qualifier. In prison.

Inside, anybody can be bought.

And, when it comes right down to it, anybody can be killed.

Boggs still had no idea why Ascipio wanted to move on him. But it was clear he was marked. No doubt in his mind. And right now, hearing footsteps come closer to the door, he knew--not a premonition or anything like that-- he knew something was going down.

He stood up instinctively. The possibilities for weapons were: a book or a chair.

Well, now, neither of them's much help at all.

Oh, he didn't want the knife again. That terrible feeling of the glass blade. Terrible ...

He looked at the chair. He couldn't pull it apart. And when he tried to lift it, a searing pain from the first knifing swept through his back and side.

He tried again and managed to get the chair off the ground, holding it in both hands.

Then part of his mind said, Why bother?

They'd burst in, they'd circle around him, they'd take him. He'd die. What could he do? Swing a chair at them? Knock one of them off balance while the others easily stepped behind him?

So Randall Boggs, failed son of a failed father, simply sat down in the chair, in front of a fiberboard table in a shoddy prison library, and began thinking for some reason, suddenly and obsessively, about Atlanta and the Sunday dinner menu of his childhood.

From his pocket he took out the book the reporter girl had given him and put his hands on it as if it were a Bible then he thought that was funny because probably to the old-time people, the old Greeks or Romans, or whatever, this myth book probably was a bible.

Prometheus got freed.

But it didn't seem like this was going to be a replay of that story. Not here, not now.

The footsteps stopped and he heard mumbled voices.

Randy Boggs swallowed and tried to remember a prayer. He couldn't so he just swallowed again and tried not to think about the pain.

The door swung open.

"Hey, Boggs."

He blinked, staring.

"Boggs, come on. Haul ass."

He stood up and walked toward the guard. He opened his mouth to say something but nothing came out, which was just as well because he didn't know what to say anyway.

"Let's move it along, Boggs."

"What's up?"

The guard had drowsy eyes and a voice to match. "The warden wants to see you. Hustle it."

*

"YOU GOT YOURSELF A PRETTY LITTLE GIRL," FRED MEGler said to Randy Boggs.

The lawyer was trooping around the office. He couldn't sit still and was on some kind of energy trip.