Beyond the wall

The first of a remarkable series of underworld stories by the author of “Thirst” and “The Harvest of the Deep.” Few other writers have Mr. Leverage’s keen sense of drama and ability to describe swift action clearly.

Chester Fay, a slender, keen-eyed, gray-haired young man,--clad in prison shoddy, serving life and fifteen years at Rockglen,--glanced through the rain and over the wall to where a green-cloaked hill loomed. “Charley,” he whispered, “we might as well try it this afternoon. Are you game?” Charley O’Mara, sixty-five years old, bent, broken, and bitter at the law, coughed a warning. He raised his pick and started digging around a flower-bed.

A guard in a heavy raincoat, carrying a dripping rifle, came toward the two prisoners. He stopped a few feet away from Fay.

“Quit that talkin’!” he snarled. “I’ll chalk you in if I see any more of it!”

Fay did not answer the guard. He spaded the earth, dug deep, tossed the shovelfuls to one side and waited until the guard had strolled within the shelter of a low shed.

“Charley!” he continued without moving his lips. “Listen, old pal. See that motortruck near the shed?”

“I see it, Chester.”

“See where the screw is standing?”

“He’s watching us.”

“And I’m watching him, Charley. We can beat this stir in an hour. Do you want to try it?”

“How you going to do it?”

“Will you follow me?”

“Yes, pal.”

“Wait till it gets a little darker. Then we’ll take the chance.”

The prison guard stood with his rifle lowered to the moist earth beneath the shed. His eyes ranged from the two convicts to the wall upon which were other guards sheltered in tiny guardhouses. He yawned and drowsed, standing.

Fay worked in a slow circle. He had seen the auto-truck come into the prison yard at noon. It was part of the road-gang’s outfit. There was no road-work that day, on account of the rain. The inmate driver had gone into the cellhouse.

Old Charley O’Mara let his pick dig into the earth with feeble strokes. He paused at times. There was that to Fay’s actions which presaged much. The gray-haired young man was gradually closing in on the drowsing guard. He was like a lean panther getting ready for a spring.

* * * * *

The attack came with lightninglike suddenness. Fay dropped his shovel, crossed the earth, struck the guard a short-arm uppercut and bore him down to earth, where he smothered his cries with a flap of the raincoat.

Charley O’Mara came limping toward the shed.

“Get a rope!” snapped Fay. “I don’t want to croak him.”

“Croakin’s too good for the likes of him, Chester.”

“Get a rope. We’ve got about fifteen minutes to work in. We ought to be beyond the wall by then.”

Fay worked quickly. He took the rope the old convict found, and trussed the guard, after taking off the raincoat. He made sure that the man would make no outcry. He fastened a stick in his mouth and tied it behind his head. He rose and glanced through the down-pouring rain.

“I knocked him out,” he said. “Now, Charley, put on that raincoat, take the cap and rifle and walk slowly toward the auto-truck. Get in the front. Stand up like a guard.”

“But they might know me!”

“They wont know you. It’s raining. The screws on the wall will think you are taking the truck out, by order of the warden. I’ll drive. An inmate always drives.”

The guard who sat huddled in the little house which loomed over the great gate at Rockglen rose, opened a small window and glanced out as he heard the motortruck mounting the grade from the prison yard. He saw what he thought was the figure of a guard standing by a convict. The convict crouched with partly hidden face over the steering-wheel.