| OCR Text |
Show he wanted, as, ard outside the .2eco, Finay. Port w 1 '" ut-He waited 0neaS r figured the guarJ.'N beds-rareWeSS P'Pe loose, l0Wer, kedC ew pleCes of clay&e PgresswasdS06-ws PgresswasdS06-ws he working V but the hole, oftheway.was othecV! most men. He squeeze through 2 -hard he tried. Had "' adietofcom dodger ean7' wouldn't have had with the pounds h ; much of his strength a!i! Dropping back to his h, three or four tries, he a mng around the cell a f" -uld go. He ran un --sweat. --sweat. Then suddenly st ripped offhis shirt. OnceTh wormed his way Up into hopmgthe sweaty bareskn;' :Xhlm t0 slip O: It worked, in a few min. crawled onto the floor J office where the guardsbidj time during the day. The doors to thefrontstref, rear yard were locked. Porti'; riedly searched through dr,,.'' boxes and coat pockets. He 1 not find a eKj; anywhere. Apparently the i,f 6 took them all home. 1 1 He did, however, fmd a pif( wire, and proceeded to f' keyofhisowntopickthelocl' frontdoor. ! (Tobecontint: Port brace himself against the insults. They were stumbling up the front steps of the jail when the sheriff suddenly stopped, turning to face the mob. "So you want to lynch him," Reynolds said. There was a loud cheer. "Here he is. God damn him. Do what you please with him," shouted Reynolds, shoving Port down the steps into the waiting mob. Port suddenly found his second wind. Clawing, kicking and slugging slug-ging like a desperate animal, he somehow managed to work his way free, earn a little space, and inch his way towards the jail wall until his back was against it. He was facing the enemy, his rear secured. "Ill kill the next man that touches me," he snarled. The half circle of cursing mob-bers mob-bers stayed out of reach, no one of them wanting to incur Port's wrath. With nothing more than sheer ferocity he had gained some breathing room. But what should he do now? A Mexican wormed his way through the close bodies to where he was facing Port. There was a coiled lariat in the Mexican's hand. Slowly he began uncoiling it. The two mens' eyes were locked on each other. "Just try it," Port snarled. "I'll rip off your testicles and shove them down your throat. Then I'll mash your damn face in." J - . : : . . - The Mexican stopped, but did not back away. Port, with his back against the wall and the mob in front of him, simply didn't know what to do. He only knew that he would not go willingly to the gallows. Someone called for someone some-one else to get a gun. Finally, it was Reynolds who came to the rescue. Pushing roughly through the mob, the big sheriff grabbed his prisoner by the collar and started towards the front door. Reluctantly, the mob made room for the sheriff and his prisoner pris-oner to pass. With the door safely shut against the mob, Reynolds went to his desk where he retrieved a pair of brand new iron shackles out of a bottom drawer. Without a word, he slapped them on Port's ankles, then pushed Port down the ladder into the basement base-ment dungeon. A few minutes later Watson followed, fol-lowed, but without shackles. The two were no longer allowed into the upper cell, which meant no view to the outside, and no treats from Violet. A few days later the jailer allowed al-lowed Watson to come out of the dungeon. Port never saw the young man again. Without companionship companion-ship the dark dungeon was doubly oppressive. In addition to being dark, it was a cool place, too cool. Port was always cold, except when he paced the floor, not an easy task with shackles on his ankles. Port studied every inch of his cell. Stone by stone he studied the floor and walls. He moved his hands over every inch of the huge logs thatcomprisedtheceiling. Hewas looking for something loose, something some-thing that could be moved or cut. -He became consumed with the need to escape. There was nothing else. In one corner there was an old stove pipe extending upward through the ceiling. Apparently at one time prisoners had been allowed al-lowed to burn charcoal in a can beneath the stove pipe. Though the hole itself was too sm all for a man to squeeze through, Port discovered mostly by feel because the light was so poor that the original hole that had been cut through the logs was quite a bit larger. It had been cut larger on purpose so the heated pipe would not catch the logs on fire. The pipe was surrounded by several inches of clay which had become dry and brittle, and with a little effort could be cracked away. Port went to work chipping the clay, using his spoon as a tool. As the pieces of fell to his feet he trampled them with his feet until there was nothing but fine powder which he spread across the floor. If the guards looked they would see nothing. To avoid being heard Port did most of his work at night, when the guards were gone. Sometimes a guard slept in the jail, but usually they all went home for the night, making it possible pos-sible for Port to make all the noise |
