The guard was making excuses, but Boldt hardly heard them. He had argued; he had warned. He had heard the words of Dr. Richard Clements as he had seen him off at the airport: “You keep your eye on him. He’s one determined fellow.”
This was no place for Caulfield. He had been inside before, and the five years he had served for a trumped-up drug charge had helped to buy him a life sentence rather than death row. That was when Boldt had pressed for a suicide watch and had lost. The arguments had centered around transporting him back and forth for the trial, overcrowding, and expense.
They stopped in front of the cell. He hoped the guard was finished making excuses, but the man added, “I guess if you’re crazy, you’re just crazy.”
Harry Caulfield had vomited, much as his victims had vomited. He was lying in the bed, his head cocked to one side, eyes shut. Perhaps it had been a peaceful death.
“You suppose he complained about the rats just so we’d put out the poison? I mean what kind of idiot would do such a thing? What the hell are we going to say?”
“That he got what he wanted.” The morning paper open on the floor meant nothing to the guard. But Boldt saw it was open to the business pages. He knew the article: ADLER FOODS FILES CHAPTER ELEVEN. Besieged by lawsuits, Adler had folded his shop, though according to Daphne he vowed to return. Adler was not one to stay down long.
“Crazy bastard,” the guard said.
Boldt turned and headed back for the entrance, passing cell after cell of human beings behind bars. They stood with their hands on the bars, staring out at him, envying his freedom to leave this place.
As he passed the front desk, the guard held out Boldt’s weapon. He stopped, stared at it. The man wiggled it. It grew heavy for him.
Boldt accepted it. Snapped it into the holster.
He flinched as the cell door closed loudly behind him.
