MacNally didn’t bother to tell his cellie that this was his first penitentiary experience. If their escape attempt failed, he did not want to diminish his hard-won rep.
“So we make our move once they call the all clear,” Rucker said. That was consistent with what MacNally had planned before he disclosed his scheme to Rucker.
Now, after leaving the laundry at 10:14pm, they exited in the west yard part of the institution. MacNally inched forward and peered around the edge. The yard officer was letting the guards out of segregation, the brick two-story Building 63.
MacNally held up a hand, telling Rucker to wait. He watched as the officer followed the guards to the rear corridor, where they would be keyed into the main prison building.
It was common knowledge among the inmates that these particular doors were twice-secured, requiring the officer on either the east or west yards to unlock them from the outside while the Centerhall guard performed the same task on the inside.
He and Rucker stayed where they were, in a corner joint formed by the intersection of two twelve-foot heavy-gauge cyclone slow-down fences that were topped with barbed wire. MacNally motioned to Rucker, who opened a pillowcase they had brought with them and passed him a shortened broom handle. MacNally slipped the wood stick through the chain links, then used it as a step. Rucker handed him a wool blanket, which he then threw across the protruding wire’s prickly-sharp points.
Once they had both scaled the slow-down fencing, they low-crawled twenty-five feet to the perimeter wall, a much taller and imposing structure: it was rumored to extend forty feet into the air and an equal distance below-ground to prevent a prisoner from going over, or tunneling underneath it.
MacNally and Rucker set their kit down at the base of the west wall where it joined with A-Cellhouse. Based on the location of the towers and the lighting fixtures, as well as the configuration of the buildings, MacNally had suspected this corner area would be the darkest section of the barrier. But until he was in that spot at night, he could not be sure. Fortunately, his educated guess turned out to be accurate.
Rucker withdrew from the pillowcase a homemade rope they had fashioned from various pieces of clothing they had tied together. It wasn’t elaborate, but it didn’t have to be. All it needed to do was hold their weight during the climb. They had checked a short length in their cell during the night by pulling on it at various points, and it appeared to be sufficiently strong. Testing it in combat, so to speak, was another matter.
Complicating the issue was that they had assembled the longest part of the rope during their time in the laundry room, when they had access to bushels of additional articles of clothing. Working in the dark, they had tied shirts and sheets together, attaching at the end a metal cleat they had fashioned out of parts appropriated from the innards of the industrial dryer.
They modified the crude-looking device into the shape of a jagged claw so that, when tossed over the side of the rough brick masonry, it would grab onto the wall’s exterior surface. If all went according to plan, it would latch on sufficiently to support their weight as they made their ascent. Once one of them made it to the top, he could stabilize it for the other.
As MacNally stood there looking up at the wall, he had to admit, the penitentiary designers at the turn of the century understood human nature. It was an imposing obstacle-four stories high-and he and Rucker needed to scale it with only the assistance of a handmade rope. If it were not for Henry, he would think twice about attempting the climb. He looked over at Rucker, who was likely thinking the same thing as he peered up into the darkness.
“We’re not gonna get over it by staring at it,” MacNally said. “Let’s get going.”
After they scaled this barrier, there was yet another perimeter fence to defeat. But it would be a simple task compared to the daunting structure in front of them. Once over it, the massive prison buildings and tree line would provide adequate concealment as they made their way through the surrounding roads that would take them into the city.
There they planned to steal a vehicle or find a garage for cover. Although most escaped inmates attempted to put as many miles and angles as possible between themselves and their pursuers, MacNally reasoned that they should do the opposite-and remain in the neighborhood until the search parties had passed them by and the manhunt expanded into adjacent states. Then it would be safe to move.
MacNally gave the cleat a twirling heave, and it soared up and out of sight. They felt the slack go tight, then heard a clunk as the metal claw struck the other side of the wall. MacNally tugged, and then, convinced it had sufficiently secured itself somewhere on the masonry, nodded at Rucker.
But as he gave Rucker the signal to proceed, he heard the crunch of footsteps on fine gravel. They both spread their bodies against the cellhouse limestone, and waited, hoping the officer would not look in their direction.
They were wearing standard issue dark blue prison jeans, and the area in which they were standing was poorly illuminated-the reason why MacNally had chosen this spot for scaling the wall. As long as they did not move, shuffle a foot, sneeze, or cough, the approaching officer might merely pass them by.
MacNally’s heart thumped in his ears as he awaited a shout, a spotlight-anything to go wrong. But the footsteps faded, and once they had vanished completely, he pushed away from the cellhouse wall and silently signaled Rucker to get moving.
Finally, as planned, Rucker began his ascent, moving upward, hand over hand, footstep after footstep, deeper into the darkness until MacNally was no longer able to see him. But the rope kept swaying and jiggling. When it went quiet, that would be MacNally’s silent cue that Rucker had made it over and was ready for his partner to begin his climb.
It felt like several minutes before the rope stilled. As MacNally was about to tighten his grasp for the ascent, he heard noise behind him. He dropped to the ground, burying his face in the dirt, and waited. Seconds became a long minute. But all appeared to be quiet.
Finally, he rose and grabbed hold of the rope. He pulled down toward him and started to bring his foot onto the rough face of the wall-but instead of the line tightening, it went limp-and he fell backwards, onto his side. “What the f-”
MacNally got to his feet and pulled some more, trying to generate tension. If the rope did not go rigid, there would be no purchase, and he would not be able to climb. He continued to yank, the line falling impotently at his feet as yards of the knotted cotton accumulated on the ground.
He wanted to yell-scream-at Rucker, demand to know what had happened. The milliseconds passed and the homemade cord continued tumbling down against his ankles. He realized this could mean only one thing.
Rucker had screwed him.
He must have cut the line at the end, and removed the cleat. The question of why he would do that flittered through his thoughts-but he dismissed it as quickly as it came, because all that mattered now was getting over that wall-before he was caught.
MacNally gave his last yank-and the remaining rope flew down at his face. He ducked-then scrambled to find the end. It had been severed-just as he had feared-and the cleat was gone.
MacNally looked around in the near darkness, trying to locate something else he could tie to the end, a jagged device that had enough mass that it would grab the other side of the wall and hold his weight as he climbed. But there was nothing.
He peered further into the dim, humid surroundings-and saw a
