`What are you going to do on Monday?’ I asked him. `You’ll be back home, doing whatever you do. You’ll be walking around Margrave or Atlanta or wherever it is you walk around. If they’re after you, won’t they get you then?’
He started up with the thinking again. Going at it like crazy. He hadn’t thought very far ahead before. Yesterday afternoon it had been blind panic. Deal with the present. Not a bad principle. Except pretty soon the future rolls in and that needs dealing with, too.
`I’m just hoping for the best,’ Hubble said. `I sort of felt if they wanted to get me, they might cool off after a while. I’m very useful to them. I hope they’ll think about that. Right now it’s a very tense situation. But it’s all going to calm back down very soon. I might just make it through. If they get me, they get me. I don’t care any more. It’s my family I’m worried about.’
He stopped and shrugged. Blew a sigh. Not a bad guy. He hadn’t set out to be some big criminal. It had crept up on the blind side. Sucked him in so gently he hadn’t noticed. Until he wanted out. If he was very lucky they wouldn’t break all his bones until after he was dead.
`How much does your wife know?’ I asked him.
He glanced over. An expression of horror on his face.
`Nothing,’ he said. `Nothing at all. I haven’t told her anything. Not a thing. I couldn’t. It’s all my secret. Nobody else knows a thing.’
`You’ll have to tell her something,’ I said. `She’s sure to have noticed you’re not at home, vacuuming the pool or whatever you do on the weekend.’
I was just trying to lighten it up, but it didn’t work out. Hubble went quiet. Misting over again at the thought of his backyard in the early fall sunlight. His wife maybe fussing over rose bushes or whatever. His kids darting about shrieking. Maybe they had a dog. And a three-car garage with European sedans waiting to be hosed off. A basketball hoop over the middle door waiting for the nine-year-old to grow strong enough to dunk the heavy ball. A flag over the porch. Early leaves waiting to be swept. Family life on a Saturday. But not this Saturday. Not for this guy.
`Maybe she’ll think it’s all a mistake,’ he said. `Maybe they’ve told her, I don’t know. We know one of the policemen, Dwight Stevenson. My brother married his wife’s sister. I don’t know what he’ll have said to her. I guess I’ll deal with that on Monday. I’ll say it was some kind of terrible mistake. She’ll believe it. Everybody knows mistakes are made.’
He was thinking out loud.
`Hubble?’ I said. `What did the tall guy do to them that was liable to get himself shot in the head?’
He stood up and leaned on the wall. Rested his foot on the edge of the steel toilet pan. Looked at me. Wouldn’t answer. Now for the big question.
`What about you?’ I asked him. `What have you
done to them liable to get yourself shot in the head?’
He wouldn’t answer. The silence in our cell was terrible. I let it crash around for a while. Couldn’t think of anything more to say. Hubble clunked his shoe against the metal toilet pan. A rattly little rhythm. Sounded like a Bo Diddley riff.
`You ever heard of Blind Blake?’ I asked him.
He stopped clunking and looked up.
`Who?’ he said blankly.
`Doesn’t matter,’ I said. `I’m going to find a bathroom. I need to put a wet towel on my head. It hurts.’
`I’m not surprised,’ he said. `I’ll come with you.’
He was anxious not to be left alone. Understandable. I was going to be his minder for the weekend. Not that I had any other plans.
We walked down the cell row to a kind of open area at the end. I saw the fire door Spivey had used the night before. Beyond it was a tiled opening. Over the opening was a clock. Nearly twelve noon. Clocks in prisons are bizarre. Why measure hours and minutes when people think in years and decades?