Nightrise

Daniel."
    "I will do what I can."
    And then he was gone, leaving Jamie's head spinning. He heard a faint click and realized that Feather had turned off the air-conditioning again. That made sense. If Max Koring looked in, he would have to see that Jamie was still suffering. The heat returned, an unwelcome blanket that completely smothered him. But he had a whole bottle of water inside him and the worst of the day was over. Jamie wished he had asked Feather the time but he could only lie there, gazing at the rectangle of white glass, watching as the light softened and faded away. Eventually, the evening came, and then the night. The single lightbulb, in a steel cage over the sink, flickered on automatically. Nobody had brought Jamie any food. Perhaps that was part of the punishment too…or a way of weakening him up for whatever was to come. He was beginning to get nervous. Had Joe Feather been discovered? Had he had second thoughts? He had said he'd come back when it was dark and surely more than an hour had passed since the sun had set.
    But it was much later when the door finally opened and Joe Feather hurried in. He had Jamie's old sneakers and a new T-shirt with him. He was also carrying another bottle of water. Jamie drank greedily while Joe talked. He wished the supervisor had thought to bring some food too.
    "We must hurry," he said. "Mr. Koring has gone…"
    "Where?"
    "There's a landing strip. A small plane. He's picking up Mr. Banes."

    Banes. It was the last name Jamie wanted to hear. He was instantly on his feet, pulling on the T-shirt, ready to go.
    "My friends are close," Feather went on. He glanced at his watch. "It is ten o'clock. At half past ten they will come. We must be ready by then."
    "What about Daniel?"
    Feather took a small plastic bottle out of his pocket and unscrewed it. Jamie saw that it was filled with some sort of red syrup. "This contains choke cherry juice," he explained. "It won't harm you." Before Jamie could stop him, he had squeezed it all over the side of Jamie's face. Jamie put his hand to his skin and then examined his fingers. The juice looked exactly like blood. "I will take you to the medicine wing," Feather said. 'You must pretend you are hurt." Jamie remembered what Baltimore had told him while they were having lunch. The medicine wing stood right up against the wall and served both sides of the prison. Now he understood what Feather was doing.
    "The security cameras will see you," Feather continued. "But they will see the blood and they won't ask questions. There is nobody inside the medicine wing. In an emergency, they would expect me to call the nurses — but of course I won't. We will be alone."
    "How do we get through to the Block?"
    "Come now. I will tell you…"
    The two of them left together. The juice had streaked all the way down the side of Jamie's face and anyone watching him would assume that he had either been in a vicious fight or had tried to kill himself.
    Joe Feather held on to him and as they went down the empty corridor, Jamie staggered as if he could barely stand up. They came to a door that led out to the football field. Jamie already knew that none of the guards carried a key to this one. It could only be opened electronically from central control. He felt a camera high above, swiveling around to examine him. Would it work? Silence. Then a loud buzz and the lock clicked open. Joe helped him through. They were out!
    It felt strange, crossing the field in the artificial light of the arc lamps. The desert was pitch-black.
    Tonight there was no moon. But the entire prison was a strange, electric white, the razor-wire fence glittering all the way around the perimeter. Jamie could see the windows of the four units and thought of the boys he had met — Baltimore, Green Eyes, DV, and the rest of them — and felt sorry that he was leaving them behind. They had made mistakes. They had done stupid things. But he had known them and he had thought none of them were really so bad.
    The medicine wing rose up in front of them with the solid, cinder-block wall stretching out behind. Joe Feather had a key to the door and let Jamie in. They passed into a reception area with a desk and two small clinics leading off a narrow corridor behind. There was an eye chart on one wall, a couple of antidrug posters on the other. Jamie noticed another camera watching him from the corner. How could the two of them do anything when they were being followed all the time?
    Joe