Take the Reason Prisoner, John Joseph McGuire [ebook reader with highlight function txt] 📗

The intercom on his desk buzzed and he flipped the switch. "Go ahead, Bennington here," he said, and realized only after he had spoken how the thought of Rooney had made his voice a growl.

"Dr. Thornberry, sir. May I see you?"

"By all means," Bennington said. "The sooner, the better."

Thornberry started talking as soon as he opened the door between the two offices.

"General, did you see the list of new arrivals? Of all people, Dalton! And arriving too late to be conditioned!"

Bennington said nothing until the psychologist had seated himself. He simply watched his chief assistant and tried to find some reason to like the man.

"What do you mean," he finally said, "too late to be conditioned?"

Having just considered this problem, Bennington's question was a testing of Thornberry, not a request for information.

Thornberry was looking aggrieved, as if the fact was so obvious even the general could understand it. "Processing takes all day, sir, and this group does not arrive until late afternoon."

"Does the processing have to be continuous?" Bennington hoped his chief assistant would show a little flexibility.

But the question threw the bureaucratic psychologist into mental dishevelment. "I beg your pardon?"

"All we have to worry about is keeping them quiet tonight, then you can slip them back to normal in the morning and run them through as if they had arrived tomorrow."

Thornberry pursed his lips. "But that would mean—"

"A little extra work on the part of very few men," Bennington snapped. "We'll keep them away from the rest tonight by sleeping them in The Cage. A couple of men in Supply can move cots and blankets over there now. Feed them coffee and sandwiches. Call the Mess Hall and get them made up. At the same time I know you'll find three or four men who want the overtime for dishing it out.

"How long do you need to know if you can use hypnosis or if you need drugs, and wouldn't it be simpler to drug the whole lot?"

"No, definitely not the last," and for the first time Thornberry was being positive, "because we have to use a massive dose and they can't shake it till—day after tomorrow, at the best tomorrow afternoon."

"The Army can decide to hypno in two minutes with a spin-dizzy wheel and some lights. How long for you?"

Thornberry bridled. "The same, especially if I do it."

"Good. So now you need a doctor to drug the ones who need it, a psychologist to decide who gets what, one machine moved and one technician." Bennington snapped on his intercom, said to his secretary, "Get Judkins in here."

"Yes, sir!"

The word seems to be getting around, Bennington decided, but this will take a moment.

He started on his next problem. "Have you ever inspected the prison grounds at night?"

"No, sir! That is Slater's duty!"

Thornberry was again the proper bureaucrat, horrified at the thought of invading another's domain.

"Judkins here," came from the intercom.

"Bennington speaking. You know the corridor between the reception and interview rooms in The Cage?"

"Yes, sir."

"Get your equipment over close to there. We have a group of prisoners arriving around 1530, too late for complete processing. But at least you can condition them against escape."

The intercom was silent a moment, then, "But how will I know who I'm working on?"

Bennington questioned Thornberry with a raised eyebrow.

The psych-expert shook his head, no.

"This time you don't need to know," Bennington said. "Get your equipment set up and report to me when it's ready."

Another long silence, then, "Yes, sir."

"He should know who he has under the hood," Thornberry said thoughtfully, after Bennington had silenced the intercom, "especially since the group includes a man like Dalton—"

"We have something more important to discuss," Bennington cut in, dismissing the subject. "Last night I inspected the prison compound."

He described what he had found, then leaned back to hear Thornberry's reaction.

"That's not in the least what I told him he could do," the psychologist said.

"What! This is your idea?"

Thornberry was equally astounded at Bennington's reaction. "Yes, of course. As soon as I took over as Acting Warden, I told Slater that social visits between the prisoners were entirely permissible until Lights Out. But this—"

The psychologist shook his head, then appeared to reconsider and his face brightened. "But it's a step in the right direction. Naturally, I prefer the Mexican system where the wife is permitted regular, very private, visits to her husband—"

"Let me get this straight," Bennington felt like a man lost in a maze. "You told the Chief Guard that the prisoners could visit each other—"

"No, not all of them," Thornberry interrupted. "I never meant that some of the problem cases, like a few of those in Number Three, should have complete social relationships."

"Just exactly what were you thinking of when you gave that order?"

"Thinking of? Why, sir, I was thinking of our poor patients here. Society has ordered them confined, yes, but need we necessarily deprive them of all human rights?"

Thornberry seemed ready to orate for an hour, but Bennington stopped him with a gesture. "All right, I've handled POW camps, maybe in one way I can see your point. But we can take up the philosophy of this later.

"Right now, this is the essential fact, that Slater has taken your order and twisted it into a racket.

"So let's talk to Slater."

But the intercom said, "He hasn't come on duty yet."

"He has the room at the head of the stairs," Thornberry said.

The door was locked, but the psychologist produced a set of master keys.

"I want a set of those, too," Bennington said.

The room was heavy with the smells of cheap whiskey, stale cigarette smoke and human sweat. Two figures were sprawled on the bed. A hairy, bearlike man, Slater; a big well-built brunette.

Thornberry squinted through the gloom, then turned on the lights. "That's Mona Sitwell," he said, "and I'm sure she was supposed to be on orders to leave here two weeks ago."

Bennington remembered the case, the spinster who had found her parents a hindrance to her extensive enjoyment of male companionship. She had literally chopped up their objections.

"Follow through on the orders you give sometime," Bennington said dryly. "You may meet a few more surprises."

The man on the bed stirred, threw his arm up over his eyes. "What do you want?" he mumbled sleepily.

Bennington mentally cursed the Civil Service regulations which tied his hands, and left him only one thing to say: "Your immediate resignation."

"Message Center, sir."

"Go ahead." The general looked at the desk clock. 1515. He could guess what they wanted to tell him.

"Sir, the new consignment will be here in about ten minutes."

"Thanks. Pass the word along to Dr. Thornberry and add, I'll meet him at the flagpole in five minutes."

Bennington pushed back his chair, slowly stood up. This had already been a full day's work.

Slater had been worse sober than he had been sleepy and half-drunk. His covering barrage of threats on leaving the prison had been equally divided between the general's personal health and the entire prison setup.

Thornberry had screened the other guards. And, after sitting in on only two sessions, Bennington had at last found one small reason to like his chief assistant. The psych-expert could spot a liar almost before the man opened his mouth.

But right now, and, at the wages offered, probably for a long time, Duncannon was very short of guards.

Judkins was ready in The Cage. An efficient man, but he had been a little resentful at the extra work involved in moving his equipment.

The prisoners would remain in The Cage overnight, except for their trips to the Mess Hall. A reorganized supply room had disgorged more than enough cots and blankets to convert The Cage into a temporary dormitory.

Bennington riffled the papers on his desk showing when the prisoners on hand had been received and how long they had been ready to go to their assigned prison. This matter took top priority. Some of the people had been here over a month. If he could push through the plan to charge the states for every day Duncannon kept a prisoner after the criminal was ready for shipment, then the various states should each pay, as a rough estimate showed....

But the clock on the desk showed 1520, time to meet Thornberry. With longer than usual steps, Bennington strode out of his office and out the main door of the Administration Building.

Thornberry was pacing around the flagpole directly opposite the main entrance.

"This man, Dalton," the psychologist said, falling in step with the general, "you know he escaped from us twice."

"Make him the first through," and Bennington dismissed the subject. "I'm more interested in this. Are there any ex-service men among the group?"

Thornberry sniffed, "Still worried about our conditioning and our security, general? I repeat, even though we do not use the lobotomies and other techniques of our cold-war competitors, we can nevertheless condition anyone sent to us so that he will not make any trouble."

Bennington shrugged, "I'd like to see you work on a para-commando. Or one of the General Staff."

Thornberry, now leading the way through the Processing Building, called back over his shoulder. "How many of them end up in prison? I mean, from the General Staff? The para-coms do, of course, they just can't adjust to civilian life and I think the Army should do something about that before they discharge them. But they never come here without an accompanying court order allowing us to use the eyeball technique."

Along the short path, enclosed by barbed wire, from Processing into The Cage. Swiftly along the corridor behind the one-way vision mirrors, down the walk to the gate in the barbed wire.

Bennington looked around and nodded approval: his reception committee for the new arrivals was waiting.

He looked across the river toward Harrisburg. Yes, just turning into the bridge approach, two tractor-trailer combos, preceded and followed by white cars.

Bennington glanced around again. From the roof of The Cage, Ferguson, drafted as a guard for this emergency, waved and lovingly patted the butt of his submachine gun.

One of the regular guards gave the general a sound-powered megaphone. He nodded thanks, lifted it.

"Give me your attention!"

"The procedure is as usual except that, when the prisoners go into The Cage, they are going to get an overnight conditioning treatment.

"But until they've had that treatment, you must be alert! These are all dangerous men."

Beside the general, Thornberry whispered hearty agreement. "Yes, yes! Except for Rooney, everyone on that list is here for armed robbery or murder and usually both."

Bennington lowered his megaphone. "I almost forgot to tell you. I added a complete physical search to your metal-detectors, we're doing it right inside the door to the corridor.

"And we're keeping all their personal effects. That was bad, Dr. Thornberry, letting them have their money. As long as a prisoner has cash, you can't trust any guard."

Thornberry froze. "As prison psychologist, I protest. I consider those procedures an unwarranted invasion of physical privacy and a forcing of a man into dependency with traumatic effects—"

"I would much rather make a prisoner dependent on my good will than have him bribe my guards, doctor. And I would much rather invade his privacy than have him invade my stomach with a knife made out of bone.

"A metal-spotter is, perhaps, good, but too many killing tools can get by them."

Thornberry seemed more than willing to continue the discussion, but the tractor-trailers were pulling off the bridge. After a moment's jockeying, they turned so that the back of the trailers pointed toward The Cage.