Free One Monday We Killed Them All by John D. MacDonald

catch the rhythm, and do it just right. It’s like playing some kind of a game.” His voice rose to a pitch thin and plaintive. “And what was she worth? A bag like Mildred? She didn’t care about herself, did she? It didn’t matter to her what happened, what she said, the things she did. All she wanted was her kicks. What she liked best was somebody watching. Jesus Christ, what makes her worth five years!”
    “Meg wants to know what she can do,” I said.
    He came back from a far place and focused on me. “What does she want to do? Pack a picnic lunch?”
    “Do you want to see her?”
    “No.”
    “Do you need cigarettes or anything?”
    He didn’t answer me. He was staring down at the floor. I waited a little while and then I left. He didn’t look up. I wondered how he’d adjust to Harpersburg. So did a lot of other people. All of us guessed wrong. We thought that toughness was a muscle reflex, that they’d peel him right down to a whimper. In this good guy-bad guy world it is too easy for all of us to believe in the myth of the gutless villain. So we all guessed wrong.

v
    Meg called me from the kitchen door and I went in for the late lunch with the prodigal brother. He was in a yellow sweater, gray slacks, his cropped hair still spikey with shower dampness. Meg served the foods he had always loved best, in great quantity. She tried to talk in a spritely way of small funny things, but there was an edge of anxiety in her voice.
    I knew what was bothering her and I had no good way to help her. I knew he was somewhat sullen and indifferent, but not as much as she believed him to be. It is the prison mark on them. We learn to recognize it in our work. I can walk down a busy city street and pick out the ex-cons who have done long time with a good chance of being right, but oddly enough some of the ones I pick out will be career enlisted personnel in civilian dress. They have lost the normal mobility and elasticity of the muscles of the face, the expressive muscles. There is a restriction of normal eye movement, a greater dependence on peripheral vision. The range of the conversational voice is reduced. There is a restriction of gesture and a reluctance to move quickly. Somewhat the same effect can be achieved as a parlor game with the normal person by asking someone to balance a book on their head and then continue to walk, sit, talk, drink.
    “Is everything all right?” she would ask, too often.
    “Everything is fine, Sis,” he would say in the deadened voice of the cell blocks and exercise yards.
    Once he looked down and plucked at the front of the sweater and said, “So damn bright. I keep seeing it. I’m used to that gray.”
    And I could see him consciously slowing himself down as he ate. Most prison disorders begin in the dining halls, so that is where they try to achieve total control. At Harpersburg they file in and line up at the long tables. No talking. The food is already served. At the whistle signal they all sit and begin to eat. No talking. The stick screwsrove the floor and the gun screws watch from the gallery. At the second whistle, five minutes later, they stand up, facing the aisle, and start the file out, farthest tables first, carrying plates and utensils. Just outside the main door they split the file out into four check lines to get the cutlery count. From entrance to exit is a nine-minute span, so they gobble the slop, choke it down, gasping with haste, or endure a constant hunger.
    I could see him trying to slow himself to the leisurely pace of freedom. But there was too much food, and it was too rich. Near the end of the meal he suddenly turned sweaty gray and excused himself hastily. We heard the wrenching distant sounds of his illness.
    Meg sat with the tears running down her face. “He doesn’t like anything,” she said in a hopeless voice. “He doesn’t like anything at all.”
    “It will take a little time.”
    “It isn’t the way I wanted it to be, Fenn.”
    “Be