Halfway and leftover, crumpled and spread back out, sheared into pieces weighted with stone, concentrated as a chunk of quartz. He rolls over and falls from the bunk and is caught by the men, the escape artists, around him.
“I’m fit for it,” he whispers.
None but themselves are awake — there are seven of them — or only those like Dumpy Links who lies hours on his back looking up at the board underside of the barracks roof. Or Morcell Jackson who tortures himself with sexual memories of the common-law wife he strangled over in Hattiesburg. Maybe another couple kept awake by fear or rage. Cul Sampson who cries all night. None of these, according to the report, see anything. They know better than to ask Bulky if they can come, though Dumpy is on his feet naked and crouched down, ready to scurry out the door, before Bulky with a look sends him back.
It is a warm, moonless night. The Milky Way lies sloshed-over and frothing. They can see fine. They follow Bulky to the forge and wait while he crawls under the raised floor to get the rope. He comes out covered in dust and grinning.
“Fucking spiders all over me,” he whispers, and he is telling the truth. Milo brushes them off, little black widows that never really sleep. The men are all barefoot. The coiled rope as big as a sheep carcass thrown over his shoulder. “All right,” he whispers, his voice tight with the effort.
