HL 04-The Final Hour by Andrew Klavan Page B

prison. The cinder blocks were painted yellow here instead of green. And during Christian services, there was a cross hung on the wall. Today, for Christmas, there was also a wreath and a small wooden crèche set up on the table that the chaplain used for his lectern. For Abingdon, the place was almost cheery.
    The chaplain—Chaplain Adams—was an old black guy. I don’t know how old, but old. He had long, sad features that looked like he was mourning for the world. I’d only had a chance to talk to him once, but I got the impression he was the only semidecent human being in the whole prison. Maybe that’s why he always looked so sad.
    He had his big leather Bible open on the table next to the crèche. He was reading the Christmas passages in Luke. His voice was as sad as his face. Even the joyful words of the Scripture sounded mournful when he said them:
    “And the Angel said to them, ‘Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people . . .’”
    Hard to make that sound mournful, but somehow Chaplain Adams managed to do it.
    There were a lot of folding chairs packed into the room. They were full, a prisoner in each, guys of every color who’d committed all kinds of crimes. Praying. Most of them sincere, I’d guess. Looking for a way out of a bad past, and a path to a better life.
    I know I was sincere. I was sitting in a chair about halfway to the back of the room, off to the right of center. I had my head bowed, my eyes closed. And I was praying just about as hard as I could. I was praying for help, praying that Mike would get word to Rose, and that Rose would get word to his bosses in Washington, and that his bosses in Washington would turn out full force to find Prince—and that everything would be taken care of by somebody else so that I wouldn’t have to break out of here with a bunch of Nazi maniacs.
    Your will be done , I added at the end of my prayer— but I’ve got to admit, I didn’t really mean it. I really wanted my will to be done: Namely, I wanted God to get me out of this mess, and fast!
    Anyway, I was hard at it, my head bowed, my eyes closed, so I didn’t really notice when the prisoner next to me got up and moved away. The first time I did notice was when I felt the smooth plastic tube slip into my hand.
    My head came up fast; my eyes opened fast. There was Blade, suddenly sitting next to me. His dreamy, murderous eyes were fixed on mine.
    I looked down and saw what he had given me. A homemade knife. I don’t know what it had been originally. Part of a bed or a chair maybe. I don’t know. It was a tubular piece of thick plastic with string wound tight around one end to make a handle grip. The other end was sharpened to a long, deadly point.
    When I looked up at Blade again, he smiled his toothy smile. He slowly pressed his index finger under his chin to show me how to drive the knife into Dunbar’s throat. But of course, I had already pretty much figured that’s what he wanted me to do.
    Then, with a quick glance around to make sure no one was watching us, Blade reached over and gently pushed the shiv up into my sleeve.
    “Just call me Santa Claus,” he whispered.
    Then he bowed his head and closed his eyes and pretended that he was praying too. And I bowed my head and closed my eyes. Only I wasn’t pretending.
    “And the shepherds returned,” read Chaplain Adams mournfully, “glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Dunbar Again
     
    “Yard time!”
    There was a flurry of snow falling as I stepped out into the yard. The sky was dark gray again and hung low over the heads of the gray prisoners moving over the grass and asphalt. The watchtowers seemed almost black against the sky. The riflemen inside were just slowly pacing silhouettes.
    I felt the plastic knife against the flesh of my wrist. It was pushed up my sleeve and secured there tightly by a couple of