Stevenson had dug up an old newspaper account of the fire at the school, which he handed out. According to the story, the fire began in the school’s main building—the structure housing classrooms, administrative offices, and sleeping quarters for the staff—and quickly spread, as embers were carried aloft by the heat and the wind, to the boys’ dormitory, the chapel, and the outbuildings. Spared from the flames, by virtue of being upwind, were the school’s Negro facilities.
The story named the guard and the nine boys who’d died in the fire—three of whom, Hatfield had told Vickery, were buried in the school’s pipe-cross cemetery because no one had claimed their bodies. So the crosses, apparently, marked “acceptable” deaths, accidents and illnesses for which the school and its staff would probably not be held accountable in any serious way; the Bone Yard, on the other hand, was the closet in which the school’s dark skeletons had been carefully hidden.
When Angie stepped back into the command post, she caught Vickery’s eye and gave him a look that indicated she’d just heard something interesting. He pointed at her with his cigar. “What’s up?”
“Two things,” she said. “I just got a call from Steve Hobbs, in Latent Prints. Steve examined the note that was on our windshield last week. The one that said, ‘Find the Bone Yard.’ Steve treated the note with ninhydrin and got some prints off the paper.”
I raised my hand like a student in class. “Let me guess. They were mine.”
“Some of them,” she said. “Not all of them. He ran them through AFIS, the Automated Fingerprint Identification System. And he got a hit. A really interesting hit.”
“Define ‘interesting,’ ” said Vickery.
“They matched a guy named Anthony Delozier,” she said. “White male, age fifty-nine. Been in and out of prison his whole life. Most recently at the Florida State Penitentiary, in Starke, for aggravated armed robbery.”
“So if he’s locked away in Starke,” asked Whitney, “how’d he put the note on your windshield?”
“He was released three months ago.”
“That is interesting,” Vickery agreed.
“Here’s the most interesting part,” Angie went on. “Forty-six years ago, at age thirteen, he was sent to the North Florida Boys’ Reformatory for truancy.” As she said it, the hairs on the back of my neck prickled.
“Where’s he now?” asked Vickery.
“Havana.”
“Cuba?”
“Florida.”
“That’s a lot closer. Smaller, too.” Vickery assigned one of the agents to track down Delozier; meanwhile, Angie pulled a stack of pages from the copier and began passing out handouts.
“Flo, in Documents, just sent us the last of the diary,” she went on. “She thinks it sheds light on the fire that burned down the school in 1967.”
Skeeter, I cant stand it no more, Buck said. He didnt look at me. I just cant stand it no more. Still not looking at me. If I dont get out of here Ill be dead in a month.
It scared me, him talking like that. Partly it scared me because escaping was hard and dangerous. There wasnt a fence around the school, at least not a fence you could see. But sometimes its the fences you cant see thats the hardest to scale. In six months only two boys had tried to get away. One of them come back missing an eye and the other one come back dead. They said he drowned trying to swim across the river, but Id seen that boy swim, and he was part fish. He never drowned. Not unless somebody helped him do it.
But I knew it was true, what Buck said. If he didnt get away he would be dead soon. That was the part that scared me worse, the truth of it. When I went to regular school I saw how teachers picked out some kids as the smart kids and some kids as the dumb kids, and some kids as the good kids and some kids as the bad kids. Once a teacher decided what kind of kid you were, all the other teachers treated you that way from then on. Like you had a big sign on your back saying smart or dumb or good or bad. Same thing in here, only nobodys sign said good or smart. They just said bad or worse or worst. For some reason Bucks sign said worst. I dont know if that meant Buck was the worst or his punishment was worst. Both I guess. No matter what he did hed get singled out and taken down.
Here, I told Buck, take this. I handed him the compass I wore around my neck. You might need it to find your way.
Find my way where, he said. I don’t know where to go.
Anywhere but here, I told him. Pick a direction, any direction, and just keep going.
That was yesterday.
When I woke up today, Buck was gone.
I was glad, but I was also scared for him. Hoping he’d make it. Afraid he wouldn’t.
I was taking out the infirmary trash today when Cockroach called to me from across the yard. Come on over here, boy, he said, I need you to haul something to the dump.
Will it fit in this trash can, I said. Its only about half full.
Hell no it wont fit in that trash can, he said. Set that down by that tree there, I need you to come do this first.
Yessir, I said, putting down the can. What is it?