Undercover Prison King novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: The Offer

The warden's office had carpet.

That was the first thing Sawyer noticed, after a week of concrete.

It had pale grey wool underfoot, a mahogany desk and a coffee service of real china.

The window looked out on the desert and none of the wire.

He wore a grey trusty's shirt a size small, and Hargis stood behind him with the baton hooked on his belt.

"Sit, Mr. Maitland," Sallow said.

Sawyer sat.

The warden poured two coffees himself and slid one across the desk.

"How are the ribs?"

"Sore."

"They'll heal. Captain Hargis gets carried away." Sallow smiled at Hargis without turning his head. "It's his best quality and his worst."

Hargis said nothing.

On the wall behind the desk hung a large framed portrait in oil.

A heavy man in his sixties, white-haired, with a square jaw and a stubborn mouth, stared out of it with his hands on a chair.

A brass plate under the frame read SILAS HARLAN, FOUNDER.

Sawyer looked at his father's face for a long time and let his own go blank.

It was the hardest thing he had ever done, harder than any fight in the yard.

"The old man," Sallow said, following his eyes. "Built all this from a loan and a bad idea. He died last month. Heart."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. He was impossible." Sallow sipped.

"He had a son, you know. A drifter, not spoken to in twelve years."

He smiled over the rim.

"The board is quite relieved the boy never turned up."

Sawyer wrapped his hand around the cup so the knuckles would not show.

"Why am I here, Warden?"

"Because I run a clean house, and a clean house needs men who keep order." Sallow set the cup down.

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