A Bloodhound to Die for by Virginia Lanier Page A

women in front of me were chattering in Spanish and gesturing at their wristwatches. They seemed to be angry. I glanced at my watch and saw that it was ten minutes until four. My guess was that the guards had refused to send for whomever theywanted to see and they were protesting that it was still visiting hours for another ten minutes.
    A bored guard slowly picked up the phone and requested an interpreter. He waved them aside and looked in my direction. I cocked my head to indicate the far end of the counter and walked several feet from the women and waited for him to follow me. He eventually moseyed on down to me, shaking his head.
    “They don’t understand English, lady, so why did we have to move down here?”
    “I doubt that. How many foreign women have you met in their early twenties that don’t understand English well enough to get by? I just didn’t want what I had to tell you to be overheard and repeated to any prisoners.”
    “Why would they pretend not to understand me?”
    He was not only bored but also pissed that he had been asked to walk a few extra feet and then had to lean over the counter to hear me.
    “They were late getting here and are still counting on being able to see their men. They’re using their minority status to get special privileges.”
    “Never happen,” he asserted. “Now, what’s this earth-shattering piece of news that you didn’t want spread to the prison population?”
    I changed my mind. This guy was an idiot.
    “I would like to speak to the warden,” I said, pronouncing each word distinctly.
    A loud raucous buzzer sounded for a good five seconds, making me nearly jump out of my skin.
    “End of visiting hours,” he explained, sneering because the racket had made me twitchy. “The warden doesn’t come in on Sundays.”
    “Okay,” I said, being reasonable. “Make it the assistant warden.”
    “He doesn’t work on Sunday afternoons.”
    “Captain of the guard?” I hazarded.
    “On vacation this week.”
    Answer Man was having fun. He cocked his head and waited for my next guess. I should have dressed better. I wasn’t being taken seriously in worn jeans, T-shirt, and cross trainers in nightmare orange.
    “To whom would I report a future jail break?” I asked politely.
    “Me,” he answered, not batting an eyelash.
    “You?” I repeated skeptically.
    “Uh-huh.”
    “Perhaps you should get pen and paper, so you won’t forget,” I suggested sweetly.
    “I’ll remember.”
    “A recent transferee from Atlanta, Jimmy Joe Lane, was telling me he’s gonna walk soon. He also mentioned my bloodhounds, in passing. I have the contract for search and rescue for this prison. My name is Jo Beth Sidden.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “That’s it? ‘Uh-huh?’”
    “Uh-huh.”
    We both turned toward the loud conversation thatbegan when a prison guard approached the waiting women. All three were speaking at the same time, and all energetically waving their arms. Answer Man and I couldn’t understand the words, but knowing the general drift of their request, it was easy to follow their progress by watching expressions and hand movements. With less than sixty seconds of rapid-fire negotiations, all three were smiling happily as the guard led them away toward the visitors’ area.
    “Mission accomplished,” I remarked.
    His look of consternation changed to aggravation.
    “Anything else?”
    “I want to apologize. I didn’t take into consideration that you might not be able to read or write. Shall I write the message and leave it with you?”
    His seventeen-inch collar seemed to shrink. Suddenly a dull flush began to creep upward from his neck to his hairline. I’ve found that younger men will shrug off an insult better than older men will; the young hate to let the female know she has scored. This one was pushing fifty.
    He gripped the counter until his knuckles were white and didn’t trust himself to speak. I decided to get out of there. It isn’t wise to insult a prison