THE taxi driver floored the accelerator, and Max felt his face flatten like an astronaut launched into space.
“What are you doing?” Alex shouted, looking up from her phone. “You’re going to kill us!”
The driver yanked the steering wheel left and right, to a concert of blaring horns from each side. “In Boston,” he shouted back, “we call it driving!”
Being rich had its advantages. After finding the treasure left by Jules Verne, Max’s and Alex’s lives had changed big time. They could buy any clothes and eat in any restaurants they wanted to. They could hire private planes and cars. But no amount of money could prevent Max from wanting to puke in the backseat of a zigzagging Lexus on the Southeast Expressway.
“What’s your name?” Alex demanded.
“Mario!” the driver replied.
“Figures,” Max said.
“Want me to slow down?” Mario asked.
“Yes!” Alex replied.
“No!” Max shouted.
Time was crucial. Max gripped to the armrest, watching the GPS. The prison was only ten miles and two exits away.
Alex clutched Max’s arm, her fingers tightening with every swerve in the traffic. “We need to get there alive,” Alex said.
“I’ll need both my arms,” Max said. “It feels like you’re trying to detach one of them.”
“Sorry.” Alex sat back, pocketing her phone. “I just texted my friend Rod at Harvard. He’s the smartest person I know. He once interned for Spencer Niemand. Now he wants to go into criminal law, and he says he’ll help us if we need it.”
“So, kiddos, who are you seeing at Bilgewater?” Mario asked, as he veered around two SUVs and a silver minivan festooned with bicycles. “Mind if I ask? Anyone famous? White-collar criminal? Ponzi schemer?”
“Burgwasser,” Max corrected him.
“Don’t know that name. Friend of yours?” Mario asked.
“It’s the factual name of the prison,” Max said. “Bilgewater is the nickname. Bilge is the bottom of a boat. When bilgewater collects, it gets slimy and gross. So the name is sarcastic.”
“He likes facts,” Alex explained.
“My kind of guy.” Mario took a right-hand exit and zoomed toward a knot of cars lined up at a red light at the end of the ramp. “Who-o-o-oa . . . hang on . . .”
He stomped on the brakes. The car began to fishtail. The back of a Range Rover loomed closer. Max closed his eyes as the car squealed to a stop.
When he opened them again, a shocked, angry Yorkie was yapping at them through the back window of the Range Rover.
“My bad,” Mario said. “Guess it must be a big day at Bilgewater.”
“Is it always this crowded?” Max asked.
Mario shrugged. “Dunno. Honestly, most of my customers don’t come here.”
Yap! Yap! Yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap-yap! yapped the Yorkie.
“My thoughts exactly,” Alex said.
Max peered through the window at the road to the right. He could see distant flashing red lights. The traffic was bumper-to-bumper all the way to a big tan-brick building about a quarter mile away. “That’s the prison,” he said. “And it looks like some kind of police action is blocking the traffic.”
“No worries,” Mario said, looking over his shoulder. “I’ll put it in reverse, climb the grassy hill, get back on the highway, take the next exit, and cut through the—”
“No!” Max and Alex cried out together. Before Mario could protest, they unhooked their belts and bolted out of the car.
A dirt path followed along the road, with cement patches that hinted of a former sidewalk. People stared through the windows of small houses, and a homeless woman with a wool cap and a bandaged face staggered toward them, holding a bottle and an empty cup. “Change? Spare some change?” she shouted in a guttural voice, lurching into Max’s path.
Trying to avoid her, Max jogged from side to side, but the old woman mirrored him. As they slammed into each other, the woman wrapped him in a kind of bear hug. “Shall we dance, old boy?” she said.
Max caught a whiff of fish. “Sorry!” he said, bouncing away
With a grumble, the woman turned her back and staggered up the road as if nothing had happened.
“Come on, Max!” Alex shouted, pulling Max toward the commotion. They elbowed their way through a crowd of people who’d left their cars to stare.
Max had no idea what they were staring at.
They stopped at the line of cars outside the prison. A man and two women with video equipment marked WBGT-TV were just inside the gate. One of the reporters was talking into a mic with a serious look. “Police are examining leads,” he said in an announcerish voice, “and the mayor has urged all in the neighborhood to stay inside houses and report any suspicious-looking people. More news at six.”
“What happened?” Alex demanded to the closest cop.
“The prison is in lockdown,” the cop replied.
“Why?” Alex asked.
“There was an escape,” said someone in the crowd.
People began speaking all at once:
“Dug a tunnel with his fingers . . .”
“Bit a guard in the neck . . .”
“A convicted mass murderer . . .”
“Snuck out in a pile of laundry . . .”
Alex looked helplessly at Max. He pulled out his phone and began accessing the social media feed of WBGT. Clicking through a post that said BREAKING NEWS, he read carefully.
“It was an escape. . . .” he murmured, then read aloud, “‘The breakout method has not been disclosed, and officials have not released any names, but he is believed to be a white male, age fifty to fifty-five. He is assumed dangerous, and local residents are encouraged to call 911 with any leads.’”
Alex ran toward a group of officials gathering by the TV interviewer, but a policeman stood in her way.
“We have an appointment!” Alex cried out.
“Sorry, not today,” he said.
“The person who escaped—do you know anything about him?” Alex asked.
The policeman shook his head. “They have to search the prisoners to be sure.”
“How are the residents going to know who to look for?” Max asked.
Not far from him in the crowd, a thin, white-haired woman spoke up: “This has happened before, honey. All of us in the neighborhood look out for one another. We recognize unfamiliar faces. These cons always try to disguise themselves. Last year, one of them wore clothes he found in a dumpster.”
“The rotten zucchini stuck to the back of his shirt gave him away,” said the man standing next to her, erupting with a big laugh. “Then there was the guy who pretended not to know English. He was wearing a T-shirt and Mickey Mouse undershorts. Like the residents in a prison town wouldn’t suspect he ditched his uniform for that getup! Hoo boy, you see every kind of crazy disguise here.”
Max began smelling fish again. And he thought back to the old woman he’d collided with.
Shall we dance, old boy?
By now Alex was moving on, talking to more people, trying to get the attention of the officials. Alex and Max looked back up the road from where they’d just come. Littering the cracked walkway was a crumpled-up dollar bill and three Skor bar wrappers.
He shoved his hands into his pocket to get his phone. “Alex!”
She elbowed her way back through the crowd. “What happened?”
“I smelled fish. I only smell fish when I feel afraid. And I only feel afraid when something is very, very wrong.” Max pulled his hands from his pockets. “My wallet . . . my money . . . they’re gone . . .”
“The homeless woman robbed you?” Alex asked.
“That homeless woman,” Max said, “was Spencer Niemand.”