Part 18 (1/2)

As the gray winter ered, the leprosy patients became more and more anxious about their future Word spread about an inainst the Bureau of Prisons for exposing him to leprosy patients A prelie, and the documents filed by the ine about unsuitable, dangerous conditions of a minimum-security facility where federal convicts and leprosy patients were free tothe battle for control of Carville to a head The Bureau of Prisons, intent on taking over the entire colony, had offered to help pay to relocate the patients The patients weren't sure if they would be offered some for somewhere else on the three-hundred-acre colony, or if they would be transferred to a nursing ho the details Or asking their opinions

The patients were suspicious from experience In the early days, they were kept in the dark about decisions on furloughs, new treates promised by one director would later be revoked by his successor And recently, the patients had been eriatric, invalid prisoners would be housed at Carville They had no inkling that erous prisoners would be a part of the arrangement

But the real probleet to maintain 130 patients at Carville was scheduled to be cut

Money-and currency-had always been a problem for leprosy patients Most colonies around the world minted their own coins and currency to prevent leprosy patients fro eneral population The coins usually honored Lazarus or the current leader of the country But Carville was never required to produce its own currency In the early days, cash was fuated with disinfectants Later, checks and cash eneral public Within the colony, though, money caused problems A staff person who perforht be wary of taking contaminated currency On more than one occasion, patients who paid for repairs would later discover that the bills had been run through a co out to dry on a clothesline Even the people orked at Carville were afraid And the ones eren't wanted to keep up pretenses

The staff at Carville was paid a 25 to 50 percent pre at the colony It was called hazard pay-a pre to work at the hospital Stanley Stein and the staff at The Star The Star had fought to eliainst the very people who cared for hi some of the staff In the end, a nomenclature compromise was reached Pay would not be cut, but it would be renaht to eliainst the very people who cared for hi some of the staff In the end, a nomenclature compromise was reached Pay would not be cut, but it would be rena after a rare winter frost, Sarah and Stan talked to Father Reynolds about their growing anxiety Sarah orried about being placed in a strange nursing hoine their reaction?” she said For blind patients, any relocation would ate new paths

Ella orried, too After church on a Sunday afternoon, she aiting forthe prison side frouards were around and stepped into the screened corridor It was the first chance we'd had to talk since I had been transferred to the education depart football playoffs

”Hey, Ella,” I said, ”what are you doing here?”

”Settin' in the breeze,” she said

And she was There was no wind, but she was sitting in the spot the patients called the breezeway This here ould talk Ella asked about uy Then Harry rode up on his bike He stopped and shook his head He couldn't believe he was going to be relocated Harry had lived at the colony since 1954 Other than a furlough each year to see his mother in the Caribbean, Harry had spent forty years at Carville

I wished I could help put a stop to the plans I tried to be encouraging, pointing out the most obvious benefit, the proposed 33,000 annual stipend

”If the stipend co to be upbeat, ”you could hborhood”

”This here is your prison,” Ella said, ”but it's our hoain, and for the first time since I had known him, he frowned He stared at his shoes ”People back away,” he said He grabbed the briers and placed his ainst the back He pulled it down over his brow and et used to it”

”People don't want folks like us stayin' on they street,” Ella said

”That's not true,” I told theot to know you” I pointed out that ere neighbors, right now ”I'm honored to live next to you And I would have been on the outside”

Ella looked at me, skeptical ”Mmm uhh!”

Then I remembered Lionel Day In 1973, Lionel moved down the street from my house He was the first African Aas stations They bought a two-story house in all-white Bayou Vieo doors down frorandparents once lived I overheard adults talk about plu property values I heard one mother say, ”The nerve of those people”

A week after his fan in his yard I don't know if kids did it as a prank or if adults did it for e was clear

I listened as some of the older boys in Bayou View plottedtheir driveaterer nigger in green, glow-in-the-dark paint so it would show up only at night And when they laughed at their own cleverness, I pretended to laugh right along with thelow-in-the-dark paint so it would show up only at night And when they laughed at their own cleverness, I pretended to laugh right along with them

Lionel was my friend We were both on the student council I wanted to hborhood I wanted to knock on his front door and invite hiize for the actions of s

I was afraid of the older kids Afraid of the names I'd be called Afraid to be on the outside

”I',” Harry said, serious and assertive Sweet Harry, with the great straw hat, all of a sudden seemed sturdy, forceful

Ella nodded ”I ain't leavin' neither”

I tried to ihbors ers But they would carry urement Ella and Harry would be found out People would discover a ”leper” had ht be just the beginning

I had done nothing for Lionel Day I h to stand by him publicly

I understood perfectly why Ella and Harry refused to leave Carville The world, out there, was full of people like me

CHAPTER 61

As the Bureau of Prisons continued preparations to take over the colony and evict the patients, dozens of new, sick inmates were transferred to Carville, ans Ahed over five hundred pounds, and athat was nearly three tiht out in front of his wheelchair

I stood in the hallith Doc and Steve Read We watched as he was pushed down the hallway by an orderly

”Looks like elephantiasis,” Doc whispered

”That's a form of leprosy, isn't it?” I said

”Hey,” Steve said, ”he's got dual citizenshi+p”

The prison population swelled, and rumors about the fate of the leprosy patients continued to swirl The lives of , just as I was beginning to feel hopeful about io, the Cuban who had baked sweets for Neil and Maggie, was hit in the face more than a dozen times because he switched channels in one of the TV rooms His lacerations required forty stitches, and he was thrown in the hole for fighting

A skinny black kid naer, pu guy had snitched on Calvin for selling stolen batteries

Two inmates in their seventies attacked each other with five-pound dumbbells On the sa cane to open a huge gash in the back of his roommate's head

The hole, the real jail inside Carville, was full Anyone who ran into serious trouble noould be sent, teht having sex with her new boyfriend in one of the janitorial closets She was shi+pped off to the parish jail, along with her new friend

Link, who had already been in the hole for biting, continued his quest to avoid work If guards dragged him to the landscape department, he found a couards looked away, he slipped back to his roouards shi+pped him off to serve teeks in solitary confineht recording bodybuilding audiotapes over the pay telephones His telephone privileges were taken away If a guard caught hiain, he, too, would be shi+pped off to join CeeCee and Link

Doc was also having trouble He lost his visiting privileges His girlfriend had tried to s roouards told hiht never be reinstated

Even Steve Read was having difficulties He started finding small piles of his hair on his pillow He blamed the water Carville was in the heart of Cancer Alley, a thirty-mile section of the Mississippi River where petrocheround ”It's cancer,” he said, ”I just know it” He also had a strange rash on his torso; he was sure he had leprosy