我上了高速公路，一直走，天色变暗了，实实在在地变黑了。随着雪堆的越来越高，已经无法分辨哪里是路的入口和出口了。不时，我发现自己走进了一个沟渠中。一阵风过来，寒冷的风，突然之间，我一阵发抖。彻寒入骨。我要快点找个地方寻找庇护，就好像是对我祷告的回应，我看到远处一个建筑的轮廓。好像是一个谷仓之类的建筑物。
我开始朝它走过去，这时积雪淹到我的膝盖了。为了到达那里，我不得不一路跋涉。等我赶到时--太令人失望了。它不是谷仓，而是一个方形木制储藏室。门关闭着，墙壁裂开了，风呼啸着吹进来，带着雪花旋转着飘进来。不管我怎样卷缩在一团，我也无法避开它。好像我在一个风道里。
为了避免冻死，我整晚都在走来走去，在监狱里也不曾这样做。我的大脑在疯狂的思考，规划未来。在等待风声变小一点的时候，我要彻底改变自己。变化我的容貌，改变我的性格，更换我的身份。我记得读过一本阿拉巴马州医生布兰迪因（Brandywine）的书-你怎么能忘记这名字-他曾经被指控为一名从恶魔岛（监狱）假释的前罪犯去除指纹。我想起了那个手术，前罪犯指尖的肉被切下来，然后指头被敷在他的肋骨间两个星期。结果指纹彻底消失了，虽然当局高度怀疑，但是根据法律的标准要求，也无法确定这个人的身份。我要自己找一个为我做这个手术的医生。我要处理我的鼻子。我要重新设置我的牙齿，这些会改变我整个脸的结构。
我整个晚上都在规划如何重建我的脸，没有再想到布兰迪因医生和他的无指纹手术，直到现在写文章的时候。
天一亮，我回到路上开始行走。很快，我回头看到一辆巨大的拖拉机轰鸣而来，伴随着发动机冒出来的阵阵浓烟。我向司机挥手致意，拇指指着纽约的方向。司机停下来了。
当我爬上拖拉机的台阶进去的时候，才知道我的腿有多僵硬。当我关上门的时候，才知道里面有多温暖。他正是要去纽约的，事情太好了。"你怎么走？"我问他。"走隧道？"不，他准备走乔治华盛顿大桥。不管怎样说，这是我最后的关口。在24小时多的时间里，我逃了5次。如果他们在通往纽约的路上设置路障，我的一切都白费了。
一个好兆头是，卡车司机对于在荒无人烟处发现我毫无疑心。"你住在附近吗？"他问。这是他问的全部问题。我告诉他，我正赶往纽约为我的姐夫工作，他是一个服装店的工头，我在路上被暴风雪拦住了。他甚至没有听我说。只是自顾自的讲自己的事情。 我了解到他开了20年卡车；卡车的震动让他得了肾脏病，这是卡车司机的职业病；他在外面的时间比在家里更多；他结婚了，有两个男孩；大儿子正在上大学，因为肾脏病和其他的原因，他们都不想成为卡车司机。然后，他又开始讲他在卡车工会的活动。他是个自说自话，喋喋不休的人，我要做的事情就是偶尔咕哝地应答一下。
最后，我们驶向乔治华盛顿大桥。和往常一样，那里有很多警察。拖车到达收费亭。司机付过路费，再次启动，然后朝着纽约前进。
我们一到布朗克斯区第179街道岔道，我就下车了。我知道汤米·克林住在第四十四街。我也知道他又在西区码头为米奇·鲍尔斯工作。
我从179号一直走到125号。纽约就是纽约，到处都是人。在125街，我看见一个人停在地铁站上端点燃一支烟。走过去，我说，“嘿，我在布鲁克林有份工作。可以给我些零钱吗？我刚发现我把钱包忘在家里了。”
原文：
219-220页
I hit the highway and kept walking and it started to become dark and then it did become dark and then it became real dark. With the snow piled as high as it was, it became impossible to tell where the road began and ended. From time to time, I’d find myself stepping off into a gulley. A wind came up, an icy wind, and suddenly I was shivering. A chill to the bone. I was going to have to find some shelter fast and, as if it were an answer to my prayers, I saw the outline of this small little building off at a distance on the side. Like a barn or something.
When I started toward it I was in snow above my knees. To get to this building, I had to practically wade all the way. And then—what a disappointment. It wasn’t a barn, but a kind of square wooden storage shack.
- The door was off and a siding was out, and the wind came whistling in, carrying a swirl of snow with it. No matter where I tried to huddle down, I couldn’t get away from it. It was as if I were in a wind tunnel.
To keep from freezing to death I spent the night walking back and forth, something I had never done in prison. My mind raced like a madman’s. Planning the future. While I was waiting for the heat to die down I was going to reconstruct myself completely. Alter my appearance, change my personality, lose my identity. I could remember reading about an Alabama doctor named Dr. Brandywine—how could you forget that name—who had been indicted for removing the fingerprints of an ex-con who had been paroled from Alcatraz. As I recalled the operation, the flesh had been sliced from the ex-con’s fingertips and the raw fingers taped between his ribs for two weeks. The result had been fingers which were entirely devoid of prints, a circumstance which, while highly suspicious to the authorities, had nevertheless made it impossible for them to establish the man’s identity according to the standards demanded by the law. I would find a doctor of my own choosing to perform this operation on me. I would have a nose job. I would design a new set of teeth that would alter the whole construction of my face.
I spent the whole night scheming on how I was going to reconstruct myself, and never thought of Dr. Brandywine and his no-print fingerprints again until the very moment of writing this.
As soon as it was light enough, I went back to the road and started walking. In a very short time I looked back and saw a big tractor-trailer chugging along with plumes of smoke coming out of its diesel. I waved my arms at the driver and pointed my thumb toward New York. He stopped.
I couldn’t believe how stiff my legs were as I mounted the high step to the cab. Or how good the warmth of the cab felt when I closed the door. To make it perfect, he was going all the way to New York. “How are you going?” I asked him. “Through the tunnel?” No, he was going over the George Washington Bridge. Either way, it was going to my final danger point. I had escaped about five times in little more than twenty-four hours. It could all come to nothing if they had set up roadblocks at the approaches to New York.
One good omen was how remarkably unsuspicious the truck driver seemed to be about finding me in the middle of nowhere. “Do you live around here?” he asked. And that’s all he asked. I told him I had been heading for New York to work for my brother-in-law who was a foreman in a dress house when I had got stopped by the storm. He wasn’t even listening. He wanted to talk about himself. I learned that he had been driving a truck for twenty years; that the vibrations from the truck had given him kidney trouble, which was the occupational disease of truck drivers; that he was away from home more often than he was home; that he was married and had two sons; that his older son was in college and that neither of them were going to be truck drivers, what with the bad kidneys and everything. And then he began to talk about his activities with the Teamsters Union. He was a self-starting, nonstop talker. All I had to do was grunt every once in a while.
Finally, we were driving into the approach to the George Washington Bridge. As usual, there were a lot of cops around. The trailer rolled up to the booth. The driver paid the toll, started up again, and headed toward New York. A good thirty-six hours after we had burst through the steel door at Holmesburg I was finally . . . finally home free.
As soon as we hit the 179th Street turnoff into the Bronx, I got out. I knew that Tommy Kling was living on Forty-fourth Street. I also knew that he was working again for Mickey Bowers on the West Side docks.
I walked all the way from 179th to 125th. New York being New York, there were a lot of people around. At 125th Street, I saw a guy stop at the top of the subway kiosk to light a cigarette. So I said, “Lookit, I’ve got a job over in Brooklyn. Do you have any spare change on you? I just found out that I left my pocketbook at home.”
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