Balloon Shot
by Joe Manchester

THE STORY: The action take place in a prison cell shared by four inmates.

One of these is Desmond, whose stories of his prison experiences—and the outlandish escapes he has engineered—are beginning to grate on his cellmates.

There is open doubt as to whether he really did slip away from Alcatraz in a homemade submarine, or tunneled out of Sing Sing via the warden's wine cellar.

His latest scheme, which is to depart from the present premises by balloon, brings on a noisy debate, and the demand that if he is telling the truth he must take the others with him.

Two guards arrive to investigate the resulting ruckus, and Desmond's chief antagonist takes pleasure in revealing what all the fuss is about—whereupon Desmond is taken off to see the warden.

But in minutes a siren sounds.

A prisoner has knocked out a guard and escaped—over the walls and away in a balloon, no less.