Getting rattled on 'the Rock'

Alcatraz Island, Calif. — EACH day at sundown, when the last tour boat departs this desolate, wind-swept outpost, one lonesome soul is left behind. He's the night watchman of Alcatraz.

Guided by the beam of his flashlight, Gregory Johnson inches down the gloomy infirmary ward of this retired prison, once home to the nation's most malicious killers and psychotic criminal malcontents.

"Hey, what's that noise?" he asks, throwing the light against the half-open door of a solitary confinement cell. He pauses, shrugging off another unexplained Alcatraz phenomenon.

"Man," he whispers, "I couldn't imagine being out here at night without my gun."