Absolution River (2 page)

III

Montana State Prison in Deer Lodge was not a kind place. The prison looked like it was designed in medieval times. The courtyard was filled with dead grass and dirt. The walls were built much like a castle with spires made of brick and iron. This prison was known for holding the worst that America had to offer in a desolate land where there was nowhere to run and mountains on all sides. The prison was outdated and should have been condemned years ago.

The cellblock was loud and filled with sounds of evil men.

“Keep it down or I’ll thump your skull!” yelled the prison captain.

An unforgiving man who just found out his teenage son had knocked up the local bar fly down at McNills. The only bar for fifty miles where all the guards dropped half their pay every check.

The inside of the prison had two levels. The second level was metal grating of the cheapest quality, and one could always hear a guard moving along the steel monstrosity occupying most of the open space of the cellblock. The cells had traditional sliding metal-caged doors which would open only three times a day, once for each meal time. The majority of the guards were uneducated and brutish. The Captain was their Ahab. His violence was known throughout the state, and he was diligent in a campaign of ensuring everyone around him knew, especially the prisoners.

None of these guards possessed the strength and will to go against the captain, except for Lt. Francis Anders, born Stalking Wolf. This name is his greatest secret, as he is a member of the Blackfoot nation born and raised on the Flathead Reservation in Northern Montana. He would not live long if his secret were to be exposed. He had a wife and child in Flathead and the guard job at Deer Lodge had great benefits; he would be just another unemployed Blackfoot without this job. He really needed it. So he played the game, and at times would have to laugh at disgusting jokes or look away at certain acts. In hiding, and in dark places of the prison where other guards were not present, he would show kindness to a select group of prisoners. Those who he felt were convicted wrongfully or who were truly attempting rehabilitation. There was one such prisoner he knew little about and he took a liking to him immediately. There was also something very familiar about him. This prisoner came in as unidentified and spent most of the time in solitary confinement. Anders would say kind words to him and would give him extra rations when he could, but eight years with this man and he knew nothing about him.

The hands of the prisoners hung out of their cells and cigarette smoke filled the air. Getting a rise out of the guards was the only entertainment on Cellblock D. Although today was not like most days. A prisoner was being released.

“He’s finally out of here,” said one of the prisoners to the adjacent cell.

“Did you hear he put four in the infirmary the first day he got here? Don’t know how many since,” said John J.

An upstanding citizen in his own right, John J was put in for trying to beat his pregnant girlfriend with famous words like, “You whore I know it ain’t mine,” and “there ain’t no way in hell I’m looking after it.” As if it was in his ability to. With three clean punches to his girl’s belly he would indeed not be taking care of anyone’s baby. Shortly after that he went to McNill’s to celebrate his new freedom. Several drinks and a few hours later he found himself locked up, not realizing he had confessed to half the guards in Deer Lodge.

All along these cells were men of similar disposition. They all knew that this unknown man, in his several years behind these walls, was not like them, and it made them angry. Angry at what they did not understand. He was mean, they knew that, but he never spoke one word to anyone. The man took several beatings in the beginning, but overtime it was he who was doing the beating, however, only out of necessity. When he was put into a corner, men got hurt.

The cellblock doors buzzed as they opened, and with two guards in front and two guards in back came the prisoner. He was in shackles with head down and long hair covering his face. The cells immediately became silent. The prisoner and the four guards came from solitary confinement at the North end of the prison. They were headed to the South exit of the prison, heading towards the outside. At his back left was Anders, who needed to unlock his foot shackles. When he completed the task and rose to him, near his face he uttered imperceptibly to the prisoner, “you made it.” The prisoner would not acknowledge but with the slightest nod. Anders looked to his left at the captain who took note of this interaction. Anders played it cool and returned to his part of the procedure.

The guards brought the prisoner to reception to receive his things. All in all it included; one pair busted up old denim jeans, one pair of work boots, an old rawhide belt, one long-sleeve button down shirt, and one hairpin. As the guard was about to throw the hairpin away, not knowing any better, the prisoner grabbed his hand, twisted it and put the guard to his knees. His fellow guards whacked the prisoner in the back of the knees and he went down with a grunt.

“What the hell?” said the injured guard. The guard handed over the pin and puzzled at its significance. Seeing as the prison was already overcrowded he saw no sense in keeping him for assault.

“Prisoner 14965, you are now being released under your own cognizance having served your full term of eight years at the Montana State Penitentiary.”

The prisoner was in the prison restroom prior to his release. He closed the door behind him and placed the hairpin on the mirror ledge. For a moment he stared at the pin and looked up into the mirror. This is the first he had seen himself in quite some time. The hair on his head and face was long and dirty. He stripped naked and trimmed his beard to a shadow and kept his hair just to the base of his neck. He looked back at the mirror and caught a glimpse of what he had become, just a broken down memory.

Lt. Anders escorted the prisoner to the outer gates of the prison. The walk was less than a hundred feet. The path was ten feet wide with twenty-foot chain link fence on each side. The tops of the fence had coils of barbwire along the entire length. The prison would not let you feel free until the very last minute. Anders walked behind and to the left of the prisoner, and stared at him the entire time. There was something so familiar about him. Now that he had shaved off a large portion of his beard and hair, he could actually see his features. The man turned ever so slightly, acknowledging the stare, and returned with eyes forward. A singular focus to leave that prison and to once again feel the taste of freedom. Anders moved around the man and unlocked the chain link door. As he opened it and the prisoner stepped forward, they locked eyes, and who that man was lingered on the edge of his mind.

The prisoner walked out a bit to the road. He looked left and right and saw nothing. He held the hairpin in his pocket and rubbed it. With the whimsical nature of the wind, he chose a direction and began to walk.

IV

Archibald Grimes was not a kind man. At fifty-seven he was forty pounds overweight with a cocaine addiction. Although, these faults were not apparent in his ability to wipe an area clean of good timber, and he enjoyed seeing the desolation that he produced. Much like the waste he laid to his family and all that knew him. It was a sick game he played sometimes as he embraced this nature of his.

He sat in his beat up chair in the trailer at one of his many worksites overseeing the harvesting of another North Central Montana timber site. A very dirty white button up shirt with black suspenders and black-rimmed glasses was his usual attire. Muddy work boots and soiled khakis also not uncommon. He wore a white hat with a black ribbon around the top and Archibald was always sweaty no matter the situation. His very existence was exhausting to him.

Heavy equipment churned outside, grinding and sawing. The trailer was old and decrepit with scantily clad women posted over the walls and stacks high with work orders, insurance claims, and subpoenas. None of this would stop him as he sat there contemplating whether he had had too much of his favorite drug that morning or if it was just indigestion. Screw it, he thought to himself as he took another snort and washed it down with his staple of Wild Turkey.

In this moment of daze right after a hit he would be the most lucid. Staring out from his desk he noticed the picture of his daughter. She was grown and off to college by now, and he knew she was glad for it. Away from the path of destruction he laid to his family and her mother. As anyone might suspect if they had met Archibald for more than a few minutes, the only thing that mattered to Arch, as his few friends called him, was Arch. He only cheated on his wife six or seven times, he thought, and he felt a brief moment of sadness as the remnants of his humanity fled with the short-lived buzz. There was not enough food, women, or drugs to satisfy him. In all these years though, as he was not a stupid man, he realized that he would not deny himself the pleasures of this life no matter the cost to his soul. This job to him was just another part of that psychosis, and every tree he tore down and piece of life that he destroyed would never be enough, and he found satisfaction in this contentment. This was what life was about and he was the lucky one to find out before his death.

“Hey boss, parcel thirty-four has some squatters, what do you want us to do?” said Frederick, who was one of Arch’s old friends’ boys. He only kept him around because of an accident quite a few years back that took Fred’s father’s life. An accident easily avoided if Arch had been drinking less and spotting more. Back in those days they cut with hands and a chainsaw, none of this fancy equipment they have nowadays. Though Arch couldn’t complain, these machines made him his millions.

“What the fuck do you think? Push ‘em out of there. If they don’t go then point a 12 gauge at their face, and if that doesn’t work, then pull the trigger,” grumbled Arch as he was awakening from his drug induced haze.

“But…” Fred said with apprehension.

Arch grumbled and grabbed the truck keys. He shoved Fred into the truck and locked the 12-gauge in the rearview window gun mount.

As they arrived, the workers were all standing around smoking and joking but immediately realized they were probably doing something wrong as the boss arrived. It was with unbridled rage that Arch led these men into the forest and it was out of fear that they would do anything he asked.

The squatters were typical tree huggers. Swirly multi-colored dyed shirts and bandanas on their heads. The girls had dreadlocks, as did the boys. None of them were much older than twenty-five.

“Hell no we won’t go!” they chanted.

“Oh, God,” mumbled Arch under his breath.

“What should we do?” asked Fred again in his usual sheepish way.

“Dammit boy, sometimes I just want to knock your teeth out, you know that? You need to grow some damn balls, and your daddy ain’t around no more to help with that. Guess I’ll need to teach you a lesson or two.”

He grabbed the shotgun from the rear window and pumped it once. The hippies were convinced that this man would not hurt them over a couple of trees. Most of them were out there because it was something to do and not some deep-rooted love for nature.

Arch did not say a word but took a poll of the eyes of his men. They were anxious to have their fear proven out there in the middle of the Montana wilderness.

All told there were four protesters, all beginning to look anxious, as this man was not like the others they had encountered. His eyes were different. He was a freight train and they were cattle on the tracks.

“Oh it is a shame my young men and women,” roared Arch, speaking to everyone to include his workers, “that you would even begin to doubt my resolve! Is there a single soul out here after my own heart? NO! There is not one of you who would presume to challenge me!”

A pause to catch his balance, balance is good for the soul he thought. He glanced at his men who were waiting anxiously for what would happen next.

“You have five seconds to remove yourself from my property or I will begin to execute you all one by one beginning with that bitch over there,” said Arch. He pointed over to an innocent looking girl with cutoff jeans that were too short, and pigtails with a pink ribbon at the bottom of each. She looked around nervously. Her head turned to her friends for support. There was none to be had.

The hippies looked at each other with increasing apprehension and decided silently and unanimously that these stupid trees weren’t worth it. They began to walk away through the East side of the parcel and on to what they hoped was a longer life.

As they were leaving Arch was not satisfied that the appropriate amount of fear was distributed.

“You there, boy, get over here, I want to tell you something,” stated Arch in a tone that was not to be argued with.

As the boy approached in his pot leaf dyed shirt and baggy jeans, Arch began to grin.

“I have half the mind to shoot you right here and leave you to the birds and maggots, but I am a merciful man and you must be thankful for that.” Arch raised the butt of the shotgun and with one fell swoop broke the boy’s nose.

“Hey you can’t do that, it’s against the law!” screamed the bitch, surprising herself.

“You see any law out here darlin’?” said Archibald quietly and as a matter of fact.

V

Drummond, Montana was a small town. The smallest you could imagine without being considered merely an outpost. Most of the buildings had been neglected minus the local burger joint, and a greater than average number of drinking establishments. Cattle roamed just outside of town and that was how the folks who lived there made a living. The main road was full of people simply passing through and getting the last of their fuel before the stretch to Missoula.

The burger place was the center of town where travelers and locals would come in simply because it was the only place to eat, but the food wasn’t half bad. Mary, a local woman, came in almost every day with her husband of sixty, and they had lived there their whole lives and would probably die there.

“Hey Mary!” shouted the young waitress. “Isn’t that your truck?”

Mary got up and saw her ‘60 ford truck speed off onto the highway.

The newly minted ex-con did not feel much but the breeze in his face in his new truck. In his mind he was merely a drifter waiting for the next thing. Hoping for something better to come along but knowing that it wouldn’t. He was simply waiting for the next life. The road stretched for miles with no one in sight. He thought back to his days as a child, but avoided this process as it led to thoughts of his father and then inevitably to the sadness when he thought of his mother. That day was behind him and forward is the only place he knew to go.

After that tragedy in his life he stayed around the house until fifteen and one day he just left. Jack’s father stopped drinking almost entirely after his mother passed. He was quiet most days and went to the fields only to return and fix Jack a simple dinner. There was only silence between them. The years continued like this. Jack was left to his own devices and most days, when he returned from his walk from school, he would explore the wilderness around their home. His imagination was alive with imaginary friends and adventures where he was always the hero. It was difficult to imagine himself as anything else. Boys often are drawn to the idea of courage and bravery against an unseen foe. This illusion of simplicity is where he found solace in a world that was so conflicted. In those woods he could create whatever world he desired and would walk home happy, as he was always the victorious hero, a smile across his face until he approached the house only to see the look of defeat upon his father’s face. Your father was supposed to be the hero in your life. A person of character who would check the closet and under the bed for monsters or show him how to be a man in this world. Byron was not this kind of man. He was broken by life and by drink.

One day, after a few years of this, Jack was about fourteen and his father came into his room one Saturday morning. He actually had a smile on his face as he peeked his head into the room, knocking so as not to disturb his son’s privacy.

“You want to help me with the truck this morning, son?” said Byron with a smile.

Jack wasn’t sure what to say. His father was actually asking him to do something. To be a part of his life, and offering him a chance to be a part of his.

“Yeah, sure Dad,” Jack said, getting out of bed, unsure of this unexpected treat. Despite all of the horror in his life caused by his father, he was still his father and his only family. To receive this offer meant more than any of them would realize for many years to come.

Jack and his father walked out onto the front porch on that cool Montana morning. The sun was just coming over the mountains and the sky a brilliant blue.

Byron looked at his son, smiled once again and said, “Grab the tool box, would you?”

This was something sacred. For Jack to be able to touch his father’s tools was an event that should have gone into the history books. This momentous occasion was lost in Jack’s memories for many years, and only recently had it begun to surface. Within him through all of the war and prison, his love had been shut up into a tomb, and only the hatred toward his father was allowed to roam free. This memory, as he sat driving on the Montana highway, revealed itself for a purpose. For that, Jack did not know why.

“Sure dad, I’d be happy to,” Jack said with a smile in return, looking at his father in awe. Perhaps there was more to him than he previously understood. A complex man faced with a complicated world, and now that he wasn’t drinking, perhaps the real him was allowed to be revealed, if only for a glimpse.

The two worked on the old man’s truck all morning. The grease of the engine was all over their arms and face. Turning and wrenching bolts, handing each other tools and all the while laughing at small jokes each would say to the other. They were happy. In the afternoon, after several hours, Byron asked Jack to get into the driver’s seat. A task that few men were allowed the privilege, and Jack too felt like a man for the first time. He sat into the well-worn seat of the old truck with keys in hand. The steering wheel high above eye level. Placing the key into the ignition Byron yelled, “Fire it up son!”

Jack turned the key and it roared. The sound was the most incredible thing that he had ever heard. He and his father worked hard at something and they achieved it together, a first in his life.

“All right!” Byron shouted, slamming the hood shut. He went around to the passenger seat and got in. Jack looked at him with curiosity as Byron looked at him. “Take her out.”

The look on the boy’s face was utter shock. His dad was going to let him take his truck for a test drive?

“You heard me, let’s go.”

Jack had seen his father do it a thousand times. Shifting the gear into drive he put his foot on the gas and the engine roared alive. The truck lurched forward and they were moving down the driveway toward the road at a steady ten miles an hour. When they reached the end of the road, Byron said, “Pick a direction.” Putting the truck on the road, Jack pushed the pedal harder and the truck was almost to fifty miles an hour. The exhilaration was evident in his face as his eyes were wide and his grin undeniable.

“Good job, son,” Byron said, and it was the last thing Jack remembered on that most amazing day.

As the crop prices continued to fall in the following years, the farm began to deteriorate at a rapid pace. No longer was there a beautifully manicured lawn and fresh paint on all of the buildings. Wind and rain stripped what beauty was left and soon Byron was left with nothing.

In those last days before he left the farm for good, his father went to the bank to ask for a loan. There was nothing to put up for collateral but as a friend and drinking buddy of the bank’s manager, he was able to swing a little leeway in order to get it approved. The loan would save the farm for the next couple of years until the crop slump was over. As a condition of the loan Byron was required to provide a ten thousand dollar cash collateral and was given two weeks in order to provide it. The bank manager continued to allow the paperwork to go through without the money as a favor to Byron.

Out on old route twenty-five there was a shack no bigger than a small barn. It was placed near the river and was made out of old scrap wood found along the banks of the same river. In it was one room with tall ceilings and the only light at night came from candles. The kinds of people in this shack were those who have all lost their way. Looking for the last bit of hope. There was a particular group of men who ran it as a back woods gambling ring. Those who could not repay their debts were dealt with harshly.

Byron sold all that he had left in order to buy into one of these illegal games; the tractor, the truck, and anything in the house that wasn’t bolted down. All in all he came away with a couple hundred dollars. The night where every good thing in his life came to an end was a rainy one. The water came into the shack and landed in large tin buckets strewn about the floor. Byron opened the creaky rusted-hinged door and entered, wearing his best suit and hat. The clothes were torn and tattered and didn’t fit very well, but this was a big night for Byron and he needed all the luck he could get. Sometimes when you wear something nice, you feel differently. Like the world is going to treat you like the person you’re wearing and not the person beneath. He walked over to the only table in the building and took a seat. They knew he was coming and they knew he was desperate. The games were fair, but the players, cutthroat. Each member of the table was in the same position as Byron, and their futures were just as at stake as his. You see crop prices affect the whole county, and without the money from the farming all were left to fend for themselves.

He placed his two hundred dollars, his last two hundred dollars, on the table and exchanged it for chips.
This is for you, Jack.
The chips were not many and it was sad to see all that money turned into only a few blue chips. So that was what lay before him, his entire life in a few round discs, his fate at the hand of chance. Over the course of the first couple of hours, Byron was doing well, extremely well. He needed ten thousand dollars to cover as collateral for the fifty thousand dollar loan, and he was nearly there. Only a few thousand more and he could walk out of there knowing the future for him and his boy were secure. He played conservatively and made incremental gains, at times only a couple of dollars here and there, but he was playing safe. Near the third hour the only other person on the table with chips challenged him. He had a good hand and felt confident in playing this one hard. He was called. On the table were three aces. His heart sunk. He had bet it all. There was nothing left. If he held onto the cards, then it would seem as if the action were incomplete and he could continue to pretend that everything was all right. He laid his hand down. Two pair kings and queens. He was never a great card player, but he thought he could win. The devastation and realization of that moment was evident in his face as a look of horror could be defined by his expression. As the other player stretched his arms out wide to sweep all of Byron’s chips to his side, he grabbed their arm. Stopping them, there was no way they could take everything of his. One of the bouncers put his hand on Byron’s shoulders and squeezed. Byron released his hand on the man and turned to the bouncer.

“You gotta give me another chance,” Byron pleaded.

“You had your chance, pal.”

“I’ll do anything, just a thousand from house.”

The bouncer turned to look at his boss who was in the corner in a fine suit smoking a cigar, wearing dark tinted glasses. They each understood the look, and a nod from the boss was all that was required. The bouncer returned his gaze to Byron and said, “Okay, but you know the conditions, right?”

“I do, I do. Thank you.”

“We get fifty percent of the winnings plus the principle.”

“Yes, okay, anything.” Byron said desperately, holding his hands together as if praying to the man.

The bouncer walked over to the back room and pulled out a thousand dollars in chips and returned to set them in front of Byron. He continued to gamble into the night and through the early hours of the morning. He was doing well but not as well as he had before. At four grand he was nowhere near where he had to be to pay back his debt as well as get enough for the collateral. Before the sunlight burst through the cracks of the planks of aged wood that ran along the walls of the building, his money was gone. His face went down on his arms as the exhaustion from the night caught up with him, as well as the realization that his life was over. A moment later he felt once again the pressure on his shoulder of the bouncer, “tomorrow, we need the money by tomorrow.”

There was no response from Byron. He gathered himself and stumbled out the front of the shack and returned home. Jack had yet to awaken and he was glad for it. Going to his room, he sat on the edge of his bed and placed his hand where his wife used to sleep. His head went down and he cried. The guilt and shame overwhelmed him as the thoughts of how he treated her and his boy flooded his memory. There was nothing good that he brought to them and it was his fault that she had died. Maybe if he spent more time worrying about her rather than how much beer was in the fridge, then perhaps there was a chance he could have noticed something that would have saved her. Jack, oh his poor Jack. There would be nothing left for him once the men came to collect a debt that he could never repay. The torment was unbearable, and he pulled out whatever clothes he grabbed first and threw them into an old suitcase he pulled from his closet. Still wearing the suit, he pulled the chair out of his desk and sat to write a note. The last thing he would ever say to Jack.

As he walked out the front door he dropped the letter onto the dinner table so Jack could find it. A moment later he was gone.

…

Jack awoke that morning and went to the kitchen to fix breakfast. His father was usually awake by then but he could not find him. On the table where he set the milk he found the note. He could not believe what he had read nor could he understand it. The anger he felt towards his father for leaving overpowered any love that may have been in it. His mother left him and his father did too, it was about time he did the leaving.

Jack packed a bag, didn’t tell a soul, and walked down the driveway, never to be seen again. He stole some cars, slept out in the Montana wilderness and became quite good at taking care of himself. At nineteen he emerged from isolation and joined the Army in the hopes that when he died in Vietnam that it would at least mean something.

His six years in the Army, three of which were spent in Vietnam, went by in a blur. The combat didn’t bother him and he kept mainly to himself. No one bothered him because he was a decent shot and did what he was told. Due to his proficiency in combat they asked him to stay and join a special unit whose main occupation was to kill, everything. He stayed an additional two years and they told him he had to go home because of a regulation mandating a limited number of years to be spent in the country by a single soldier. He asked if he could remain, as there was nowhere for him to go. He was forced out and he found himself back in the states, discharged and alone.

The war did not affect him like it affected others. He did not enjoy it but it was a distraction from reality. He roamed around the country taking odd jobs, getting just enough money to move onto the next town, and eventually he got himself landed in jail. It was the first time he had decided to get involved in the real world and it landed him in solitary confinement for the entirety of his eight years in prison. He didn’t want to think about it right now and he zoned out on the road.