No Beast So Fierce (3 page)

For an hour the bus ground a slow ascent up a canyon between slabbed rock walls spotted with scrub. There was no view. I used the interlude to examine an envelope of papers handed me at the prison gate. Three parole report forms. One was to be filled out and sent in the first week of the month. Name and prison number, address, place of employment, income, savings, description and license of automobile. There was a copy of the parole agreement I'd signed, and its conditions. They were standard—maintain suitable employment (what's “suitable”?), make no address change and drive no automobile without written permission, no drinking, make no contract, borrow no money, avoid ex-felons and persons of ill repute, and heed the advice and counsel of the parole officer. Failure to comply with any condition was grounds for return to prison without notice or hearing.

A form letter told me the parole officer's name was Joseph Rosenthal. I was to contact him and report as soon as I arrived. I liked the idea of having a Jew: Jews had suffered so much that he should have some empathy for my problems.

The bus stopped for twenty minutes in Santa Barbara. I hurried to the sidewalk, wanting to just walk around until it was time to go. The tangle of movement and color dizzied me. Everything was strange, a different world than I was accustomed to. Impulsively, I ducked into a liquor store for a twenty-five-cent cigar and a half pint of vodka. The desire wasn't so much to get drunk (I was drunk with freedom already) as to exercise some choice, buy something.

But drunk I was as the bus swept along the seacoast on the last leg of the Journey. I watched the surf weave lace patterns along the beach and the sea glaze with the molten hues of early summer twilight.

I forgot the proximity of Los Angeles until the bus turned up a ramp into Santa Monica. Then awareness of being home crashed with complete surprise and some disbelief. As avidly as a child, I pressed my nose against the tinted window and stared out. Each block was familiar, yet each was renewed surprise.

In West Hollywood we changed boulevards. To the left was the Sunset Strip, and I could see the green hills dotted with white apartments. Memories jumped to mind with almost physical force. This was my territory the year before prison—the only good year in my memory. Not good in any moral sense, quite the contrary, but money had been easy and I'd spent it on easy living, an expensive apartment, sports car, silk suits, good liquor, and food. However meaningless and unfulfilling such a life had been, it was a constant intoxicant. With so much hedonism there was no time to think of “meaning”. That year had cost me eight of nightmare, an unfair bargain.

The bus entered Hollywood. I recalled dreary stucco bungalows of yellow and pink, already going to seed after their heyday in the '30s. Now there were high-rise apartments and skyscrapers.

Suddenly the bus was pulling into a depot. My ticket was for downtown Los Angeles. I hadn't thought about stopping in Hollywood. Now I grabbed my parcel and hurried off, my stomach churning.

The depot was small, uncrowded. The time was 5:20. It was late for the parole office to be open, yet I decided to telephone and see.

A woman answered. Her “please” and “sir” sounded strange. I was more accustomed to “asshole” and “motherfucker”. Rosenthal was still in his office.

“Hi there, Max,” he said. “I'm surprised that you called. Your bus wasn't due 'til six and I'd be gone by then.”

“I got off in Hollywood.”

“That's where you are now?”

“They said I was to contact you on arrival. That's what I'm doing.”

“Good. Good. How do you feel?”

I told him I was a little drunk. Though the statement seemed naive, and it was in a way, there was a test in it. If he accused me of doing wrong, I knew I had a prick and could act accordingly, lying to him forever after. If he passed over it with humor or understanding, I would know that I could manipulate him. But he did neither. He just said, “Oh,” and I blushed, cursed myself as a fool—for not having learned the lesson to keep my mouth shut to authority. He asked where the deport was located. And the bizarre thing was that I didn't know. I'd been born in Hollywood but remembered no bus depot. Leaving the receiver to hang, I walked outdoors.

The street sign said Vine Street; the cross sign said DeLonpre Avenue. I must have passed the bus depot hundreds of times without noticing it.

I froze, looked around in fascinated wonder. To the left was the downtown Hollywood skyline, familiar to me since childhood—now both known and new as birth. Beyond were the low, hazed hills with a giant sign, Hollywood, perched on top. To the right, a block away, was the Ranch Market. It was old and huge, open-stalled in the style of another era. The sight of it brought a rash of memories. In the postmidnight hours the market—its hot dog stand and magazine rack—catered to weirdos and geeks, freaks and tipsy whores and their pimps. One had to pass the hot dog stand to reach the parking lot, and here at darkness gathered the strange people, watching with predatory eyes those who shopped at 3:30
A.M.,
cocktail waitresses and musicians red-eyed from smoky bars and marijuana, pills, booze, inadequate sleep. In my teens, too young for bars, with nowhere to go, I'd come to the market on the prowl for a drunk or a fairy to lure somewhere and knock in the head—for fifteen or twenty dollars.

During daylight it may have been just another market. I'd only seen it in the middle of the night.

Remembering Rosenthal, I hurried back, gave him directions, and promised to wait on the corner; he was going to stop on his way home from work.

Before going outside, I bought a handful of picture postcards and addressed them to friends left behind in the cage. I had appreciated the gesture from others in the past and was certain my friends would do the same.

The shadows were lengthening and a wind was rising. It was the first twilight I'd seen in eight years, for the prison was locked up at four in the afternoon. Leroy, Aaron, all the numbered men, were now settled with earphones, books, thoughts.

Rosenthal arrived in a plain, compact automobile, pulling up to double-park and beckon me. I got in quickly and he pulled around the corner, parking on a residential street of small bungalows. My first impression was of a fat, merry little pig in rimless glasses. Bristles of a heavy beard contributed to this impression; so did his suit, which was far too tight on the pudgy frame. This was exaggerated by a moon face squirting from a tight collar. Perched on his head was a ridiculous porkpie hat with a green feather. His appearance was more absurd than threatening.

The advantage I had of appraising him while he drove was more than offset by his having a large file on me. He eyed me with frank curiosity while we shook hands.

“I imagine you feel pretty good,” he said. “You were busted a long time.”

“Yeah, I'm kind of dizzy, freedom drunk.” I was trying to place a trace of doubt in his mind about what I'd said over the telephone. His eyes narrowed; he had joined the statements. He said nothing about it.

“You don't look so tough,” he said, smiling affably, getting to what he knew from the file. I grinned back with a candor I didn't feel. There was no forgetting that our relationship was essentially that of a knife held to a throat. He could order me jailed whenever he felt like it. I sensed that his affability hinged on my agreeing with him.

“Think you can do this parole?” he asked.

“I don't see why not. It's just a matter of living like millions of other people. I've got problems, but they're inside me and I should be able to handle what's in myself.”

“Good, positive attitude. But sometimes it seems harder than that for men who've been in prison. They need help. That's what I'm here for. I've seen both good and bad in your jacket. Most parole officers have eighty or ninety cases. I've only got thirteen—special cases.”

“I'm a special case … I only had a forgery.”

“A forgery, yes. But the record goes back so many years, and there's been episodes of violence. That's why you're a special case.”

“I need more watching,” I said bitterly.

“They think so, and it's my job.” He paused, then went on, “You don't have a job, so to get my supervisor to approve your release on schedule I had to submit something. I've got you a place in a halfway house on Twenty-fourth and Vermont.”

“Halfway house!” The idea of going to a rescue mission for exconvicts, which halfway houses are, made me sick. And the address was in what had been the ghetto border eight years before; now the area was 95 percent black, I knew.

Seeing my feelings, he explained that halfway houses were made for such men as me, those without home or family or assets. “It's just a refuge until you get settled.”

Perhaps he was right, but it seemed like welfare and it was still under authority. I wanted freedom, not a change of cells. He sensed by attitude and changed subjects: “What about a job? Anything in mind?”

“They always need car salesmen. I talk pretty well and I did it once.”

“I've gotta say no to that. Too much temptation to bilk someone.”

“Well, do you have any ideas?”

“We'll talk about it tomorrow. My supper's waiting and my wife will chew me out. What about the halfway house? Try it for a night or two.”

“Let me decide that tomorrow, too.”

“Where're you staying tonight?” I saw the thought behind his suspicious eyes: was I going to disappear, hang up the parole?

“I'll be at your office early. Keep my bundle in your car. And I've got thirty dollars gate money. I won't lam and leave that behind.”

“I don't care if you run. It's no skin off my ass.” He reached for the ignition key. “I'm going past Hollywood Boulevard. Want a ride to there?”

“That's fine.”

Hollywood Boulevard seemed as good a place as any, though I'd had no thought whatsoever beyond Rosenthal.

When I stood on the curb and Rosenthal drove away, freedom's full impact landed. Until that moment I'd been carried along by the thought of reaching the city, the necessity of seeing Rosenthal. Now my freedom was absolute, of a kind few persons experience. If I went north or south, east or west, up or down the sidewalk, it made absolutely no difference. It was freedom to the point of being in a void.

A faceless crowd hurried by me with destinations born of choice and linked with past choice. Everyone had somewhere to go, and they were happier in their invisible fetters than if confronted by freedom. I was dizzy and overawed and somewhat frightened.

A neon forest was coming alive. The aureole of brilliance around each tube grew as it ate the night. Colors flashed spasms, bubbled illustrations, whorled and exploded, gleamed on the waxed metal of automobiles. I began walking toward the west simply because the brighter lights were there. I had to make some choice, some movement.

“Now what the fuck should I do?” The question should have been absurd, for I'd been born less than two miles from where I stood, had lived my whole life (when free) in Los Angeles. Yet among the city's millions I could think of nobody to telephone. Among the multitude were hundreds of criminals and ex-convicts whom I knew, who were more or less friends. They'd be in cocktail lounges on the Sunset Strip, or in dingy bars downtown, or beer joints and cantinas on the east side. They lived furtively, deliberately made themselves hard to find. A tour of the hangouts would put me in contact with a few. Through them I would find the others. In a few days I could be returned to the underworld milieu. It would be easy—and it was precisely what I wanted to avoid. Suddenly the neon burned my eyes; it was like the sensation on the bus except more intense. The crowd scurrying by might as well have been insects, so alien to them did I feel. I struggled for mental equilibrium.

The odor of food and awareness of hunger brought me back to reality. A greasy hamburger in a crowded coffee shop tasted delicious after so many years in a place where Velveeta cheese was a delicacy. I was finishing a cup of coffee and studying people (men wore their hair longer now) when I flashed on who to telephone. Willy Darin, the dope fiend. He'd been on parole from the Narcotic Rehabilitation Center for two months, according to the grapevine. His father-in-law's telephone number was in the directory, and someone there would know how to contact Willy.

My hand sweated on the receiver. I knew the entire family and anticipated knowing whoever answered; but the man's voice on the other end was unfamiliar.

“Is this the Pavan residence?” I asked.

“Yeah. Who do you want?”

“Who's speaking?”

“Man, you called here.”

The game of mutual suspicions was ridiculous. “My name's Max Dembo,” I said, “and …”

“You re jivin'!”

“I'm not jiving.”

“Goddamn, man! This is Willy. When did you raise?”

“This morning. Damn, brother, I didn't recognize your voice. Say, I'm stranded out here in Hollywood. Have you got some wheels?”

“Yeah, sort of. It might get there. But it'll be a while, say an hour. You're lucky you caught me here. I just stopped on my way home from work. I've gotta go home and shower.”

“How's Selma?”

“Same old shit. We'll cut it up when I get there. We'll get loaded.”

“Not on junk.”

“Some pot or something.”

“Don't hang me up. You know how fuckin' undependable you are.”

“Don't sweat it. Where'll you be?”

“Hollywood and Vine. Where else, motherfucker?”

“I'll be there in an hour.”

When I went outside to kill an hour wandering, the tumultuous uncertainties were gone. The ache of being alone was also gone. Prison atrophies many emotional needs, but it increases others, among them the need for companionship. The twenty-four-hour crowding grates the nerves, but insidiously it addicts.