On the Loose (11 page)

"What?"

"You got high card. Bet!"

Old Doctor Skinner was semiretired and had
failing vision. He bet a nickel. Everyone stayed in
except Chub Tuttle, a volunteer fireman whose
real job was roofing and carpentry. Chub played
timid, as if he were using grocery money.

Malcolm dealt again, a card to each, face up, and
scowled at his, which indicated nothing. He perpetually scowled. He was heavyset and surly, with
latching brows and a permanent pucker. Years ago
when he was in the army a sucker punch permanently disfigured his nose. "You're high, Chief."

Chief Morgan bet a dime, and Sergeant Avery,
an erratic player, raised it a quarter.

"Why the hell did you do that?" Malcolm demanded. "You haven't got anything."

"You don't know what I got."

"You don't play right, Eugene. You throw everything off."

The chief said, "You in or out, Malcolm?"

Malcolm fed the pot and glared. His jealousy of
Morgan went back to high school when each had
competed for the same girls, Claudia MacLeod
among them. Spinning out more cards, he said,
"What do you think of Harry Sawhill marrying the
bimbo from the Heights?"

Still high man, Morgan bet another dime.
Sergeant Avery raised a quarter. Morgan said, "I
don't think anything of it."

Doctor Skinner, dropping out, said, "What
bimbo?"

"It's Malcolm's way of speaking," Morgan said.
"Play cards."

On the last card Sergeant Avery, who had misread his hand, had nothing. Malcolm, who had
caught a third deuce, dropped his sudden smile
when Morgan, realizing he had a flush, laid it out.

"I had to win sometime."

It was the doctor's deal. Chub Tuttle, whom he
had brought into the world, shuffled for him because his fingers were arthritic. "Same game," he
said to placate Malcolm. The deal was slow, the bets
fast, though none of the up cards showed promise.

Malcolm said, "How come his kid got -a break?
You have anything to do with that, Chief?"

Morgan knew he was being baited and didn't respond. "Make sure you know what you're doing
this time, Eugene."

Sergeant Avery was raising again but with a
keener eye on the cards. Bucking foolish odds, he
filled an inside straight and beat Malcolm's two
pairs.

Malcolm said, "I was wearing your badge, I'd
have done things different."

It was Morgan's deal, five-card stud, quarter bets
only. Morgan's up card was an ace. Chub Tuttle immediately dropped out. Malcolm snorted.

"Christ, don't you ever stay in?"

He beat Morgan's ace with a pair of eights. Morgan said, "What would you have done different?"

.No sense talking about it." He raked in quarters. "Too late."

Morgan persisted. "I'm curious."

.You wouldn't understand."

Sergeant Avery had the deal, draw poker, guts to
open. Chub Tuttle opened with a dime, threw away
no cards, and won a small pot with -a full house.

"The reason you wouldn't understand," Malcolm said, "is you're not a real cop. You don't even
carry a gun."

Two attendants stood at each end of the dining
hall, where breakfast was served in two thirtyminute shifts. Breakfast was toast, cornflakes, an
overripe banana, and as much tomato juice as anyone wanted. Bobby Sawhill carried his tray to Dibble's table and, looking frantically around, said,
"Where's Duck? Duck's not here."

Dibble was in charge of a table of twelve.
Duck's chair was vacant. Dibble said, "He's sick."

"Is he going to be all right?"

"I'm not a doctor."

"Where is he?"

"In the infirmary."

Bobby picked at his breakfast, eating only some
of the cornflakes. The boy sitting on his left, a Hispanic with the eyes of an owlet, said, "Can I have
your toast?"

In the afternoon Bobby received permission to
visit the infirmary. Duck's last name was printed
on a tag tied to the end of a metal cot. The name
was fat and Polish, senseless to the ignorant eye. It
didn't look like a name to Bobby, simply a jumble
of letters. Bobby's voice quavered.

"I didn't know."

Duck smiled. He had been sick for three days
without telling anyone. Food had come up on him.
Rocking with pain, his body had convulsed, then
crumbled. An attendant had carried him in his
arms to the dispensary and later wheeled him into
the infirmary.

"What's the matter with you?"

"I got an ulcer. Sometimes it bleeds."

"Bad?"

"No big deal," Duck said, surprised that Bobby
seemed worried. He had always been sickly. His
childhood was rickets and ringworm.

"You don't look too good."

"I'll be back soon. Who's doing the toilets?"

"Doesn't matter, Duck. It'll always be your job."

"'Cept when I get out for good. Then they'll have to get someone else. Whatcha looking sad for,
Bobby?"

He didn't want to leave, he wanted to hold
Duck's hand, but a female nurse who needed to do
something with pills and a needle said, "Sorry,
doll, you can't stay."

At suppertime he ate nothing but a sliver of
cranberry sauce. Leaning over his plate, he said,
"He's not going to die, is he, Dibs?"

"Why would he want to do that?" Dibble said,
buttering a thin slice of white bread. "He's got it
made here."

"You're not just saying that, are you?"

"Would I do that? Who loves you, Sawhill?"

"You do, Dibs."

The Hispanic boy touched Bobby's elbow. "Can
I have your hamburg?"

Harry Sawhill sat in a private section of the visiting room and waited for Bobby. He ran a nervous
hand over his head. In the past few months the
hair on top had thinned into uncertainty. His face
was haggard. Ten minutes later he was staring into
the blue of his son's eyes.

"I'm supposed to be in class," Bobby said, hands
tucked into the pouch pocket of a sweatshirt.

"Mr. Grissom says it's all right." Harry was on
his feet, his voice tense and uneasy. "You look
good, Bobby. Leaner and more muscular."

"I work out. Why are you here?"

"To see you. Why else?" Harry tried to force a smile and failed. He spoke rapidly. "I got married,
Bobby. To Mrs. Becker."

There was no response, no reaction. Bobby
looked at his watch. "I'm missing algebra."

Harry had a few thoughts about going mad and
then eased away from them. Tightening his shoulders, he said, "Do you know how much I loved
your mother?"

"I don't remember her."

"Yes, you do. Then she died, I died too for a
while. Part of me is still dead. Do you know what
I'm telling you?"

Bobby shoved his hands deeper into the pouch.
"She lied to me. She said she wouldn't die."

"She couldn't help it."

Bobby's eyes hinted that he had something to
say about that but never would. He simply gazed
at his father and said, "I'm a killer."

Harry heard the ring of a school bell from a distant part of the building. He heard the traffic of
feet in corridors. He remembered a teacher at
Pearson Grammar School, Miss Mulvey, who wore
frilly blouses over wire-cup bras, which made her
breasts fascinating to eighth-grade boys. He said,
"Yes, I know."

"Don't you want to ask me anything?"

"Would you tell me?"

Bobby swaggered. "No."

Reaching the point again where he felt he might
fall apart, Harry stepped back. His concern for
himself began to outweigh his obligation to
Bobby.

"I don't want you to come here again," Bobby
said.

"Why not?" He felt frustration and anger. "For
Christ's sake, why not?"

"This is my home," Bobby said. "Not yours."

Bobby was all smiles. Sitting with Dibble on a
bleacher bench in the gym, he said, "You were
right. Duck is OK."

"Told you he would be. You don't listen."

They were watching a basketball game, two
teams from Dormitory C. The best players were of
color, their bodies serpents, their movements nature's gift to the game, in which the two white
players looked out of step, stripped of purpose.
One of them threw up an air ball.

"He says he prayed. Is there a God, Dibs?"

"Sure, I see him in dreams. He's a black guy like
me, but he doesn't see me. I think he's trying to
pass."

"Jesus wasn't black."

"Who says?"

A whistle blew. Ernest had fouled somebody. He
wasn't the best player, but he was the most aggressive. His shaved head, hooded eyes, and tattooed
arm made him menacing. Dibble rolled his eyes.

"He shouldn't be playing. He lost his privileges."

Bobby munched on a candy bar. "What did he
do?"

"Don't eat when you talk to me. I don't want
you spitting my way. He broke a new kid's jaw for
playing his radio too loud."

Bobby crunched up the candy wrapper and lowered his voice. "He bothered Duck again."

"How so?"

"You know."

Ernest threw for three points and missed, but
the ball bounced off the rim and was in his hands
again. He zigzagged, faked, leaped, and stuffed the
ball in. His mates high-fived him, but the ref called
him for an offensive foul. Dibble frowned.

"Why didn't he tell me?"

"He's ashamed."

Dibble shrugged. "I can't be everywhere at
once."

In their room Dibble read a newspaper. He was
a current event, up on everything. Then he looked
through books he'd told Bobby to bring him from
the library. Three were by Dickens. He had read
them before, several times.

Bobby said, "How come you like him so much?"

"He writes about the good and bad, nothing in
between. The bad always pretend they're good,
but you know they'll be brought to their knees in
the end. That's what keeps you reading. You want
to see the bastards grovel." Dibble stretched out
on his cot and doubled a pillow to prop his head.
"Tell me, Sawhill, did you really pop two people?"

Bobby nodded. "I really did."

"Both women, right?"

For the first time since arriving at Sherwood,
Bobby felt an invasion of his innermost privacy, a
threat to his balance. "Why can't things be done
without a reason?"

"There's always a reason." Dibble smiled. "But
that doesn't mean you have to know it."

Bobby had an image of Mrs. Bullard, the lady
with the roses, but he had no attachment to the
memory and let it drift away. The image of the
other woman, young, pretty, lingered a second or
two longer. "Who did you kill, Dibs?"

"Doesn't matter."

"But you killed someone."

"I didn't pull the trigger," Dibble said. "Somebody else did, but I was there. When I kill, it'll be
somebody important."

"Then you don't know how it feels."

"How does it feel, Sawhill?"

"Like you're someplace else."

The two of them still awake, Bobby spoke through
the dark. "Would you kill Ernest?"

Dibble drew a sharp breath. "You didn't listen."

"If he touched me, I'd kill him."

"You don't have perspective, Sawhill. Doing
Ernest would put your future in the joint, and you
wouldn't have one there, take my word for it."

Bobby pulled the covers under his chin. Often
he had no ability to express his feelings, to spring
words from his heart.

He said simply, "You're good to me, Dibs."

"I got honor. Rest of the guys here don't. And
you, Sawhill, you got hang-ups. Grissom says the
biggest is about your mother. Is that right?"

"I don't talk about her."

"What's the problem? She's dead, right?"

"She's inside me."

"My mother burned to death. She was soot on a
fireman's face. I tell it as it is, Sawhill. You oughta
try doing that."

"She was sick inside. Cancer."

"There you go."

Bobby didn't want to go on talking about her
and lay quiet. He heard rain rattling on the window
and wondered what month it was. He had forgotten. "What else did Mr. Grissom say about me?"

"Said you're emotionally immature. I could've
told him that."

"He told me I was one of his best boys. He said
I'm going to have a treat and you'll tell me about it
when it's time. When's it going to be time?"

"When I think you can handle it. Grissom wants
to keep us all straight, so every once in a while we
get a treat. Big time."

"What's the treat, Dibs? Can't you tell me?"

"You saying you can't guess? Jesus, Sawhill. It's
a woman."

Bobby went silent. He pulled the covers over his
face. He was confused, hurt. After several moments he spoke through the blanket. "What about
what you and I do?"

"That's kid stuff," Dibble said. "Go to sleep."

A towel wrapped around his loins, Ernest lay on a
bench in the shower room. Dozing, he looked like
a molting cobra with skin covering its eyes. The
eyes opened. "Whatcha looking at, Duck?"

Duck kept his distance. "You're not supposed to
be here. It's not your shower room."

"You gonna put me out? Come let me see you
do it."

"You wouldn't talk this way, Dibs was here."

"But he ain't here. Just you and me. Heard you
were sick, Duck. Even heard you weren't gonna
make it."

"God made me better."

"Nice fella, God. He must like you. I like you
too." Ernest raised his head and motioned with it.
"Come do what I want."

Duck was trembling and tried not to show it. He
tried to hold back tears. "What d'you want me
for? You gonna have a woman pretty soon."

"Can't wait."

The tears came. "I don't wanna be hurt again."

"What's a little pain between friends?" Ernest
stripped off the towel and pitched his voice high,
like a girl's. "Come please me."

Duck began backing off slowly, then swiftly.

Ernest leaped up in a pretense of pursuit. "I'll
get you later, Duck. Count on it."

Some of the boys from Dormitory B, ages sixteen
through eighteen, were already in the visitor's
room. The women arrived presently, six of them,
chatting and laughing. Two were white, one was
Hispanic, and the other three were African American. Dibble appeared. He was in charge and
moved among them. He knew them all, and they knew him and liked him. One of the white women
ran -a hand up his arm.