The Animal Factory

by Bunker, Edward

  “We ain’t gonna do that,” T.J. said. “Hellfire, we’re jes’ gonna talk to the ol’ boy—in the North block rotunda.”

  “Here’s how we figure it,” Paul said. “We’ll make up a bogus money package, some lettuce or green paper in cellophane and Scotch tape. I’ll send word that we’re gettin’ him out—or that I’m gettin’ him out—and then I’ll lure him into the rotunda. The fellas here can ease in behind and rob both of us. The sucker trusts me … not enough to give me anything, but enough to show up. You can’t be one of the robbers,” Paul added to Earl. “He knows you and me are together from when he hit the ticket last month and I paid him off.”

  The group watched Earl, and although he had some misgivings, there was no doubt that he would help. He would have preferred to tell them to wait, that he was being sent a load of heroin by someone they knew in Los Angeles, but none of them were interested in what might happen in a week or two; they wanted it now. Almost equally important, they wanted some action, something to ease this boredom, and prison limits the choices in that area.

  “When do you want to do it?” Earl asked.

  “As soon as we can,” Vito said. “I need a fix.”

  Earl went back up the stairs two at a time, but instead of turning right into the big yard, he went left down the road between the education building and library. The yard office was a hundred yards from the arch, a five-year-old building with front and rear office and toilet. It was redwood and glass, designed thus because too many beatings had taken place in the old solid-walled office it replaced. A fence ran from in front of it across the road. Beyond was the plaza in front of the chapel, the custodial offices, and main gate.

  When Earl entered, the Indian day clerk, Fitz, was at the typewriter. A solid convict who was personable unless drunk, Fitz looked at Earl and winked. “Pretty early for you, ain’t it?”

  “Business.”

  Through the glass wall Earl could see Lieutenant Hodges in the rear office. Hodges disliked him and the feeling was reciprocated.

  Big Rand, the three-hundred-fifteen-pound guard who ran the office, sent yard officers on escort details, and otherwise coordinated activities, jerked open the washroom door. “I heard you out here, Copen, heard every word.”

  “Well, tell your mother about it,” Earl said. “Assuming you can get the bitch out of the whorehouse.”

  Big Rand tried to puff his face into a mask of rage, but when Earl gave him the finger the guard began grinning. Earl glanced through the glass to the rear office. “Cool it,” he said. “You forget who’s the lieutenant today. Remember, he kept your big ass in a midnight-to-eight gun tower for three years.”

  “Yeah … the cocksucker,” Rand said.

  “C’mon outside, Supercop. I need something done.”

  “I know this is trouble,” Rand said, but followed Earl into the sunlight.

  “There’s a guy in ‘A’ Section I want pulled out for fifteen or twenty minutes. His name’s Gibbs, but I don’t know his number. We can get it off the spindle.”

  “Whaddya want him for?”

  Earl shook his head and made a face of disgust.

  “Jesus, Earl,” the giant said in defensive plaint, “I wanna know so I can protect myself in case …”

  “In case what?”

  “You kill the guy or something.”

  “Fuck, I don’t do any shit like that.”

  “Not anymore, but—”

  “Okay, if any questions come up, you called the guy to interview him for a janitor’s job at the office. The guy’s on restriction because he doesn’t have a job.”

  “We only use niggers as janitors.”

  “So you’re a bigot now? Won’t hire a white boy?”

  Rand made a “sss” sound and slowly shook his head, a surrender in what had been a game more than a test of wills.

  “Wait about ten minutes before you call over there,” Earl said.

  “What if he shows up?”

  “Interview him for the job.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Gibbs. They’ll know his number over there.”

  Rand stepped back to the door and stopped. He pointed a threatening finger. “I’ll bet this has something to do with dope. I’m gonna bust you someday.”

  “You’ll bust your mother. You’d rather jump in a pit with a grizzly bear than fuck with me.”

  In mock rage, Rand kicked the door frame. “You’d better show some respect. I’m Supercop.”

  Earl ignored Rand and began walking away.

  “Inmate Copen!” Rand bellowed. “You’d better be here for work early. I wanna see you.”

  Earl kept walking but glanced back. Rand was in the doorway, both arms extended, and he was giving Earl the finger with both hands.

  Ten minutes later everyone except Paul was at the northeast end of the big yard; they were all watching the other end where Paul would come through the throng near the canteen after meeting Gibbs at the South cellhouse entrance. To a casual spectator they would have looked languid, but Earl saw the flared nostrils, tight lips, eyes bright with concentration. This was a big score in prison terms, and Earl had no doubt that any one of them would kill Gibbs to get the heroin if there was a chance of getting away with it. What strange icons men worship, he thought. How fucked up we get in this place—and I want it as bad as they do. Heroin is the only dope that takes away prison’s misery.

  “Gimme a cigarette, Homeboy,” Bad Eye said to Vito.

  “I’m dry … just a poor Mexican trying to get high.” He was slender, with striking green eyes and a bright white smile. Earl liked Vito; everybody liked him.

  “How big is this vato?” Vito asked.

  “He’s big,” Ernie said; he had a shoelace in his hand and was snapping it nervously. “We oughta get some steel.”

  Earl made a deprecating sound. “Shit! If five of us need iron for one dude, even if he’s King Kong, we better go ask Stoneface to lock us up for protection.”

  Black Ernie winced at the rebuke.

  T.J. spoke. “Yeah, we don’t need to carry a felony for this fool. We just fake. He’s big … but he’s weak as soggy toilet paper.”

  Paul Adams appeared, moving quickly from the thickest part of the crowd. He was alone.

  “Check him,” Vito said. “Old folks has the coldest stroll in town.”

  Earl grinned, for Paul’s walk epitomized the 1940s hipster: a hand in one pocket, the other swinging high with a snapping motion, the shoulder dipping and rolling.

  “Where’s the guy at?” Ernie said, voice shrill. “That old motherfucker better not have fucked this up.”

  Earl watched T.J. and Bad Eye look at Ernie, who never noticed the narrowing eyes. Vito did and winked at Earl, saying silently that Ernie was a fool and should be ignored. He’s a fool, Earl thought, but those youngsters are bigger fools. They’ll feed him his heart if he fucks with Paul. And if they can’t, they’ve got fifty more who will.

  When Paul arrived, his usually doughy complexion was florid. “He’s coming in a minute. You dudes come in right behind us. And don’t start laughing. This is serious shit.”

  “Serious as a heart attack,” Bad Eye said.

  Earl was going to stand lookout. When Paul moved away from the group, Earl went ten yards the other way and stretched on the concrete bench fastened to the East cellhouse wall, crossing his legs and bracing himself on one elbow.

  Suddenly Paul started moving back toward the crowd, and Earl saw Gibbs emerging. The two met, exchanged words, and came toward the North cellhouse door. Gibbs weighed over two hundred pounds, but his belly bounced against his shirt and his movements were ungainly. He looked as square as Paul looked hip.

  Earl watched Gibbs’s eyes to see if they were focused on the waiting group, who were ignoring the walking men and feigning conversation among themselves. They didn’t stand out because of the other clusters of convicts. Gibbs wasn’t even looking around. He was listening to Paul.

  Earl scanned t
he yard for guards; none were visible except one on the gun rail, and he was a hundred yards away and looking in another direction. As the two men neared the open steel door, Paul put a hand on Gibbs’s shoulder and held back a pace to let the man enter first. The instant he disappeared, the four thugs began moving, and Earl got up to arrive just behind them. As they slipped through into the semi-darkness, Bad Eye pressing to be first, Earl took a position outside the door. There was risk that a guard might start to come out of the cellhouse or Death Row.

  A young black appeared beside Earl, moving quickly and glancing over his shoulder. Earl would have felt the same way if he’d met four known black militants in a blind spot like the rotunda.

  Earl leaned to his left and peeked around the door into the gloom. Paul and Gibbs were against a wall, the four bandits crowding them, with Bad Eye and Vito holding right hands inside their shirt bosoms as if they had shivs hidden there. Paul was holding up his hands in supplication. T.J. snatched something from him and pocketed it—the cellophane-wrapped paper.

  Through the yard gate came the gangly figure of Sergeant William Kittredge, walking slightly behind and to the side of a tall black convict whom Earl recognized; he had stabbed a white tier tender in the East cellhouse during a race war six months earlier. Sergeant Kittredge was obviously taking the man from the visiting room back to segregation in “B” Section and would not come toward the North cellhouse rotunda. A few seconds later, Earl heard the splat of flesh striking flesh, and then grunts and shuffling feet. Before he could look inside, a figure flashed past him, followed by a grasping, burly arm covered with red hair. The arm missed and Gibbs was loose in the yard, running in a ludicrous pigeon-toed gait, his shirttail flapping behind him.

  Running was forbidden and the quick movement immediately attracted the attention of a gun rail guard. A police whistle bleated. Sergeant Kittredge froze and turned as Gibbs ran toward him—and saw the four thugs scurrying along the cellhouse wall. He also saw Earl—and Earl knew it, so instead of walking away he entered the cellhouse. After all, he lived there.

  The bottom tier was active, especially around the television set where the Army-Navy game was about to start. Fear gnawed at Earl’s stomach. They could all spend a year or two in segregation over this, and it had been a long time since he’d been in the hole. Kittredge had seen all of them, and if Gibbs was questioned by Lieutenant Hodges … Earl next felt anger, wondering what the fuck had gone wrong in the rotunda. Had Gibbs balked? Unlikely. Someone had punched him when it wasn’t necessary, had scared him too much, and he’d panicked.

  Earl went to the front row of the television seats where his place was saved by Preacher Man, a chubby thirty-year-old member of the Brotherhood who handled the North cellhouse tickets. Preacher was bundled in a heavy melton jacket zipped to his throat, and a black knit cap was pulled over his ears. It was Preacher’s usual mode of dress and, also as usual, he needed a shave. Earl gave him all the tickets he’d collected on the yard, which was the reverse of the usual process, and told him to hold them until later. Sensing something amiss, Preacher wanted to know if help was needed. Earl shook his head and went back through the rotunda. He stopped in the shadows to peer out. Kittredge, Gibbs, and the black were gone. Nothing was happening. The sergeant would have had to keep going with the black, so there would be a delay before the repercussions started.

  The gang had scattered. Earl prowled in the direction they’d gone and found Paul.

  “What happened back there?” Earl asked.

  “Ernie trying to be a bully. He smacked the chump in the mouth and the guy broke and run. He was scared shitless. Ernie couldn’t wait for the chump to dig it out of his sock.”

  “We shot a blank, then?”

  Paul made a face of disgust and nodded. “We might wind up busted, too … if Kittredge saw us.”

  “He saw you. Where’d Gibbs go?”

  “They got him, took him to the hospital.”

  “So where’s everybody at?”

  “Vito split to the West block, Ernie’s with his friends, and the Dynamic Duo went to the gym. Bad Eye is madder’n a motherfucker. He’s cussin’ a blue streak. T.J. is phlegmatic as usual, but you know how he is. He can be murderous and you never know it. If we go to the hole, Ernie might be in trouble.”

  “He’s just a fool who wants to be a killer. It isn’t worth a killing and the risk because he’s a fool. What the fuck …”

  Earl fell silent, knowing that although he and Paul had as much influence as anyone over the two young men, it wasn’t enough. Conditioned by a lifetime of violence, he was willing to use a knife if he felt threatened, or if it was a question of saving face, but he didn’t believe in revenge unless it was necessary to avoid ridicule. He was capable of violence while disliking it; T.J. and Bad Eye both thought of violence as the first answer to any problem. T.J. was less quick but more relentless; Bad Eye was more explosive but could be reasoned with after the first blaze of temper. Earl didn’t care about Ernie, a loud-mouthed braggart whose ambition was to be a big shot in prison’s violent world, but Earl did care about his friends.

  “It might come out okay,” he said. “Kittredge is Seeman’s protégé and he likes us okay. It depends on whether Hodges gets our names. If he does, we better pack our shit for ‘B’ Section.”

  “What can the guy tell ’em? He can’t tell ’em we tried to rip him for some dope—he doesn’t think it was me anyway and he doesn’t know any other names, I don’t think. If he says we were pressuring him, what the fuck, he stays in the hole and gets transferred. We might get ten days, but here they gotta cage the prey because there are too many predators.”

  Earl snorted, nodded, seeing the irony. Gibbs would be in protective custody for months until he was transferred to a softer prison. The officials couldn’t make transfer too easy or they’d be overrun with men asking for protection just to get out of San Quentin. During those months of isolation, Gibbs’s food would be spat in, his face spat on, and he would be despised as a coward—for being a victim.

  The public-address speakers blared: “Copen, A-forty-two forty-three, report to the yard office immediately!”

  Earl squeezed Paul playfully on the shoulder cap. “Well, I’m gonna find out what the score is.”

  “I’ll be waiting right here.”

  Sergeant William Kittredge was waiting on the road beyond the yard gate, leaning against the wall of the education building, a sly grin on his face. He was bouncing a red ball the size of a jawbreaker up and down in his hand, and Earl knew it was a balloon containing two grams of heroin. The powder was packed down, the balloon knotted and the end snipped off.

  “You guys lost something, didn’t you?”

  Earl shrugged. “Not that I know of.”

  “What about this here?” Kittredge held the balloon up between his thumb and forefinger.

  “I never saw it before,” Earl said, careful to keep his voice modulated. Kittredge might take too vehement a denial as an insult to his intelligence, while something coy would be an indirect admission.

  “That’s not what I heard.”

  Earl didn’t reply. It was better to wait till he knew Gibbs’s story.

  “Let it hang. I’m not telling Hodges what I saw, but when your boss comes on duty, I’ll see what he wants to do. Meanwhile, come on down to the office so you can type a memo.”

  “Where’s Fitz?”

  “On a visit. Anyway, I want you to type this one.” Earl walked beside Kittredge to the yard office, where Rand was doodling on a yellow legal pad. The lieutenant was not in the rear office. The memo had been roughed out. Earl polished the grammar and spelling as he typed:

  TO: THE CAPTAIN

  SUBJECT: GIBBS, 47895

  At 9:50 a.m., this date, while on duty as yard sergeant, the writer was escorting an inmate from the visiting room to “B” Section when a gun rail officer blew his whistle on the Main Yard. I turned and saw inmate GIBBS, 47895, running from the direction of the North cellhouse r
otunda. I took the subject into custody and continued to “B” Section; then took Gibbs to the hospital clinic where he was treated for a cut mouth (see medical report). At that time he handed me a red balloon knotted into a ball and containing a beige powder. Gibbs claims it is heroin, and that he was given it by three inmates, two white and one Mexican, whom he can identify if he sees them but cannot name. They wanted him to take it into “A” Section for delivery to “Bulldog,” apparently LADD, 12943. When he refused, he was assaulted and ran out. According to Officer Rand, Gibbs had been called to the yard office for a job interview. Gibbs was placed in administrative segregation pending hearing by the Disciplinary Committee. Contents of the balloon have not been given a field analysis as of this report.

  Now Earl knew Gibbs’s story—and that Kittredge believed it. Refuting it was impossible without confessing the truth, and that was out of the question. He handed the report to Kittredge, who signed it and put it in an envelope.

  “There are better ways,” Kittredge said. “I could bust the whole fuckin’ mob of you.”

  Earl saw Rand behind Kittredge, and the big guard was holding a finger to his lips. The admonition was unnecessary.

  “You run things around here,” Earl said. “You can lock everybody up every day of the year.”

  “Okay, Earl, okay,” Kittredge said. “What I’m trying to tell you is to get your friends to lighten up. That fucking gang is getting too far out of line. Every day the captain gets a dozen snitch letters about those maniacs. There must be a hundred letters that Bad Eye killed that colored guy in the lower yard last year.”

  “What about that white boy they killed in the East block? And the four that got stabbed in the school building? And the bull that they killed in the hospital?”

  Without saying it in so many words, Earl was subtly reminding Kittredge that since the beginning of the racial wars a dozen years ago, and especially since black convicts had begun killing white guards, there was an unspoken alliance between some of the guards and the white convict militants. Before the guards began falling, most of them had been even-handed; now many looked the other way at what white convicts did.