The Animal Factory

by Bunker, Edward

  The lower yard opened and the press of bodies lessened as men went down to sit in the bleachers, lie on the grass, play handball and horseshoes, or strum guitars. The canteen lines were running. And men came from the crowd around the canteen carrying pillowslips of commissary.

  Paul Adams and Bad Eye came up. The latter had two brown bags from which the tops of milk cartons peeked out. Paul had an open quart of buttermilk and a sack of tortilla chips. He and Bad Eye glanced at Ron with momentary curiosity, nodded a greeting. He remembered them from the lower yard during the riot, but didn’t recall Bad Eye’s name. Paul’s he remembered; the whitehaired man stood out among the youths even more than Earl did.

  The new arrivals aborted the conversation. Ron hadn’t realized how much he was enjoying himself talking to Earl. He now experi enced a momentary pique.

  Earl offered Ron the sack of chips and buttermilk, but Ron made a wry face and turned them down. “Buttermilk, blah.”

  “There’s sweet rolls and regular milk,” Bad Eye offered, indicating the sack.

  “No, thank you,” Ron said.

  “Go ahead,” Bad Eye said, voice rising.

  “Hold on, young ’un,” Paul said, pursing his mouth and shaking his head. “You always wanna force a dude to take a gift. Maybe he isn’t hungry.”

  “I’m not,” Ron said.

  “Don’t turn it down if you are,” Bad Eye said. Then to Earl. “C’mon, we gotta get to the gym. Brother T is holding some weights and there’s some brew in the equipment room. He’ll be madder’n a Jap if we don’t show pretty soon.”

  “Wanna smoke some grass?” Earl asked Ron.

  “No thanks. I would, but I’ve got to see somebody up here in a few minutes.”

  “Suit yourself.” He slapped Bad Eye on the back and they turned to go.

  Watching the figures leave, Ron felt a mingled sense of loss and jealousy because they belonged and he didn’t. For lack of anything else to do, he wandered under the high weather shed where a dozen convicts had spread newspapers and laid out scores of paperback books for the weekly exchange. They would also sell them for a pack of cigarettes for two, sometimes only one, depending on the title and condition.

  Ron was looking down at the books when someone touched his shoulder. He turned—and so did his stomach. Psycho Mike faced him, the swarthy face devoid of expression except for the maliciously glittering eyes. Ron fought back the surge of dismay, knowing that any sign of weakness would magnetize aggression. The surprise wiped out his resolve to bluff, and then fight if necessary.

  “You been duckin’ me, ése,” Psycho said.

  “We were locked up until this morning,” Ron said.

  The Puerto Rican nodded, but he hadn’t been listening, didn’t care; his mind was locked on its own intentions. The crowd was close around them, and he was keyed up and fidgety.

  “C’mon, ése. I wanna talk to you. You got a problem.”

  Psycho Mike jerked his head and made his way through the crowd, but watched Ron from the corner of his eye in animal wariness. Ron followed unprotesting, thoughts twisting, conscious of weakness in his legs, resenting the peremptory order and yet afraid to balk. Maybe he could avoid trouble.

  They approached the mess hall wall where there were fewer convicts. Some of Psycho Mike’s friends were spread along the wall, faces set in permanent masks of toughness, watching the two men approach. Psycho Mike stopped just beyond the hearing of his friends.

  “Some guy’s talkin’ bad about you,” Psycho Mike said.

  “Who’s that?”

  “Some white dude in the West block … says you’re a rat.”

  The word fell like an electrical charge, as terrible an accusation to a convict as a death sentence, and virtually the same. “That’s crazy! It isn’t true!” Then indignation was overcome by fear. “I don’t even know anybody here,” he croaked.

  “I don’ know, mon … but we gotta see him … get it straight. Like, if you are a rat and you been hurtin’ my name by hangin’ around me …” The words trailed off into silent threat while he nodded his head for emphasis.

  “Well … it’s a mistake. How do we see him? I don’t want my name fucked over.”

  “We’ll go over to the West block after lunch. I told him I’d bring you.” The words were cold with menace.

  “The West block is out of bounds. Can’t we get him out here on the yard?”

  Psycho Mike shook his head. “No, we gotta go over there after lunch. The regular bull on the mess hall gate gets relieved and doesn’t know who lives over there.”

  Ron’s sightless eyes were on his shoetops, and his lips sucked together as if they’d been touched by a persimmon, but the expression hid his overpowering sense of being trapped. His hands were jammed in his pockets and were wet with sweat. Temporarily forgotten was his loathing of Psycho Mike.

  Convicts sauntered by, going about their own business, and Mike’s cohorts eyed the conversation they couldn’t hear. Ron looked up, and despite his dilemma, or perhaps because it made him more acute, he was struck by the drab monochromatic colors—dull green buildings, dead blue denims. The lack of sun made everything gray.

  They stood speechless for a minute, Ron looking away but aware of Psycho Mike’s stare. Then police whistles blew, indicating it was time to form up lines for lunch or clear the area. Those who weren’t eating could go to the other side of the yard or the lower yard. A guard came along, shooing convicts like chickens.

  “Let’s go eat,” Psycho Mike said.

  Ron accepted the trek to the West cellhouse, but he rebelled against eating with the man. “I don’t feel like it. I’m going to walk around the lower yard, get myself together. I’ll meet you after lunch.”

  “Up here. You be up here.” The threat beneath the order was open.

  As Ron went down the stairs he looked over the field where bullets had rained the last time he’d seen it. Now a cheering crowd of several hundred convicts watched an intramural football game. Cleats dug into grass stained with blood, and Ron was amazed at how quickly convicts forget. He heard music from a jazz group. In the distance Mount Tamalpais was crowned with cumulus.

  Ron didn’t know what to do. He had no reason to doubt Psycho Mike’s story, though it was utterly unreasonable. He didn’t know anyone in the West cellhouse. He wondered if the narcotic agents had set him up. They’d offered him a soft deal if he cooperated and were enraged when he’d refused. No, that was crazy. It was just a mistake and would be corrected when he saw the man. Yet what if the man persisted? Ron knew the code required him to make the man retract or else do him violence, in a kind of trial by force. Without a retraction or a stabbing, the accusation would be taken as true. He would be a reviled outcast and someone—a twenty-year-old psychopath craving a reputation—might run a shiv into his spine. He could go to the yard office and ask to be locked up, but that would be taken as a confession.

  He found himself at the gymnasium door when what had been lurking in the back of his mind surfaced. He’d put the story before Earl, ask advice. He wouldn’t ask for help, but he knew that he was hoping for it.

  The gymnasium, the prison’s newest building, had a guard inside the door checking privilege cards. As Ron held his card out for inspection, he scanned the vast room. Tall, supple blacks in red gym shorts were playing half-court basketball. Chicanos and whites were watching games inside the two four-wall handball courts. The weightlifting platforms were filled with workout groups, each one with three or four men. Ron saw T.J., remembered the craggy face from the laundry during the strike. Now the weightlifter was barechested, his muscles pumped up and flushed with blood. His massive arms were marred with jailhouse tattoos. He was sitting on the end of a padded bench, two other men with him. He sprawled back, raised his arms to where a rack held an Olympic weight bar, on each end of the bar five forty-five-pound wheels. It totaled well over four hundred pounds. The two assistants lifted the weight from the rack and held it until T.J.’s extended hands had a grip
. “Okay,” he said. They let go. The weight came down, went back up with seeming ease, descended again, and then rose slowly, the great arms quivering for a second until the elbows locked firm. The two men took it away and put it on the rack. Ron exhaled, realizing he’d been holding his breath.

  “Get on, Superhonky,” an onlooker said, bringing a grin and a wink from T.J. as he swung up to his feet, arms extended from his sides, the blood vessels on his shoulder caps swollen into hard ridges.

  Ron went up on the platform, through the groups of men. T.J. saw him coming and gave an impassive nod of recognition.

  “Where’s Earl?” Ron asked.

  “They’re all up in the equipment room,” T.J. said. “An’ they’re up to no good.” When Ron hesitated, T.J. jerked with his head and pointed with his eyes toward a wide mezzanine at the far end of the gym. A third of it was wired off with heavy mesh and here were stored football and baseball uniforms. The rest of the mezzanine was a television viewing area.

  Skirting the basketball court, Ron went up the stairs and rattled the door by banging on the mesh with the heel of his hand. The inside of the area was invisible because the uniform racks were set to hide it.

  A slender Chicano, shirtless and barechested except for a dangling medallion, appeared from behind the uniforms. His visage was thin, ferretlike, but his hazel eyes were ready for quick laughter. Before Ron could speak, the Chicano called back over his own shoulder, “Earl, that youngster is here.”

  The reply was inaudible, but the Chicano unfastened the lock and opened the door. Behind the uniforms was an area with a Ping-Pong table and chairs. Half a dozen convicts were spread around, and a sweet alcohol odor came from a plastic mattress cover on the table. It was loaded with liquid and the pulp of oranges and its folded mouth stood upright. Paul Adams was dipping a gallon can inside and pouring the contents into a plastic tumbler. He handed the can to the shirtless Chicano who’d opened the door.

  “Hot Vito, baby,” said Bad Eye from a corner. “Don’t get too drunk. You’re too smooth to lose your senses.”

  “Man,” Paul said. “Hot V’s got a prick like a horse. You’d better not mess with him. Show him, V.”

  Vito grinned impishly but said nothing. He was too busy drinking.

  Earl Copen was on a chair tilted against the one solid wall, a coffee jar filled with home brew in his hand. “Yeah, remember Vito put that sissy in the hospital with a split asshole last year.”

  “You motherfuckers got dirty minds,” Vito said.

  Bad Eye was at the brew sack. He glanced to Ron, who stood just inside the room. “Want some? It’s pretty fuckin’ good hooch.”

  Ron shook his head, feeling ill at ease and out of place. These were volatile men, and half-drunk more unpredictable than usual. Yet there was apparently no resentment at his presence. Nobody looked at him with hostility. He caught Earl’s eye and motioned that he wanted to talk. Earl thunked the chair down and followed Ron outside. The room was noisy behind them.

  “I’d like to borrow a knife,” Ron said without preamble.

  “Whoa!” Earl said, holding up both hands. “Not so fast. I can’t give you a piece if I don’t know who it’s for. I gave one to a guy once and he stabbed a couple of my friends in the Mexican Brotherhood. And they might’ve wanted to kill me if they found out … even though I didn’t know. What is it? Psycho Mike making trouble?”

  “No, not him directly, but—” And Ron told the story, at first hesitant and stilted, but then in a rush. Earl listened with the wisp of a smile, but his eyes drew narrower and the flesh around them flickered.

  When Ron finished, he became aware that Bad Eye’s face was at the wire on the door, like a fish at the glass of an aquarium. He’d been listening unnoticed.

  “I know I’ve got to stop that kind of talk,” Ron finished.

  “Think he’s needin’ a knife, Bad Eye?” Earl asked.

  “Yeah … to stick in that greasy Puerto Rican for tryin’ that stale ass game.”

  Earl looked Ron directly in the eye. “They want to trick you over to the West block. There’s just one bull in the whole building. They were going to pull you in a cell and rape you.”

  Ron colored, furious at such treachery and embarrassed at his own gullibility.

  “It’s no big thing,” Earl said. “Lemme go talk to the dude.”

  The burden on Ron was lightened, but he didn’t want to involve Earl, and he didn’t want to be obligated. Not knowing what to say or what he wanted, Ron didn’t answer.

  “Stay here,” Earl said.

  “I don’t want you to fight my battles for me.”

  “I’m not, man. If I thought I was going to have trouble, I wouldn’t go. But he’s playing a game and I’ve been playing games around here for eighteen hard years. It’s easier if you’re not on the scene.”

  “I’m goin’,” Bad Eye said.

  “Fuck you,” Earl said with an affectionate grin. “You’re drunk and you get too extreme even when you’re sober. We don’t want a war over some bullshit.”

  “He might not like you gettin’ involved.”

  “I’ll take Superhonky. And Ponchie, if I can find him—just to stand in the background and look tough. If we’re gonna have some trouble, you’ll be there—’cause I know you ain’t gonna let nothin’ happen to me. I raised your ass.”

  When Earl went down the mezzaine stairs, Bad Eye asked Ron if he wanted to go inside. Ron declined.

  Inside, Bad Eye repeated the story to Paul and Vito.

  “Is Earl tryin’ to fuck that kid?” Vito asked.

  “Naw,” Paul said. “He might think he wants to, but he won’t turn him out. Earl hasn’t got any dog like that in him. What’s happened is that kid’s found a friend.”

  “Shit!” Bad Eye said. “Earl’s an old snake in the grass.”

  “Hold it! He befriended you when you were just a shaver.”

  “I was a tush hog and a bully when I was a baby.”

  “Okay, tush hog … but it’s still not a smart move for Earl. Someone that young and good-looking is a time bomb around here. There’s a lot of animals here. There’s some crazy motherfuckers here—”

  “We’re crazy as anybody,” Bad Eye said.

  “Right … but you know there’s nobody that strong here. We don’t know every maniac. I mean … you know what I mean.”

  They knew—any fool can kill you.

  Psycho Mike and his retinue were among the last to leave the mess hall. Despite the bright day, their jacket collars were turned up. They slouched along in arrogant toughness.

  But a viper gives no warning, Earl thought, and a coral snake is pretty. He was standing nearby, leaning on a steel pillar of the shed, while T.J. and Ponchie stood twenty yards away in feigned nonchalant conversation.

  Earl strolled casually toward Psycho Mike’s group, thinking that these kids had seen too many motorcycle movies. He kept his hands exposed to show he wasn’t armed—though he wouldn’t have put his hand under his clothes even if he was; that showed the hole card. He was thinking that he would have to be delicate, imply the threat without showing it, be careful not to upset insecure egos. He wanted to get through without violence—not that he was afraid of violence when necessary, but he did want to get out of prison one more time without having to break out.

  Psycho Mike’s eyes were on him; his face was hard and he’d noticed Earl’s allies, though they were giving no indication that they were involved.

  “Excuse me, Mike,” Earl said. “I need to talk to you.” He angled between Psycho Mike and the gang, separating them, and then eased away a few steps. Mike stepped with him, warily.

  “I heard about that guy in the West block putting a jacket on Ron.”

  “So, ése?”

  “So it’s bullshit.”

  “He’s gotta do something about it. It makes me look bad.”

  “I know it isn’t true … and the kid is ready to cut the guy’s head off. He’s got a shiv.” Earl paused, noted the
flicker of surprise in Mike’s eyes. “Personally, I don’t want to see him get in trouble. Both of us are his friends. We can go over and see the dude … do whatever has to be done. Maybe you’re not that involved … I dunno. If you’re not, tell me who the dude is and T.J. and Ponchie and me’ll go see him.”

  Earl spoke with such sincerity that Psycho Mike was confused. He couldn’t be sure it was a ploy, and his scheme shriveled up. He was not afraid of Earl, whom he didn’t really know and thought was too old to be tough, but he knew of T.J. and Ponchie and the White and Mexican Brotherhoods. Psycho Mike’s ego would have required that he make a stand in a straightforward power play, but Earl’s strategy left him an out.

  “Whaddya think?” Earl asked.

  “We don’t have to do that. I’ll see the guy and pull him up. I thought something was funny ’cause he’s from Sacramento, not L.A. He’s got Ron mixed up with somebody.”

  “I’ll really appreciate that, bro’,” Earl said. “I’d hate to see serious trouble over nothing.”

  Psycho Mike grunted noncommittally. He’d been outmaneuvered and was certain Earl had the same plans he had for the youth. Why else would a hardrock con put himself out on a limb for a pretty kid?

  Earl didn’t know what his intentions were about Ron, nor why he’d become involved. He would have snorted derisively at the mention of altruism and become irritable if accused of trying to make the kid a queen. At the moment, however, he was giddy from relaxed tension. He walked down the stairs between his friends, patted Ponchie on the back and thanked him for coming along. They’d known each other since juvenile hall but were in different groups, and Ponchie was under no obligation to get involved in Earl’s problems.