No Journey's End: My Tragic Romance with Ex-Manson Girl, Leslie Van Houten

by Peter Chiaramonte

  Gabrielle called at around quarter past eight and asked if she could come over. She pledged to bring a dozen hot chewy Montreal bagels and a tub of fresh cream cheese. She asked what I was up to, so I told her exactly.

  “I’m reading all about Leslie Van Houten and writing a letter in support of her getting out of prison.”

  Gabrielle said she wondered where I found the time.

  “What is so damned important about Leslie Van Houten? Don’t you have other things to worry about, like grad school for starters? Or have you no time for that or me either?”

  “First of all, there’s plenty that’s ‘damned important’ about Leslie Van Houten,” I said calmly. “This is no mere distraction. These are cultural studies, among other things, the way I see it. As to your point about grad school…”

  And so I went on for nearly an hour and never let Gabe get a word in edgewise.

  “I think you need to play the game more and not be so radical,” she said at last. “That is, if you want to get a job and keep it. Do you plan to continue with coaching?”

  I shook my head.

  Gabrielle said, “You never say so. I never know what’s really going on with you. Are you still angry about last night at the Gardens?”

  She asked me before I was ready to answer. Nothing more was said by either one of us for a minute or two. Gabe helped herself to another hot press of coffee. She wasn’t smiling.

  Finally, I made the announcement.

  “I’ve decided not to go on with teaching high school as a professional route. That much is sure. I’m still waiting to hear back from the higher education group at OISE about getting into the MA program this summer. If they say ‘No,’ I’ll decide something else later. Professor Sheffield sent me a very nice letter, requesting my referees forward their letters directly to his office. I’ve asked Higgins and Kidd for their recommendations. What do you think of the plan?”

  “You’ll get in. Peter, I know you will.”

  Then, her face turned the somber color of autumn. Her dark eyes were suddenly wide with affection when she added, “You’ll be moving on soon, one way or another.”

  Ten seconds of silence elapsed.

  Sounding sheepish, I repeated, “One way or another. I’ll never suit where I am. Let’s face it. If I get into OISE, maybe—just maybe—there’s a chance. I’ll start with summer school as a trial and see if things work out after that.”

  Gabe didn’t say anything more right away and neither did I. After a minute or two, she turned my face towards hers with her hand under my chin.

  She said, “I know you won’t like my saying so, but isn’t your interest in Leslie Van Houten just an infatuation with somebody famous?”

  “Is that what you think?” I said, looking her straight in the eyes.

  “Maybe.” She looked away. “You admit you’re distracted, unfocused, uninspired...therefore unhappy. I can see you haven’t been paying attention. Karen thinks so too.”

  To myself I kept it hidden how right I thought she was and why.

  “Is that right? Attention to what, exactly? You guys seem to think I’m looking to be somebody’s some kind of hero? If it were true, that would be nice, but that’s not the point.”

  I stood up and brushed the crumbs from my lap onto the carpet. Gabe swept them up while I watched without protest.

  “If that’s not the point, what is? And what do your friends Buck or Jean have to say? Have you discussed this with Andy?” Gabrielle asked. But I couldn’t answer.

  What I thought was too muddled and would’ve taken too long to make any sense to either myself or others.

  Before stepping out the door she kissed me twice on the lips and once on the forehead. That finishing touch felt like the uncertain beginning of one thing and the end of another. Once Gabe was gone, I went back to reading and started writing another letter. I played Neil Young’s Zuma once more, getting high on the mood of his music. As I wrote, I sprinkled in lyrics of his with words of my own that matched the syllabic verse of his songs. Gabrielle’s visit was pushed aside in my mind and soon forgotten. All my thoughts went out to the tall pretty girl imprisoned somewhere on the dark side—east of Eden—in sunny California.

  Since Leslie hadn’t said much about her upcoming trial in her letter, that was something I was sure to ask her about. And, since she’d been polite enough to ask about my family and where I was from, I was anxious to answer her questions. I told her about growing up summers on a family farm thirty miles north of the city and about spending the school year living near Carlton and Yonge in the heart of downtown Toronto. She asked me what my high school was like, and I tried to explain how I didn’t know since I never went there. I was expelled after my first year at a private Catholic boys’ school. And, after transferring to public school and failing grade ten twice, I told her the principal at Victoria Park Collegiate, Jackson Tovell, (who knew me from football, hockey, and track) said he’d had a look at my grades and was puzzled. I had to sit for the Dominion of Canada IQ exam in his office. He said he needed to know whether or not I was “truly a moron.”

  When I was sixteen, I left home to live with Jackson Tovell and his family. We lived in a nice suburban house near Windfields Park in York Mills. It was a big break for me—a real turning point in my life—that happened right after an exceptionally hardhearted beating I took from my father. To be fair, my dad, Frank, never drank or ever once spanked my butt that I can remember. He went straight from the flat-out palm-slap upside the head to full-fisted sucker punches when I wasn’t looking. Other people remember him as a handsome, devoted son, and peppy raconteur. Yeah, I saw that tap dance he did for others—especially strangers. But what I recall best of all was my broken nose and thirteen stitches over both of my eyes.

  The law in Ontario secondary schools granted principals the authority to complete official transcripts any way they decided. Instead of attending the rest of high school, Jack arranged for me to audit whatever classes I wanted to take at the University of Toronto—provided I had the consent of each professor. I was never turned down. There were no tests or exams I had to take unless I wanted. I voluntarily wrote essays, for which I received feedback. The best gift of all about having the freedom to learn was taking the reins out of the hands of the pezzonovante, who were forever trying to put the bit between my teeth. Jack taught me the meaning of curriculum. It means the racecourse for charioteers and their fastest, most powerful chargers.

  Most importantly, I said in my letter to Leslie that, instead of schooling, I’d learned to take responsibility for directing my own education and not leave that to others. Since I never had to worry about attendance or meaningless hoops to jump through, I became a socialization that didn’t take, which is a badge of honor I’ve been paying the price for, without regret, ever since. Some battles are worth the fight, even when lost. It toughens you up for the next one.

  In 1968, Jack called an old friend at the Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. They sent varsity hockey coach Tiff Cook to Toronto to recruit me. After watching me play and inviting me to visit the campus, I joined the Bobcats about the same time as Leslie joined Manson. I stayed for two years before transferring home to the University of Toronto. Ohio U had no graduate school of philosophy.

  Each question Leslie asked about me, I put back to her. For example, I asked about her wanting to become a professional writer once she was out of prison. And I told her how, philosophically speaking, I believed teachers of writing could never gain any real sense of an individual’s personal worth and unique value for creative expression, as long as they continued to dictate to others what they must learn for themselves. I borrowed the phrase instead of education from John Holt—hoping it wouldn’t sound too grand to ask her, “Why must everything be ‘learned’ before students are permitted to do it?” I told her that compulsory schooling was a destru
ctive invention and that, in my view, I was headed in another direction as a philosopher—somewhere new I could call my own.

  Once I’d finished trying to impress her, I inserted the recent photograph of myself that she asked for inside the pages of my letter. It was a black and white picture Gabrielle had taken of me. I asked Leslie if she could send me one of herself as well. I dropped the envelope in the post box outside the drug store near Rochdale College. There was something else I thought to do on a whim. I went into the store and purchased two Valentine cards. One was for giving to Gabrielle with chocolates and flowers. In the other, I hastily scribbled belated best wishes and signed it, “Amor Fati, from Peter with kisses.” I posted the card same as the letter to: Leslie Van Houten, Booking No. 4186-613, P.O. Box 54320, Terminal Annex, Los Angeles, California.

  On the Sunday before Valentine’s Day, Gabrielle had come up with a cool idea for our taking part in a family tradition. Instead of lining up with other shameless, dutiful couples in restaurants, we observed the Feast of San Valentino at Gabrielle’s house with her entire family. We shared dinner at home and then watched a video together on the latest invention: a Sony Betamax. Dr. Strangelove, how romantic. Still, I thought this all very special and charming.

  When I arrived back home at my flat, it took me less than an hour to plan for school the next day. With time to spare, I spent the rest of the night getting high and reading more about how Leslie met Bobby Beausoleil. The history of boyfriends, I decided, might be one way of figuring out what led to Leslie joining the Manson cult in the first place. Maybe Gabe had been right to call it an “infatuation.” I’ve heard it called worse. None of that mattered. I wasn’t just curious to find out about how Leslie’s entanglements with the Manson cult ever got started, but also how she dragged herself out of that abyss. But it was too soon, and I didn’t dare ask her. I waited and wondered if I’d ever hear back from her in a second letter. In the meantime, I kept reading The Garbage People.

  * * *

  Leslie Van Houten was twice voted “homecoming princess” of Monrovia High School in California. Her parents divorced when she was just fourteen. Soon after all that, she and her first serious boyfriend started experimenting with sex and drugs. (Sounds good to me. Who hasn’t?) For a while it became a habit of theirs to skip school, get naked, and drop lots of acid. Leslie in the Sky with Diamonds. In the sixties, unguarded teen lust and subsequent pregnancies were not uncommon—neither was legal abortion. Leslie wanted to have the baby, but her mother insisted against it.

  After her parents split up, Leslie ran away toward San Francisco. Like so many of us kids at the time, she was headed that way with flowers in her hair and songs in her heart. And, somewhere near Mendocino, she joined a camp of other young hippies who were into mysticism, yoga and psychonautic adventures. Those were the times. And that’s where she met the handsome drifter Bobby Beausoleil, who went by the nickname “Cupid.”

  When Leslie told Bobby she’d go with him anywhere, he asked her, would she go as far as Hell. He claims she answered, “Take me.” And, as it turns out, that’s where they were headed. Right away, Leslie discovered she was expected to share Cupid with a gaggle of other girls and be part of his entourage—kind of crowded at bedtime. Bobby traded the old school bus in for a beat-up truck that he and his band of gypsies used as a camper. It wasn’t long before Leslie tired of all the cramped quarters and infighting among the girls over Bobby’s divided affections. So she ran off with Cupid and another girl back to LA. He said he had friends with solid contacts in the music business. Here comes the next Elvis.

  After drifting between public rest areas and parking overnight in a series of vacant lots, the group eventually settled at the Manson Family encampment at Spahn Ranch near Chatsworth. This rent-a-tired-pony estate was actually the site of an old Western movie set owned by a near-blind cowboy named George Spahn. There were still a few hired hands around to look after the horses. And, in exchange for having a few of the girls to look after him, Mr. Spahn let Charlie’s Family bunk in tatty old trailers and derelict buildings scattered about the property.

  When Manson first met the pretty brunette Beausoleil brought with him this time, he dropped what he was doing to study her closely. Charlie had plenty of experience handling runaway teenaged girls like Leslie before. First, he tacitly implied he possessed insight into all of her lonely disaffections. For example, he used a common theatrical device to mirror her moods. By copying each changing expression or gesture Leslie made, Manson intended to show how well he could identify what she was thinking and feeling. That’s why they call guys like him “con artists.” Leslie’s childhood clan was soon forgotten, once she’d found this new family home. She may have been lost, but she wasn’t alone. There were plenty of kids on drugs looking for a way out of the juggernaut. Nothing new seemed unappealing.

  Danny DeCarlo, a member of the Straight Satans motorcycle club who was camped out at the ranch at the time, shared a dusty old bunkhouse with Bobby and his harem. DeCarlo said how right away he could tell Leslie was more independent and smarter than the other girls. She was open to Manson but still a bit skeptical, at first. But, after Leslie split up with Bobby Beausoleil, she went back to the Manson family at Spahn Ranch. Charlie took it upon himself, Danny said, to “set her straight” and damn quick at that. The words Danny used to describe this process were, “She was going to fit in like she was being locked down.”

  I had to wonder what on earth all of that meant and how it was done.

  Since Leslie was very attractive, Charlie saw he could use her to get the men he wanted to join his cult. Other witnesses corroborated the effect Manson had on each of his followers. Most agreed he was like “some kind of hypnotist” who savored the role. During the first trial, Prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi confirmed these facts, whenever it suited him, but vehemently objected to the same points when reiterated by the defense team in their counter-arguments.

  Former Manson Family members such as Leslie Van Houten were nothing more than Charlie Manson’s “pawns,” Bugliosi reported.

  Later on in his book, he wrote: “Somewhere along the line, I wasn’t sure how or where or when—Manson developed a control over his followers so all-encompassing that he could ask them to violate the ultimate taboo—say, ‘Kill,’ and they would do it.”

  And some of them did, Mr. B.—some more profusely than others. Why was this man so intent on reducing them all to pawns of Charlie Manson with no will of their own and then equally intent on reconstructing them as mindful, capable individuals acting out of their own volition? Bugliosi seemed as nuts as the rest of them.

  * * *

  A change is as good as a rest, so they say. I was still spending time each week sprinting, skating and lifting. And reading about Leslie was one way I had of putting my feet up. The more time I spent reading about the Manson case meant spending less time with friends such as Gabrielle Adler and Jean Cousineau. Besides, both Gabe and Jean were as busy with school and other things as I was.

  It was a cold Tuesday night, the 1st of March. I had been reading more about Leslie’s long past affairs with boyfriends like Beausoleil, Manson, Watson and others. I was tired of looking for clues to the attraction. I have to admit that, at one point, I was feeling put off by so many citations to Leslie’s devotion to these sorts of creeps. I certainly had nothing in common with any of these jokers, except one tiny bit with Tex Watson, who played football and sprinted in high school. But I also realized that guilt by association is nothing but prejudice. Some feeble excuse for getting my competitive blood up. One simple fact is that Leslie had been terribly young and out of her mind at the time all this madness happened. I knew there was more to the mystery than that, and the way I had to find out the truth was to go on exchanging letters. I decided to put a lot of myself into that.

  It was well after ten when I called it a night. Then the telephone rang sounding louder t
han usual. On the other end a substantively drunk Jean Cousineau was calling from a pay phone inside of Frank Vetere’s Pizzeria. I think he said that he and Gabrielle would like to come over to talk.

  6

  Waiting for the Siren’s Call

  As someone bound to lecturing others way more than I should, I welcomed Jean and Gabe over. Naturally, I was curious, even if it was obvious what this was about. I was anxious to hear what they had to say. I brushed my teeth, swallowed three extra-strength aspirin and put the water on to boil. I lit a scented candle, burned a doob for myself right away and rolled a couple more for later on.

  I took a quick inventory to assess how I was feeling and recorded this in my diary. For one thing, my whole body ached in a nice way, only my neck was stiff from reading in bed. It snapped, crackled and popped when I turned it. My face and the back of my neck began to feel flushed and damp when I stretched. The century-old radiator felt too hot, and the air in my apartment stood stale and looked rather murky. A cold, timorous wind was starting to blow outside in the dark, though I felt compelled to open the windows.

  The first thought I had when I opened the door was that Jean was too drunk to talk. He quickly confirmed I was right.

  “Where’s Gabrielle?” I asked, and Jean said something that sounded like, “She chickened out,” or whatever the French is for that.

  “How...rar yu?” he asked.

  Once he stepped inside, Jean rushed past me and straight to the john where he threw up in loud heaves and splashes. Poor salaud. You can only laugh if you’ve been there yourself. I put a fresh roll of paper towels beside the door to the bathroom and left him in private. When he dragged himself out ten minutes later, Jean asked for a glass of water. I had one ready with ice cubes and handed it to him after he staggered to the futon and fell down.