Dead Souls

by J. Lincoln Fenn

  I have to go. Opal doesn’t buy my work-emergency excuse—she had to stop herself from rolling her eyes—but I whispered to Justin that I have to meet him in person, explain why I won’t be seeing him for a while. Justin nodded quietly, a gift.

  I hate this, having to lie. Two lies already before I’m even out the door. And it does unnerve me—oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive and all that. But the end also justifies the means, and if I can save Justin’s life as a result, I’m sure he’ll forgive these small trespasses. Plus I just may be the only person on earth who could even get close to Saul. Invisibility has its uses.

  So I grab my coat, my keys, ignore my cell, which is blowing up with more dead soul chatter about Gary—Emergency mtg., 7:00 p.m.—and strike off for Marin.

  UP CLOSE, the prison doesn’t look the way I expected, certainly not the San Quentin I always pictured across the bay. From the bridge, it always seemed like a fortress—impenetrable, formidable—an impression cemented by the stories my parents swapped with their druggie friends, tall tales about barbed wires for miles, dungeons, secret booby traps to prevent escape, guards with assault rifles surveying it all from a tower equipped with heat-seeking bullets.

  The reality is more like Disneyland took a wrong turn into Soviet bloc architecture. The original Gothic structure looks like a fort or a monastery, but there are other buildings too—a brick one that could pass for a nineteenth-century factory, along with flat-topped, monolithic cement structures of unknown purpose.

  And surprisingly there’s only one public gate into the prison, manned by a solitary, slightly pudgy guard. I pause at the stop sign, put the car in park, roll down the window. My plan is to pretend I’m lost and ask for directions while I get a good view of the front entrance so I can park somewhere out of sight and then ghost in.

  “Hello,” he says with a smile. “Visitor parking is there.” He cheerfully points to a nearby part of the lot. Then he hands me a logbook, which I wasn’t expecting. All it takes is a beat of my hesitation for him to take a look at me more closely. Not a regular, obviously.

  I see what other people wrote and note several entries for “Museum” under “purpose.” There’s a museum at San Quentin? Sounds good enough, so I do that too. I pass the clipboard back to him, and he looks at it for a good minute.

  “Tourist?”

  “Sort of,” I say. “I live in Oakland. But I’ve never been over here.”

  He nods at this, his suspicions somewhat eased. “Saw the show, huh?”

  “Yes,” I say, no idea what he’s talking about.

  “That week it came out, we had to expand the hours. Bus in folks from San Rafael. Thank God it’s died down. ID?”

  I show him my license, and he notes it, then he waves me through. “Brown building to your right. No photos or using your cell phone on prison property. Enjoy.”

  I slowly roll into the lot, feeling a minor thrill of victory, but then it strikes me—the prison’s sheer enormity. It’d be easy to wander the hallways all day, and I don’t have the time. Not surprisingly, interior blueprints weren’t available online, although I do have a photo printed on my inkjet of the exterior doors to the Adjustment Center, or so the Web tag said. I’ve never tried ghosting somewhere unfamiliar, based only on a photo. Essentially I’ll be winging it, surrounded by more than four thousand inmates and armed guards. Great.

  I feel security’s gaze on me, clocking time. I can’t imagine that disappearing in my car while he’s watching would be a good idea.

  Well, nothing for it.

  I get out of the car, see the sign for the SAN QUENTIN STATE MUSEUM, right next to the SAN QUENTIN HANDICRAFT GIFT SHOP. God bless America. If there’s a bathroom with a lock, I might just be able to pull this off.

  I walk by another sign, USE IT AND LOSE IT, over an icon of a cell phone, and enter the door to the museum.

  The air is tepid, and a small, useless fan whirs on the floor. Cinder-block walls painted beige, the floor lined with yellow and white checkerboard linoleum tiles, well worn. There’s a desk with a sign-in log, a half-filled mug of coffee with powdered creamer floating on the top, and a scratched old wooden chair, empty for the moment, and a bell, the kind you see in hotels.

  I have the place to myself, for now. In case there’s a camera, I pretend to be interested in the small labyrinth of displays, keeping an eye out for a bathroom sign.

  There’s a bit of rope from the last prisoner who was hung, a model of the death chamber that was, according to the descriptive card, built by the inmates it would later kill, an assortment of confiscated shivs. Headline news clippings from across the century blown up serve as wallpaper, detailing the most horrific executions, the wildest murders. If the museum was anywhere except the grounds of San Quentin, it’d seem like a cheap carny sideshow, but because of the proximity to actual death-row inmates, it offers a shiver cemeteries can’t touch. I wonder how many of them were dead souls. How many had a choice.

  “That was for ‘Bloody Babs,’ ” says a voice out of nowhere.

  I turn to find a sixties-ish man in a worn, CASH, SAN QUENTIN T-shirt, a slightly gleeful twinkle in his eye. He points to the glass case I’ve landed in front of. There’s a blindfold wrapped around the head of a foam dummy, and next to it a black-and-white photo of a woman who could pass for a 1950s film star.

  “She wanted a blindfold before they gassed her, said she didn’t want to have to look at the people watching. Understandable, I guess.”

  I’m expected to reply, so I say, “Interesting.”

  “Susan Hayward played her in the movie.”

  Just then a family of six enter, a macabre Sunday outing for the kids. Real tourists judging by the tucked-in T-shirts, brand-new sneakers, and identical cargo shorts. The littlest, wearing a striped prison hat, rings the bell twice before her mother shushes her.

  “Duty calls,” he says. I guess he must be the curator and the inhabitant of the empty chair.

  “Is there a bathroom?” I ask.

  He nods, points me to the back of the building. There’s a sign hanging from the ceiling: RESTROOMS—DAMES & GANGSTERS.

  Strange how a few decades can turn horrific crimes into quaint spook stories, give murderers the shine of celebrity. The victims aren’t represented in the memorabilia; they’re part of the story, but not the focus. Never are. I pass by rusted manacles, a straightjacket yellowed by time, brown wooden tombstones with numbers only, 41876, 26213. It’s not inconceivable that if Gary survives, he’ll be incarcerated here too.

  A problem I intend to avoid altogether.

  I reach the nook with the restrooms, find a repurposed cell door painted bright pink with DAMES in block print. Inside, there’s a stainless-steel toilet, plain mirror, stainless-steel sink—leftovers from the last prison refurb maybe.

  I click the lock and take a look at my watch. The sign on the museum said it closes at four thirty, and it’s three thirty now. Plus I bet one of the little girls in the family will need to hit the bathroom soon—they always do.

  I quickly pull the photo of “solitary” from my back pocket. It shows a long hallway with what looks like thick, steel freezer doors painted white, each with a narrow, rectangular opening for food trays and handcuffing. Cement floors, not painted, burnished to a high shine. The floors, I’ve learned from the Internet, need to be easy to clean because most solitary inmates try to kill themselves at some point, hoping the time it takes for the guards to suit up is longer than it takes to bleed out.

  It’s a very, very long hallway.

  I hope the bathroom lock holds. I can imagine the stir that’d be created at finding a pile of clothes with no person attached to them, the mere seconds it’d take to review the video footage, connect my name to the log. Start a manhunt.

  Fuck.

  I close my eyes, picture the hallway in my mind. The quiet hu
m of the bathroom fluorescent light slowly, slowly, starts to fade away.

  IT’S COLD IN SAN QUENTIN. That’s the first thing I notice, followed by the stink of unwashed bodies, the echoing reverb of shouts muffled through steel, hands pounding against narrow slits of windows. I shiver, look down. Naked. Check. Invisible. Check. Desperate. Check.

  Something white hits my foot—a crumpled, flattened piece of paper folded into a triangle, attached to a clear fishing line. Just as quick, it’s yanked back and slips under one of the metal cell doors. Shoots out again but this time I step out of the way, watch as it slides into the cell directly opposite, where the note is obviously plucked because when the fishing line is yanked back, the note is gone.

  Next, a folded newspaper glides from another cell down the hall under the door of another. Fascinating. It’s like watching frogs snag flies—a lot of activity for what’s supposed to be solitary confinement. But then, what else do you do when you have nothing but time on your hands?

  Now my problem is finding out which cell holds Saul. There are so many.

  An idea strikes the next time a note shoots out from a door. This time I grab it, tug at it three times. Follow the line of string to the small, narrow window.

  Just as I expected, an inmate presses his face against the pane of glass to see what happened. Young—too young to be Saul—white and thin as a rail, with tattoos that wrap around his neck and up the scalp of his shaved head. From his point of view, it must be quite the show, because all he sees is a note floating in midair, drifting back to him airborne like it’s held by a ghost, which in a way it is.

  I open the meal-tray latch. Drop the note inside. Slowly . . . slowly, the inmate edges forward. Reaches out a tentative hand.

  “Where is Saul Baptiste?” I whisper through the slot.

  He jumps back like an electric shock passes through him, and his hand starts a junkie tremble. And while yes, it’s the disembodied voice that startles him, I think there’s another part reacting to Saul’s name. He looks the way we look when we talk about Scratch.

  “Wha?? Wha??” His eyes dart around his cell, expecting a prank maybe, a bored guard’s attempt at breaking up the monotony.

  A voice behind me, muffled through glass. “Who wants to know?”

  I turn and see another inmate, thick-necked with a dark goatee, peering at me, or right where I’m standing. He licks his dry lips. First I feel the telltale magnetic pull, and then I see it, the dead soul shadow, immune to the bright fluorescent lights.

  Christ, he does see me.

  My heart starts to race, but then I remember, the cell doors are thick, and this is the most secure part of the most secure prison in California. I leave the skinny junkie and approach.

  He meets my eyes directly. Then lets his drop and linger over my breasts. Yes, he sees me. I fold my arms protectively over my chest.

  “You gotta watch out,” he says. “One of the guards is a dead soul, too.”

  Damn. Hadn’t considered that.

  The inmate takes the rest of me in, eyes roaming appreciatively over my body. It’s disgusting, a violation, a pornographic act, and a part of me—a huge part of me—wants to spirit away back to the museum bathroom. But I’ve come this far. I’ve got too much skin in the game, and he knows it.

  He leans his forehead against the glass. “What do you want with Saul?”

  “I want to ask him a question.”

  He laughs. “Good luck with that, little sister. Just don’t get too close. He just got another five years for biting the ear off a doctor.”

  Not the kind of news I was hoping for. Maybe he really is crazy, like Alejandro said. “A doctor. What kind of doctor? Is he ill?”

  “Loco. Swallowed a spoon. Too dangerous for the psych wards, so they stick him here. Illegal as shit.” He spits on the cement floor. “And you, you got nice ears, little sister. I’d hate to see anything happen to them.”

  This does get my attention. But I can always disappear entirely. At least that’s what I tell myself.

  “What cell is he in?”

  “Come in here and I’ll whisper it in your ear. Might be the last thing you hear.” He exhales softly, leaving a cloud of fog on the glass, then licks a small circle with the tip of his tongue.

  For half a second, I actually think about it; that’s how bad I want a double deal. Corruption is like a credit card: once you start spending, small acts of treachery don’t seem like a big deal, not when you’re over your limit anyway.

  But then I realize I have some bargaining collateral of my own.

  I smile. Press my finger against my side of the glass. “Can you guess why I’m here? Maybe I just hang out in prisons for fun . . . or maybe my favor’s been called in.”

  Ah, that gets his attention.

  “So,” I continue. “If you want to explain to him why you got in the way, that’s really up to you. I’m sure he’ll understand. He seems like the forgiving type.”

  This has the intended effect. He now appraises me differently. “I don’t believe you.” But he sounds like he’s trying to convince himself.

  I lean in, whisper, “You heard about the Christmas recital massacre?”

  He whistles and claps his hands, almost in appreciation. “Seriously? That was one of us? Sick. That was totally, totally sick.”

  It makes my stomach churn, but this is wasting my time.

  “Now,” I continue. “Which cell?”

  HE’S EXTRAORDINARILY THIN, hunched over on his singular bed, which is fastened into the wall, floating. Face shadowed even under the stark fluorescent light, bald at the top of his head, with white straggly hair that reaches his shoulders. His orange jumpsuit hangs on him, bags around his waist—more of a scarecrow than a man anymore. I wonder if it’s some kind of hunger strike, or if he suffers from anorexia. Or maybe, if he’s completed his favor, he’s trying to kill himself the only way left.

  There is nothing else in the bleak cell except for a toilet, a sink, and a thin gray mattress with a thin gray blanket. Not a single personal item—not a book or a photo or a scrap of paper.

  He rocks back and forth, humming softly, like he hears a symphony no one else can, fingers tapping along to the inaudible melody. Maybe the guards won’t let him have anything in his cell. What else has he eaten? I hesitate a moment outside the door. If he’s aware of me, he doesn’t register it.

  “Saul,” I try quietly.

  Nothing. No response. I remember how scared the skinny junkie was at the mention of Saul’s name, and I realize how completely, utterly stupid my next act will be. The man has traded his soul, bitten off the ear of his last visitor, and lost everything he cares about, possibly his mind too. He’s locked in a cell behind thick cement walls, isolated from the general population because he’s determined to be that dangerous. But I have to know. There’s no choice really.

  I decide it’s easier to walk through the cell door than to try to close my eyes and ghost myself inside. It’s a tight space—I never can tell exactly where I’ll end up with the ghost thing, and I want to stay close to the exit. Walking through walls is a trick I’ve been working on for the past two months, something that takes a lot of concentration and a certain verve, because I can feel it, the wall, each wire pressing as it passes through my flesh. I taste the insulation, and the drywall, and if there’s a telephone cable, I even pick up bits of conversation.

  I let my mind relax, then take the first step into the door. My foot passes through, then I reach in an arm, and then the rest of me goes through easier. Once I’m in, I’m left with the aftertaste of something acrid in my mouth, lead paint maybe.

  Still, Saul doesn’t look up.

  What if it isn’t Saul?

  But then he does look, a twitchy, sideways glance. His pale eyes are rheumy, cold, mercilessly intelligent, and completely insane. I recognize a desiccated version of
Saul’s protest picture. Older, yes, but also like something is consuming him from the inside out.

  “There’s no point, point, point,” he says, to himself or me, it’s not clear. “Not the first, not the last, not the last, not the first.”

  He jumps to his feet quicker than I would have thought possible, and instantly he’s a mere inch or two away from my face, staring with a near feral intensity. “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.” I feel something charged between us, a kind of static electricity.

  My heart pounds and I take a step back, but I didn’t come all this way to leave empty-handed. “That’s from a play, right?” My voice is shaky, but it’s offering, an attempt to direct him. Gauge how mad he is.

  He leans in a little closer. “Dante,” he whispers furtively, like someone else might be listening in. “I can feel it when a new one’s here, I can always feel it.” He taps his index finger on his temple. “Here, I feel it in my head. It won’t stop; it never stops. The words, the words, the words. Sometimes I paint them on the wall. They wash it off. The bastards wash it off.”

  A wave of goose bumps ripple across my skin. But it’s something like a conversation. “Where do you get paint?”

  He smiles then, or makes a grimace. “Alejandro says he’ll bring me paint, but he lies. He never does. He never does.”

  Alejandro. Either he’s not as out of touch with Saul as he claims, or this is just another reveal of Saul’s madness. Hard to say.

  “So I paint with what I have,” Saul continues. “Blood or shit. Shit or blood.”

  The words seem to strike him then, a flicker of lucidity, because he deflates, turns away, stares hard at the unforgiving, cement wall. I notice a spot on his thin mattress has a slight indentation from all the years he’s spent sitting there. And there are scars on his neck, repeated cuts across his jugular vein—one still looks raw, not entirely healed. I wonder what he uses to cut himself.