Thrill Kids

by Packer, Vin

  The office was comfortable. The desk was large, with papers scattered on top, and a few books. A package of cigarettes was open and two ash trays were filled with butts.

  The doctor looked up at Heine. He was standing framed by the window behind him; he held a report in his hand. “Hans Heine?”

  His eyes were cool, neither kindly nor condemning. “Yeah.”

  “I’m Dr. Wetman. Sit down, Hans.”

  Heine sat down and braced his hands on his thighs.

  “Relax, Hans. We’re just going to chat.” He took a cigarette from the pack and offered the pack to Heine. “Smoke?” he said.

  “I don’t smoke or drink,” Heine answered.

  The doctor’s voice was not cold, and he smiled at Flip. “Not even marijuana?” he said.

  “Naw,” Flip said. “I just had that for a gag.”

  “Your folks were here an hour or so ago, weren’t they, Hans?”

  Flip said, “Uh-huh.”

  He hated to remember the scene in the interrogation room. His mother had looked shabby and old and out of place there, and suddenly she had looked very little to Flip too, and pathetic. She had not been able to stop crying; she had cried the whole time, making any conversation between them virtually impossible. But his father had talked to Flip. His father had said he had warned Flip that something like this would happen; he had warned him, hadn’t he? His father had wanted to know how Flip thought the whole family felt with his picture on the front page of the Daily Record. His father had said, “Are you satisfied now, Hans, that you have dragged our good name in the mud?”

  “How did it go?” Dr. Wetman asked.

  “Rough.”

  “Why, Hans?”

  “Man, like, they just never did dig me. You know?”

  The doctor nodded.

  “I mean I’m an American.”

  “Yes,” the doctor said.

  “I couldn’t even read comic books. What kid doesn’t read comic books? All American kids do.”

  The doctor reached for something on his desk. He handed it to Heine. It was a battered copy of Night of Horror.

  “Is this the sort of thing you read?”

  “That’s it. Only, like, not all the time, man,” Flip added unsurely, afraid now of what this man would think of him.

  “I notice,” the doctor said, “in this one they have several characters carrying switchblade knives.”

  “Yeah. They go in big for that.”

  “You had a knife like that, didn’t you?”

  Flip said, “Yeah. That’s the knife I used. Police took it.”

  “Do the others read these comics, Hans?” “Didn’t you ask them?”

  “I’m not examining them,” Wetman said. “I asked Judge McKeon to let me talk with you a few times before the trial.”

  “Why me?” Flip said. Then his hand went to his shorn head. “My head, huh? Because I shaved off my hair for a gag? Like, I’m crazy or something?”

  “You see, the main reason for an examination,” Wetman said, “is to determine a point of legal sanity or insanity. The doctor you talked with yesterday was in charge of that.”

  “And I’m nuts, huh? I told him how my head happened.”

  “I know, Hans. No, you’re not nuts. No, you see, I’m interested in discovering what attraction these comic books have for young people. I’m informed you’re something of an authority.”

  Flip grinned. “Man, like, I must of read millions, I guess.”

  “And you like what in particular about them?”

  “Oh, you know — all those knives sticking out of people’s middles.” Flip laughed, and at the same time he wondered why he had said it. He wanted the doctor to be interested in him, to want to talk with him. It was funny; the doctor was a foreigner too — he had an accent — but Flip liked him. Why had he liked him so immediately? There was something about his mildness.

  “Is that all?”

  “Nobody gets pushed around.” “Nobody?”

  “You know, man. Like, in one this guy started shoving this kid around, and the kid came back that night with some other kids and they made the guy dance to music. You know? They were whipping his legs.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “You can get a whip for three-seventy-five,” Flip said. “They advertise them.”

  “Did you ever send away for one?” “Naw. Like, who needs it?”

  Flip fumbled with his hands. It was curious; he was thinking of a song, the one with which his sister always opened the second set at the place. “Du Lieblicher Stern. He had been humming it to himself all day and remembering the way his mother always sighed and said, “Ach, du schönes Deutschland!”

  “What are you smiling at, Hans?”

  “Was I smiling?”

  “Yes.”

  Heine shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know,” he said. “Let’s talk about comic books.” The doctor nodded. “All right.”

  “Well,” Flip began, “in one there’s this bat man and his friend. I mean, this bat man really digs his friend, you know? He takes care of him and everything. He’s older, like, a lot older, and they hang around together. I remember in one,” Flip continued …

  He wondered as he talked if he could keep the doctor sufficiently interested in him to want to see him a second time. Manny and Johnny and Bardo had their folks coming every day, coming and bringing them things. His folks wouldn’t be back, Flip felt. And then in the back of his mind the little poem his mother had spoken played over and over like a broken record:

  Schon ist’s vielleicht anderswo

  Doch hier sind wir sowieso.

  “Man,” Flip said in a burst of desperate, feigned enthusiasm, “the comic books are the craziest! The things those cats think up. Like, in one there was this doll getting herself whipped and then …"

  The guard led him through the block past the cells and up into the interrogation room. He walked in step with the guard and turned square corners. At the door of the interrogation room he saluted the guard. “O.K., General,” he said. “P’toon dis-missed!”

  He was smiling when he walked in. Ivy Raleigh stood looking at him, saying, “Bar! Bar!” He went to her and they embraced.

  “Ummmm!” he said. “Arpège?”

  “Chanel,” she answered mechanically, studying his face carefully.

  “Now, Ivy,” he said. “I told you not to worry.” “But in the papers, Bar — they quote you as saying all those things.”

  “Ivy, I told you yesterday. This is all trumped up! I wasn’t even with those infantile people. Leogrande will prove that at the trial.”

  “Bar, even if the truth is terrible, won’t you tell me? Please, Bar, it’s important!”

  “Ivy,” he said solemnly, looking into her eyes, “Bardo has never lied to you, has he?”

  “No, darling,” she answered. She paced across the room, clutching her hands together. “Some of the quotes, though, Bar. They sound like you. You know, the way you use the third person? And you never did like bums. I’m just so — Oh, Bar, darling, darling — please tell me if you had anything to do with it!” She stood there, her hands outstretched toward her son.

  “You look lovely,” Bardo said. “New dress?”

  “No.”

  “Perfect color for you. Bardo approves.” He smiled at her. “Ivy, dear, relax. I’ll be out of here in no time, and there’ll be some apologies from the authorities, you can bet. You know, John Wylie’s getting out. Well, I will too.” He took her hands. “I’m innocent, Ivy. This is all trumped up — all of it. You can thank your United Press for that! You have your eminent newsmen to thank for that!”

  She dropped her hands from his and sat down on the bench. “But where were you, Bar? Where were you that night? You’ve never made it clear. Ernest can’t help you if you don’t confide in him.”

  “Ivy, I was at the movies. I told you that.”

  “No, Bar. You didn’t. You said — oh, darling, you said you were home.”

  “I was h
ome. Then I went to the movies. I went to see The Conquest of Everest at the Trans-lux on Madison. There now, are you satisfied? Really, Ivy. You do believe Bardo?”

  “I want to, Bar. My baby.” She rested her face in her hands.

  Bardo strolled about the room with his hands in his pockets. “You know,” he said, “the latrines in this place are kept in an infinitely filthy condition.”

  “Bar, Bar — ” She watched him walk back and forth.

  “Poor Pollack,” he said. “He’s a nice lad. I’m sorry he’s mixed up in this.”

  “Is that Emanuel?”

  “Yes.”

  “The one with the snake?”

  “Yes. Sincere,” Raleigh said. “Wonderful creature.”

  Ivy looked more carefully at Bardo. He was rubbing something between his fingers. The sun caught the reflection and sent a dart of light to the ceiling.

  She said, “Bar, what’s that in your hand?”

  He looked down at the ring. “Your ring,” he said. He smiled at her. “I found it. I was going to surprise you.”

  “Bar, in the papers they — ” Tears came to her eyes, and her words came with difficulty. “They said that Carlos Rodriguez had to kiss a — ” She could not finish the sentence. Bardo Raleigh ran to her.

  “No, Ivy,” he said. “Don’t cry! Bardo can’t bear to see you cry, Ivy. Listen, Ivy, those reporters are liars! Infinite liars, Ivy!”

  “My poor, poor darling,” she said.

  “McCoy!” Bardo Raleigh said. “He never liked me, Ivy. He never did.” He knelt by her, looking up at her. “He was jealous, Ivy.”

  “Yes, Bar, yes,” she said through her tears. She put her hand on his head, running her fingers gently through his hair. “Yes, my darling,” she said.

  “You believe me, don’t you, Ivy?” he asked.

  “All right, Bar. Yes. Yes.”

  “And you won’t — you won’t marry him, will you, Ivy?” “Oh, Bar!” she cried. “Promise,” he insisted. “Promise.” “I won’t marry him,” Ivy Raleigh said. Bardo smiled broadly. “Huzzah!” he said. “Huzzah! Huzzahl”

  “Well,” Emanuel Pollack said to his parents in the interrogation room, “tomorrow’s the big day, I guess.” His father said, “I guess so.”

  Pollack sat between them on the bench. His mother was weeping quietly into a handkerchief. She said, “My son! My little boy!”

  “Don’t cry, Mom,” he said. “Gee — don’t cry.”

  “You’re just a child!” she said.

  “Almost seventeen,” he answered. He grinned. “Too young to tango.” Where had he heard that? he wondered. Who was it that had said that?

  “Are they treating you all right, Emanuel?” his father asked.

  “Sure,” Manny said. “We had corned beef and cabbage for lunch.”

  “I brought you some more candy bars,” his father said, “in the basket. I brought your Geographic too.” “Thanks, Dad. That’s swell.”

  They sat there silently then, save for Ruth Pollack’s occasional sobs. Finally Manny said, “Will you tell me again, Dad, about Sincere?”

  “If anything happens,” his father began, and his mother gave a loud sob, “Sincere will be taken to the Bronx Zoo. They’ll give him the very best care in the world up there. They’ll know all the things to do for him, you know. That’s their business.”

  “Sure,” Manny said. “Sure.”

  “He’ll be in good hands, Emanuel.”

  “I know it,” Pollack said.

  The guard’s rapping came at the door. “Time’s up!” “Already?” Nathan Pollack said. “Where does the time go?”

  His mother hugged him. He raised a hand to put it around her thin shoulders, but dropped it, unable to touch her. “Aw, Mom,” he said. “Maybe it’ll come out O.K. Maybe.”

  Mr. Pollack stood up. He shook his head sadly. “We’ve done everything we could, Emanuel.”

  “I know it,” Manny said.

  “I don’t know how it happened. You were a good kid. I just don’t know.”

  His mother still hugged him, clutching him tightly.

  Manny said, “Well, it did. That’s all, I guess.”

  “You should have listened to the psychologist, Emanuel,” his father said. “You should have let her help you.”

  Manny hung his head. “She never said much, Dad.”

  “You’re just a baby,” his mother said, “and they’re going to take you away.”

  The guard opened the door. “Time’s up!” he repeated.

  Manny stood up. His mother and father looked at him, and he looked at the floor. “Well,” he said. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow. In court. I’ll see you,” he said. He started to go with the guard. His mother reached out and touched him. Her voice was dull and apathetic, as though she were talking in her sleep. Her fingers clutched the sleeve of Manny’s coat, then dropped to her side.

  She said, “I remember the day your brother and I went to buy that suit. Afterward we ate chow mein in Longchamps, and saw The Big Sleep. Humphrey Bogart was in it.”

  18

  THE THRILL IS GONE

  — New York Daily Record headline, November 29, 1953

  TWO THRILL-KILLERS SENTENCED TO LIFE; JUDGE BARS POSSIBILITY OF PAROLE

  CONVICTED THRILL KILLERS Bardo Raleigh, 17, and Hans Heine, 17, today were sentenced to life in prison, without possibility of parole.

  Judge R. F. McKeon pronounced sentence on the pair after hearing an abject plea for mercy from Heine, marijuana-carrying “hepcat” of the gang, who celebrated his seventeenth birthday in jail last month.

  In a note read to the court by John Ready, counsel supplied by the state for Heine’s defense, Heine said he realized now that he had brought disgrace on his family, but declared that he had never meant to be “a bad boy.”

  “I always wanted to be good; to belong. I never did anything bad before. Not like this. I never dreamed I would end up this way. I never meant to kill that old man,” Heine wrote.

  The two young killers were found guilty October 14 of first-degree murder in the killing of homeless Milton Litt, a Manhattan vagrant they found in Central Park. Litt was tortured and then left to die.

  The jury recommended mercy, but Judge McKeon could have disregarded the recommendation and sentenced the defendants to the electric chair.

  As Heine and Raleigh were brought handcuffed to the courtroom, Mrs. Thornton Raleigh, only parent present, had to be taken from the spectators’ section in hysterics.

  Handcuffs were removed from the two youths during the proceedings, with four Department of Correction guards standing by. The defendants, with their attorneys, were summoned to the bench, and Judge McKeon asked if they had anything to say.

  Attorney Ernest Leogrande, representing Raleigh, made an impassioned plea for mercy, declaring that neither boy had received a fair trial. “In this case I ask for an investigation of those who connived to try this case in the press,” Leogrande said. “This case was tried in the press! Is this justice? It is heartbreaking to know what Mrs. Raleigh has gone through — what my client has suffered, emotionally and physically. There was no intent to kill! My client is a sick boy!”

  In sentencing the pair, Judge McKeon said he had made an exhaustive study of all the aspects of the case, and had decided to accept the jury’s recommendation of mercy.

  “This means that in the event the Appellate Court should ultimately affirm this judgment of conviction,” he said, “you can never be eligible for parole. The only possibility of your ever securing your liberty is through a pardon by the Governor. I hereby sentence each of you to life imprisonment in a state institution.”

  Heine bent over and wept.

  Raleigh, his face wooden, remained standing, gazing blankly at Judge McKeon.

  The pair was handcuffed and led from the court. Heine regained his composure somewhat, but Raleigh skipped to get in step with Heine and the attendant officer, and displayed all of his old cockiness as he cut square corners on
his way from the courtroom.

  In the corridor outside the courtroom, Mrs. Raleigh collapsed upon hearing the sentence.

  During the trial the State dropped its first-degree murder charge against John Wylie, 15, “baby” of the quartet, who was not involved in the murder.

  Earlier this month Emanuel Pollack, 16, was committed to an institution for delinquent children after Children’s Court Justice ?. K. Pitts turned down his plea that he be allowed to return home and go back to school.

  (Pictures on page 1)

  THE END

  of a novel by

  Vin Packer

  If you liked The Thrill Kids check out:

  3 Day Terror

  1.

  “That’s just the way I am—even in Paradise I’d know all the wrong people.”

  THAT NIGHT Delia Benjamin got back to town; the first face she saw was his face—the stranger’s. He held open the door of Porter Drugs for her.

  A moment before, driving through the familiar streets of Bastrop with her mother, she had wondered why she had come home. She had wondered that just after she had asked her mother to pull in at Porter Drugs so she could buy cigarettes, and her mother had answered:

  “Right off the bat—in buying your’ cigarettes! Delia, now, that won’t make a good impression.”

  Delia knew it was futile to say the hackneyed, that women smoked quite unashamedly nowadays—even those who weren’t divorced; knew too that her mother realized that much, but clung more comfortably to the archaic, and believed that Delia should adopt those standards, “under the circumstances;” because people were going to judge her all the harder now. Mrs. Benjamin’s people were the “girls” of the Birthday Club, the “girls” of the Methodist Muses, and the entire congregation of Second Methodist Church.

  Delia had said, “I didn’t come back to make a good impression,” and it was just at that point that she had wondered why she had come back; then vaguely recalled lines of a poem in some long-lost textbook that seemed to answer the question: Home is where when you have to go there, they have to take you in.

  Mrs. Benjamin, voluminous in magnolia-splotched print silk; voluble—some in Bastrop say old Judge Benjamin was talked dead—had removed one white-gloved hand from the steering wheel momentarily, gathered her black nylon raincoat more securely to her shoulders, patted the wiry new “perm,” and continued, “I hope you didn’t come home to make a tawdry impression either!” Mrs. Benjamin pronounced it toe-dree, and thought of it always as the only antonym “good” had. “Not just when everything is nice and it’s Music Emphasis Month. Delia, I wrote you that I’ve been elected a muse, didn’t I? I’m Terpsichore until October fifteenth.”