Forsaking All Others

by Jimmy Breslin

  The clerk picked up a yellow folder. “Docket number X875643, David Robles. Charged with 125.25 and 150.15. Arresting officer, Detective Harold McGahan.”

  The 125.25 was homicide and the 150.15 meant arson. Maximo sat with his head down. Could the judge, Rose Keogh, have seen him, he wondered, and if she had seen him did she even know who he was? Then he relaxed. Even if she knows me, he said to himself, if I sit here and show nothing, then she will not know what case I am interested in.

  “Your Honor.”

  “Yes?”

  “If it please the court, Your Honor.” The district attorney of Bronx County himself, not some cheap assistant, arose, tugged at the bottom of his vest, and began talking.

  His name was Ben Rossoff. The story about him was so famous that even law students like Maximo knew it: the day in 1969 that he heard Kennedy had gone off the bridge at Chappaquiddick, Rossoff went to the windows of his office, looked out over the Bronx and said, “Why couldn’t it have been on the Willis Avenue Bridge?”

  As he spoke to the judge, Rossoff used words like “text of affidavit,” “inhibiting factor,” and “application.” Maximo thought he was back at the lectures in the royal ballroom of the Statler Hilton. Looking over at David, Maximo saw the words produced the same narcotic effect on the boy as they do on students at the bar exam class. As if he were a law student two hours into a lecture on torts, David Robles let his eyes droop and then close.

  When Rossoff finished, David’s Legal Aid lawyer took a step toward the bench.

  “On behalf of the defendant Robles, I would point out that this youngster has no place to go if he wanted to,” the Legal Aid lawyer said. “He can’t take a boat to China. He should be allowed to go home to his mother.”

  “And what is the people’s recommendation?” the judge asked.

  “The crime was committed at 4:30 A.M.,” the district attorney said. “This gentleman is not a good bail risk.”

  “This gentleman is a child,” the Legal Aid lawyer said.

  “If I may continue,” the district attorney said. “Your Honor, we ask for high bail because there is a strong possibility of conviction, and also because, may I remind you again, that as for his being home, the crime was committed at 4:30 A.M. Your honor, this is a homicide case and it will be tried as such. The defendant is over the age of fourteen and Bronx County is prepared to display its outrage over this matter. We remind you again, Your Honor, the crime took place at 4:30 A.M. The defendant was not at home, we assure you of that.”

  Maria Robles unfolded the birth certificate and handed it to Maximo.

  “You take it up,” he said to her.

  “Where?” she asked.

  Maximo brought his head up and pointed to the Legal Aid lawyer. As he did this, the judge, who had been staring at the light fixtures hanging over the bench, suddenly rocked forward and her eyes fell on Maximo. Then she watched intently as Maria Robles, in her white dress and red shoes, walked haltingly down the aisle.

  “What is it?” Rose Keogh said.

  Maria Robles stopped. Her paper was held out as an offering.

  “Take your seat,” Rose Keogh said.

  Maximo was out of his seat and up the aisle. “If it please the court,” he said. “This woman is the boy’s mother.” Maximo pointed at David Robles. “And she would like at this time to hand her attorney proof that the boy is not fourteen, as the district attorney says, but is actually eleven.”

  “You may hand it to the lawyer and then take your seat,” she said to Maximo.

  “Can I take my boy home?” Maria Robles said.

  “Please be seated, madam,” Rose Keogh said.

  Maximo handed the certificate to the Legal Aid lawyer, who regarded it as a triumph. Maximo went back and sat with Maria Robles as the Legal Aid lawyer presented the birth certificate to the district attorney and the judge. The Legal Aid lawyer said that the presence of the certificate meant that all charges had to be changed to juvenile status. The district attorney said no matter of importance such as this could be settled by a mere piece of paper. There were other records, and the boy’s own statement, to show that he was fourteen and thus eligible to be tried as an adult for murder.

  Judge Rose Keogh, who had been staring at the light fixture hanging over the bench, rocked forward in her chair and stared down at the defendant.

  “I believe it is my duty, and I will do my duty,” the judge said. “I will remand the defendant.”

  One of the court officers tapped David on the shoulder. David’s eyes widened and then blinked away the spell of the airless room.

  “It’s over,” the court officer said.

  Turning, David walked toward the bench where his mother sat. The mother was halfway out of her seat when the court officer caught David by the elbow. Spinning David around, the court officer led him toward the door on the right of the courtroom and into the detention pens.

  “Where they taking him?” the mother asked Maximo.

  “They are taking him to Spofford,” Maximo said.

  “What is Spofford?” the mother asked.

  “It is the jail for children,” Maximo said.

  “In the Bronx?” the woman asked.

  “In the Bronx,” Maximo said. “You can visit him there.”

  When Maximo stepped out onto the sidewalk, Rossoff, the district attorney, was already speaking to the television news cameras.

  “Most people don’t understand the problems we have here in the Bronx,” the district attorney told five cameras. “We have 250,000 burned-out apartments in the South Bronx. This is not theory. This is not law school. This is a problem we have to come to grips with. We have had an investigation of massive proportions into this fire. This was a fire that killed two people.”

  As he spoke, Maximo saw, the district attorney did not look at the reporters. The district attorney looked directly at the cameras.

  “That is the man who put my boy in jail?” the mother asked Maximo.

  “Yes,” Maximo said. “He is called the district attorney. We will go see your boy tomorrow.”

  At ten o’clock the next morning, Maximo met the mother in front of her building on Pinto Avenue. Once again, the mother was wearing the white dress and the red high-heeled shoes.

  Walking under the Bruckner Expressway, Maximo and the mother walked over to Hunts Point Boulevard. Turning left onto Spofford Avenue, they walked two blocks to the four-story, white brick building called the Spofford Juvenile Detention Facility.

  In the driveway, two detectives in an unmarked car honked twice. There was the hum of an electric motor and the metal gate covering the entrance rolled up like a garage door. Maximo and the mother followed the car into the courtyard.

  “This one’s so small, we almost had to throw it back,” one of the detectives shouted to a guard as he reached into the back of the unmarked car. A small foot stuck out of the back door. The five-foot three-inch prisoner stepped out of the car into the courtyard.

  “You have to take the handcuffs off,” the prisoner said. “The law say when I get here you got to take the handcuffs off.”

  “He’s been here before,” the detective said to the guard.

  “He’s been here three times this month,” the guard said.

  As he handed the detective a receipt for the prisoner, the guard looked over at Maximo and the mother.

  “What’re you doing here?” the guard asked.

  “We came to visit a boy named David Robles,” Maximo said.

  “Well, the entrance for the visitors is down at the side,” the guard said.

  Walking back onto the sidewalk, Maximo and the mother turned right.

  “Who you coming to see?” a woman at a table just inside the visitor’s entrance asked.

  “David Robles,” Maximo said.

  “When’d he come in?” the woman asked.

  “Yesterday,” Maximo said.

  “Just have a seat over there,” the woman said. “We’ll fetch him.”


  Fifteen minutes later, the door at the far end of the room opened and David swiveled his head until he saw his mother. There was no sleep in his eyes now. His eyebrows were knotted and his jaw muscles bulged. His hands were at his side, clenched into fists. He shuffled over to the table, his back arched, his feet moving without leaving the floor. As the mother reached across the table to hug him, David stared straight ahead, his mouth drawn back tight.

  “Sit down,” the mother said.

  The boy shook his head.

  “Sit down,” the mother said.

  Gripping the edge of the table, the boy slowly lowered himself onto the bench.

  “Maximo is here now,” the mother said. “He is going to help us.”

  “If you want to help me, get me out of here,” the boy said.

  “There is nothing that can be done until the bail hearing,” Maximo said. “I hope it will not be long before the hearing.”

  “I have been here one night and that is a long time,” the boy said. “If I told what they did to me, it would make them let me out.”

  “The guards hurt you?” Maximo asked.

  “No, not the guards,” the boy said.

  “The other boys?” Maximo asked. The boy put his hands in his lap. Silent, he rocked back and forth. Maximo studied the boy’s face. There were not cuts or bruises.

  “They didn’t beat you up,” Maximo said.

  “No,” the boy said.

  “They did something to you?” Maximo asked.

  “A little something,” the boy said.

  “A sex thing?” Maximo asked.

  “A little something,” the boy said.

  “Are you bleeding?” Maximo asked.

  “I was,” the boy said. “All night. But not now. I hide under my bed until there is no more blood.”

  “Who was the boy?” Maximo asked.

  “He said he would kill me if I told,” the boy said.

  “What was his name?”

  “Homo.”

  Reaching across the table, the mother touched the boy’s cheek with her fingertips. The boy shook off the touch. The mother pulled back her hand and bit the knuckle of her index finger.

  The door at the back of the room opened again and a husky prisoner wearing a denim cap strode into the room.

  “Yo,” the prisoner called to two other teenagers sitting at the far corner of the room.

  “Yo,” the two teenagers called back.

  David’s eyes nervously followed the husky prisoner, who went to the corner of the room.

  “Is that Homo?” Maximo asked. David nodded once.

  “Do you want me to tell the police or the guards?” Maximo asked. David shook his head once.

  “Are you afraid he will hurt you if I tell?” Maximo asked. David nodded once.

  “I will leave you with your mother,” Maximo said. Rising from the table, Maximo left the visitor’s room and cut over to the main entrance.”

  “Hey,” Maximo shouted to one of the guards. “I want to see the man in charge.”

  “He’s not here,” the guard said. “What do you want?”

  “I want one of the prisoners arrested,” Maximo said.

  “If he’s a prisoner, he’s already been arrested,” the guard said.

  “But he raped one of the other prisoners,” Maximo said.

  “Did the boy tell you what would happen to him if he reported it?” the guard asked.

  “He said the other boy would kill him.”

  “Believe him,” the guard said.

  “He broke the law,” Maximo said.

  “Everybody in here broke the law,” the guard said. “In here, the law been broke.”

  Walking out of the building and into Maria Robles’ alarmed look, Maximo knew that he should have many soft words before the truth, but nothing formed in the hollowness inside him.

  “Where is he?” she said.

  “Nothing,” Maximo said.

  “Nothing?” Her eyes became very wide.

  “I can’t get anything done today.”

  “You are as wise as a spider. You must do something.”

  “Not today.”

  “When can you?”

  “I can’t tell you anything. I don’t know.”

  Her hand trembled and gripped the front of her coat against the cold. “I will bring a gun and shoot somebody to get my little boy back.”

  He put his hands into his pockets and started walking away. He called over his shoulder to her, “You might as well come with me.”

  “I stay here.”

  “What for?”

  “For my son.”

  He resumed walking down the side of the building along the high cyclone fence with barbed-wire topping that surrounded the white brick building, which reflected both the dreary winter afternoon and the cultures of the two communities it served almost exclusively: “Nemo Y Linda” and “I Luv Baby Dee.” Words put on the wall by some kid in the night had done more harm to the system than he had been able to do with his ambition, energy, time and the beginnings of knowledge. He had been able to separate himself from his culture and to know more than the average person who was born Puerto Rican, he told himself, but he found that the power that this gave him, to make his own decisions, was not enough to disturb a hierarchy that could hear no crying.

  For no reason he thought of, out of animal habit, some small memory of a warm barn, he walked up to 138th Street and moved along a frozen street that was as lonely as a field. When Maximo walked into the bar, Teenager was sitting on the pool table with a cigarette in one hand, a glass of brandy in the other and a sneer on his lips as he spoke to a serf in a blue imitation leather jacket. Seeing Maximo, Teenager called over the serf’s head, “I don’t see you for months.”

  Maximo was too tired to answer with anything more than a nod. At the bar were Santos Rivera and Albertito.

  “Where is Benny?” Maximo asked.

  “Who knows?” Rivera said.

  “This is Tatiro,” Teenager called out, placing a hand on the head of the man in the blue jacket. “Tatiro is saying something to me. Tell Maximo what you just said to me.”

  Tatiro turned his head and said to Maximo, “I just took Pepe off the count for Teenager.”

  “Is he telling the truth?” Teenager called to Maximo.

  Maximo stared at the floor. “I don’t want to hear anything,” he said.

  “Here, show him your evidence,” Teenager said to Tatiro. “Maximo, see the evidence the man brings.”

  Tatiro turned to face Maximo. He stood with his legs together. The front of his red basketball pants was stained with a deeper red. The basketball pants were worn over gray sweatpants.

  “Show him,” Teenager said.

  Tatiro lifted his right leg to show the inside of this one leg of the gray sweatpants was splotched with blood.

  “Pepe,” Tatiro said.

  “Aha!” Teenager shouted.

  Santos Rivera pushed his rotten teeth into Maximo’s face and shook with laughter.

  “It is Pepe,” Tatiro said. “I take him off in his cellar. You could ask anybody who knows Pepe if he didn’t get taken off in his cellar last night.”

  Teenager’s face crinkled with laughter. “He comes here to show me his evidence. He thinks that on the street nobody will see the blood on him because it is on the red trunks.”

  The others in the bar exploded into laughter. Teenager put his drink and cigarette on the edge of the pool table and stood up. “So now he sees he has this blood on the sweatpants. So he comes over to here by walking like this.” Teenager started to shuffle with his legs clamped together. While everyone screamed, Maximo looked at the rotten teeth and inhaled the smell of Luisa Maria’s thick perfume rising from the dust behind the bar, and here in front of him was this Tatiro with his bloody front and his eyebrows raised in reasonableness: is it not fair to say that if I have this man’s blood on me, then it was I who killed him?

  Teenager’s hand came through the laughter and sla
mmed Maximo on the shoulder.

  “What’s the matter with you? I don’t like people coming in here and not laughing with me.”

  The slap on the shoulder irritated Maximo. “I don’t feel so funny,” he said.

  “I never can find you. Then you come here and tell me you don’t feel funny.”

  “I’ve been busy,” Maximo said.

  “All of a sudden you are too busy for me,” Teenager said. “Now you are sad because you see me.”

  “That isn’t it,” Maximo said.

  “Sure it is,” Teenager said. “Here, give Maximo a drink. Make him laugh.” Teenager finished his brandy and sniffed loudly as he put the glass down.

  “Sounds like you have a cold,” Maximo said.

  “A very bad cold,” Teenager said.

  Santos Rivera thrust a hand into his jacket and brought out a gold cigarette case which he opened with a show.

  “Medicine for the cold.”

  “Aha!” Teenager said as he saw the crystals inside. “Do lines.”

  Maximo stood up. Once too often, he told himself. If once he thought there was comfort and excitement here, with Teenager protecting him like he was a cub and danger that seemed delicious and acceptable because it was present only in the air, then to preserve the illusion he should have remained away forever. For he saw now only rotten teeth and lips covered with spit. In his mind now he saw David Robles cringing in a corner of an empty room in Spofford, with the big black kid stepping in and closing the door behind him. Maximo closed his eyes.

  “I’m going,” he said.

  “You must first have your drink,” Teenager said.

  “No, I’m going,” Maximo said.

  Teenager clamped a hand on Maximo’s wrist. “You are not leaving.”

  Maximo yanked his arm back suddenly, breaking Teenager’s grip. A tiny dart ran across Teenager’s eyes. His hand went back to Maximo’s wrist, clamping more firmly this time.