“That job ain’t treating you too good.”
“Yeah, what the fuck can I do with Selma on one side and the parole officer on the other? She doesn’t dig you anymore, either. She says I’d better keep away from you.”
“I caught her vibes. She just wants someone to blame if you get out of line.”
“Where you been? I expected you to come around.”
I told him about the jail sojourn and my fugitive condition.
“So you’re gonna start rippin’ again.”
“That’s my best game … along with doing time.”
“I hate to see it.”
“What else can I do?”
“Nothin’, I guess. That reminds me. I saw somethin’ the other day that might interest you. A market. It looks easy.”
“Right now I’m working on that crap game heist L&L ran down. I even met the great Johnny T. He’s a pipsqueak has-been.”
“That’s better’n a never-was, like me.”
A shadow appeared against the screen door of the house. Selma called out to Willy that supper would be ready in a few minutes.
“Let’s go around back,” Willy said. “I need a fix.”
“So you’re hooked … back in your bag just like I am in mine.”
“Just halfass hooked. I can clean up in two days.”
“Yeah, okay, clean up in two days.”
The garage had a storage room nestled to its side. Baskets of old clothes, a sofa and a broken refrigerator were stored in it. From beneath the refrigerator Willy brought a water glass, inside which was a polyethylene-wrapped outfit and a condom of heroin.
“Want a taste?” he asked, unfastening a knot capping the rubber prophylactic. It was a half ounce of heroin and Willy couldn’t afford a hundred dollars on his wages. He had to be doing some slight peddling.
“Yeah, I’ll go for a little taste.”
A minute later I pulled out the needle and suppressed the trickle of blood with my thumb. It had been many years, and I momentarily reviled my weakness. That was swept away in the quick flowering glow. Tendrils of warmth (an indescribable warmth) reached through every crevice of my body and the deepest recesses of my brain. Even loneliness was obliterated. This was peace on earth. Yet my fury was too precious to lose permanently in the addict’s somnolent twilight.
“Good smack,” I said, voice slurred.
“Pretty good. Fuckin’ shit’s gonna be my death someday.”
“How are you passing nalline?”
“I’m not going. I don’t fix for two days and take steambaths. Last week I missed; this week I’ve got a codeine prescription from a dentist, so it don’t matter. Are you hungry?”
“What about Selma? She won’t dig feeding me.”
“Man, fuck her. Let’s go grease.”
“Where can I stash this pistol until I leave?”
“Damn! You sure got one of those quick. Here.” He took it and shoved it behind the sofa cushions. “Nobody’ll come in here. That reminds me about that market. I was cashing my check and they sent me to the manager’s office. It’s upstairs just inside the parking lot door. Nobody can even see you go up. There’s a fat Mosler safe in the office.”
“How big a market?”
“Not a huge Safeway or anything, but not a corner grocery either.”
“How many cash registers?”
“Three.”
“It might be worth something. Where is it?”
“On Santee, right near the freeway off ramp.”
“Speakin’ of money, how are you fixed?” I saw his color rise with embarrassment. “Forget it. We’ll be shittin’ in tall cotton soon as I make a score.”
Decision was postponed while we went indoors. The children had already finished and were in another room. My appetite was good despite the heroin. Willy was shirtless across from me, leaning over the table as he shoveled in his food. His brawny torso belonged more to the image of a stevedore than to a drug addict. Selma saw that we were on drugs and glared at me accusingly. She scarcely spoke, rattled pans as she washed them—but she’d set a place at the table for me.
It was decided they would drop me at Mary’s on the way to the movie. Joey was going to stay the night with his cousins. During the short ride in the stuffy, crowded, rattletrap automobile, I decided that the situation of hitching rides and sleeping on floors and couches was unbearable. Tonight, after dark, I’d steal a car and take off a small robbery. There was a motel near Santa Anita racetrack that I’d robbed years before; it would be good for a couple hundred dollars. Mary would have an old nylon stocking I could use for a mask. Stealing a car would be easy. All I needed was a pistol and guts. I had both. It was less than the smartest move in the history of crime, but fuck all that, too.
Stealing an automobile was unnecessary. Mary owned an eleven-year-old Plymouth. After a moment’s lip-biting hesitancy, she gave me the keys, exacting a promise that I’d return by morning so she could go shopping.
By 9:00 P.M. I was passing Santa Anita and saw a department store where the motel had been. I began driving the boulevards of the suburban towns, looking for something else to heist. Time was limited. As night deepened, lights turned off, money was put away, and cars would become so few that I would lack cover. I was looking for a business by itself with only a couple of persons inside, situated so pedestrians and passing vehicles would be unable to see what was going on. Several liquor stores fulfilled these requirements, but they were taboo. Liquor stores are to bandits as flypaper to a fly. Frequently robbed, it’s usually by amateurs unaware that too many are owned by ex-fighters or ex-policemen or other pugnacious personalities. A pistol is often beneath the counter, or the proprietor’s wife is in the back room with a shotgun. Invariably, the money (except for a few dollars) is hidden.
At 11:00 I found a small market. It was on a corner where everything else was closed and dark. Around the corner was a residential street. There were no pedestrians. I parked two hundred yards down the side street, checked the pistol, and walked back. My thoughts were forcibly locked into place. I’d learned that too many thoughts about the consequence dampens courage. Going to commit a crime is like going into battle, except the criminal can withdraw until the action commences; the soldier is under orders.
Even with a locked mind, my body wanted to rebel. My legs were as stiff and jerky as stilts and my stomach knotted. I realized I needed this petty robbery for practice nearly as much as I needed the money.
Mask balled in one hand, ready to be jerked over my head, revolver in a hip pocket, ready to be drawn, I stepped through the doorway into the light—and froze.
A youth in white apron was on a ladder, placing orange boxes of detergent on a shelf. An elderly man, also in apron, stood beside him, handing up the boxes. Neither had seen me.
They were Chinese.
My stomach sank. When I was fifteen, I’d strong-armed an elderly Chinese. Mary’s brother, Gino, was with me. The man was in his fifties, frail, face seamed like old parchment. I had a three-foot length of two-by-four lumber. I demanded his money. I’ll never know if he was refusing my demand or didn’t understand. I swung the piece of wood and it glanced off his head and he grabbed it. We struggled for it momentarily; then I loosened one hand and punched him in the mouth. A cigarette was dangling from his lips. It disappeared, and then, I’ll never forget the sight, he spat out mashed tobacco, blood, and pieces of teeth. I demanded the money again and again, and he kept shaking his head, and I kept punching him. I could feel his facial bones breaking, and each blow drew the blood up through his flesh. I panted with frenzy. He shook his head and wouldn’t fall down. Gino watched, horrified. Finally, I threw the man down and tore his wallet from his pants. When I washed my hands in a gas station, blood covered them to my wrists. I vomited. The wallet had twelve dollars.
I never forgot the episode. And as I went through jails I heard experienced thieves advise to never rob a Chinese; they won’t give up the money.
Now, poised inside t
he market, I wanted to back out. But I wanted more money. I jerked the pistol and moved toward the cash register. They didn’t have to give me the money. I only had to hold them at bay while I took it.
The old man heard my footsteps. I raised the pistol as he turned. “Don’t move.” The words came out embarrassingly shrill.
His eyes hooded; otherwise there was no response. I kept moving, meanwhile watching them. If necessary I’d shoot, first at the legs.
“Hey, man,” the younger one said, stepping off the ladder. I raised the pistol to his stomach. The old man grabbed his wrist.
Neither said anything more. I opened the cash register, using a knuckle so as to leave no fingerprints. I then realized I’d forgotten the mask; it was still balled in my hand. They’d be able to identify me if I became a suspect. For one moment I thought of killing them, then recognized the absolute madness of the idea. I scooped bills and coins into my pockets, not bothering to count, though I knew it was meager. Facing them, I backed around the counter and out the door. Then ran for the car.
Ten minutes later—a world away from the crime in a city of millions—I counted the money: $185.00. It was so insignificant for a possible life sentence that I wanted to cry. What kind of a life was this? It hurt, too, because I’d robbed the downtrodden. What I’d taken in fury and violence was probably more than they profited in a week’s hard work. My feelings were not exactly repentant, not remorseful—merely agonized at the whole tangle of human existence. I cursed especially a situation where crime was my only exit.
4
A CHANGING flicker of gray-white light around the edge of the window shade indicated that Mary was watching television. She was wearing a flannel housecoat with her hair in curlers. She pressed a forefinger to her lips to hush me and whispered that Lisa might be awake. We went into the kitchen.
I had two bags of groceries, both a gift of friendship and a tribute to Fate from crime. Most of what I’d bought—steak, lobster, and a huge canned ham—are too expensive for a welfare family.
When she emptied the bags, she stared at me, dubious and questioning. She wanted to know where I’d gotten the money.
“Well, would you believe …”
“No, I wouldn’t.”
“So don’t look gift horses in the mouth, right?”
“Whatever you did, whatever you got, it isn’t worth it. Selma told me you jumped parole. You didn’t even try.”
“Willy tells her too much, and she talks too much in general.”
“Why didn’t you even give it a try?”
“You don’t have to try to swim the Pacific to know you can’t do it.”
“So now what happens?”
“It looks like I’m either going to get a pocketful of money or a booking slip. If I can’t get the money, I don’t give a fuck about the second.”
“What kind of life is that?”
“None for you. It looks right for me. Just put the meat in the refrigerator; then you can preach.”
“I’ll save my breath. Thanks for all this.”
While she moved around the kitchen, I learned that she had somewhat anticipated my return. Lisa was sleeping with her and, as Joey was with Willy and Selma, I could use the children’s bedroom. “If you’re hungry,” she said, “I can make you a sandwich or something.”
“Bed’s better.”
“Come on. Use either bed; they both have clean sheets.”
The room was small, clean, Spartan. The walls were bare; no toys lay around.
“Come in for a while,” I said, reaching for her arm as she started to go. My voice was hoarse. Her eyes looked into mine, widened. I was frightened both that she wouldn’t understand and would turn me down.
“I’ll be back,” she said.
While I waited, naked under the sheets, I felt misgivings about Joe Gambesi. Whatever their relationship, she was a friend’s wife. And, too, though she was attractive she was too familiar in a different relationship to stir intense passion. It was faintly incestuous. Into these waverings came a bizarre thought: the epitome of failure for a man released from prison was that “he came back so quick he didn’t even get his dick wet”. It was a threatening thought, a possibility, and this as much as anything reinforced my wavering lust.
Mary still wore the housecoat when she returned, but her hair was brushed out. It was black, fell below her shoulders, and was full-textured. The bedroom lights were out, but the door was slightly open so there was a sliver of light. As she came forward her legs flashed; she was naked beneath the housecoat. Her legs were strong and supple as a dancer’s. The sight erased the last trace of hesitancy. I got hard immediately and was pulsing as soon as she dropped the housecoat to the floor, slipped under the sheets, and ran her fingers softly over my stomach. Her hair spilled over my shoulder and cheek and the touch was electric. It had been eight years since I’d kissed a woman, and I’d practically forgotten the feel of a soft body scented with soap. Waves of sensation dizzied me.
We’d just started fucking when the doorway came fully open. The expanding light from the doorway made us turn our heads. “Mom, are you there? Oh …!”
The sheet was gone and Mary’s legs were around me, the soles of her feet stroking the back of my thighs. She gasped and began struggling to throw me off. My eyes were transfixed by the aghast stare of the girl at the door. The glare from the hallway was like a spotlight.
“Get out of here,” I said angrily, yet I felt absurd shame, as if we were doing something wrong. Behind that I wanted to laugh, too, for it seemed I was doomed to being celibate.
“Who are you?” the child demanded, near hysteria. I was moving toward her, my nakedness flopping. She shrank away. Mary had drawn a bedsheet around herself.
“I’ll scream!” the girl said as I grabbed her arm. I could visualize the neighbors calling the police. “You’ll do no such thing,” I said, squeezing her arm until she winced.
“Leave her alone, Max,” Mary said, her voice shrill. “Oh, Lisa go to my room. I’ll be there in a minute.”
The girl stared at us, the horror becoming venom. She whirled and disappeared, leaving the door open. Another door slammed.
Mary began rocking back and forth, the sheet still around her. I closed the door.
I put on my shorts and sat on the bed, personally wanting to finish—but Mary’s sightless stare emphatically said No.
“That was a far out climax,” I said, chuckling.
“It’s not funny.”
“In a way it is. And sometimes all you can do about things is joke. The saddest things are the funniest.”
She ignored me. “What am I going to do?” she thought aloud. “This is the first time.”
I wanted to tell her: “Then you’re a fool.” Instead I said, “Maybe I can talk to her.”
“No. You’d better go. If you’re gone I might be able to make her forgive me.”
“Forgive you! For what?” I bit my tongue.
“We shouldn’t have.”
Words failed me. Mary really believed we’d done something immoral. It was fantastic, and sad, too. By begging forgiveness from her daughter she’d reinforced both their beliefs that it was wrong.
I dressed quickly. Mary waited modestly beneath the sheet until I departed.
It was 2:30 A.M. when I started the car, for I still had the keys. “I’m getting me some pussy,” I thought, “even if I gotta jump out of the bushes.” Twenty minutes later I was cruising slowly down Broadway in Downtown Los Angeles, looking for a whore. At the hour it was just a mite less risky than the rape, for every fourth automobile was black and white with a red light on top. I found a hooker standing in the light of the marquee from an all-night movie. She wore a mini-skirted dress of shiny yellow rayon. Twenty minutes later we were in a motel.
At dawn, when we left the motel, I stole the television set. Fuck it. A true criminal is a criminal all the time.
All the thief underworld hangouts would be virtually empty until night. I dropped the w
hore downtown, had some breakfast, and killed time until the stores opened. I went shopping, bought a decent pair of slacks and sweater and two sets of wash and wear clothes; also two pairs of shoes, one of them with crepe soles. Then I paid a week’s rent in a motel near the Hollywood Bowl. The room was well-furnished, overlooked a swimming pool and sun-yellowed hillsides.
Though totally exhausted, I showered and shaved and prepared to throw the prison-issue clothes away. When I counted the grimy bills and loose change my wealth was eighty dollars—not much for having committed an armed robbery. However unlikely that I’d now be caught (they’d catch someone for a similar small robbery and display him to the victims of all recent small robberies), it could have meant a decade in prison. The gain for such risk was a few clothes, a piece of ass, and a week’s rent. The most galling aspect was that if no “good” score came before I went broke, I’d make another fool move. It’s disgusting to behave stupidly, but doubly so while knowing it’s stupid in advance.
Yet when I went to sleep I was at peace with myself. During the week I’d tried to fulfill the parole I’d been torn and uncertain; now I was doing what I knew how to do.
That evening I journeyed through the city’s criminal environs to make contacts and find a crime partner. I knew the last would be difficult despite my wide range of criminal acquaintances. I wanted an experienced heist man, someone physically large and tough who would balk at nothing. Finding thieves willing to cash bad checks or commit a small burglary was no problem; I could find half a dozen of these in a weekend. But they would stare at me as if I were insane if I mentioned ripping off a Mafia crap game and banks. Such criminals, however habitual, prefer crimes where to lose means short imprisonment and another chance, which has its points—except that the maximum profit is nickels and dimes. Criminals willing to gamble for big stakes, and whom I’d trust, were few and far between. The man I wanted had to give and arouse absolute trust where I was concerned. Only a fraction of the hundreds of criminals I knew by name fulfilled these qualifications, and those I could remember were all in prison.
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