Racehoss

by Albert Race Sample

  “Awright, thas enuff uv that shit!” Boss Humpy hollered. “You nigguhs break ‘em up now!”

  The building tenders moved through the crowd toward them and Big George said, “Say B.C., y’all break it up now. Da man’s lookin at y’all, break it up!”

  Neither said much when the building tenders parted and shoved them away from each other. However, Marble Eye did mumble as he walked back up the alley, “You ain’ gon whup my muthafuckin ass an no other nigguh.” And he meant it. If B.C. wanted to show off, he sure should’ve grabbed somebody from another squad and not Number 1. Everybody in Number 1 hoe would fight.

  With this brief interruption over, it was back to the business at hand. Nolan was talking through the bars with Polly, a Number 4 tank building tender, to allow a few minutes for things to get back to normal. Turning his attention toward the picket boss, “Boss, will you open 3 tank? I need to git those imprints made.”

  Boss Humpy hated doing anything the cons asked, and he shot back, “Can’t them nigguhs do it thru the bars? Ever one uv ‘em got them long ol’ mouths.” But knowing Nolan was working under strict orders from the warden via the captain, the door’s lever was belligerently thrown.

  “Y’all lissen up heah!” Polly hollered. “You nigguhs lissen up now!”

  Nolan made the announcement, “The warden wants me to take imprints frum three uv y’all wit all y’all’s teeth. He wants a big-moufted nigguh, a medium-moufted nigguh, an a bird-moufted nigguh to make yo imprints in this mold. You nigguhs qualified, cum on up here.”

  Nobody moved forward, only feet shuffling and snickering. Nolan looked at Polly, and Polly looked at Nolan. They didn’t have a plan for the arisen selection process crisis. Nolan spoke out, “An the warden said you buildin tenders is gon help do the pickin.”

  Polly hollered, “Awright, I ain’ gon do dis shit by mysef, the resta you muthafuckas git offa yo asses an git ta pickin.”

  Building tenders from both tanks began rounding up their choices.

  Ape was urging Candy along, “Cum on now, baby. G’on up dere an bite dat shit so evuh nigguh dat gits a pair o’ teef made frum yo mouf will hafta pay me fo life. Cuz das lak evuh nigguh whut gits dem teef will be kissin my o’ lady. An baby, you don’t want no nigguh kissin you an not payin us. Now do you?” nudging him forward again.

  Ape was cutting back two life sentences. He had gotten one added since he’d been down for choking a con to death with his bare hands. The victim had a knife in his hand, but Ape literally squeezed the air out of him before he ever got to raise it. Candy was doing twenty for midnight burglary. Both were multiple offenders who had grown up at Gatesville State School for Boys and graduated to hell. Ape and Candy seemed content with the life to which they had both grown so accustomed.

  By now, several of the star sissies had been shuffled to the front and were gathered around the middle domino table where Nolan and Polly sat. Except for Forty, all the building tenders were there in the interest of their specific punks. Each one trying to get his punk to calm down and “stop actin lak a damn fool.”

  “Say, Nolan,” one hollered, “let our woman g’on an bite dat shit an git it over wid. You dun kissed her. You knows how sweet her lips is.”

  Trying to ignore the comment, Nolan gave out more directives, “Y’all look here, les git this over wit so I kin git on outta heah. I got a lot uv shit to do to git these molds ready by tomorrow.” The once-a-month real dentist would be down to pick them up. “Look, I know alla y’all want yo, ahem, friend, to give the imprint. But I have to have three sizes—small, medium, an large. Jus by lookin, y’all know that suma these nigguhs is ‘liminated.” Nolan continued, “You nigguhs whut know y’all’s ‘liminated, move on back outta the fuckin way an let suma these other nigguhs git up here.”

  A few of those standing around the perimeter of the crowd moved toward the back. Then a few more and a few more. How in the hell did they know they were eliminated?

  “Now, les git to pickin sumbody,” Nolan urged. “Whut bout this nigguh?” he asked, pointing directly at Candy. This brought a howl and a chest beat from Ape. Nolan had played it on the safe side. Nobody offered any opposition to his first suggestion. A few cons whistled and hollered when Nolan said, “Okay, we got one. Candy’ll bite the medium-size mold.” All the toothless cons bared their gums, grinning acceptance of Candy as the “medium” mold imprint biter.

  Ape, in his thunderous voice, “Evuh one a you muthafuckas whut gits a pair o’ my baby’s teefs is gon gimme a sack o’ dust evuh week or I’m gon do sump’n to his ass!”

  Now, to choose the small and large. This was going to be difficult. Things were boiling down to B.C. and his punk Mama Good Drawers, and Air Hammer (former Number 1 squad member) and his punk Mama Better Drawers. B.C.’s life sentence was for murder and Mama Good Drawers was doing twelve for burglary. Air Hammer was doing fifty for robbery and Mama Better Drawers got thirty-five for poisoning somebody. All of them, except Mama Good Drawers, could hold their own in the muscle department.

  Air Hammer looked at Nolan, “Doc, jes by lookin, you knows my ol’ lady’s mouf ain’ big as Mama Good Drawers.” Nolan wasn’t about to dispute Air Hammer’s word.

  B.C. made his pitch for Mama Good Drawers, “You right Air Hammer, yo nigguh’s mouf might be liddler, but it sho ain’ as priddy.”

  “Look, B.C., you knows muthafuckin well I ain’ scaid o’ yo ass, nigguh,” Air Hammer blasted back. “An me an you kin settle dis shit in th’ back or rat now! Cuz it don’t make a fuck ta me. I been kinda wantin suma yo ass anyway.”

  B.C. pondered his predicament. “Man, fuck it! Let Mama Better Drawers bite dat shit. I don’t wont my woman puttin his mouf on nuthin but my you-knows-whut. Cum on baby. Les me an you go in th’ back. I wont you ta pick my face.”

  One more to go, a big-mouthed mold biter. Everybody was moving away from the domino table and slowly drifted toward the back of the tank. For whatever reasons, nobody liked the idea of being selected to provide the large imprint. Except for a few cons sitting on the bench at the front of the tank, Polly and Nolan were without an audience.

  “Cum on, Polly. Pick sumbody so I kin git outta here. It don’t make a fuck who it is.”

  Polly wheeled away from Nolan and walked over to the five or six cons sitting on the front bench. If a big-mouthed con was what Polly was looking for, he certainly had found one. Sitting among those on the bench was Gatermouf. Polly pointed straight at him, interrupting his conversation, “Hey you, you wid da big mouf!”

  Gatermouf looked confused, even though Polly’s finger was aimed right at him. “You talkin ta me, Polly?” he asked in bewilderment.

  “Yeah, you nigguh. You got da biggest muthafuckin mouf on da bench. Yeah, I’m talkin ta you. Git up offa yo ass an cum bite dis shit fo da Doc.”

  Gatermouf didn’t move, “Say man, how cum you fuckin wit me?!”

  “Nigguh!” Polly yelled, “if you don’t git yo ass off dat bench, you gon need sum teefs yosef!”

  Polly’s hogging tactic worked. Gatermouf slowly made his way toward Nolan, grumbling, “I don’t know whut y’all fuckin wit me fo, dey’s a whole lotsa nigguhs in heah wit moufs bigger’n mine.”

  Polly overheard, “Who nigguh?! Name sumbody! You don’t know nobody heah an nowheres else wid a mouf bigger’n yo’s!”

  “Well, if my mouf’s so fuckin big, who in da hell gon wear a pair o’ teefs made frum my bite? Yeah, smart-assed muthafucka, tell me dat!”

  Polly was tired of arguing, “Man, fuck you! Bite dis Gotdam shit befo I put my foot in yo ass.” Gatermouf reluctantly sank his teeth into the modeling material.

  Christmas day arrived. The purple and red crepe paper hanging from the ceiling sagged from the heat of the radiator pipes. After today, it would be taken down, boxed up with the other decorations, and put away until next year.

  The night before, we were issued a new shirt, britches, and pair of brogans, the year’s ration. The clothes were made by the women prison
ers at the Goree Unit. Getting our new clothes was like looking into fortune cookies. Inside the fly of our pants was written “I wish” or “I love it” and other little messages. They even wrote their names, numbers, where they were from, how much time they were doing, and even poems under shirt collars and around the cuffs and tails—any place they felt would escape the eye of the clothes garment inspector. Even though the Christmas messages would come out after the first washing, they did add to the merriment of the Yuletide season as convict after convict discovered and showed what was written in his fly “specially” for him.

  It was still early morning and not many cons were up and stirring about just yet. In another few minutes, the tank would be pulsating. Card and domino games would be starting soon, and Big Devil even allowed dice games today. This was the only day of the year that he pulled out all the stops. We could gamble openly in the games and not worry about getting busted. Wasn’t much fear of a con being punished today, unless he smarted off at a boss.

  Big Devil also gave orders to the picket boss to leave the door separating 3 and 4 tanks, and the one separating 1 and 2 tanks open so we could “visit” in the adjacent tank. Cons marched through the opened doors like ants. Some just walked through, turned around quickly, and reentered their own tank. Being able to get out of the tank had more to do with it than visiting.

  After our Christmas dinner of turkey and all the trimmings was over, everybody was handed a small paper sack as we walked out the messhall door. In it were about ten pecans, a super small apple, an orange, and a small walking cane peppermint stick. Also as we walked out of the messhall, a cupful of salted peanuts was poured into our hats, which we had been told beforehand to bring to the messhall with us.

  Most of the cons rushed back to the tanks and headed straight for the gambling tables. The small sack and hatful of Yuletide goodies was like giving them $500 worth of chips at the Las Vegas casinos. It was hilarious to listen and watch the betting in those games. “Shoot twenny goobers. Twenny goobers I shoot.” At the rate they were counting out their peanuts, some of those games would last all night long. The peanuts were handled so much all the salt and skins had been rubbed off. The gamblers bet a few, ate a few, and squabbled all in between.

  The Number 4 tank residents were the lookouts. They could see from their windows whenever somebody came from the front office. One of them sounded the alarm, “Heah cums Cap’n Smooth. He got two nigguhs wit him totin sum boxes.”

  Beer Belly commented, “Maybe he be brangin my prole papers.”

  Bad Eye answered, “Shit, you ain’ gon make no prole ‘way frum dis hellhole. You kin forgit dat shit. Nobody knows where dis muthafucka is, specially dat prole board.” Elaborating, “Hell, I been down heah goin on ‘leven calendars an ain’ never seen nairn down heah yet. ‘Sides, dey needs a hellacopta an a pair o’ spyglasses jus ta find th’ road dat cums in heah. An dat’s way too much trouble.”

  “Yeah,” Chinaman chimed in, “thas de only reason I ain’ dun run off. I don’t know where in th’ hell I am.”

  Cap’n Smooth came in the back door and up the hall. Two houseboys tagged behind him carrying a cardboard box apiece. “Y’all jes set ‘em down heah under th’ picket,” he ordered.

  After they sat the boxes down, “Anythang else, Cap’n Suh?”

  “Naw, thas all. Let these two nigguhs back out, Boss,” he hollered to Boss Humpy as the two trusties turned to leave.

  “Merry Christmas ta you, Cap’n,” they said in parting.

  “Yeah.”

  The full name the cons had dubbed him was Cap’n Smooth Mouth, but spoke of him as Cap’n Smooth. He was transferred here from one of the northern units when Big Devil took over the camp. He had the notorious reputation for being the “hardest cap’n” in the system, even though he was in his sixties. He got the job done and was hard driving, but if a con was a good worker, he didn’t fuck with him and wouldn’t let the boss fuck with him.

  When a boss was fucking with a con without cause, Cap’n Smooth would holler, “Let that nigguh alone, Boss!” and ride his horse over. He drove the bosses and talked to them the same way they did us. “I’m half a inch away frum makin you tote that Gotdam saddle down that turnrow!” He wasn’t bullshitting either! He had fired many bosses in the field and made them unsaddle their horse and leave walking, carrying their personally bought saddle on their shoulders to the building.

  He’s best known for leaping off his horse onto the backs of field workers like Hoot Gipson of the old Wild West movies. He’d fight him man to man and wouldn’t allow the bosses to intervene—win, lose, or draw. When he staged these cantankerous mêlées, he managed to draw a few, but never won “nairn.”

  His idea of weekend fun was to come in the tanks and chase cons down with a pair of pliers to pull out their whiskers or the hairs on their heads if he felt it was too long. Sometimes, he put on convict whites he got from the laundry and eased his way into the tanks to catch unalerted crapshooters. He’d sit on a con’s bunk unnoticed by the gamblers until he made his presence known, “It’s my fuckin shot now.” He took all the loot and threw it up in the air. Whoever caught it got to keep it.

  The main thing Cap’n Smooth disliked was the “suckass” tactics the cons used on the officers. By now, the tanks’ prime suckasses had gathered at their tank doors. With the curiosity of baboons, they were dying to find out what was happening, but didn’t know how to approach him.

  Finally it got the best of one, “Moanin, Suh, Cap’n.” Smooth didn’t answer. Undaunted, “Cap’n, dem sho is sum priddy boots.” Scratching his head, “Sho would lak ta shine ‘em up fo you sum time,” he said in his best Stepin Fetchit voice.

  “Nigguh,” Cap’n Smooth replied, looking at him as if he were a twice-used condom, “git yore Gotdam ass on ‘way frum ‘em bars, ‘fore I cum in thar an stick these purty boots in yore stankin black ass!” His temper riled, “You Gotdam, rotten-assed bastard! Cum up heah fuckin wit me on Christmas. I oughta throw yore mawdickin ass in that pisser. By God, if it weren’t Christmas, thas whar you’d spend the next thirty or forty days!”

  The harangued con dropped his head, stuffed his hands into his pants pockets, and began to shuffle away. Looking back over his shoulder like a whipped dog, he muttered, “Merry Christmas ta you, Cap’n Suh.”

  “You jes kiss my Merry Christmas ass,” Cap’n Smooth snarled, “you lowdown sonuvabitch!” Looking up at the picket, “Boss, now that that sonuvabitch dun quita fuckin wit me, I wantcha to call all them ol’ nigguhs up heah to the front whut needs them false teeth, an git all ‘em one-eyed fuckers up heah too.”

  “Y’all hold it down in thar so I kin hear that Cap’n,” Boss Humpy hollered down to the tanks. “That Cap’n wonts alla you nigguhs whut needs them ol’ eyes an teeth to cum on up heah to th’ front. Rat now!” He added, “If y’all wont this shit, you betta quit draggin them ol’ asses roun an git on up heah!”

  Cap’n Smooth propped his boot on top of one of the boxes as he talked to those gathered at the tank doors on both sides of the hall. “I’m gonna git that boss to open ‘em doors an let you nigguhs cum out heah under this picket to git you a set uv these fuckin teeth thas in this box,” indicating the one he had his foot atop. “An you ol’ nigguhs whut needs eyes, they in that box right thar. Y’all understand that?” Shouting to Boss Humpy, “Open them doors an let these nigguhs out.”

  The tank doors opened and the disadvantaged filed out in semi-orderly fashion. Bad Eye, One Gone, and Gotch Eye cautiously began opening the eye box, while Rat and Gila Monster gingerly opened the teeth box.

  Too gingerly for the captain’s impatience. He barked, “You nigguhs quit a-pickin over them fuckin eyes an teeth! Jes gitcha sump’n an git on ‘way frum heah! You rotten bastards kin switch ‘em roun when y’all git back in them tanks.” Rushing them, “Gotdam sonsabitches, gon fuck aroun all day pickin over ‘em damn thangs. Jes git ‘em an git th’ hell on back in them tanks!”

  Pairs of hands rippe
d into each box grabbing what they could. Cons were putting their eyes and teeth in as they came through the doors. Most of the plates got mixed during the scavenging and the teeth recipients were busily swapping them to come up with a matching pair. After they did, some were holding theirs over cigarette lighters, heating them in order to bend them into “proper shape.”

  Our famous baseball pitcher Rat and some of the others made a beeline straight to the gambling tables with their presents and pawned them as collateral to get into the games. I chose to get in one of the other games that played for cigarettes and tobacco. I didn’t have any use for an extra eye or set of teeth—yet.

  In a nearby game, an argument broke out between Blood Eye and Squat Low. When Squat Low won Blood Eye’s eye, he put it in his pocket. Blood Eye didn’t like it, “Say man, take my eye outta yo pocket!”

  “Fuck you, man! It ain’ none a yo eye no mo. Dis eye is mine til you pay me my stuff.”

  “I don’t give a fuck, take my eye outta yo pocket, Squat Low. You ain’ gon be totin my fuckin eye roun in yo pocket.”

  “Whutcha wont me ta do wit it den?”

  “Why don’tcha put it in yo locker.”

  “Put it in my locker? Nigguh, I don’t wont dat thang lookin at me evah time I go in dere ta git sump’n.”

  Blood Eye left, soon to return with an empty, all-purpose Bull Durham sack. He pitched it on the table. “Squat Low, put my eye in dis ‘bacco sack so you won’t see it lookin. Ain’ nuthin in yo locker my eye wonts to see no how. Less it’s one a dem homemade fuck books you got.”

  “Say, Blood Eye, you blockin da cards,” Squat Low said as he scooped up the sack and put it in his pocket. With his mind on the game, he really hadn’t paid any attention to Blood Eye and the fight was on. It didn’t last too long because some of the other players quickly broke them apart. But when it was over, Squat Low put Blood Eye’s eye in the sack and back in his pocket. “I’ll put yo eye in my locker when I git thru gamblin.”