JUST THE TICKET
1
It was almost two in the afternoon when the man casually strolled out of the public bathroom and into one of the long corridors of Atlanta’s Hartsfield Airport. He was dressed in a conservative dark business suit and clean-shaven. Neatly combed unremarkable brown hair framed an equally unremarkable face. The most distinctive thing about him was his luggage: a beautiful alligator carry-on in one hand and a black leather computer case slung over his shoulder.
The man strolled the concourse, idly glancing into each gate’s waiting area as if looking for his flight. But when he reached the midpoint, he took the escalator downstairs to the underground monorail that connects the terminals in the huge airport.
In the car, he placed the alligator bag on the floor, but he never loosened his grip on the computer case. The first stop was Concourse C. The man got off and took the escalator back upstairs. Again he walked the corridor, checking each gate. He stopped in a bookstore, browsed the computer section for a few minutes, then went into one of the restaurants and drank a cup of coffee, slowly.
When he was finished, he returned to the monorail. He exited at Concourse D, and climbed to the Delta corridor.
Again he meandered through. Finally, he turned and sat down in the waiting area at Gate 22—a three-thirty-five flight to Chicago. The only other occupant of the area was an elderly woman reading a paperback romance novel.
The man seated himself carefully, placing the alligator bag on the floor at his feet. Then he pulled the computer case onto his lap, opened it up, and took out a gray laptop. He pressed a button and the screen gradually ripened into a complicated-looking spreadsheet, some of the numbers in red.
The man worked at his computer for about ten minutes. The elderly lady watched him covertly, eyes flicking from her book to the computer screen. She could make out colors, but that was all.
Then the man turned off the computer, closed it up, and replaced it in the case. He got to his feet, checked his wristwatch, glanced at the digital display over the ticket counter, and walked off.
In a few minutes, the gate area began to fill. The elderly woman kept her eye on the man’s luggage. He hadn’t asked her to, and certainly he would return in a few minutes. And this wasn’t New York, after all. But still . . .
2
I was wearing an old Army jacket. I hadn’t shaved in three days and I needed a haircut. Probably looked like I needed a bath, too, but that wasn’t true.
It only took me a second to swoop into the gate area, pick up the alligator bag and the computer case, and start walking down the corridor like I had a plane of my own to catch.
I was almost to the very end when the cops stopped me.
“Excuse me, sir,” the first one said, using “sir” like an insult the way cops do, “may I see your ticket?”
“What for?” I asked him.
“Sir, we’ve had a . . . That is, we’ve received some information. . . .”
I just stared at him. Right into his eyes. They hate that.
“Is that your luggage, sir?” the other cop asked.
“Of course it’s my luggage,” I told him. “Do I look like a goddamned Skycap to you?”
“May I see your ticket, sir?” the first one asked me again.
“I don’t
have
my damn ticket,” I said. “That’s the problem. I came all the way out here, and then I find I left my ticket at home.”
“And that’s where you’re going now?” the second cop said. “Home to get your ticket?”
“There isn’t a whole lot of point in that,” I said. “No way I get back here in time to make my flight.”
“And which flight would that be, sir?” the first cop wanted to know.
“Why is this any of your business?” I asked him.
“Sir, do you mind if we check your luggage?”
“Check my luggage? I already told you, I’m going to miss the flight. Why in the hell would I want my luggage checked?”
“Uh, not check it on a flight, sir. Just check to see the . . . contents, all right?”
“No, it’s
not
all right,” I said. “I already left home without my damn ticket, now you’re hassling me for no reason. This is really embarrassing,” I told him, looking around at the crowd that had gathered.
“Sir, we have the right to check any luggage being carried through the airport. That’s the law.”
“Bullshit. There’s no such law.”
“Oh, you’re a lawyer?” the first cop said, sarcasm dripping from his voice.
“No, I’m an ex-con, all right? You happy now? But I’m still not letting you search my luggage. You got no probable cause.”
“Ah, a
jailhouse
lawyer,” the second cop said. “What’s your name, pal?”
“None of your business,” I said. “I’m tired of this. I’m going home.” And I started to walk away.
They put the handcuffs on me then. And brought the elderly lady over to where I was standing against the wall. She said she saw me take the luggage all right, but she had a plane to catch and couldn’t she just . . . ?
The cops let her go, after they took her name and address and everything. Then they walked me back to the gate area and made me stand there with them while they checked the flight manifest at the desk. Then they went around the waiting area asking anyone if they lost some luggage.
Nobody said they did.
The well-dressed man never came back.
They arrested me. I spent the night in jail.
3
The next morning, the judge said bail would be ten thousand dollars. I told him I didn’t have ten thousand dollars. He told me I could wait for my trial, then, unless I wanted to plead guilty. I told him I hadn’t done anything. He told me I should talk to my lawyer.
He meant the public defender. It turned out to be a woman, a young black woman with a fierce, pretty face. I told her what happened. She said, did I really have a ticket back at my apartment? I told her, sure I did, but I wouldn’t give the cops my address because I was afraid they’d go in there and make it disappear.
She asked me, would I give
her
the address? I looked at her for a long time. Finally, I told it to her. She said she could get the key from the Property Clerk’s Office, where they vouchered all my stuff when they booked me, if I’d just sign a release. I did that.
Three days later, I was back in front of the same judge. The lady PD told him that I had a valid ticket for the same day I had been arrested. The DA told the judge they had a witness to me stealing the luggage. The PD said, where was this so-called witness? The DA said she was out of town, but they could bring her in for the trial.
The PD said I had receipts for the computer and the alligator bag too. The DA said “sure” in the same sarcastic voice the cops used.
4
I was in jail for almost three months when we came back to court. The DA told the judge that they couldn’t find their witness. She wasn’t at the address on her driver’s license, and they wanted to drop the charges.
The PD said I had sat in jail for all that time and I was innocent. The cops had bungled, she said. And she said that if I had any sense I’d sue for false arrest.
I thanked her when they cut me loose. And I asked her, did she know the name of a good lawyer in Atlanta? Because I
did
want to sue.
The lawyer turned out to be pretty good after all. He checked out my receipts. He even got the passenger manifest from that flight to Chicago, and there was not one single person booked on it who came close to the man the elderly lady had described. Not that anyone could find that lady anyway.
5
It took almost a year and a half, but the city offered me two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to settle my lawsuit. The lawyer said he would take a third, plus expenses. So I would net about a hundred and sixty-five thousand.
I took it.
Actually, I only netted around a hundred. Twenty-five for Maggie, another twenty-five for James, plus the cost of buying that ticket I never got to use, tickets for Maggie and James to get out of town, and the computer and the alligator bag.
Still, it wasn’t bad for three months’ work.
for Lou Bank
SUMMER GIRL
E
very summer, the rich people come out here, to the end of the island. They rent houses for the season so they can play here. Mostly on the beach or on the water. Sometimes they play inside. The real rich ones, they
own
houses, but they use them only in the summer.
The summers are perfect here, but the winters are ugly and hard. The people who live here all year wait for one thing only. Summer means money. Winter means pain.
The summer people sometimes buy little puppies for their kids, so the kids will have something to play with. But they can’t take dogs back to the city, so they just leave them. The people who live here take some of them, but they can’t take them all. The ones the people can’t take, they live or they die. If they live through the winter, they usually make it. But you can see they will never be regular dogs again.
They call those dogs “summer puppies,” because everyone knows what the rich people want them for. And what happens to them.
Lorraine was a summer girl.
It wasn’t like she was the first one. Everyone said it would happen. Everyone
always
says it will happen. And every year, some girl—sometimes more than one, even—thinks it won’t happen to
her.
The summer girls are like the summer puppies. Some of them just go back home. But they’re broken toys, and they’re never the same. Some of them take off, and they never come back. Nobody knows what happens to them.
Lorraine probably wouldn’t have even asked me if I hadn’t been in prison. Everyone knew that I had been away. People out here, they don’t stick together or anything, the way you’d expect if you watched a lot of movies. We get all the movies here, because the summer people want them—so there’s a nice theater and all. And it’s something to do in the winter, if you have the money. It doesn’t matter. This isn’t the movies. People look out for themselves, that’s all.
So, when I killed that guy in the fight, everybody knew about it. My lawyer wasn’t from out here. We don’t have lawyers all the way out here. The only ones we ever see are the real-estate ones, and they have their offices closer to the city. But they sent a Legal Aid. And he was the one who told me people in these little towns always stick together. The guy I killed, he was an outsider. So probably the jury wouldn’t hurt me, that’s what he said.
He didn’t know anything about the way things are out here but I always let him talk. It was nice to have company.
They finally offered me a deal. Manslaughter and the Minimum, they called it, like it was something you order in a diner. It means five years any way you slice it, and that’s only if the parole board cuts you loose right away. So this Legal Aid, he said I shouldn’t take it, because the locals—that’s what he called people in the town—they wouldn’t hurt me and I might get a better deal even if they didn’t cut me loose. He talked about “reckless” and “negligent” and all other kinds of murder. Because that’s what they charged me with—murder.
It was a hard decision. If I took the deal, I’d have to go to prison. If I didn’t, I might not. But if I didn’t take the deal and I went to prison, it could be for a very long time. I had to think about it. That was about all I had to think about, every day in jail.
I figured if prison was like jail I would kill someone else for sure if I had to stay there too long. And then I’d never get out.
So we had the trial. Nobody saw what happened, not really. The cops said I confessed, but that was a lie. I told them the truth. What happened. Yeah, I was on his property. But I was just looking for work. It was summer, and that’s what you did—you went around asking the rich people if there was any work they wanted done. I always got work that way. So did a lot of other guys.
I knocked on the front door, but there was no answer. So I went around to the back. Lots of times, they’re all out there, in the back yards.
Nobody was there either. So I turned around to go, and that’s when I saw them. I didn’t know him, but I knew her. Clarisse. She was a couple of years younger than me, I guess. I remembered her a little. Her red hair, mostly. They were naked. Doing it on this sofa-thing they had out back. I turned around. It wasn’t none of my business. But then I heard her yell something and I ran. I knew it was nothing but trouble.
I never did see the man’s face. So I didn’t understand why he came up to me outside the bar that night. He told me to keep my mouth shut. I told him I didn’t know what he was talking about. It was the truth when I told him that. But, like I said, I didn’t know who he was then. He said he had checked, and he knew I wasn’t working for his wife’s lawyer, but not to get any stupid ideas. I still didn’t know what he was talking about, but I figured out who he was by then. And I also figured out how he got my name. Clarisse.
I didn’t say anything. He said he wasn’t going to pay any lousy little blackmailer. Then he had this guy with him grab me. The guy who grabbed me, he was much bigger than the rich guy who’d been with Clarisse. He punched me in the stomach, real hard. The guy, the rich guy, he said that was nothing. If I didn’t watch my mouth, I’d get a lot worse.
If that rusty old tire iron hadn’t been on the ground in the parking lot, it probably would’ve ended just like that. But by the time it was all over, the big guy was lying there the same way I’d been. Only he was facedown and he wasn’t going to get up. The rich guy ran away. The same way I had when I first met him.
The next morning, the cops came and I told them the truth. But the rich guy, he said he had been at his house the whole night before. Sure, the big guy worked for him. But it was his night off, and he’d probably gone to the bar looking for some local pussy, that’s what the rich guy said to the cops. I wasn’t there when they talked to him, but that’s what they told me he said.
The next thing that happened, the rich guy’s wife, she had a lawyer too. And he came to see me. So I told him everything, all over again. He looked real happy when I told him Clarisse’s name. He said he’d be back soon and when he came I wouldn’t have nothing to worry about.
When he didn’t come back, I figured I knew what happened. And when I heard Clarisse’s father got a new car, I knew for sure. Clarisse was a slick girl. She sold me twice, to two different people.
I had the trial. The jury found me guilty of the same manslaughter they’d offered me in the deal. And the time I spent in jail waiting for the trial, it all counted against the sentence. The public defender, he was surprised. He said he thought the town would take care of its own. I thought so too, but we thought different about how they’d do that.
The Parole Board let me go my first time up. That was the real surprise, because I’d been right—I did have to kill a man in prison. But they didn’t really pay no attention. They locked me in the bing—that’s solitary—for a few months, and it went on my record and all, but I never got charged by the police or nothing. When I went to the Parole Board, I told them my plan was to go home and work. I couldn’t tell them what job, exactly, because I never really had an actual job. But they didn’t care, even though all the guys in the block said that would blow it for me, not having a job to go to.
Lorraine knew all this. Well, not about what happened in prison, but the rest. So the reason she asked me, did I want to be partners with her, that was because of what I did. The murder, I mean. I know that was it.
What she told me was, this guy—the one who’d made her a summer girl—he had a
lot
of money. Cash money. In a safe. In his house. Not his summer house, his city house. And all we’d have to do is go there and take it.
I told her, if it was that easy, how come she hadn’t done it herself?
She said she didn’t have a key or anything. So we needed to get in his house when he was there, and make him tell us exactly where the money was. In a safe,
probably
. Two things: Get in the house, and make him talk. Lorraine said she could get in the house. She knew all about him. She knew when he’d be there alone. And as soon as he opened the door, I would come in too. And make him tell us.
I told her I would think about this.
Then I just listened to what other people in the town said.
Lorraine had been a summer girl a couple of times again after the first one. She hadn’t been broken like the others. She knew what the deal was. She wasn’t such a young girl anymore, but she looked real good.
Clarisse, she was a whore. She worked a couple of towns over, out of an apartment. She even had her number in the newspapers—one of the guys in the bar showed me. It was like they was all proud of her. A celebrity.
I saw Lorraine the next week. I told her it didn’t make sense, what she wanted to do. The guy, he’d be able to identify us pretty easy. And no matter what he promised, he’d tell the cops. Or somebody.
Lorraine said she knew that. Just looked at me when she said it.
I told her I wasn’t going to take the weight for a homicide. She told me she’d never talk. I laughed at her. I could see it, what she wanted. Maybe the money, sure. But she hated the guy for making her a summer girl. This wasn’t really about the money, it was about making him pay. Prison was full of people like her. People who you couldn’t pay with money—it always had to be blood.
But I didn’t say none of that. I just told her, no way I was going to do a murder, no matter for how much money, if it meant I had to trust her.
She asked me, what would she have to do to prove I could trust her?
I told her where Clarisse lived.
for Honey & Pokey