On the Loose (9 page)

Then Ben did.

Mr. Grissom, the administrator of Sherwood, considered himself enlightened, progressive, and
benevolent. A light-skinned African-American, he
considered himself free of racial resentments and
clever enough to play by his own rules. He said,
"I'm not putting you in a dormitory, Sawhill.
They'd make meat of you, you know what I
mean?"

Bobby stood before Mr. Grissom's desk. "I
think so."

Mr. Grissom's mobile face gained speed as he
spoke. "You'll share a room with an older boy.
Dibble. He's seventeen, smartest student here.
That's what we call you boys here. You listen to
Dibble, you'll do all right. By the way, he's black.
That bother you?"

"I've never known anybody black."

"That's your misfortune."

"I'm white."

"I can see that. Here, that doesn't count."

"What are you, sir? Are you black or white?"

"I'm neither. That means I'm in the middle, and
that makes me fair and square."

Mr. Grissom stood up from his desk. Bobby had
thought Mr. Grissom was tall but now saw he was
short and wiry and, like everyone else, wore the
uniform of Sherwood. Gray sweats.

"You play with yourself, Sawhill?"

Bobby blushed. "Sometimes."

"Keep it to a minimum. Masturbation isn't punishable, but homosexuality is. Drugs are taboo.
So's lying, stealing, and acting up, especially in the
classroom. Good grades count here, give you extra
privileges. Dibble will clue you in on the rest. Any
questions?"

"What's he in for, sir?"

"Same as you. Welcome to Sherwood."

The whitewashed room was impeccably neat,
furnished with two army cots, two wall lockers,
and a writing table, nothing on the walls except a
shelf lined with paperbacks. The occupant stood
loose and tall in a T-shirt and low-waisted jeans.
He was a runner, his skin ivory black, his body
honed for speed and supple strength. "That's
mine," he said, pointing to one cot and then the
other. "That's yours. What's your name?"

"Bobby."

"Baby name. I'm Dibble. You're on probation.
Six weeks from now, it works out, you can call me
Dibs. Nice watch you're wearing."

"It's a Seiko."

"Rich kid, huh? You get things from home, you share everything. Choice of two things, one better
than the other, I get it."

Bobby nodded. He liked Dibble's voice, swift
and clear, as much a man's as a boy's, and he liked
the italicized stubble on Dibble's jaw.

Dibble said, "The table's mine. You don't touch
anything on it. Another thing you don't do is cry.
Bad things happen, you live with 'em. Only one
thing scares Grissom, that's a kid killing himself. It
puts him and Sherwood in jeopardy."

"I wouldn't do that."

"You never know."

Bobby liked Dibble's stance, relaxed and easy,
real cool, thumbs hooked into the top of his jeans.
He wished he had Dibble's body but knew his
bones were different. He said, "How come you get
to wear jeans?"

"It's a privilege. I'm the only one who's got it.
You got no privileges at all. First six weeks you do
toilet duty."

"Am I going to get raped?"

"Not by me." Dibble looked him over. "You're big,
but you're soft. Work out in the gym all you can."

Bobby smiled. You don't talk black."

"That so? You talk sissy. You got a way to go,
kid. Can you take pain?"

"I don't know."

Dibble slapped him hard across the face. His
head shot back. His whole face down into his neck
felt the shock. His eyes watered, but he didn't cry.

"Good boy," Dibble said.

A bank of urinals led to a series of stalls, opposite
which was a row of sinks. Beyond was a shower
room. Mops and brushes, yellow soap and water,
ammonia and deodorizers kept the place clean and
smelling right. In charge was a white boy called
Duck because he waddled like one. Bobby was his
assistant, but Duck did the most work because he
took pride in it.

Bobby said, "What are you in for?"

"I touched girls," Duck said quickly, as if he'd
also taken pride in that. He was older than Bobby
but smaller and had a happy face.

"How long you been here?"

"I don't keep track." He ran the head of a mop
through a wringer and squeezed it dry. When he
scrubbed the urinals, his energy was manic.

Dibble, wearing a nylon athletic jacket over his
T-shirt, came in a little later to inspect the place,
which he did quickly, a few glances here and there,
while Bobby and Duck stood at attention. "Good
job," he said and patted Duck on the shoulder.
"Did you tell Sawhill you're silly in the head?"

Duck grinned. "He knows."

"And what am I?"

"You're coal waiting to become diamond."

"Good boy, you got it right. And what did I tell
you Sawhill is?"

Duck's grin turned sheepish. "Bobby's a turd
waiting to be flushed."

"Does he know you're in charge? Does he do
what you tell him?"

"I do," Bobby said.

When Dibble left, Duck said, "He's the best."

Away from the toilets Duck stuck close to
Bobby. In the classroom, repeating grades, Duck
did poorly while Bobby, seated beside him, often
let him copy from his paper, which the teacher
didn't seem to mind. Neither was much good in
the gym. They had no grace in tossing up a basketball, no eye for the basket, no feel for the ball,
though no one openly made fun of them. They
were Dibble's charges.

In the recreation room Dibble put on shows. No
one, not even when he spotted points, could beat
him at table tennis. His arm was a steel whip, his
serves invisible. When he used English, the ball
went crazy. Watching, squeezing Bobby's arm,
Duck said, "I love him."

Bobby said, "Me too."

Bobby liked it best when he and Dibble were
alone together in their room, even when he couldn't
make a sound because Dibble was reading or thinking or simply relaxing. In the silence he imagined a
sharing of secrets so sensitive they didn't have
words. His eyes relished Dibble in repose.

On his feet, Dibble said, "Grissom-'s scheduled
you for counseling. Therapy. They're gonna want
to know what makes you tick. What makes you
laugh. What makes you sweat. My advice, Sawhill,
is don't let anybody get in your head."

"I never have."

Dibble smiled. "You're not as dumb as I
thought."

Married, she kept her name. She was still Trish
Becker. Harry Sawhill kept his house, and she put
hers on the market without moving out. They lived
in both places, back and forth, a couple of weeks
in his house, longer in hers. Hers didn't sell because she kept the price inordinately high, and as
abruptly as she had put it on the market she took
it off.

Harry, ensconced in her bed, called to her. "I
thought you hated this house. I know I do. It's far
too big."

"I'm not letting it go for a song." She was stepping onto a scale in the bathroom. She weighed in
at a hard hundred-thirty pounds, which was her
essential shape.

"What's the real reason?"

"I want my children to know they have their
home to come to."

"What's the matter with my house?"

"That's Bobby's house. This is theirs."

He was silent for a moment. "You hate him."

She was brushing her teeth. After spitting out,
she said, "I fear him. Don't you?"

"He's my son."

"He's not mine."

When she entered the bedroom, Harry drew
aside the covers on her side of the bed. "We really
married, Trish, or we just pretending?"

Her thin gown clung to the expanse of her hips.
Through the translucency her groin divulged the
true color of her hair, which was not blond. She extinguished the bedside lamp and darkened the
room. "Ask Reverend Stottle. He said the words."

Settling into bed, she took comfort in the
knowledge she would not be alone through the
night. Should a bad dream wake her, she could
reach out for warmth, provided Harry wasn't in
the throes of a cold sweat. He rolled against her
with no alcohol on his breath. He hadn't touched a
drop in a week.

"Shall we?"

"If you want," she said.

When he rested a hand on her abdomen, she remembered her panic when her first marriage was
disintegrating and her need for refuge consuming.
When he kissed her on the mouth, heavily, greedily, she remembered lying lumpish for men she
didn't want, men who considered her windfall.

"Where are you going, Harry?"

He was dipping under the covers, raising them,
loosing them. He was down on her, licking a
stamp. Where would he mail her? Was she first
class or bulk?

It wasn't working.

She forced him back up. Eschewing the inferior
position, she straddled him, bore down, and took
command. Her fantasies flew to his brother and
then to her first husband. She connived with both,
two phantoms carrying her down the stretch. A moment later she collapsed as Harry's head jerked up.

"What are you laughing for?"

"I always do," she said, controlling herself.

"Not that loud."

"I'm happy."

He spoke with sadness. "No, you're not."

She spoke with practicality. "Next best thing."

Chief Morgan finished buying take-out at the deli
counter in Tuck's when a slight figure appeared at
his elbow without warning. A voice said, "Do you
miss her, James? Do you miss her as much as I do?"

He turned slowly, a weight on his shoulders. "I
miss her in my own way, Mrs. Perrault."

"But you can find another woman. I won't ever
have another daughter." Mrs. Perrault's eyes were
teardrops. Her hair was tightly permed, but the
hues were gone. Wrinkles in her face reached out.
"Why wasn't that boy put away for life?"

He answered quietly, his tone deliberate. "His
uncle got him a good lawyer."

"Sawhills have money. That's the long and short
of it. They have money, and I have no daughter.
What am I to do with the little that's left of my
life?"

He had no answer, only a rush of memories. He
remembered the tint of Claudia's skin, the small
mole between her breasts, the childhood collection
of abscess scars in her underarms.

A critical moment passed.

"Do you eat your supper alone, James?"

"Usually," he said, "but sometimes I have it at
the Blue Bonnet."

"Would you like to eat with us? My sisters aren't
the best company, but you're welcome."

"Maybe sometime," he said.

They stepped aside for other customers, Morgan
clutching his take-out bag, not all that much in it
for a grown man. Mrs. Perrault said, "You probably think I do, but I don't blame you. Claudia had
a mind of her own, but we didn't often let her use
it. We wanted her to ourselves. My sisters don't see
it, but we were selfish."

"She was just looking for a life of her own," he
said. "That's the whole of it."

They stepped out of the store. Mrs. Perrault had
in her arms a small bag of groceries. He wanted to
carry it for her, but she shook her head. "I'm able."

Claudia's Dodge Colt was parked behind the
store. The sight of it hurt his eyes. "I didn't know
you drove," he said.

"I do a lot for myself now."

He opened the driver's door, stepped back, and
gazed up at a sky of restless white clouds jostled by
whatever disturbances roamed that high. Mrs. Perrault settled in behind the wheel, fastened her seat
belt, and looked out at him.

"We have to sell that awful house. I don't think
of it as Claudia's but as Mrs. Bullard's. I can't
imagine who would want to buy it."

Nor could he. Were he felonious, reckless, not
the police chief, he would burn it down. Were he
an expanded version of himself, he would take all
matters into his own hands. He closed the driver's
door and started to walk away. He stopped and
turned around when Mrs. Perrault called to him,
her small face framed in the open window.