The Moneychangers

by Arthur Hailey

  Avril … as he had seen and touched her … breathtakingly beauteous, naked and desirable. Instinctively he moved his fingers, reliving the sensation of those full, firm breasts, their nipples extended, as he had cupped them in his hands.

  And all the while his body … striving, burgeoning … made mock of his intended righteousness.

  He tried to move his thoughts away—to banking affairs, to the Supranational loan, to the directorship which G. G. Quartermain had promised. But thoughts of Avril returned, stronger than ever, impossible to eclipse. He remembered her legs, her thighs, her lips, her soft smile, her warmth and perfume … her availability.

  He got up and began pacing, seeking to redirect his energy elsewhere. It would not be redirected.

  Stopping at the window, he observed that a bright three-quarter moon had risen. It bathed the garden, beaches, and the sea in white ethereal light. Watching, a long-forgotten phrase returned to him: The night was made for loving… by the moon.

  He paced again, then returned to the window, standing there, erect.

  Twice he made a move toward the bedside table with its intercom. Twice, resolve and sternness turned him back.

  The third time he did not turn back. Grasping the instrument in his hand, he groaned—a mixture of anguish, self-reproach, heady excitement, heavenly anticipation.

  Decisively and firmly, he pressed button number seven.

  9

  Nothing in Miles Eastin’s experience or imagination, before entering Drummonburg Penitentiary, had prepared him for the merciless, degrading hell of prison.

  It was now six months since his exposure as an embezzler, and four months since his trial and sentencing.

  In rare moments, when his objectivity prevailed over physical misery and mental anguish, Miles Eastin reasoned that if society had sought to impose savage, barbaric vengeance on someone like himself, it had succeeded far beyond the knowing of any who had not endured, themselves, the brutish purgatory of prison. And if the object of such punishment, he further reasoned, was to push a human being out of his humanity, and make of him an animal of lowest instincts, then the prison system was the way to do it.

  What prison did not do, and never would—Miles Eastin told himself—was make a man a better member of society than when he entered it. Given any time at all, prison could only degrade and worsen him; could only increase his hatred of “the system” which had sent him there; could only reduce the possibility of his becoming, ever, a useful, law-abiding citizen. And the longer his sentence, the less likelihood there was of any moral salvage.

  Thus, most of all, it was time which eroded and eventually destroyed any potential for reform which a prisoner might have when he arrived.

  Even if an individual hung on to some shards of moral values, like a drowning swimmer to a life preserver, it was because of forces within himself, and not because of prison but despite it.

  Miles was striving to hang on, straining to retain some semblance of the best of what he had been before, trying not to become totally brutalized, entirely unfeeling, utterly despairing, savagely embittered. It was so easy to slip into a garment of all four, a hair shirt which a man would wear forever. Most prisoners did. They were those either brutalized before they came here and made worse since, or others whom time in prison had worn down; time and the cold-hearted inhumanity of a citizenry outside, indifferent to what horrors were perpetrated or decencies neglected—all in society’s name—behind these walls.

  In Miles’s favor, and in his mind while he clung on, was one dominant possibility. He had been sentenced to two years. It made him eligible for parole in four more months.

  The contingency that he might not receive parole was one he did not dare consider. The implications were too awful. He did not believe he could go through two years of prison and fail to emerge totally, irreparably, debased in brain and body.

  Hold on! he told himself each day and in the nights. Hold on for the hope, the deliverance, of parole!

  At first, after arrest and detention while awaiting trial, he had thought that being locked into a cage would send him mad. He remembered reading once that freedom, until lost, was seldom valued. And it was true that no one realized how much their physical freedom of movement meant—even going from one room to another or briefly out of doors—until such choices were denied them totally.

  Just the same, compared with conditions in this penitentiary, the pre-trial period was a luxury.

  The cage at Drummonburg in which he was confined was a six-by-eight foot cell, part of a four-tiered, X-shaped cell house. When the prison was built more than half a century ago, each cell was intended for one person; today, because of prison overpopulation, most cells, including Miles’s, housed four. On most days prisoners were locked into the tiny spaces for eighteen hours out of twenty-four.

  Soon after Miles had come here, and because of trouble elsewhere in the prison, they had remained locked in—“lock-in, feed-in”, the authorities called it—for seventeen whole days and nights. After the first week, the desperate cries of twelve hundred near-demented men made one more agony piled upon the others.

  The cell to which Miles Eastin was allotted had four bunks clamped to walls, one sink and a single, seatless toilet which all four inmates shared. Because water pressure through ancient, corroded pipes was poor, water supply—cold only—to the sink was usually a trickle; occasionally it stopped entirely. For the same reason, the toilet often wouldn’t flush. It was bad enough to be confined in the same close quarters where four men defecated with a total lack of privacy, but staying with the stench long after, while waiting for sufficient water to remove it, was a disgusting, stomach-heaving horror.

  Toilet paper and soap, even when used sparingly, were never enough.

  A brief shower was allowed once weekly; in between showers, bodies grew rancid, adding to close quarters misery.

  It was in the showers, during his second week in prison, that Miles was gang raped. Bad as other experiences were, this had been the worst.

  He had become aware, soon after his arrival, that other prisoners were attracted to him sexually. His good looks and youthfulness, he soon found out, were to be a liability. Marching to meals or at exercise in the yard, the more aggressive homosexuals managed to crowd around and rub against him. Some reached out to fondle him; others, from a distance, pursed their lips and blew him kisses. The first he squirmed away from, the second he ignored, but as both became more difficult his nervousness, then fear, increased. It became plain that inmates not involved would never help him. He sensed that guards who looked his way knew what was happening. They merely seemed amused.

  Though the inmate population was predominantly black, the approaches came equally from blacks and whites.

  He was in the shower house, a single-story corrugated structure to which prisoners were marched in groups of fifty, escorted by guards. The prisoners undressed, leaving their clothing in wire baskets, then trooped naked and shivering through the unheated building. They stood under shower heads, waiting for a guard to turn on the water.

  The shower-room guard was high above them on a platform, and control of the showers and water temperature was under the guard’s whim. If the prisoners were slow in moving, or seemed noisy, the guard could send down an icy blast of water, raising screams of rage and protest while prisoners jumped around like wild men, trying to escape. Because of the shower-house design, they couldn’t. Or sometimes the guard would maliciously bring the hot water close to scalding, to the same effect.

  On a morning when a group of fifty which included Miles was emerging from the showers, and another fifty, already undressed, were waiting to go in, Miles felt himself surrounded closely by several bodies. Suddenly his arms were gripped tightly by a half dozen hands and he was being hustled forward. A voice behind him urged, “Move your ass, pretty boy. We ain’t got long.” Several others laughed.

  Miles looked up toward the elevated platform. Seeking to draw the guard’s attention, he sh
outed, “Sir! sir!”

  The guard, who was picking his nose and looking elsewhere, appeared not to hear.

  A fist slammed hard into Miles’s ribs. A voice behind him snarled, “Shaddup!”

  He cried out again from pain and fear and either the same fist or another thudded home once more. The breath went out of him. A fiery hurt shot through his side. His arms were being twisted savagely. Whimpering now, his feet barely touching the floor, he was hustled along.

  The guard still took no notice. Afterward, Miles guessed the man had been tipped off in advance and bribed. Since guards were abysmally underpaid, bribery in the prison was a way of life.

  Near the exit from the showers, where others were beginning to dress, was a narrow open doorway. Still surrounded, Miles was shoved through. He was conscious of black and white bodies. Behind them, the door slammed shut.

  The room inside was small and used for storage. Brooms, mops, cleaning materials were in screened and padlocked cupboards. Near the room’s center was a trestle table. Miles was slammed face downward on it; his mouth and nose hit the wooden surface hard. He felt teeth loosen. His eyes filled with tears. His nose began to bleed.

  While his feet stayed on the floor, his legs were roughly pulled apart. He fought desperately, despairingly, trying to move. The many hands restrained him.

  “Hold still, pretty boy.” Miles heard grunting and felt a thrust. A second later he screamed in pain, disgust, and horror. Whoever was holding his head seized it by the hair, raised and slammed it down. “Shaddup!”

  Now pain, in waves, was everywhere.

  “Ain’t she lovely?” The voice seemed in the distance, echoing and dreamlike.

  The penetration ended. Before his body could know relief, another began. Despite himself, knowing the consequences, he screamed again. Once more his head was banged.

  During the next few minutes and the monstrous repetition, Miles’s mind began to drift, his awareness waned. As strength left him, his struggles lessened. But the physical agony intensified—a searing of membrane, the fiery abrasion of a thousand sensory nerve ends.

  Consciousness must have left him totally, then returned. From outside he heard a guard’s whistle being blown. It was a signal to hurry with the dressing and assemble in the yard. He was aware of restraining hands withdrawn. Behind him a door opened. The others in the room were running out.

  Bleeding, bruised, and barely conscious, Miles staggered out. The merest movement of his body caused him suffering.

  “Hey, you!” the guard bawled from the platform. “Move ass, you goddam pansy!”

  Groping, only half aware of what he was doing, Miles took the wire basket with his clothes and began to pull them on. Most of the others in his group of fifty were already outside in the yard. Another fifty men who had been under the showers were ready to transfer to the dressing area.

  The guard shouted fiercely for the second time, “Shithead! I said move!”

  Stepping into his rough drill prison pants, Miles stumbled and would have fallen, but for an arm which reached out, holding him.

  “Take it easy, kid,” a deep voice said. “Here, I’ll help.” The first hand continued to hold him steady while a second aided in putting the pants on.

  The guard’s whistle blasted shrilly. “Nigger, you hear me! You an’ that pansy get the hell outside, or be on report.”

  “Yassir, yassir, big boss. Right away, now. Let’s go, kid.”

  Miles was aware, hazily, that the man beside him was huge and black. Later, he would learn the other’s name was Karl and that he was serving a life sentence for murder. Miles would wonder, too, if Karl had been among the gang which raped him. He suspected that he was, but never asked, and never knew for sure.

  What Miles did discover was that the black giant, despite his size and uncouthness, had a gentleness of manner and a sensitive consideration almost feminine.

  From the shower house, supported by Karl, Miles walked unsteadily outdoors.

  There were some smirks from other prisoners but on the faces of most Miles read contempt. A wizened old-timer spat disgustedly and turned away.

  Miles made it through the remainder of the day—back to bis cell, later to the mess hall where he couldn’t eat the slop he usually forced down from hunger, and finally to his cell again, with help along the way from Karl. His other three cell companions ignored him as if he were a leper. Racked by pain and misery he slept, tossed, woke, lay fitfully awake for hours suffering the fetid air, slept briefly, woke again. With daybreak, and the clangor of cell doors opening, came renewed fear: When would it happen again? He suspected soon.

  In the yard during “exercise”—two hours during which most of the prison population stood around aimlessly—Karl sought him out.

  “How y’ feel, kid?”

  Miles shook his head dejectedly. “Awful.” He added, “Thanks for what you did.” He was aware that the big black had saved him from being on report, as the shower-room guard had threatened. That would have meant punishment—probably time in the hole—and an adverse mark on his record for parole.

  “It’s okay, kid. One thing, though, you gotta figure. One time, like yesterday, ain’t gonna satisfy them guys. They like dogs now, with you a bitch in heat. They’ll be after you again.”

  “What can I do?” The confirmation of Miles’s fears made his voice quaver and his body tremble. The other watched him shrewdly.

  “What you need, kid, is a protector. Some stud t’ look out for you. How’d you like me for yours?”

  “Why should you do that?”

  “You start bein’ my reg’lar boy friend, I take care o’ you. Them others know you ‘n me’s steady, they ain’t gonna lay no hand on you. They know they do, there’s me to reckon with.” Karl curled one hand into a fist; it was the size of a small ham.

  Though he already knew the answer, Miles asked, “What would you want?”

  “Your sweet white ass, baby.” The big man closed his eyes and went on dreamily. “Your body just for me. Any time I need it. I’ll take care of where.”

  Miles Eastin wanted to be sick.

  “How ’bout it, baby? Waddya say?”

  As he had so many times already, Miles thought despairingly: Whatever was done before, does anyone deserve this?

  Yet he was here. And had learned that prison was a jungle—debased and savage, lacking justice—where a man was stripped of human rights the day he came. He said bitterly, “Do I have a choice?”

  “Put it that way, no I guess you ain’t.” A pause, then impatiently, “Well, we on?”

  Miles said miserably, “I suppose so.”

  Looking pleased, Karl draped an arm proprietorially around the other’s shoulders. Miles, shriveling inside, willed himself not to draw away.

  “We gotta git you moved some, baby. To my tier. Maybe my pad.” Karl’s cell was in a lower tier than Miles’s, in an opposite wing of the X-shaped cell house. The big man licked his lips. “Yeah, man.” The hand on Miles was already wandering.

  Karl asked, “You got bread?”

  “No.” Miles knew that if he had had money it could have eased his way already. Prisoners with financial resources on the outside, and who used them, suffered less than prisoners with none.

  “Ain’t got none neither,” Karl confided. “Guess I’ll hafta figure sumpum.”

  Miles nodded dully. Already, he realized, he had begun to accept the ignominious “girl friend” role. But he knew, too, the way things worked here, that while the arrangement with Karl lasted he was safe. There would be no further gang rape.

  The belief proved correct.

  There were no more attacks, or attempted fondlings, or kisses blown. Karl had a reputation for knowing how to use his mighty fists. It was rumored that a year ago he had used a shiv to kill a fellow prisoner who angered him, though officially the murder was unsolved.

  Miles also was transferred, not only to Karl’s tier, but to his cell. Obviously the transfer was a result of money changing
hands. Miles asked Karl how he had managed it.

  The big black chuckled. “Them guys in Mafia Row put up the bread. Over there they like you, baby.”

  “Like me?’

  In common with other prisoners, Miles was aware of Mafia Row, otherwise known as the Italian Colony. It was a segment of cells housing the big wheels of organized crime whose outside contacts and influence made them respected and feared even, some said, by the prison governor. Inside Drummonburg their privileges were legendary.

  Such privileges included key prison jobs, extra freedom of movement, and superior food, the latter either smuggled in by guards or pilfered from the general ration system. The Mafia Row inhabitants, Miles had heard, frequently enjoyed steaks and other delicacies, cooked on forbidden grills in workshop hideaways. They also managed extra comforts in their cells—among them, television and sun lamps. But Miles himself had had no contact with Mafia Row, nor been aware that anyone in it knew of his existence.

  “They say you’re a stand-up guy,” Karl told him.

  Part of the mystery was resolved a few days later when a weasel-faced, pot-bellied prisoner named LaRocca sidled alongside Miles in the prison yard. LaRocca, while not part of Mafia Row, was known to be on its fringes and acted as a courier.

  He nodded to Karl, acknowledging the big black’s proprietorial interest, then told Miles, “Gotta message f’ ya from Russian Ominsky.”

  Miles was startled and uneasy. Igor (the Russian) Ominsky was the loan shark to whom he had owed—and still owed—fifteen thousand dollars. He realized, too, there must also be enormous accrued interest on the debt.

  Six months ago it was Ominsky’s threats which prompted Miles’s six-thousand-dollar cash theft from the bank, following which his earlier thefts had been exposed.

  “Ominsky knows ya kept ya trap shut,” LaRocca said. “He likes the way ya did, ’n figures ya for a stand-up guy.”

  It was true that during interrogation prior to his trial, Miles had not divulged the names, either of his bookmaker or the loan shark, both of whom he feared at the time of his arrest. There had seemed nothing to be gained by doing so, perhaps much to lose. In any event he had not been pressed hard on the point either by the bank security chief, Wainwright, or the FBI.