City of Sharks

by Kelli Stanley

  “C’mon. Let’s go back to your apartment.”

  A couple of the other patrons whistled and the man next to Smith elbowed him. “Now’s your chance, Howard. God knows you ain’t gonna get a better offer.”

  Smith looked up blearily and planted his feet.

  “I’m not goin’ anywhere. I’m stayin’ here til they throw me out. Go ’way, dick-lady. Go ’way.”

  Miranda looked from the red, stubborn face of the writer—drunk, but pretending to be even drunker—to the worn, tired faces of the men and women surrounding him. She hopped off the stool, nodded to the bartender.

  Faced the man with small eyes and new Florsheim shoes wavering in front of her.

  “You can’t hide, Smith. Not from the cops, not from me. I’ll expect to find you at the Gump’s party tomorrow night. If I don’t, Fisher will haul your ass to jail and keep it there … for your own fucking good.”

  She tossed a five-dollar bill on the counter.

  “Keep an eye on this goose for me, boys … and nibble one on me.”

  She walked out of the Lodge Tavern to an accompanying cheer of whistles and claps.

  * * *

  No late-night dinner at the Moderne, not tonight.

  She grabbed a hamburger from the Hotel Oxford cafe, extra onion, extra pickle, extra ice in the Coke.

  Ate methodically, machine-like, while Frank Sinatra warbled from the jukebox.

  Food gave her something to do.

  I’ll never smile again …

  She walked home, six long blocks, avoiding Chinatown, avoiding the Moderne, avoiding anyone she knew.

  Tomorrow she’d call Fisher and Meyer and Bente, tomorrow she’d talk to Allen and buy more sticks from Gladys. Tomorrow she’d brace Bunny or chase down Smith, find out about what he’d written. Tomorrow she’d call the hospital and see whether Louise made it through the night.

  Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow …

  She’d rejoin the world tomorrow on a trip to Alcatraz.

  Tonight was its own prison.

  She limped up the last hill slowly, catching a glimpse of Raphael around the corner, choosing which blonde to let past the red velvet rope. Her legs ached from the exercise but the pain was real, tangible, localized, the kind of pain that she could endure, appreciate, even savor.

  Pain as pleasure, pleasure as pain, semper idem, semper idem. Gladiator in arena consilium capit, too late, too late, too late.

  She pulled open the heavy door to the Drake Hopkins, gust of wind fighting her. No Roy, no Leo, no one at all in the lobby. The stairs squeaked in protest, and she gripped the oak banister, out of breath by the time she reached the fourth floor.

  The door swung open. Apartment still smelled like coffee. Miranda walked into the kitchen and turned on the light. Bent over the cold coffee grounds and inhaled, deep, earthy aroma.

  Burnett told her once, when he was very drunk and just scored a pair of C’s on a surveillance job. He told her to remember the victories, remember the booze, remember the dough. Remember the grunts and moans and the first fifteen minutes in the backseat when she was seventeen, remember the men she kissed and made love to and the ones she slapped.

  Remember her mother’s face.

  Then, he said, with a philosophical mien and his fingers wrapped around a bottle of Four Roses, forget it all.

  Because nothing mattered but that goddamn piece of paper in your wallet, the paper that made you free, beholden to no one, that didn’t tie you to an assembly line or a desk or a typewriter.

  The paper that didn’t tie you to anything … or anyone.

  She found the number in her reporter’s notebook and left a message for James, the gravelly voiced woman with a slight Southern accent sounding half-asleep. Two in the morning in Washington and she hoped he’d deliver, making a few phone calls when he woke up, make sure she was on the list for a boat ride to the Rock. She hung up, waited for the line to clear, and called Fisher.

  He wasn’t in but the desk sergeant wasn’t Collins and he recognized her name.

  “You that lady gumshoe I heard about, huh?”

  She made noncommittal answers and an effort to sweeten her tone. If James fell through, Fisher was her only hope. She didn’t want to wait, not with Louise’s life and maybe Thelma’s and maybe even Smith’s in jeopardy.

  Alcatraz was next, even if she had to swim with the fucking sharks.

  Miranda dropped the handset into the cradle and started to undress, trailing clothes into the bedroom.

  The yellow wallpaper with the blue forget-me-knots nodded and beamed at her, all singing, all dancing, Broadway revue of flowers, here’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance, pray you, love, remember …

  Rick helping her find a clown and a little girl across four hundred acres of Treasure Island. Rick seeing her for the first time since New York, meeting at Lotta’s Fountain. Rick telling her about Burnett, Rick dressing up like Robin Hood, Rick driving up to the Napa Woods and saving her from suicide or a fucking lobotomy …

  She sank down on the edge of the bed and poured herself a shot of Old Taylor, the whiskey strong and sweet, scorching as it slid down her throat. Took out her wallet and looked at it, the folded-up and worn piece of paper with her name on it.

  Remember, Burnett said.

  Remember.

  Twenty-Five

  The bull from Alcatraz took his time.

  He was checking the list for civilian passengers, the free-to-go kind, no transfers from Leavenworth or McNeil today, no bank robbers or post office bandits, no men who filed too many writs and raised too much hell or who wouldn’t take incarceration with the docility the government demanded.

  Miranda shivered.

  Seven thirty, and the fog was still thick at the pier around Fort Mason, the dim outline of the steam ferry General Frank M. Coxe barely discernible.

  A group of schoolkids, various ages, descended from the boat, chattering about Tyrone Power and Clark Gable, shopping with their mothers then maybe a picture at the Alcazar, the boys swaggering around the dock, playing cops and robbers, Saturday morning the most exciting time of the week.

  A couple of women shooed them off toward a White Front stop, mid-thirties to early forties, working-class matrons with frowsy hair and sales-rack dresses, women who followed their husbands to prison and lived just outside the walls, just outside the violence, women who thought they were lucky to get the free housing and never asked too many questions about what happened inside.

  Women who looked at Miranda with suspicion and curiosity, one to another. She could make out the word “visitation” and “moll” out of the mouth of the mousey blonde.

  The bull peered up from underneath his cap. “Says here you’re meetin’ with Warden Miller. Got it wrote down in pencil.”

  She gave him a smile. That’ll give the blonde something to fucking talk about.

  “That’s right. Thanks, Officer. What time does she leave?” Miranda nodded toward the Coxe, a sturdy-looking passenger ferry with a shallow draft and plenty of room. Steam belched from the boat’s funnel and made more fog.

  The bull narrowed his eyes, looked her up and down. “You some kinda newshen, lady? Figured you was here to see one of the big trouble boys, though that kind usually take the McDowell, the regular transport boat. Maybe you got some pull with the army or somethin’, but you won’t get no news outta the Rock—we don’t talk, see? Nobody talks. It’s against the rules.”

  “My name’s on the list. My business is my own.”

  He looked hard at her again, then dropped his eyes and shrugged. “Whatever you say, lady. Jus’ tryin’ to save you from pukin’ your guts out. It’s a rough ride this morning, even if it’s only a mile. You don’t look like no sailor to me. Got ten minutes til launch.”

  Miranda shook out a Chesterfield from the pack in her pocket.

  “Thanks. I might surprise you.”

  She huddled under the black Persian lamb coat and lit the stick, the damp air and Bay wind blo
wing out the lighter twice. The women left, still whispering, herding the children and clutching grocery lists. A couple of men in dungarees, probably civilian workers at one of the shops on the island, loitered by the boat, talking to the captain.

  Miranda inhaled the cigarette and reread the telegram James sent this morning.

  All set 7:45 A.M. Fort Mason, Coxe ferry. Seeing Miller. Ask abt Roy Gardner, Rufus McCain, Henri Young, last hunger strike, mat shop fire. Call after.

  She studied the words, drawing down hard on the stick. James came through for her, but not just for her. It was a long shot whether he could get the potentates of Devil’s Island to see a private investigator … especially a non-Pinkerton, nonmale private investigator whose name was in the paper too goddamn much. That he had succeeded—and on such short notice—meant that the State Department or James’ own connections wanted her to learn something and report back.

  Something the Bureau of Prisons wanted checked up on? Punishment maybe, the cruel and unusual kind. Something to do specifically with Roy Gardner, Henri Young, and Rufus McCain.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, huddled against the cold Bay wind, trying to remember what she’d read.

  The hunger strike was just a couple of months ago, dutifully leaked to the papers by the civilian workers and maybe even careful bulls who liked a little folding money. Over one hundred inmates, protesting conditions on the Rock, and only about a month after a mysterious fire broke out in the mat factory. Funny that James mentioned them both.

  The fire wasn’t much, though the papers ate it like candy—a fishing boat heard the alarm and thought it was another escape. Refusing to eat wasn’t much of a bargaining tool and the strike petered out, like most strikes on the island, with the ringleaders locked up in whatever hole Johnston deemed appropriate. Initiative and energy required hope, one of the first casualties on Alcatraz.

  Besides, the warden had hoses he could shove down your throat.

  About six or seven months before the strike, around the turn of the year, Roy Gardner committed suicide at the Hotel Governor. The author of Hellcatraz was just too tired, he wrote, to continue on. He apologized, posted his warning sign on the door, and left a tip for the maid before inhaling potassium cyanide.

  She looked at the telegram again and frowned. Gardner wrote the most infamous account of the dungeons—what the bulls called “disciplinary segregation.” And he wound up dead. Whether he’d been encouraged, no one thought to investigate.

  Then there was McCain and Young. They’d taken part in the infamous escape attempt last year—the one that cost Doc Barker his life. No one really knew what happened to the would-be escapees, since the United States Attorney opted out of pressing charges … again, for reasons unknown.

  There’d been five men involved in all, one a black inmate named William Martin. She remembered Rick talking about it—since Alcatraz was completely segregated—hell, they even had separate barber chairs in the prisoner barber shop—and the press made sure to play up the race angle. Five white men making an escape attempt was one thing. Four white men and a black man was quite another.

  She nodded, mouth grim. Whatever they’d done to McCain and Young and the other survivors, she was willing to bet Martin had it a hell of a lot worse.

  Miranda took one last inhale on the cigarette and dropped it on the wooden pier, crushing it with her pump.

  She’d ask about Martin, too.

  * * *

  The waters were choppy, the way Miranda liked them, and she faced the prow, salt-spray biting her cheeks and hair.

  The bull who checked her in was inside the warm cabin, shivering underneath his peacoat.

  Two civilian workers, mechanics or machinists, sat together talking, shooting an occasional glance through the window to where Miranda stood like a figurehead.

  She took a deep breath, tasting salt, eyes blinking, leaning into the wind as they sailed by Treasure Island. Soon there’d be screams from the Roll-O-Plane and numbers ringing up on the Giant Cash Register, the excited shouts of kids and the roar of the Roller Coaster, Sally’s girls sharing a cup of black coffee and stories from the night before, Ken Silverman testing the diving bell, his new wife Nina beaming when he speaks of the wonders under the sea.

  Only eight days more for the Pageant of the Pacific, the Magic Carpet, the Magic Island, conceived as an airport, born for a Fair, testimony to a peace that would never be in our time.

  Back in New York, The World of Tomorrow would last another month before it, too, became yesterday.

  Miranda watched the fog wrap around the Tower of the Sun.

  The ferry ride was only about fifteen minutes. Better make the most of it.

  She sighed, and made her way to the cabin.

  Once inside, she sat opposite the men on the long, narrow wooden bench, shiny with wear. The younger one kept staring at her, the older one growing irritated.

  “Christ, Zach, ain’t you heard me? I tol’ you five times already—that presser’s gonna blow if we don’t order a new valve soon, I don’t give a damn what the warden says. Can’t run no rubber mat factory without a goddamn presser, can we?”

  He was grizzled and gray, younger, probably, than he looked, with ancient grease stains on his dungarees and a carefully mended coat. The younger one was late thirties or early forties, dark brown hair and beefy, with a map-veined nose and protruding gut. Weak blue eyes crawled over her.

  “Yeah, yeah, I heard you. So we get a message to Meat Head and fill out a request. Alls we can do is warn ’em, Mitch. We ain’t the bosses. They been keepin’ a tight fist on supplies since the fire, anyway—you’d think we was the crim’nals, way they act.”

  He spoke slowly, eyes lingering on Miranda’s legs. He looked up and she met his eyes.

  The bull was on the other end of the cabin, leaning back against the windows, gently snoring. She gave the workman a long, slow smile.

  He sat up straight and leaned forward. “You here on a visit, lady? “Pop Gun” Kelly, maybe?”

  The older man nudged him in the ribs. The younger one ignored him.

  “George gets a lot of visitors, does he?”

  “Yeah. Not all of ’em as good-lookin’ as you, though. What’s your name, doll?”

  Her lips twitched. “Miranda. Say, I overheard you say you work in the mat shop. Ever find out what caused that fire a few months back?”

  Zach raised his eyebrows. The older one, Mitch, shook his head and made a low growling noise.

  “We ain’t supposed to talk about it, angel. But between you, me, and the deep blue sea, I think it was a joe named Hensley. Leastways, that’s what Link says.”

  “Link? Who’s that?”

  “That’s what some of the birds call Linkletter. He’s captain of the guards, just got promoted. Used to be lieutenant, but he’s Meat Head’s main boy—”

  “Zach!” High-pitched warning from Mitch. The small dock was coming into view now, huddled beneath the looming desolation that was Alcatraz.

  Zach grinned sheepishly. “Sorry, lady. Ain’t supposed to talk about the Rock.”

  Miranda nodded, and scooted forward on the bench, peering through the dirty windows. The lighthouse shone a cold beam on the Bay, waters gray and dark gray, kelp and seaweed floating on top before drowning beneath the current. Wreathed in fog, the island was bigger than it looked from the safety of San Francisco: massive rock, steep climbs, and a long, low steel box of a building, coffin of living men, clinging to the hard, dark gray sandstone and struggling for survival against the wind.

  A few plants clung to the sides of the island, some native, some plantings by the warden’s house and before him, the army, living emblem of civilization and the dominance of man against nature.

  Seagulls swooped and pelicans flew low, cormorants cleaning themselves after a dive.

  No other signs of life.

  The bull woke up from his morning doze with a loud grunt. Miranda started busying herself with her handbag, said it nonchalan
tly.

  “Is ‘Meat Head’ what the prisoners call the associate warden?”

  Zach glanced over at Mitch and stood up, the ferry slowing down and rocking as it slipped toward the dock, a couple of men emerging from an outbuilding and throwing ropes to secure her. The mechanic leaned over Miranda. He smelled like bacon grease.

  “Yeah. But I’m surprised you don’t know that, seein’ as you’re Kelly’s girl an’ all.”

  The bull finally stood up and stretched, his lips moving while he counted the passengers on the boat. Satisfied, he stood up and started giving orders.

  “All right, you men, get ready. First you, lady, ladies first, even on Alcatraz.”

  Zach pressed into her, close whisper. “I work in the new industrial building, mat shop, Zach Russell’s the name. Make plenty o’ kale, too, case you get lonely, sittin’ around waitin’ for ‘Pop Gun’.”

  Miranda smiled and stepped away, pulling her gloves on tighter. “Oh, I’m not here to see Mr. Kelly. I’m here to see Associate Warden Miller.”

  She nodded at the ashen-faced mechanic and took the few steps up to the deck, the guard already outside and reaching down for her hand.

  The small ferry was rocking against the wooden dock and the two men had thrown a plank over the gap between the boat and the platform. Miranda held her beret down, wind yowling in a disconcerting shriek as it whipped around the island, fog patchy and dense as it clung to the already decaying buildings perched around the mooring.

  The bull helped her across, rough hand supporting her as if she were a child. Zach and Mitch headed up the hill to the right, Zach avoiding her eyes. The men on the dock chatted with the boat captain for a few minutes, before the Coxe sailed into the salty wind once more, next stop Angel Island.

  Miranda watched the boat pull into the choppy water, remembering why she’d made the journey, remembering the catch in her throat this morning before the nurse at Children’s came on the line, Louise “still unconscious but expected to survive.” Maybe the secretary would remember something and be able to communicate it … maybe she wouldn’t. One way or another, Miranda wasn’t leaving the Rock without some goddamn answers.