Mr. Blue: Memoirs of a Renegade (51 page)

Suddenly there was sdence
throughout the cell house except for the scrape of running feet. More than one
man was breaking through the crowd to get away. The guard leveled his rifle,
but was unable to shoot into the press of bodies. He tried to follow along the
gunrad, still blasting his whistle in accusation, but his quarry disappeared
down the rear stairs.

Guards on the cell house floor
were too late to reach the scene. The assailants got away.

I decided to forgo my NCAA wager
and get out of the cell house before the rotunda gate was locked. They might
even ask
me
some
questions. As I hurried back toward the front stairs, I looked down at the
floor of the cell house. Four blacks were pushing a flatbed handcart used to
move laundry hampers and metal trash barrels. Now it carried a
"brother" who was being rushed toward the hospital. He was on his
back, legs drawn up and head raised, his denim jacket open and a red stain
spreading across his white tank top. The blacks who pushed the cart would have
let a white man die, and a white convict who gave aid to a wounded black
(unless the white was assigned to the hospital) would be ostracized by other
whites, if not attacked. The first rumor was that he had been stabbed and
thrown from the fourth tier. Looking down, that seemed unlikely. If he had been
dropped forty feet to the concrete, bones would have been broken. He would have
looked different.

From the rows of tiers above,
hundreds of convicts stared down at the exiting group. The question was, who
had stabbed him. If it was another black, it was between assailant, victim and
their partners. If it was a Chicano, so far that had not caused any widespread
trouble, but if it was white on black, or black on white, there would most
certainly be trouble.

As I reached the rotunda door
the building Sergeant was coming from another angle to lock it. In the
background the public address system was crackling and bellowing
"Lock up! Bay side
lock up! Yard side lock up!"
The Sergeant raised a hand of restraint, recognized
me then let me slip out into the Big Yard night. Guards were coming on the
double, holding their jangling key rings in one hand and batons in the other.

I started back across the yard.
It was an Edward Hopper study in light and shadow, with several figures
working. One wielded the nozzle of a heavy canvas fire hose, while another
dragged the weight along behind. Other convicts were sweeping up trash and shoveling
it into wheelbarrows. The night yard crew were all friends of mine; they
couldn't get assigned without my wink to the lieutenant. Paul Allen was
approaching, waving his broom. From the yard at night you could see into the
lighted cell house. "What happened in there?" he asked.

"Some nigger got stabbed up
on the fourth tier." I used the racial epithet, but it was without animus.
Although I would not have used it with any black, even joking with a friend, if
I used anything different with Paul, he would have commented.

"We got another war kickin'
off?"

"I dunno who got him. He
doesn't seem to be hurt bad."

Through the yard gate came
Lieutenant E.F. Ziemer, the third watch commander. A man in his mid-fifties, he
had the gait of someone who has spent years on a rolling ship. In his case it
had been a submarine. His hat was tilted rakishly to the side. He was
sauntering toward the East Block rotunda. He was my boss and I gave him a half
salute. He stopped. "Hey, Bunk," he called. "Keep yourself
avadable. We're going to have reports to write tonight."

"I'll be around,
boss."

"One other thing."

"What's up, boss?"

"They're supposed to gas
Aaron Mitchell a week from Friday. It's pretty messy over there. I sent Willy
Hart over to hit it with a mop. He wanted me to ask you to help him."

"He would."

"If you don't mind."

"Sure. How do I get
in?" Keys to the execution area were kept in #2 gun tower over the Big
Yard gate.

Just then a guard came out of
the North Cell House rotunda, which provided entry to both the cell house
through a steel door on the left and the overnight condemned cells through
another steel door straight ahead. The guard was the runner, who picked up and
delivered mail and memos and escorted convicts (say to the hospital) at night.
He was heading toward #2 gun tower, obviously to return the key. Ziemer called
his name and we walked over to meet him.

When the runner opened the green
steel door, Willy was in the open gate of one of the two overnight cells. He
had a broom in hand and a grin on his face. Beside him was a bucket on wheels
with a mop handle protruding. Behind him was an open green steel door, and two
or three feet beyond that was the open oval door into the gas chamber, somewhat
reminiscent of a diving bell. There sat two chairs side by side. I immediately
thought of the story of Allen and Smitty, Folsom convicts executed for killing
another inmate. A bull told me that when the door was closed and the wheel
turned to seal it, they leaned their heads together and kissed goodbye, chair
to chair. As I thought of it, I laughed. Willy had just said something funny,
he was often very funny, and thought I was laughing at his witticism.

"Hey, Bunk, I see you came
to help."

"I'll be back for you two
in half an hour," the guard said. "How's that?"

"Sounds good," Willy
said. "We should be done by then."

The guard closed the door and we
were alone with the overnight cells and the gas chamber. I stood in the opened
gateway of the first cell. One step out, one step to the right through the
door. One long step (or two short steps, or one skid mark of dragged feet) was
the entrance to the gas chamber. Damn, it was small. It was painted green and
shaped like an octagon with windows from about waist height up. Venetian blinds
now hid the interior from the witnesses who stood outside. The first row had
their noses inches from the glass, and the doomed fellow was inches on the
other side. A witness definitely witnessed things up close.

"Didn't Shorty Schrekendost
paint this place?" Willy asked.

"I think so . . . 'bout ten
years ago."

"I think he wrote his name
under one of the seats."

"He wrote it everywhere
else in the joint. Lemme check." I flopped on the floor and rolled over on
my back so I could see. I saw no graffiti, but I did see how death was
administered. Low technology, a lever with a hook where the gauze bag of
cyanide pellets was draped. When the lever was moved, the bag dipped down into
a bucket of sulphuric acid and gas was created. The seat bottom was perforated
to ease the gas's flow upward.

I raised my head. Thinking about
smells and stuff stirred a memory. "What about my outfit? Where's it
at?"

"I got it stashed out
there. As soon as we leave . . ." "I hope you cleaned it so it
doesn't stink." I was riding Willy as a joke. It was part of the relationship.
If I acted otherwise, he would suspect some kind of put on.

"It's clean . . . and oh,
I've got a present for you brother."

From a shirt pocket he brought
forth a matchbook. Inserted so it stuck out both sides was a joint. "Well
fire the sucker up," I said.

So he did. We sat side by side
in the gas chamber, passing the joint back and forth. It was pretty good pot
and we got high, laughing and telling stories until we heard the key turn in
the outside lock. We jumped up and looked busy. Willy was swinging the mop and
I was swiping a rag across the witness chairs. I wondered how many pissed in
their britches when the cyanide hit the pan and they were eyeball to eyeball
with the dying man.

The guard was unconcerned with
cleanliness, although he did sniff the air and ask, "What's that I
smell?"

"I don't smell
anything," Willy said. "You smell anything, Legend?"

"You put Pine Sol in the
mop bucket, didn't you?"

Willy shook his head. "No .
. . nuthin' but a little ammonia."

"That's what it's gotta
be."

The
guard sensed a put-on without knowing what or why; he didn't recognize the
smell. "C'mon," he said, and told Willy to bring the gear. "The
lieutenant wants to see you
pronto,"
he said to me. I went out with a grin.

While
Willy and I were mopping the execution chamber, Lieutenant Ziemer had been
questioning convicts who had cells where the incident occurred. He had
discovered very little, but he had to file a report of some kind. That was my
job. All incident reports
had the same form: "At approximately     , on      date,
while on duty as            , I 'observed,' 'was
told,'" etc. It was very
ritualized and I had
it down pat.

"The victim, Robinson, B-00000, suffered three
puncture wounds

from an unknown instrument in his right upper chest.
(See medical

report.) Subject claims he was assaulted by an unknown
Mexican.

It should be noted that
Robinson was recently transferred to this institution following several
disciplinary reports at the California Men's Colony. It should be noted that
the subject has a hostile demeanor. The writer placed him on administrative
lockup pending investigation and disposition of this incident.

Lieutenant Ziemer read the
report and signed it. "Goddamn I write a helluva report," he said,
widening his eyes and gaping his mouth in feigned naivety. "Big Red Nelson
complimented me at the last staff meeting. He asked how you were doing."

"I'm goin' over to the cell
house," I said. "Unless you need me.

"Be around about eleven. Those officers working
the East Block will have to fde reports." "I'll be here, boss."

When I reached the yard, where
the yard crew had finished cleaning and were putting away their equipment,
Danny Trejo had the real news about the East Block stabbing. The altercation
had begun in the education building where the Chicano and the black were both
enrolled in literacy training, which means they tested lower than the fourth
grade and were being taught to read. Somehow they had exchanged stares, which
became sneers and then a word or two: "So?" "So whatever
..." The bell then rang, ending the period. Both existed in worlds where
it was impossible to conceive, much less articulate, the senselessness of
murder arising from locked stares and nothing more.

When word got around that it was
Chicano and black, most whites relaxed, glad not to be involved. Some
especially militant blacks plotted retaliation. As far as they were concerned
a brother had been stabbed and nothing else mattered. Chicanos anticipated
possible trouble and readied themselves. Black tier tenders delivered knives
from mattresses and ventilators. Chicano cell house workers did the same.
Perhaps a dozen on each side actually armed themselves, taping large, crudely
honed but deadly knives to their forearms so they were easy to jerk from their
sleeve. Or they poked a hole in the bottom of their front pants pocket, so the
blade went down against their thighs while they held the handle out of sight in
their pocket. It could be drawn in an instant. As in the Wild West, the
quickest draw often decided who lived and who died.

The prison slept without realization that the tinder
of black rage toward the white man had been ignited. No one could have imagined
how hot the inferno would be or how long it would burn.

Two giant mess halls feed San Quentin's
convicts. The larger of the two, the south, is divided into four sections, with
murals of California history on their walls. It was like a high school
cafeteria instead of the feeding place of robbers, rapists and murderers, drug
addicts and chdd molesters. Both mess halls together are inadequate to feed all
of the convicts simultaneously, so it is done in shifts. The North and West
Cell Houses ate first in the morning. After eating, the inmates could go out on
the yard or back to their cell house until the eight o'clock work call.

By 7.30 the last of the East and
South Cell Houses were usually in the mess halls. Those first unlocked were, as
a rule, already leaving for the yard. I never got up for breakfast, but this
morning Veto Tewksbury (a San Fernando Valley Chicano despite the name, which
came from an English squire who owned many thousands of acres in Arizona once
upon a time) reached through the bars and shook my foot. "Get up, man.
Shit's gonna hit the fan out in the yard."

I stood up and looked out
through the cell bars and the cell house bars to the Big Yard. Sure enough, it
was more segregated than usual. As always, blacks were gathered along the North
Cell House, directly below my window, but where they were usually joshing,
laughing and talking, this morning they were somber and silent. The line
dividing the races was usually narrow and overlapping, with nobody paying real
attention to the territorial imperatives, but on this morning the space was at
least thirty yards. About 300 blacks stared balefully at two clusters of
Mexicans; one cluster of about a hundred was partially under the shed on the
blacks' right flank. Another hundred faced the blacks head on across the empty
asphalt. Behind the Chicanos, backing them, were a dozen young Nazis and a
score of Hells' Angels. Sprinkled among the Chicanos were ten or fifteen whites
ready to back their homeboys, or tight partners. One clique of whites was
conspicuous standing on benches along the East Cell House wall. In the last
black versus white race war, they had carried the brunt of the mayhem, and had
committed other stabbings and murders. It was the strongest white clique, but
its numbers in the general population had been depleted by officials locking
them in segregation and transferring them. Though violent, the clique was not
especially racist; that is, they would not start a race war. But its members,
like me, had Chicano partners who backed us in a confrontation with a large
Mexican gang, which would become La Nuestra Familia, mortal enemy of the
Mexican Mafia, a.k.a. "La Erne." In the southwest, especially in
Southern California but also Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Texas, it is far
better to be an enemy of La Cosa Nostra than the Eme. On this particular
morning, however, these gangs were still nameless embryos.

The guards were aware of the
volatile situation in the yard. Several with rifles and a body-budding sergeant
with an antiquated but effective Thompson sub-machine gun were lined up on the
gunrad outside the North Cell House wall. It was easy to tell that most were
lined up on the blacks. (It wasn't whites or Chicanos who had killed several
guards during the last year.) One black guard, however, was conspicuously
targeting the Mexican ranks. That was the racial situation in San Quentin. I
was disgusted with the whole ignorant mess. It was beyond racism, or race
pride, or even revolution. It belonged to tribal wars in the New Guinea jungle,
complete with headhunting. No matter how insane it was, it wasn't something I
could ignore. Too many whites, then still the majority, tried that tactic. It
only invited aggression.

The standoff and stare down
continued for the next ten minutes as the mess halls finished disgorging
prisoners into the yard. The ranks swelled. The riflemen watching from above
anticipated an open riot, but tension was reaching an unbearable pitch.

From the sidelines, a black and
a Chicano appeared. The black, lightskinned and handsome, was a prizefighter so
good that nobody within forty pounds of his weight would fight him. He did
perform Ali's mantra of dancing like a butterfly and stinging like a bee. He
was also a dope fiend and disregarded racial lines to satisfy his craving. He
was not known as a militant, although some suspected him of undercover
agitation. I don't think he hated whites, but he was a proud black man and,
like me, when the lines were drawn, he stood with his own. Nobody could blame
him for that. The Chicano, who had recently returned to San Quentin on a murder
conviction, wanted to be a "shot caller" in the prison firmament and
had gathered a clique of about a dozen, whose members now stood with the throng
under the shed.

When the two reached the center
of the empty asphalt, the black prizefighter motioned toward the mass of
blacks. Two came forward, both tall and military in bearing, one with a head
shaved and oiled like my own. It glistened in the morning sunlight. He had
influence among the Black Muslims. The other wore tiny Ben Franklin glasses and
a bushy Afro, the style favored by blacks at the time.

The quartet stood in a tight
circle. The blacks spoke, gestured, tense with accusation and ire. The Chicano
took over, held the floor, and the conversation went on while the yard gate was
opened and the steam whistle blew the morning work call. Half the convicts in
the yard streamed out, glad to avoid possible trouble. The faced-off warriors
on both sides held their places. So did the riflemen looking down from the gun
walk. The conference was allowed to continue because it might setde things without
further bloodshed.

The conference broke up. The
black fighter shook hands with the two militants and the Mexican walked back to
his waiting crew. He said something and gestured toward the gate, leading his
clique off the yard. The black spokesmen went back to their waiting throng. A
dozen black warriors gathered around them and listened to what they said.

The public address system blared
an order to clear the yard. T.D. and Bulldog stepped off the bench along the
wall and walked past me. T.D. held up a packet of canteen ducats. "I'm
buyin' the spread." (He meant pints of ice cream that would be passed out
and eaten with identification cards, which were perfect for dipping into the
pint boxes.) "Ain't nuthin' gonna happen."

"And everybody's
glad," another voice said.

To which I thought,
I don't know about everybody, but I'm damn sure glad.

The confrontation disintegrated
and turned into individuals and tiny clots moving toward their assignments.
Within minutes the yard was nearly empty except for a few night workers, our
crew standing in a circle. The seagulls and pigeons that saw their chances
descended to take them. T.D. handed me an open pint of Neapolitan. I had my ID
card ready to dig in.

"I was ready to get it
on," T.D. said, draping a meaty forearm on Veto Rodriquez's shoulder.
"Nobody was gonna hurt Mule." Veto was sometimes called mule because
of his large penis, and he really needed very little help to avoid being hurt.

"I wonder what they said out there," Paul
said. "You think he apologized?" The last comment brought laughter
but no further speculation. My thought was,
who cares?
Days later, the truth was
revealed: the Mexican clique leader had disowned the assadant, claiming that he
was a Nazi, not a Chicano - hence there was no trouble between brown and black.