Chapter 12. Mad Max - The Punishment

Max was awakened by a call from Adrienne.

After hello’s, Adrienne began, “My mother’s here with Alesandro. She wants to talk to you about something.”

Not wanting to sound too eager, he asked, “Sure, but the restraining order?”

“Never mind that, Max. I want to see you.”

“Your mother came all the way from Biarritz to see me?”

 “Yes, to see you.”

He’d been curious about Alesandro and wanted to meet him too. Because her mother was there, the obsession returned, and his imagination ran wild. He pictured himself at an altar putting a cheap ring on Adrienne's finger with the blessing of her fantastic family. Now that he’d let go, perhaps his prayers were being answered.

“When do you want me to come by? I’m off for a few hours.”

He parked the bike on the street and buzzed the gate. Adrienne greeted him warmly with an affectionate embrace while Alesandro, and a dignified woman in her eighties awaited him at the dining table. Alesandro stood, and, when Max awkwardly reached out to shake hands, Alesandro held out his left and nodded; his right arm immobile. The atmosphere was thick to Max. Adrienne sat next to her mother. It had the feel of a business matter... like being called on the carpet with witnesses.

“I’m honored,” Max had to restrain himself from saluting, “Adrienne has told me about you.”

Alesandro spoke, barely acknowledging Max, “This is Mme Fournier. Please sit with us a minute.”

“Oh, please, Alesandro, this is my mother Johanna.”

Max sat across the table from Johanna and Adrienne. He was unable to make small talk as they sat at the table silently for several minutes as she appraised him. She opened tersely, “We know Nick is the one who assaulted Adrienne. It is clear to us that he is an animal.”

She paused, eyes searching Max’s face for a response.

He had nothing to add as he felt the same about Nick. What came next was unexpected and drove a nail deep in his heart.

“You will stay away from Adrienne. She has enough problems. You may not be as crude as Nick, but you are no saint.”

“But Max is my only friend,” Adrienne protested.

“If he is your friend, he will respect our wishes,” she put a hand on Adrienne’s shoulder.

“But mother, he isn’t the problem. He’s the only friend I have that is clean and sober.”

“Clean and sober?” Johanna scanned Max’s face and continued, “Sure. Maybe. But how long will he be. A month... a year... How long? Do you know? Does he know? How many times have you lied to us about your own sobriety?”

Max decided not to defend himself because of the AA phrase, we cease fighting anything... or anyone... something like that. Even though he had Adrienne on his side he saw the truth in what her mother was telling him.

“I have other business to attend to and can’t stay here to watch Adrienne. She has agreed that Alesandro is going to be living here. At any rate, we don’t have a restraining order on you at this time but, if I hear you have put one foot in this door again, I will.”

“Damn it! Alesandro is not my prison guard,” Adrienne pushed her chair back, a steady stream of tears began down the contour of her cheeks. She was ready to bolt from the room but stopped, realizing she had nowhere to go.

Alesandro handed her a tissue from the box that was already on the table, evidence of an already tearful morning. She sat back down.

“What about Nick?” Max asked. Nick’s absence at the table was conspicuous, the elephant in the room, and Max thought that he ought to have been there. “Is he also banished?”

Adrienne cried, “If that fucker comes around here, I will be the one to kill him!”

Max did as he always did when he was upset, he went to the Amtrak and bought a ticket. This time it was a short round-trip ride to and from San Lois Obispo. Train and Greyhound rides helped him to console the smothering lead weight in his chest of the smothering blues and, if the train was on time, he could catch a meeting at the Alano Club upon returning. He sat by a window with the ocean view on the way there, had lunch in SLO, and returned on the mountain side of the coach for the ride back. Whatever troubles he had were out of his mind by the time he got back. Max felt that any ride out of town was a better remedy than a shot of Jack or going out of his mind with grief and anger.

He was early back in Santa Barbara at the Alano Club and took his usual seat on the bench against the wall. It is called the Shoe Bench by some old timers. The Shoe Bench was called that for all the sneakers, loafers, and slippers that hang there. He liked it there because he could see everyone coming or going and no one could sit behind him. One of his favorite young women, Teresa, a scrawny hippy-freak type redhead, sat next to him. He liked her but suspected she was gay. Besides, she was way too young for him.... or rather, he was too old for her. Jimbo was one of the people she was friendly with and Max liked having an innocent connection like that.

After the usual “Hello” and “How have you been doing?” greetings, she suggested, “We should go for coffee at RoCo after the meeting.”

“I’d like that very much,” Max leapt at the opportunity to get to know this woman. She was an oddball with unshaved armpits, unkempt and wild red hair that exploded over and around her face and matching bright green eyes. She usually wore man-beater tank tops and sweats covered by a hoody, but Max had seen her after she got off work in black slacks and a white dress shirt.

Max loved anyone, especially young women, whose lives had already taken them off the beaten track. Most of the newcomer young women were hell bent to find a man. It was as though their identity was immersed in owning a partner of substance. They’d previously hooked up with some real losers, abusers, or otherwise cosigners of their bullshit in their drinking and drugging years and one way or another, within the first few months of sobriety (in AA, NA, CA or any other A). These would hook up with the sober, or not so sober, version of the disease. These had joined a social club in AA. But the rare ones like Teresa were committed to centering on the spiritual core of the Fellowship.

The RoCo was near empty but they sat outside. Curious about her interests, Max asked the usual questions.

She answered his queries with pride, “I’m a computer geek, it could be said.”

“Okay, I like that. I’m kinda new at it. A computer’s not much more than a word processor to me.”

“You’re a writer?”

Max was normally shy about talking about his passion, but there was something about how Teresa’s pride evoked the same spirit, so he was eager to share it with her, “Yes, how did you guess?”

“You seem to me to have a demon inside that needs to be let loose,” she observed.

“Really, is that a bad thing?”

“No, not for you. But I have something else I wanted to talk about. I’m an intern at the PD. I heard about the bullshit at the Baker house... more than rumors.”

“So much for confidentiality.”

“Yes, I know. There are no secrets there except the ones they want to keep. I have a friend that works close with Detective Ryan. Ryan isn’t a bad cop, but he has secrets and so does Dan Richards.”

“Thanks, but why are you telling me this?”

“Ryan can be good. You can actually trust him. He fills me in sometimes. Like he needs someone to know his shit. Believe it or not, he respects you.” She stopped abruptly before Max could ask any more questions.

Officer Richards had just entered the doors with another officer. That wasn’t unusual and didn’t alarm Max because the RoCo was a stop for nearly every cop or construction worker in town. What did cause him to pay attention was the way Teresa reacted to their presence.

“In case you have more trouble, here’s my card,” she rose from her seat leaving her coffee cup three quarters full, “I have your number. I’ve gotta go.”

She passed Richards on the way out. Max watched Richards leer at her and make a comment to the other officer while patting his arm pits. The officer guffawed.

Max got up and left while they were still in line at the counter. Nudging the other officer, Richards turned to face Max as he passed, “You have a hot date there Mr. McGee?”

Max ached to respond but couldn’t put in words the disgust he felt for Richards, so he proceeded to the door.

Chapter 11. Mad Max - The Crime (pt. 2)

Billy’s trailer was on the other side of the tracks… well, the other side of the freeway and the tracks… in a storage lot… a yard where RVs, boats, trailers and storage bins were hidden away from the eyes of the tourists and locals. The fenced-in lot was secured with razor-wire running the whole perimeter. He felt secure in the depths of the lot. 

While amid shooting up, his pager beeped. “Who the fuck can this be.”

He checked the number on the display. He’d been using heroin a long time and it had been ages since he’d ever gotten much of a rush out of a fix. It amounted to little more than keeping dope sickness at bay. The number on the pager wasn’t a familiar one. 

“Damn,” putting on a flannel shirt over a stained wife-beater undershirt, “Probably another one of the French bitch’s friends?”

Still, he had to get a few more bucks together to score another 100 grams, had about ten halves wrapped and ready that had to be unloaded before he had enough for that. Maneuvering his bicycle over to Scolaries on Milpas to use the pay phone, his chest sank as the Hispanic accent answered on the other end of the line, “Hey, Billy, meet me at three.”

“I’m not ready yet.”

“Sheet, Billy, wotchew mean… not ready?”

“Just a couple bucks short…” he wanted to bitch about Miguel using his name on the phone, but he let it pass, “… didn’t expect to hear from you so soon.”

“I’m in town joss a few hours… sometime today. I give you a good deal; have a grand on you when I call.”

“Can I get credit for the diff…?”

“No, I call you back…”

“Give me ‘til five…” the line was dead before he could finish.

He pulled up to the chain-link fence and remembered he’d been so eager to get to the phone that he’d forgotten to lock the gate. 

“Can’t get too hungry, Billy,” he chided himself. “Whew,” he exhaled when he saw Nick’s car in front of the trailer. “I might be able to unload all my stash on Nicky.

“What’s up, Nick!” He hit the driver’s side window with the palm of his hand.  Nick was nodded-out… “Yo, Nick!”

“Uh?” the window came down… “I tried pagin’, where you been?” Nick muttered.

“No, you didn’t… I ain’t got no calls but it don’t really matter now.”

“We need to talk… let’s go inside.” Nick slurred, opening the car door.

Pushing it shut, Billy fumed, “We can talk here”… shit, looking around… always paranoid… glancing over his shoulder towards the gate, “C’mon, let’s take a walk.”

About fifty feet away, Nick asked, “How much you got?”

“Right now?” Billy knew Nick was good for much more, “About ten hits.”

“I’ll take ‘em… you got a deal for me?”

“A buck-fifty…”

“One-fifty? Are you shittin’ me?” Nick had to bargain for everything… even though a hundred and fifty dollars wasn’t such a bad deal for fifty grams of tar. “I got a C-note… that’s all.”

He turned towards the trailer without answering: Nick followed.

“Okay, maybe?” Billy had already talked with Adrienne earlier and knew that Nick had a c-note and a fifty on him he’d lifted from her stash of cash the last time he’d been at her place.

But it was in Nick’s DNA to wheel and deal. He knew you can rarely get change from a drug dealer, and especially not Billy. He would have to get it down to a hundred bucks or give up the whole fifty.

“Get the fuck outa here, you know one-fifty is the best I can do.” Billy was only playing along. He only needed about eighty bucks to score more and a hundred would have been a little gravy on top of what was needed. Billy hated these rich-bitches when they tried to milk him.

Nick played it hard one more time, “One-hundred, you prick… and that is my final offer.”

“One-twenty-five then,” Billy stepped around to the end of a trailer.

Nick followed him, pulled out a c-note without saying anything more and handed it over rolled up.

Billy looked at the c-note in expectation of getting the rest. When it didn’t come, the deal became a ‘take it or leave it’ one. The deal was done… “Wait here.” Billy walked back to the other end of the trailer and pulled the trailer-hitch off, looking back to make sure Nick wasn’t watching. He took out the snack-sized zip-lock with ten wadded-up foils of tar from the square tube within which the hitch was left unbolted. 

Returning to where Nick awaited, he passed the bag and they walked back to the trailer. Billy was satisfied that he had enough to buy the hundred grams from Miguel just on time.

Chapter 11. Mad Max - The Crime (Pt. 1)

Bed-rest… Adrienne had been sent home after the oxygen mask was taken off the open wound on her hip. Max was in jail, and, if he was ever to get out, Nick had put a restraining order on him. Her protests were ignored at first. Nick had insisted on nursing her and she was so doped up on oxycotin that she let him. This generous offering was primarily a ruse to give him full access to the house, but he wasn’t there much, and she often had to struggle out of bed to get to the kitchen or to the toilet. She was weak and so fucked up that whenever she did venture down the stairs, she could barely make it back up to her bed. She asked Nick a couple of times about her purse and empty wallet, but he changed the subject or told her about a deal he’s made that would be good for them both. Most of her days she slept and let all Nick’s manipulations and lies rest too. She wasn’t going to give up, but right then, she needed to rest.

Max was resting too, in County jail. His life was looking like an old country song, “I’m in the Jailhouse Now.” He tried to decipher the confusion… thoughts ran wild… “Pardon me, Hank Williams, but I don’t want to be in one of your songs at this moment, eh?” Max thought he had broken that cycle when he got sober but there he was, thinking “Surely, I ought to be able to get out on O.R. first thing in the morning… no outstanding warrants or fines… living pretty clean too… oh yeh, on probation for that Rod Goldbrick incident... what does all this have to do with a cosmic plan?”

He sat on his bunk after lights-out, once all the noise of the concrete and steel settled down , when a familiar calm came over Max . He was at peace and it felt as though a hand was on his shoulder. He turned to look but no one was there. So, he sat with his back to the wall of the cell… Hell, he was given a private cell, isolation they call it, and he waited there while his mind leafed through old catechism stories… thinking again, “Would an angel appear before me, shake my cage, and unlock it?” The gentle hand on his shoulder assured him it could, and he fell into a peaceful sleep.

The next morning Max still had the feeling of that hand on him and everything became clear... all this shit. He didn’t know how it would turn out or what motives and powers were behind it but he knew for sure that he was to play an important part in some sort of cosmic drama. It was a cosmic drama that made perfectly clear what his next step would be. He hadn’t known such clarity since that day in the hooch with Kuka a decade before.

Max slept, and every night a dream of a Kachina Jaguar... sometimes with Kuka’s face... danced around him singing a chant... his friend, Jimbo, flying... riding an eagle that was holding a snake, “You will be back in the tall grass with a bird dog.”

Max scratched out with pencil on a pad provided by one of the Correctional Officers: “Bird Dog? What.... Harry Baker? Baker, Baker... Adrienne Baker? Nick Baker? ‘Shit! Gotta ask her about... shit!’”

Correctional Officer Ramos stopped in passing Max’s cell, “You goin’ bug-shit in there, Max?”

“Naw, just thinking out loud.” He was so wrapped up in thought about these impossible connections that he hardly acknowledged the guard before he asked, “Say, anyone get a sniff for when I might get cut loose.”

Ramos shrugged, “How would I know?”

“Yeh, sorry,” Max went back to his note pad, “just wondering.”

About a week later he was awakened at three in the morning, “McGee, roll it up, you’re goin’ home.”

“What… Someone bailed me out?”

“I don’t know… just roll it up!”

He suited-up down in Property and taken up to the lobby where he signed an agreement... the restraining order... to stay five-hundred yards from Adrienne, or her house... and then he escorted out the door.

Three in the morning: What the hell? He didn’t like the feel of it. He noticed that Richards parked at the far end of the parking lot. Just for the hell of it he walked over to the squad car. When Richards opened his window, Max asked, “Don’t suppose you could give me a ride into town… eh?”

“I don’t think so, punk. You know you’ve been snitched out by your junkie friends.” Richards rolled up his window and drove away.

The cab finally arrived; Max’s sponsor, Jimbo, behind the wheel. They’d been on the road for a good five minutes before Jimbo asked, “So, what did that cunt do to get you in jail this time, Max?”

At that moment Max had a newfound distaste for the “C” word… especially when applied to Adrienne. Before he knew what words were coming out of his mouth, he was ordering Jimbo, “Drop the ‘C’ word, Jimbo.”

“Yeh, yeh, okay,” Jimbo grinned, pleased at this change in attitude. “It was on the front page of the News Suppress… but I wanted to hear your side.”

“I can’t believe it Jimbo, but, back there in my cell, a calm came over me and I felt a hand…” Max gave Jimbo all the details without embellishment.

“The Hand of Gawd, eh?” Jimbo had a similar experience. “Yeh, I’ve told about my last drunk. I was out of it when they put the paddles to my chest.”

“Something like that.... yeh, that was a good one Jimbo. I told you about Kuka before. I gotta tell you. She came to me in dreams... and you did too.”

“Awe, c’mon, Max. Don’t go psychedelic, Dorothy back from OZ, on me.”

“No, Jimbo, she was a Jaguar Kachina singing... ‘You’ll be back in the tall grass... the tall grass with a bird dog... back with the Bird Dog’.”

Jimbo tried to change the subject by assuring Max, “Most of us didn’t think you did it and you still have your shift on the roster at the cab company,” and ending a subject that gave him the creeps, he added, “Knock off that Kachina talk or they’ll all think you lost it.”

 “Jimbo, Jimbo. Man, I know there's a cosmic dance going down here and we’re in the middle of it.” Max felt like he ought to convince his best friend and sponsor. “You are too, Jimbo. In the dream... riding an eagle with a snake.”

“We ain’t the center of the universe, Max.” Jimbo scowled, “You know where that bullshit takes you.”

“Yeh, maybe you’re right...” Max had to admit, “But there was this peace and clarity in knowing.”

“Peace and clarity is okay, but I suggest you lay off the peyote visions, eh?” Jimbo laughed, adding, “The eagle and snake, like on the Mexican flag?”

“I have to check and see if the city’s pulled my license,” Max would’ve been surprised if they hadn’t. It was routine to pull a cabbie’s license when arrested for any misdemeanor... let alone a felony, like assault and battery on a woman... one that put her in a hospital, seriously fucked up.

“I’m sure you can still dispatch if they did… you got everyone in the office backing your action, Jackson.” Jimbo had one eye on his rearview mirror.

Max saw this, “What are you seeing?”

“Don’t look now, but a cop’s tailing us.”

“I bet it’s Richards,” Max assured Jimbo. Jimbo was sometimes still paranoid from all the pot he’d smoked the past three decades before he got sober and he needed to know he wasn’t imagining things. Max looked back over his shoulder... it was Richards. He was following the cab, making no attempt to make his presence unknown, so Max waved.

“Damn it Max, I said don’t look back!”

Max smirked, “You’ll be getting to know him. I think he is beginning to be our good friend.”

“Is that the cop who wants some sugar from Frenchy?” Jimbo asked.

Richards parked at the end of the cul-de-sac after Jimbo parked in the driveway at Max’s place.

“I’m grateful Jimbo. How much do I owe the company for my bail?” Max asked. It was his turn to change the subject.

Jimbo hesitated before he answered, “Naw… Sue didn’t bail you out. She’s too tight with the cash to do that.”

“Well then, have you heard anything about Adrienne’s condition?” Max wondered. Adrienne might’ve done it.

Jimbo asked, “Say, you ain’t still in love with that bitch after all the shit she’s chucked your way?”  As Max opened the car door, he asked again, “Well, are you?”

Max sat back down a few minutes and let Jimbo say some more. After all, he was more than an old drinking buddy, he was Max’s sponsor too.

Jimbo’s tone turned apologetic, “Y’know, maybe you’re right. You got some karma with that chick. She comes all the way to Santa Barbara… across an ocean and the whole damned continent to hook up with you. It's cosmic… that’s what it is, damned karma.... and you were with Nick’s dad in Nicaragua before you ever met them!”

Max tried to sleep but couldn’t nod out while thinking of Adrienne… of Ryan... of the Bird Dog and the Kachina... goddamned Richards out there and wondering what those damned S.O.B.’s were up to. The clarity he’d experienced in the jail cell clouded up once more.

Adrienne didn’t bail Max out. All charges had simply been dropped. The DA saw no chance for a conviction once Adrienne became able to communicate through her own lawyer. No one was charged with her beating either. It was damned unusual for charges of spousal abuse or assault against any woman dismissed so easily. The State usually pursues charges even if the victim doesn’t want to. Max was curious about this lapse and suspected it to be a covert corruption of the justice system. He seriously wanted to know, but decided it was best to leave it be. Serenity Prayer... “The things I cannot change.”

It was precisely that; the powerlessness over it all that bugged Max the most. He was damned if he was going to do nothing about her beating, but hadn’t he just spent a week in jail without an apology or a howdy-do from the law? He already knew that the justice system rarely, if ever, apologizes for its mistakes. Once they sink their teeth into you, no matter whether you are guilty as charged or as innocent as the baby Jesus, an ambitious prosecutor will comb the books to hit you with anything to get a conviction… unless you have connections and Max honestly thought that he didn’t have any.

Chapter 10. Navigating the Brown Water Navy (Pt. 2)

August 1967:

Ryan had served in the Brown Water Navy on swift boats out of Qui Nhon in Viet Nam where he met Harry Baker. Harry Baker wasn’t in the Navy. He wasn’t in the Army. He wasn’t in the Marines or the Air Force either. At first Ryan thought Harry Baker was C.I.A., or maybe O.N.I., but soon learned Harry Baker was one of many contractors hired by the services to do jobs... well, jobs that were, off the record. Harry Baker was one of those people you had to work with in the services that you respected but wouldn’t have wanted anything to do with off the job. Since 1965, Ryan’s crew had dropped off this mysterious man in places no one but Charlie would venture into and then pick him up a hundred klics down-river. Nothing was ever said about these missions.

Baker had a good eye for talent and also knew which closets in high places where the skeletons were hidden to get his personnel where he could use them. Though Ryan was a good swift boat commander, he was better suited for intelligence work. Baker recommended Ryan for the Naval Investigation Service of the O.N.I., and, after training at Quantico, he was stationed at the Saigon Embassy to sniff out the drug trade that had been infecting all branches of the military services in Vietnam. Wars are rarely won by going up the official chain of command. It takes people like Baker to secretly put people in places where the Peter Principle doesn't apply.

Ryan was in his room when there was a knock on his door. He hated these off-duty calls. He hadn’t slept a full night in a week and he'd been looking forward to hitting the sack for so long he’d stopped counting the hours.

He shouted from under his pillow, “Go away!”

However, the way it works with intelligence services, there's no such thing as off-duty.

“Ryan, open the door or I’ll kick it in.”

Ryan had been expecting Baker... he’d looked him up and made contact through a friend of a friend, about a sensitive personal case in the drug trade, so he got off his cot and opened the door.

Harry Baker wasn’t instrumental in uncovering who was exporting it and to whom it was imported but he was involved in taking care of the problem.

"Harry, I need a favor returned. We've uncovered a problem and, at the head of the list of the problem is my brother, William."

Ryan’s work was about investigating and accumulating evidence to be turned over to Hoover’s suits for prosecution stateside, but, for independent contractors such as Harry Baker, it was about eliminating the problem altogether.

"He's mixed up with some nasty shit... my team, you know, we've been investigating a case."

"Drugs?" Harry Baker knew all about it but played along, "Your Brother? I see... and you want me to do what?"

"Yeah, It's China White going home in aluminum boxes out of Da Nang.... coffins. I can't go near this, but I think maybe you can..."

"There's no need to bloody your gloves over your brother. He's in Da Nang?

"Yes…William Ryan, Spec-4, at the Mortuary Affairs Unit. The O.N.I. boys have pulled the covers on most of those involved. Willy's part is shit, he's way over his head in it, know what I mean?"

“So, what do you want me to do?” Harry Baker’s always knew what strings to jerk, how hard to jerk them, and how to use what he knew to some future advantage.

Chief Warrant Officer, Patrick Ryan, liked Harry Baker’s ability to get things done. Sometimes these were done in ways Ryan wouldn't approve of, but his likes and dislikes didn’t matter concerning his brother. "Look, I’m up for promotion and my brother...” Ryan was embarrassed to admit his motives, but the fact that his own brother might be involved in smuggling heroin made him particularly vulnerable to unwanted scrutiny. “I don’t want you to harm him beyond fuckin’ him up enough...”

Harry, impatient with long stories to explain common human frailties, raised a hand to interrupt, “...enough to have him shit his pants out of this racket.” Baker liked Ryan and had seen him in action. Whatever corruption he might be involved in was covered by the fact that he was good under fire. But, for Harry Baker, nothing was free, “You know you’ll owe me for this one.”

Harry met with Willy Ryan at the China Beach Surf Club. It was a casual meeting in front of the beer stand. Surf boards leaned against the beer shack, GI’s in knee length cut-off baggies hung around with bottles in hand, waiting for a set: it could have been from an instamatic picture of any scene in Baja California or anywhere else every surfer dreams of. The surrealism of a war going on just a few klics away didn’t escape anyone’s consciousness. That is what the beer, the rum, the vodka, the gin or the pot, heroin, and for some… some are even said to chew on a taste of C-4 to get a kick assed mother-fuckin’ trippin’ high… that’s what all of that was for… to blot out the faces of smiling gooks from out of the dark of a hootch or the thump of mortars and the AK’s staccato clack of caps busted... decapitations… punji sticks, legs and limbs… bloody shit and guts spilled out… all of it that was surely awaiting the next patrol. The chances that the award for service, beyond getting fucked up in one of the above, aforementioned  ways, was very likely to be in one of those aluminum boxes Army Specialist William Ryan had been packing up to be shipped back to Travis for the past six months.

Reaching out a hand to greet Harry, Willy offered, “Ya fuckin’ wanna Tiger Piss?”

Harry put a hand forth, wrapping his huge paw around the un-calloused hand of a man who’d not done a lick of work in several years. “No thanks, I’ll stick with a Schlitz.”

“Pat told me you’re some kind a skivvy honcho… got some fuckin’ Mo-Jo of some sort, eh?”

The word, fuck, Harry never did like it…, no matter where there were GI’s in Vietnam everything was fuckin’ fuckin’… mother fucker…, fucked-up, fucked-over and fuckin’ this or fuckin’ that. No offense was meant by the term and no offense was taken, but Harry just wanted to get on with his business and get it fuckin’ over with.

“I want you to listen real close to me,” Harry paused long enough to make sure the kid was listening.

“I’m all fuckin’ ears,” Willy’s brain was in high gear wondering, who the fuck did my brother send over here behind these pilot’s sunglasses?

“You have a choice… You need a change of scenery,” Harry pulled out a manila envelope. “Read ‘em.”

Willy held the papers away from the sunlight for longer than it would have taken him to read them twice… … a lateral transfer to the Marines… report to Camp Schwab… rank and all. He knew the training camp in Okinawa… he’d stuffed enough of the Corps’ corpses to know what the line at the bottom of the form meant… Marine Recon units were trained there.

“Okinawa? What the fuck? A Marine recon unit? Who the fuck are you?” The papers trembled in his grip. “Shit, I ain’t being trained for fuckin’ recon… I ain’t never even been through grunt fuckin’ boot camp! How can I…?”

“Your question ought to be, what is my choice?”

“I don’t fuckin’ get it.” Like a rat in a maze… Willy’s mind had no idea where it was being led. It hit on the idea that this had to do with an O.N.I. investigation, or something like that… maybe his brother was tipping him off by sending this guy. “You got fuckin’ nothing on me. Even if you fuckin’ did, I’d take the Stockade at Presidio over humpin’ the paddies like a pig-fuckin’ grunt.

“No one said anything about Presidio,” Harry took off his shades so that there was no doubt left at all about his steel grey eyes.

“Hey, does the Alférez know about this?”

“No, you’re in the clear… just another body-bagger that can’t take it anymore.”

Willy tried to stay composed, but he was damned near shittin’ his pants, “Let me get this straight, you ain’t talkin’ stockade?”

“No, I’m not talkin’ prison.”

Peculiar things happen in life that turn a guy like Willy around. His first tour in Recon gave him a taste of blood… he loved it… loved it so much that he re-upped… loved it so much that, after he recovered from shrapnel wounds in Okinawa, a couple Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart, he went civilian contractor for P.R.U. He took his bullet in Cambodia or Laos… no one said… no one cared… he was a civilian and the body counts are for G.I.’s. He never got to go home in one of the silver caskets either… his newfound honor bought him a hole in the red clay.

Despite that, CWO Patrick Ryan and Harry Baker were beholden to each other because, in a way, Baker had saved his brother and, well, these are bonds that aren’t broken very easily. They had also worked together in another case in which Baker had pulled Ryan out of hot water with several cross-jurisdictions on the Kraszhinski case. They had history.

It is often things that begin as small favors returned, and protecting Nick was one of those. It wasn’t as though Ryan had been corrupted because of an attraction to a sordid vice but, ironically enough, it was about a debt of honor to him. Honoring an old friend that had helped him out with his brother. There were limits however, and Nick had stretched Ryan’s loyalty to breaking point and now that Harry Baker was gone... well, how long... how long?

“This is how long.” He answered himself. This was it in Ryan’s mind.... a line had been crossed and it was his duty to let the bricks fall where they would from this day forward. It was something he faintly remembered David Kraszhinski saying, “A boy becomes a man when his father dies.” Maybe it was that. Nick’s father, Harry Baker, in a roundabout way had been his own father. And now, he too, was free of those bonds.

Chapter 10. Navigating the Brown Water Navy (Pt. 1)

Ryan stood by the water cooler oblivious to the ordinance regarding smoking anywhere on the premises. A ban on workplace smoking was a new California state law then, and that included restaurants, bars, jails, and even police stations (Labor Code 6404.5). Cigar smoking had been taken from him by his cardiologist a few years before, but he still slipped in a smoke now and then. Depending on which was on hand, cigar or cigarette, he told himself that one to be less harmful than the other.

He hadn’t Mirandized Max for two reasons. One: because he Knew Max wasn’t guilty, and Two: because he hoped Max would talk more freely and give him something useful... something other than what he already knew about Nick.

Richards approached him waving the smoke aside and feining a cough, “What do you think?”

Blowing smoke in the precoscious cop's face, he said, “He didn’t do it.”

“What do you mean, he didn’t do it? Nick saw him coming up the hill on his motorcycle…”

Ryan was annoyed at Richards' unprofessional use of any suspects first name, especially Nick Baker's,“You mean, Mr. Baker?” 
He didn’t appreciate Richards and considered him a sloppy cop that was too ambitious... too enthralled with the power a badge gave him to be useful. Ryan knew the boy had a bone for Max and he also knew the kid had another bone in his pants for Mrs. Baker. “Tell me then, Sherlock, why would McGee give a ride to the woman he damned near killed? I'll tell you why, because he dropped her off in his taxi.” He glared at Richards now, “Don’t piss me off, Dan. The receptionist at the ER witnessed that much. Nick Baker's either a damned good liar or you're too easy to be a good cop.”

Ryan thought of himself as a good cop. He looked forward to starting each day with a good case to investigate.  Most cases were as simple as putting together a kindergarten picture puzzle. However, he hated cases where influence, old debts, and favors, filtered into his judgment… the pieces of the puzzle get smaller and it takes on three dimensions. He didn’t know what to do about Nick Baker because Nick Baker was a part of that kind of a puzzle. Now we had this Max McGee getting entangled in this mess with Richards pissing on the case files.

“Hey Ryan, Richards!" the Police Chief barked while storming out of his office, “Get in my office now. They stood before his desk as he popped a tape into the VCR, “What’s this shit Richards?”

Ryan grinned as he watched Richard’s squirm when the tape began rolling. On the screen was a dapper Dan Richards with a young reporter revving up for the interview that would launch her career. The nice-looking woman, right out of broadcast school, was standing with Dan Richards in front of a rundown apartment house, she reported, “Today we have breaking news on the arrest of a suspect in the brutal assault on a Riviera woman in her home. She is recovering in Cottage Hospital from a broken jaw and several other injuries. Officer Richards has some information on the details of the arrest.”

She held a mic to Richards' face. He stood smartly in full dress blues, chest decked out with ribbons, appearing as though he was a spokesman for the whole police department, “Yes, we have a suspect in custody.”

In her best reporter's voice, she asked, “And you were the arresting officer? Can you give us any details about the arrest and the name of the suspect in this brutal assault?” 

Ryan restrained himself from laughing at the thought that she was holding the mic at ready like she would wrap her lips around it if it gave her ratings.

She passed the mic back to Richards, whose persona became that of every TV cop since Sergeant Friday as he answered, “Yes I can. The suspect is a cab driver with a record that goes back several years. He gave up without a struggle at his apartment on lower Anacapa Street. They call it the Funk Zone. He's been charged with assault to commit deadly harm and is now held in isolation at County jail.”

“Can you give us his name?”

“The suspect's name is Max McGee.”

Ryan interrupted with a snort, "Funk Zone? Really, Dan, you're tryin' too hard to fuck her."

The Chief came from around his desk and poked Richards' chest with a forefinger, “We have a Public Service Officer for these things. The only reason I can think of that you'd do such an asinine thing is... shit, why beat around the bush? I know you're campaigning with the Mayor for my position when I retire.”

“Sir, I was asked on the crime scene if I knew anything about who did this. I figured what the fuck... ya know.”

“And you just happened to be wearing your dress uniform? Get out of my office.”

“But sir, I was only...”

“Now!” the Chief went back to sit at his desk. “Ryan, you stay.

Richards left with his tail between his legs and closed the door.

“That boy's a pain in the ass. What've you got so far?”

“McGee didn’t do it.”

“You got any leads on who did?  Was it her husband? Who is it... Nick Baker?” The Chief’s retirement was only a few months away. He had expected these kinds of political wrangling and now this case was taking on the appearance of a nasty tangle he had no energy for. He continued exasperated, “The Mayor has been calling every two or three hours.”

Ryan held back. He couldn’t let on that he might have to cover up for Harry Baker’s sake though he was almost sure he wouldn’t this time. It was hard not to think of himself as anything but dirty, covering for Nick Baker. Before this incident it was mostly misdemeanors... petty shit like DUI’s and possession but now he had to do some CYA ... just in case, so he said, “Nick Baker has an alibi at this time. We haven’t been able to substantiate it but you never know. Mrs. Baker has some pretty shady acquaintances we are also checking out.”

Chapter 10. Mad Max - Crime & Banishment

From that day in September the year before; when Max rolled out of bed, fell to his knees and surrendered to something omniscient for guidance, he was aware that his life was under new management. He didn’t know what that would entail, he’d begun the task of, not only doing the next right thing, but tapping into the intuition of what that might be. He was one of the rare ones who knew, without being told, that he would have to make amends to the people he had harmed, short-changed, lied to, and otherwise stepped on, throughout those dark years of his drinking and drug use. The first that came to mind was the abandonment and neglect of his daughter, Ariel, and the rest followed. He wanted to do it all right away, but it became clear to him that it would be vanity to start this herculean task without some sort of guarantee that he wouldn’t be inclined to repeat the same mistakes. Mistakes, ha! he thought, a mistake is something accidental… very few of Max’s crimes and misdemeanors were anywhere near that category. He’d made dozens of conscious, albeit chaotic, life decisions, but they weren’t mistakes at all.

He went to AA meetings and listened to what others did. Knowing it wouldn’t be enough to just say, I’m sorry, he had to get serious about digging deeply into the causes and conditions… the fears that governed his actions. He dreamed of having someone like a priest he could relate his innermost thoughts about these secrets and somehow knew that he would be able to handle them better if he did. He hadn’t thought of how much of his past haunted him until his friend, Jimbo noted, “Max, how can you say you ain’t afraid of nothin’? You fuckin’ sleep with that damned radio on all night to talk shows… UFO’s and shit.” That was how he decided to ask his friend to sponsor him.

Max knew Jimbo was right. It was how he managed to fend off the dark dreams… the cold sweats… the terror… the guilt and shame. Nightmares that had Jaguars lurking in the jungles of Central America and snakes in the high grasses of the Everglades. There were too many to explain to a sponsor, but he tried the best he could. There were felony crimes... abuses of neglect... abandonments, and a forest that hid the trees until he was awakened once more. There was no Hollywood option of checking into a celebrity spin-dry and coming out the other side with a book or movie deal. If he came out of it able to look his daughter in the eye, it would be more than enough.

Still obsessed with Adrienne, and unable to imagine life without her, he came running whenever she called. He was fully aware of how pathetic this obeisance was, but he couldn’t help himself. He was at home on lunch break when she called. He heard the lower register of heroin in her voice. His spirit was nearly crushed.

Crushed was the best word for it. Hell, his heart stuck so in the throat he felt he could have vomited it out. This was the first real test of his new-found sobriety. Sure, she’d banned him from her bed, and then got herself tangled-up with any low-life she could, and this puzzled him… hurt him deeply, but what was worse was that she kept him around… like her personal eunuch. He wanted to murder whoever it was in her bed, banging her, and fixing her with junk. Then, when she showed him her abscess, his hopes were completely smashed. She nearly died and that was the closest he’d ever gotten to going back to drinking.

The liquor store was only a block away. Sitting on the couch…. thinking… “My credit’s still good at Willy’s.” He struggled with the whys, and the hows, and the what-the-fuck’s of it all, “What am I supposed to do?”

Homer jumped up on his lap and calmed him a few minutes. Jimbo had left a pack of smokes on his last visit. Max kept it in his desk drawer for whenever his friend came back. Max had quit smoking before he got sober and was glad to not have to struggle with smoking as well as drinking. However, he sat there on the couch and decided to have a smoke and to think about it before going to Willy’s.

All the old hands at sobriety say you’re supposed to call your sponsor, help a newcomer, or work the Steps when tempted to drink, but he chose to smoke a cigarette. It was his way to slap back at GAWD. Though, not so sure of his motives, he prayed, “Please help me,” as he lit one up. Immediately, before the smoke filled his lungs, he knew that he had awakened a tobacco monster and had merely traded addictions. Still, it was a better option for him than drinking.

As Max smoked the cigarette, there was a knock on the door. Having nothing to hide, regardless, he felt more than a little bit concerned when he saw a uniformed cop standing on the porch. He opened it and asked, “Can I help you?”

The officer had a notepad out, “Max McGee?”

“Yes.”

“You dropped off Mrs. Nicholas Baker at the emergency room today?”

“Uh? Oh, Adrienne, yes?” Max thought of a cop from back in his drinking days… Unsure, but he might be the rookie from way back when Beatrice… Maybe it isn’t him, Max thought. Then, when the cop hefted his chest, he read the name-tag, Dan Richards.

Richards, uh-huh, it was him. Checking for familiarity, he quipped, “Time flies, eh?”

Ignoring the quip, Richards plowed into the purpose of his call, “Do you mind telling me why you left the ER before the police arrived?” he was surly.

Detectives are usually in plain clothes. Richards was in uniform. It was a sure thing the man hadn’t been promoted to detective? Max knew that much and wondered what this cop was about.

“Yes, she called while I was on break and I had to get back to work.”

“Turn around and put your hands behind your back,” Richards sneered towards the new guy off the porch that Max hadn’t noticed before. “This one is trouble… T-R-O-U… bull!” He was an old hand now with his own rookie in tow.

The rookie put a hand on the hilt of his gun… just in case.

Max had thought that Adrienne would have told the police what had happened and never thought that he’d be a suspect… unless something worse had come about that she couldn’t talk. Concerned, he asked, “Is Adrienne okay?”

Of all the times Max had to go to jail he, thought, I truly need another smoke now. Damnit, they don’t allow smoking at all in the Santa Barbara Police holding cells and certainly not in County. He would’ve confessed to anything for a smoke. His thoughts ran all over the place… He wondered what Adrienne had told the police and then smelled the scent of Nick’s B.S. on it. What the hell, Max knew he was innocent but, what if… what if? What then?

He was kept in a holding cell where the powers-that-be had him cooling-off; cooling-off with goose-bumps forming on his shivering arms under a light short-sleeved shirt. It was a long wait... maybe an hour. Where there are no clocks, fifteen minutes can seem like an hour. He was led to an interview room. His heart skipped a beat when he recognized it was detective Ryan who opened the door to peek in.

Ryan’s face lit up too but, voice modulated, said, “Mr. McGee, what the hell… I haven’t seen you in a while.” He entered the room plopping down a thick file on the Spartan table between them. He was almost jovial.

Max emulated a young Dustin Hoffman’s from The Graduate, “Under these circumstances, I can’t say that I’m all that pleased to see you again, detective Ryan,” but was glad to see the detective nonetheless. It’s hard to explain it, but any familiar face can give a guy hope under these circumstances; even if the familiar face was that of the Grand Inquisitor Torquemada himself.

“Let me get a warmer shirt for you and some coffee for us. I’ll be right back,” leaving the file on the table, Ryan went towards the door.

“I ain’t goin’ nowhere.” Max tried to sound nonchalant.

Ryan left without comment and was gone for something like a half hour. Not only does time stretch as mentioned before but it’s a tactic… It would be wrong to say time means nothing to jailers. Time is a power play to let the suspect know who’s in-charge of time and, by implication, who’s in-charge of you. Right back can mean any hour or day. While Max was waiting, he flipped open a corner of the file… enough to see that the report on the top had Richards’ name on it. He looked up at the ceiling and smiled for the camera’s sake.

Balancing two Styrofoam cups of coffee, Ryan came back into the room with a long-sleeved flannel shirt he threw across the table at Max, “See here, Mr. McGee, we seem to have a problem…”

“What do you mean, we?” Max took a sip of the bitter brew, “don’t you mean, me, I have a problem. Or is it, we, we have no cream or sugar?”

“Why don’t you just tell me your version of what happened and…”

“All due respect, sir, police station coffee sucks.” Max’s lips burned from the coffee,

“This ain’t Starbucks. I can tell you now that the courts will go easier on you if you cooperate,” Ryan said casually as he thumbed through the report.

“Aren’t you going to read me my rights? I know the routine, detective. Would it do any good to talk?”

Max suspected, by the detective’s tone, that anything said was going to be used against him, in or out, of a court of law. It didn’t matter a whit whether his Miranda rights were read. If he refused to say anything they’d be able to avow he was uncooperative and, if he did talk… well, it too would be held against him.

Regardless, Max explained, “I took a break and went home for lunch. I didn’t have much time.”

Ryan folded his arms and leaned back in his chair… “Did you stop by Mrs. Baker’s house then?”

The mind wanders when it ought to be focused. Max wondered how far Ryan could balance his chair without falling and gave up trying to figure out anything else, “I had no plans to see her. I just had time to get home, wolf down a ham sandwich, and get back in the hack …”

“Then, are you saying you didn’t go to Mrs. Baker’s house?”

He’d already said too much but it no longer mattered, “No, I went there alright… I got a phone call. She was hurting.”

“How did you know she was hurting?”

“Listen, maybe you want to get this interview over and read me my rights?”

“Mr. McGee, we have enough to hold you in jail for more than a few days.” Ryan thumbed through the files, “You’ve already been tagged with a restraining order. We have enough of your past on record to throw the book at you. Do you want to cooperate or not? Tell me now, because I’d just as soon get home to dinner.” He slammed the file shut.

“She called me at home and she was hurting. I could tell she was hurting because she could hardly talk.” Max’s eyes fixed on the pack of smokes in Ryan’s shirt pocket…Chesterfields, non-filtered.

Ryan pulled the pack of cigarettes out of his jacket … lit one, passed it to Max, and tipped back on his chair again.

“Thanks, man,” pulling on the smoke and letting the harshness of the vapors smack his lungs, he coughed, “that’s the best smoke I’ve ever had. I mean it.”

Ryan watched Max take the drag and leaned back again in his chair some more, “So, you’re telling me you didn’t beat the crap out of her too?”

Max wasn’t sure what to think… was he getting set up? Or could Ryan lean back one more degree before falling on his ass.

“Do what, smash her face up or inject her butt with tar?” he was getting tired of it… “Tell me, Ryan, is she going to be okay?”

“You tell me, McGee, you know what you did…” Ryan opened the file again, “the last time we had a talk… the Bea Brinker case… it turned out that the judge thought you hadn’t done anything criminal… lack of judgment were his words, I recall.”

Not remembering that far back or seeing Ryan there… “You were there in court?” Max’s mind abruptly changed focus and was no longer concerned about the physics of Ryan’s chair.

“Yes, I thought we had enough on you for something… maybe not spousal abuse… maybe something like creating a disturbance… anything… the DA doesn’t care to lose cases. His wiener shrinks, and it pisses him off.”

“Sorry to disappoint him,” Max observed the veins popping out on Ryan’s neck… “Maybe you should loosen your tie.”

“Don’t get smart with me, asshole. This time we have a clear-cut case of bodily injury. Mr. Baker saw you on the way up the hill on your motorcycle as he was leaving. And, guess what, wise-ass? When he left home he says Adrienne was okay…”

“That asshole lied. I went up there in my cab. Do you honestly believe she could’ve ridden all the way to Cottage on a bike?”

“Whatever,” Ryan had checked with the E.R. receptionist. Ryan had also sensed that Richard’s report was bullshit. He already knew Max was telling the truth.

“So, does this mean you will read me my rights and tuck me in for the night?” Max resigned, knowing by then that there was no chance of going home this day.

“Just tell me what happened and stop wasting my time,” Ryan was gleaning what he could to file of what little Nicky had been up to.

“I went up there… her face was bashed in and one eye was swollen shut…. She was weak and with a fever… I didn’t know why… I thought it was from the beating she’d just taken but then she showed me the abscess on her hip. I connected the dots and took her to the E.R. in my cab… not my motorcycle.”

 Ryan rocked forward planting both elbows on the table with a thud, “Why did you leave the E.R.?”

“I had to get back to work…” no longer playing the role, Max wanted Ryan to believe him, “Time is money in a cab, after all… so I took off thinking she would explain what happened.”

“According to this report she did tell officer Richards what happened.”

“He was the rookie with you on the Bea Brinker case, eh?” The imp in Max couldn’t help but to grin, thinking of the tomato soup spilled on the table that the rookie had mistaken for blood way back when he had been falsely accused of rape and spousal abuse.

“And it ain’t lookin’ good for you.” Ryan continued, pulling out the Miranda card to read it even though he’d recited it thousands of time before.

“Could I ask one more question before you go, Ryan?”

“Go ahead, Mick, make it a good one.”

Calling Max, Mick, pissed him off. It could be considered the “M” word to some Irish… akin to using the “N” word. “Ryan’s an Irish name, we ought to be pals… you’re a Mick too, eh … like kin, y’know?” Max thought Ryan wasn’t going to be a friend of any kind so, as they glared at each other, he asked, “What kind of pull did Nicky’s daddy-o have over you, Pal? …eh?”

Ryan just stood up and had another officer put cuffs on Max to haul his sorry ass back to a holding cell. But before they parted paths Ryan said, “Get it straight, we ain’t pals. Keep asking those kinds of questions and you will be in deeper shit than you are now.”

Max had to comment, “There’s a lot of shit in this toilet, detective. A lotta brown water to navigate mate.”

Max had no clue as to how close to the mark he’d hit willy-nilly.