'You handling all of this? How's this been?'
'Hey, he's havin a great time,' Eddie answers, 'this here is Fun City,' and laughs with continuing appreciation for his own humor.
Descriptions appear beyond Nile. Up close, he looks himself, painfully uncertain. Behind his eyes, his spirit always seemed to be skittering about on the ice of suppressed terror. Now he shrugs.
'I worked in here,' he says. ‘I meet most of my clients here the first time. I know the drill.'
Eddie has walked them into Department 7. The cinder-block walls and staircases are painted thickly in red gloss. Here the steel doors open with a key, admitting them to the barred foyer, where a number of guards are congregated, two of them women. Beyond a wall of bars lie the tiers, the catwalks, the region of steel where the men are housed. There are dour scents of steamed food and disinfectant. A radio plays; a cell door bangs far above and the metal floors overhead resound with movement. A single window at the far end, half a block away, is the niggardly source of the little natural light. Seth, from here, can see the nearest cells, strung with clotheslines. Postcards and family photos are taped inside the bars, above the little shelves they call the bunks. On one a man with smooth dark limbs lies in his briefs, immobilized by the sorrow of confinement.
As they enter, a prisoner, whose jumpsuit is tied about his waist, revealing an imposing physique, comes to the bars, remonstrating with the guards in an intense ghetto squeal. Seth does not understand much. The man's hair is grown wild, uncombed, untreated, rising up in nubby spears, flecked with nits of lint.
'Get your ass back, Tuflac,' someone says to him. 'We done told you three times already.'
Eddie holds a hand aloft like an amiable host and directs Nile, Hobie, and Seth into a cafeteria which doubles as a visiting area. There are four or five other prisoners meeting with outsiders at various tables spread around the room. One man in a tie is clearly an attorney. The rest are family, girlfriends, making the odd visit on a weekday afternoon.
'Okay, now we need to talk,' says Hobie. He points Seth away. 'Got to be just Nile and me to protect the privilege.'
Inclined to protest, Seth can name no reason, except that he has come halfway across the country from Seattle to facilitate this meeting. He is relegated to one of the small tables bolted to the floor, while Hobie, somewhat triumphantly, directs Nile to the farthest corner. The cafeteria is compact, with glazed brick walls, spotlessly maintained, except for the stains and gang signs tooled into the white laminate tabletops. By terms of the jailhouse, this place is almost cheerful. Daylight, soothing as warm milk, emerges from a bank of barred windows, and three or four vending machines provide a touch of color. At the table nearest Seth, a slick Hispanic man is visiting with his girlfriend or his wife. With teased-up masses of dead-black hair, she has dressed to give him an eyeful - a tight red sleeveless top, cut daringly, and black jeans that make a taut casing for her healthy female bulk. Her eyes are painted so heavily they bring to mind Kabuki. She is up often to get coffee, cigarettes, a Coke. Coming and going, she and her man grab as much of each other as they can, a quick, relentless passing over of hands. They are flouting the rules, but the three or four guards in khaki looking on from their positions of retreat around the room remain impassive. Pleasure, so brief, can be forgiven.
Eddie, with time on his hands too, has approached Seth. 'So what-all is it you write?' he asks.
Seth rolls out his standard patter on the column: syndicated nationally, printed here in the Tribune.
'Oh yeah, yeah,' says Eddie, but it's clear he's never heard of Michael Frain and is mildly disappointed. They both momentarily contemplate this dead end. Casting
'Hey, he's havin a great time,' Eddie answers, 'this here is Fun City,' and laughs with continuing appreciation for his own humor.
Descriptions appear beyond Nile. Up close, he looks himself, painfully uncertain. Behind his eyes, his spirit always seemed to be skittering about on the ice of suppressed terror. Now he shrugs.
'I worked in here,' he says. ‘I meet most of my clients here the first time. I know the drill.'
Eddie has walked them into Department 7. The cinder-block walls and staircases are painted thickly in red gloss. Here the steel doors open with a key, admitting them to the barred foyer, where a number of guards are congregated, two of them women. Beyond a wall of bars lie the tiers, the catwalks, the region of steel where the men are housed. There are dour scents of steamed food and disinfectant. A radio plays; a cell door bangs far above and the metal floors overhead resound with movement. A single window at the far end, half a block away, is the niggardly source of the little natural light. Seth, from here, can see the nearest cells, strung with clotheslines. Postcards and family photos are taped inside the bars, above the little shelves they call the bunks. On one a man with smooth dark limbs lies in his briefs, immobilized by the sorrow of confinement.
As they enter, a prisoner, whose jumpsuit is tied about his waist, revealing an imposing physique, comes to the bars, remonstrating with the guards in an intense ghetto squeal. Seth does not understand much. The man's hair is grown wild, uncombed, untreated, rising up in nubby spears, flecked with nits of lint.
'Get your ass back, Tuflac,' someone says to him. 'We done told you three times already.'
Eddie holds a hand aloft like an amiable host and directs Nile, Hobie, and Seth into a cafeteria which doubles as a visiting area. There are four or five other prisoners meeting with outsiders at various tables spread around the room. One man in a tie is clearly an attorney. The rest are family, girlfriends, making the odd visit on a weekday afternoon.
'Okay, now we need to talk,' says Hobie. He points Seth away. 'Got to be just Nile and me to protect the privilege.'
Inclined to protest, Seth can name no reason, except that he has come halfway across the country from Seattle to facilitate this meeting. He is relegated to one of the small tables bolted to the floor, while Hobie, somewhat triumphantly, directs Nile to the farthest corner. The cafeteria is compact, with glazed brick walls, spotlessly maintained, except for the stains and gang signs tooled into the white laminate tabletops. By terms of the jailhouse, this place is almost cheerful. Daylight, soothing as warm milk, emerges from a bank of barred windows, and three or four vending machines provide a touch of color. At the table nearest Seth, a slick Hispanic man is visiting with his girlfriend or his wife. With teased-up masses of dead-black hair, she has dressed to give him an eyeful - a tight red sleeveless top, cut daringly, and black jeans that make a taut casing for her healthy female bulk. Her eyes are painted so heavily they bring to mind Kabuki. She is up often to get coffee, cigarettes, a Coke. Coming and going, she and her man grab as much of each other as they can, a quick, relentless passing over of hands. They are flouting the rules, but the three or four guards in khaki looking on from their positions of retreat around the room remain impassive. Pleasure, so brief, can be forgiven.
Eddie, with time on his hands too, has approached Seth. 'So what-all is it you write?' he asks.
Seth rolls out his standard patter on the column: syndicated nationally, printed here in the Tribune.
'Oh yeah, yeah,' says Eddie, but it's clear he's never heard of Michael Frain and is mildly disappointed. They both momentarily contemplate this dead end. Casting
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