Dealing, Or the Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-brick Lost-bag Blues

Part two of a new novel

Synopsis: I'm Peter Harkness, a Harvard student, and all of this started one day when I flew into San Francisco, having taken a highly unofficial leave from classes. In my hand, I had a very special aluminum-lined, double-locked suitcase; in my sports coat, I had a bulge caused by $2500 worth of bank notes; in my head, I had the Berkeley address of a man called Musty--all provided by a guy named John back in Cambridge.

Musty, at 23, was one of the biggest and most efficient marijuana wholesalers on the Coast. My job was fairly simple: I would give Musty the bank notes. Musty would give me ten bricks of dope neatly wrapped in foil. I would stow them in my suitcase and fly back to Boston. I would then hand them over to John. Simple--except that the scenario didn't play the way it was written.

Nobody was home at 339 Holly Street when I got there, so I waited in my rented car. A few minutes later, some visitors arrived--a whole squad of cops and narcs out to bust Musty. As soon as I could, I got out of there.

Berkeley, as I saw it, was jumping in its usual late-Sixties fashion. On the avenue: stoned, hostile, funky, greaser freaks and stoned, out a-sight, panhandle freaks. Up on campus: a sullen clump of cops just waiting to come out swinging. In Sproul Plaza: a ring of picketers chanting and stomping.

When I finally made connections with Musty in Oakland, he was very cool. He'd avoided the bust and he had the bricks for me. When Musty invited me to smoke a little of his stuff and Lou, a friend of his, borrowed my car, I stayed on. I stayed on so long I got fairly stoned and very weary. Musty sent me to an empty upstairs bedroom for the night.

Only it wasn't empty; it had a girl named Sukie in it and she was there because it seemed that her dog was having puppies in her own room. So we smoked some of her grass and we talked some, and eventually things began to go very well. And would have gone a lot better if there hadn't been a sudden knock on the door, at which three guys in pin-stripe suits march in, looking like walk-ons for Robert Stack and dangling their wallet badges.

They searched the room, but, miraculously, they didn't find any lids. I couldn't figure why they were so sure of themselves. I finally got the story when I was booked. Lou, that friend of Musty's, had been stopped by a traffic cop. There had been a lid of Lou's dope under the seat. When he was pulled in, Lou got very helpful and gave them my name and Musty's address.

It was just a freak accident, the kind of dreary, half-assed thing that could happen to anybody. Still, I was the one who was in trouble now.

Notes From Jail: Brought to you by the silent majority of Alameda County. Arrival sensations. Jail really exists. Astoundingly dull. In conception, execution, duration, the idea of jail is a watershed in man's inanity to man. Does have its good points. A raving genius couldn't possibly have thought of a simpler way to drive one absolutely crazy. Sense deprivation child's play compared with this. Jail is will deprivation. No life. Death meaningless. Ambition a torture. Failure a vision in steel.

More: It goes on. Green everywhere, bathroom green. Like going blind from an overdose of ethyl crème de menthe. County runs a tight ship. Enter jail proper, all personal effects removed and checked. Money, matches, belt, shoelaces. Don't want people hanging themselves by their shoelaces. Then on to converted shower stall, also green, big enough for three men, sitting. Five men are standing. Pay phone on wall, am allowed two calls, lawyer and bondsman. Names of bondsmen scrawled all over the wall, no lawyers. Search-and-seizure manual forgot to tell me they take my money away when I come in. I can't call. Others are calling. Suddenly realize they've been through all this before. Have to have been through it to know the ropes, like everything else. Whacked-out old bestubbled wino asking everyone if he can blow them. Sorry, bud. Gets heavy and I start singing. Very effective. Yell till your lungs burst, but singing drives the guards crazy. Transferred immediately to cell by myself.

Cell: Incredible. Everything electric, controlled from out in the hall. No keys like the movies. Bars four inches apart and cross-riveted, can't cut and bend. Mine one of eight cells looking onto large room connected to messroom and guards' corridor. Altogether, ten doors for the one block, all controlled from corridor. More green. Bare bulbs on all day, all night, no sunlight. No air. No idea what time, they have taken my watch. Might slit my wrists. Know that x amount of time has elapsed, due to unidentifiable slop brought around twice a day. Never eat but. go out to messroom, a chance to leave the cell. Doors lock behind even in mess. Four steel slats riveted to wall in my cell, one has a blanket. Somehow it is cold after dinner, good to have a blanket. Light directly overhead through grating, wish I had something to poke it out. Combination can-drinking fountain in my cell attached to wall. I piss on mess floor. Anything to fuck them up.

Amusements: Good deal of writing on the wall. Jails probably the most creative places in America. No time, have to create your own. Tremendous variety. Slogans, dates, epithets, jokes, obscenities. Some take me back to fourth grade, others brilliant. Everything indelible, since scratched into paint on wall. No pens allowed. Layers of painted-over graffiti beneath current coat of paint. Deciphering these provides blessedly time-consuming endeavor. One magazine in cell, old copy of Life last seen in parents' living room. "Ancient Egypt: Grandeur of Empire." Very appropriate for jail. All is lost empire here. Carefully drawn life-size penis inserted into Nefertiti's mouth on cover. Excellent job. Flash: Someone smuggled a pen in to do that. Have to know the ropes.

Not eating makes me sleepy. I sleep a lot, surprisingly good dreams. All of things I cannot have. In one dream, I order a Coke, the guard brings it. I wake up crying, so happy, and see green. Back to sleep. I have no matches and nothing to smoke. Guards won't give me any, the cunts. First meal third day, they come and take me out. Everything sharp and clear in my head from not eating. Gums hurt from no nicotine. No one in cells looks up as I go. Why bother? They're still in. Down the hall, the desk. This the out-of-stater? Yeah. Two of the plain-clothesmen who picked me up there. Manila envelope with what looks like my name on desk. Wrist watch, belt, ballpoint, blah blah blah. Piece of paper, sign here. Where? Here. Plainclothesmen pull my hands behind again, on with the cuffs. Wait a minute, I hear my voice. First time I've spoken in three days. It sounds crystal clear. Wait a minute, I had 20 bucks on me when I came in here. Frown behind the desk. See the receipt? See your signature? You signed on, you're signed off. So get the hell out. Wait a minute, I repeat, I had 20 bucks, see the 20 in the corner there? Behind the desk, heavy now. He'd like to work me over cuffed, I think. So that's your game, huh? he says. Looking at plainclothesmen, like, Do him good for me. That's your cell number! he says. About-face. Have to know the ropes. Forward, march, past two guards and through a thick steel door, locks inside and out. Small sign on door says, Be surf, to close tight as you go. Don't worry, fell as, you don't have to say it twice.

Interrogation was a flight up and had padded chairs. It was a small room, but on the way up, I passed through an office of busy secretaries and big broad windows with the sun coming through. And then I realized that if they'd just wanted to interrogate me, they could have done it in the cell and a lot more privately, too. The fact that they were doing it here meant only one thing--I was out.

Inside the room, they took the cuffs off and I found myself facing Crewcut and Fats. They sat and stared at me.

"What day is this?" I said.

"Tuesday," Fats said.

I nodded. Groovy. Economics on Friday. I hoped that Herbie would be in good form when I got back.

Then the third guy came in, the head pig, and sat down at a desk after making a lot of noise taking off his coat and unbuckling his shoulder holster. He reached into his desk and fumbled around for a moment.

I reached into my manila envelope and got out my cigarettes. But no matches. I shook out a cigarette and looked over at the pig, who was still lumbling in the desk. I hoped he was going to produce a light.

Instead, he whipped out a plastic baggie full of dope and stuck it in my face. That was supposed to scare me shitless. I turned to Crewcut and said: "Got a match?"

"I don't smoke," he said.

I looked at the second guy, who just shook his head slowly, like he could hardly be bothered shaking his head at me.

So I reached into my manila envelope and pulled out my belt and put it on. Then I put in my shoelaces and wound my wrist watch and put my pen in my pocket. Nobody said anything until the pig said: "There are some questions we'd like to ask you."

I turned to face him. "You got a light?"

"I don't smoke," he said. Nicotine stains all over his fingers.

"There are some questions we'd like to ask you," Crewcut repeated.

"Before you go," Deskman speaking, significant tone. It was good to know that I'd been right about getting out and I got a heady adrenaline rush of anticipation.

"Tell us about your friend."

"My friend?"

"Now, let's not waste each other's time, fella," Crewcut said. "We've been through all this before."

"We know all about you," Deskman said. I noticed how thick his glasses were.

There was nothing to say. I still wanted a smoke.

"We got your friend, he's in the other room, if you want to speak to him." Crewcut said. Sure you do, chum, I thought. "And we've got your marijuana here"--Deskman lifted the bag in the air and gazed at it--"so you might as well play ball. Now, are you going to tell us about it or not?"

"About what?"

They didn't blink. "About the whole thing."

"There isn't any whole thing," I said. "I've never been to Berkeley before--I'm a student in Boston and I happen to be on vacation, which is almost over now, thanks to you gentlemen--and I met the girl I was with when you picked me up on Telegraph that afternoon. And we got along, so she offered to put me up." Smirks all around. "And this guy, Lou whoever he is, needed a car, and she knew him and said he was all right, and I lent him my car. Now, the fact that he was busted with an ounce of marijuana in my car may be legal grounds for hassling me, but it doesn't mean I'm going to know about 'the whole thing.' I haven't got the slightest idea what he was doing with the dope or where he got it. Why don't you ask him?"

"We have. He said it was yours."

"Mine? I don't even smoke marijuana. I haven't touched dope for years. There's a lot of things you can try to pin on me, but a dope rap isn't one of them."

"You've got one on you right now, buddy boy."

"Did you by any chance get any fingerprints off this bag of marijuana? Did you by any chance find any of my prints? Or did you simply take his word for it, that 'cause it was my car, it was my bag of dope? Isn't it usually the case that where there's a lid, there's a pound, or a kilo or a number of kilos? And did you find any dope in the young lady's room that night or on my person at that time? And have you found any since then?" I was getting worked up and I remembered suddenly the tracks on Lou's arms and decided to take a new tack. "In other words, are you doing anything except hassling me on the word of a paranoid speed freak, who borrowed my car and then laid a bum rap on me?"

"Relax, Harkness," said Deskman. "Yeah, we did all those things and we ain't got much on you. But the fact (continued on page 182)Dealing(continued from page 154) remains that it was your car and the dope was in it, and we can make things pretty uncomfortable for you on your, ah"--he paused, savoring his own thoughts--"vacation. Unless you come around and talk dirt with us."

"Talk to you. I have been talking to you. And so far, it hasn't gotten me anywhere." I was doing the indignant-citizen number now and enjoying it immensely, after doing time for what even they had admitted was a pretty thin hustle. "I want a cigarette. I haven't had one for three days. Don't any of you guys have a match?"

Deskman nodded to Crewcut, who grudgingly reached into his coat and pulled out some matches. Handed them to me. As if on signal, all three of them pulled out their butts. I lit mine, looked around at all of them and blew the match out. Threw it on the floor, put the book in my pocket. Crewcut was staring at me. Deskman again, suddenly intense:

"You a good friend of O'Shaugnessy's?"

The question caught me completely by surprise and I was glad I had the cigarette. Took a long drag. It tasted unbelievably good. Meanwhile, my thoughts not at all under control. Had they busted Musty that night, after I'd gone, and were they now keeping it from me? Had they been watching him the whole time, and me, and known why I was in the house? Had they seen my car at the first house that afternoon and followed it, hoping to catch me with something? (It didn't seem like Hertz to have no tail-lights.) Had they planted the dope on Lou, just so they could run me in? The last made the most sense, 'cause it would explain their letting him off with a few questions and "taking his word" that it was my dope. Just how much did these pigs know? It was all happening very fast. I decided the least I could do was make them work for it.

"O'Shaugnessy?" I said.

"Yeah, Harkness, you know Padraic J. O'Shaugnessy? Big pusher, long black hair and a mustache? Ring any bells?"

"No, I don't know any O'Shaugnessy. Is this another one of Lou's ideas?" I had to find out. Maybe he was the stool Musty had been talking about that night.

"No, your friend Lou didn't have anything to do with it. So you don't know any O'Shaugnessy, huh, kid? Fred"--to Crewcut--"what's the name he uses on the street, what do the creeps call him?"

"Musty," said Crewcut with the sour expression of a man who's blown lunch and missed the bowl.

"Know anybody by the name of Musty?" Deskman said, leaning forward.

"Musty," I said, trying to sound as if I were mulling it over. "Yeah, I met a cat named Musty. He was with Lou when I met Lou at the house that night. When Lou asked me for the car. Wears his hair in a ponytail, is that the guy you mean?" Said in a tone of intense distrust, as if that were just the kind of weirdo a nice clean-cut Harvard boy like myself could never forget.

"Yeah, that's the one. Seems that you have an excellent memory, Harkness, when you feel like it."

"I do have an excellent memory," I said, "but not for people's last names when I only know their first."

"OK, wise ass," said Crewcut. "Didn't learn nothing in the cooler, huh? That kinda talk's gonna get you nowhere around here. We don't wanna know how smart you are. We know all about you and this O'Shaugnessy. So let's have it. Is he the one who gets you the shit? Where does he get it? Where'd you meet him? Who do you deal the shit to? C'mon, Harkness, let's have it. Now!"

The vibrations in the room were getting a bit tense. They were going through the kind of verbal foreplay that cops do when they're deciding whether or not to really hassle you. But Crewcut had blown the scene, I could see that from the way Deskman was glaring at him. He'd given it all away. They knew I was connected with Musty, but they didn't know how or why or when or where. And, probably, they didn't even really know, they just had a damned good hunch. Deskman shifted position, took his glasses off and looked through them. Put them back on his nose and said:

"Now, Harkness, you got a trial coming up, a hearing tomorrow. You play ball with us and things could go very smoothly. You don't and your vacation's going to be something of a financial disaster."

Blew it again, Deskman. Trial. Hearing. That meant everything was all right.

"I'm not saying another thing till I see a lawyer," I said.

"You could a spoke to your lawyer any time," Crewcut exploded.

"Not after you thugs took all my money, I couldn't!"

"You didn't have any money, Mr. Excellent Memory," Fats said, breaking his silence. "I seen you sign the sheet."

"I had twenty bucks, goddamn it, and you saw me tell the guy that, too. And you saw how he hustled me out of it and you played along with him and dragged me up here. Sign the sheet, my ass."

"You wanna go back down and talk it over with him?"

"I want to get out of here, right now," I said. "I know damn well somebody's paid my bail, or you wouldn't have me up here, and you got no right to hold me any longer. I'm not saying another thing till I see a lawyer. I don't care if it's just one of your crummy public defenders. You wanna try to make those phony charges stick, go ahead."

Deskman looked at me, sizing me up. He knew that I knew that it was all over and that he had to let me go. But it wasn't over yet. He held the bag up to the light, swung his chair around to face me and shoved the bag under my nose.

"How long you been smoking this shit?" he said.

"I told you, I don't smoke dope."

"How long?" he said, like I better answer.

"I smoked, maybe two years. Maybe more. Don't anymore."

"O'Shaugnessy turn you onto this shit, huh?"

"No, he didn't," I said. Absurd questions.

"LSD," said Crewcut, dragging on his cigarette fiercely, "what about that shit, you take that, too?"

"I don't recall being busted for that," I said.

Deskman leaned forward, strange gleam of satisfaction in his eye, as though he'd just destroyed the golden calf singlehanded. "Tell me, Harkness," he said, "is it good kicks?"

I looked at him, astonished. So that was the problem. Well, there wasn't anything I could do for his head. I shrugged and said: "Better than alcohol."

It was pointless to bait the pig, but I couldn't help enjoying it when he suddenly began to sweat. His face got red and his lower lip twitched. "Only it's not legal, is it, Harkness? And that doesn't bother you, does it, Harkness? You don't give a fuck for the law. You can't be bothered with what's legal and what isn't. The whole fabric of society is a big joke to you, isn't it? You're just so smart you can do whatever you want, can't you, Harkness?"

"How do you figure that?" I said.

"I don't have to figure it, Harkness," he shouted. "I know it. I know all about you."

"You know all about me?" I said and looked at him. He was serious. "You should've considered the priesthood, lieutenant. This isn't a job for you, it's a calling."

His eyes flashed when I said that. He rocked feverishly in his chair for a moment and then said: "OK. OK, Harkness. You're pretty funny, you're a pretty funny guy. You got a lot of quick answers, a lot of smart-guy know-it-all answers. And you go to your big Ivy League school and wear your English clothes and your old man buys you everything and you're sick, you're sicker than hell, and all the bastards like you. But let me tell you something, punk."

His face was now very red. I waited (continued on page 242)Dealing(continued from page 182) for him to tell me something, seeing as how he knew all about me.

"Tomorrow, punk," he said, "tomorrow you're going to be in front of a judge and that judge is going to know you weren't very helpful. And you're gonna get a felony for all your efforts, see? A big fat felony." He held an open hand out to me and crushed the air, squeezing the felony, big and fat. "And you might even do some time for this one, Harkness, because society isn't going to put up with your kind of liberal shit anymore, you better believe that. We aren't going to put up with it forever--your drugs and your sick life and your disrupting and your crime."

"Disrupting? Listen, I was trying to get some sleep when----"

"Shut up," the pig said. "You better learn to shut up, Harkness, and you better learn fast. Because when you get out of here, all your cars and your money and your slick girlfriends aren't going to get this off your record, no matter how much you talk. You're going to have to explain this one, Harkness, everywhere you go. Every time you try to get a job, you're going to have to do some explaining, and every time you apply for a loan. And no matter how much explaining you do, it's never gonna go away."

He paused to catch his breath and shook his head at me. "Sure, Harkness," he said viciously. "I know. Sometimes it happens, a good boy like you. Good family, good education--you just slip up and make one little mistake. But you've made your mistake this time, see, Harkness, and you're gonna be explaining it for the rest of your life. The rest of your crummy life."

Deskman put out his cigarette in an ashtray next to me and I could smell the fumes when I said: "Well, it seems that everybody gets their kicks somehow."

With that, he stood up from behind the desk and I saw again how small he was. Beware the small man. He waved to his two henchmen.

"All right, boys, get him out of here." His face was strained; he was showing great forbearance. I stood up and he came over to me, until he was just a few inches away. I was half a head taller than he was and he didn't like that.

"You're a really funny guy, Harkness," he said in a low voice. He began to speak slowly, but the words picked up as he went. "A real funny guy, a joker, a know-it-all. I bet all your friends think you're a funny guy and a know-it-all, too."

And with that, suddenly, he kneed me in the groin. It was very quick and I coughed and bent over, leaning on the desk.

"You're scum," the pig said. "And we're going to break you and your kind of scum, curb you like dogs, so that decent people don't have to step in your shit. So decent people don't even have to look at you, see, Harkness? So that they won't even have to know you're there."

And he kneed me again and I coughed again and fell back into my chair, my pack of cigarettes falling out and spreading like white splinters over the floor. The pig gave a final snort and walked out, leaving me doubled over in the chair, trying to get my breath. When I finally looked up, I saw a cigarette being offered. Crewcut held it out, looking sort of embarrassed to be offering me a smoke but too embarrassed not to. The other cop was trying not to look at anything, peering out into the outer office.

I took the butt and Crewcut lit it. After a drag or two, I felt a little better. The pain was sliding away. I wiped the tears from the corners of my eyes.

"That's a man the force can be proud of," I said.

Crewcut looked pained and swallowed a couple of times. "Murphy feels strongly about all this," he said.

"I noticed," I said. "Is he always like that?"

"Murphy feels strongly about these things," Crewcut said again. "He thought he could find out a lot more from you than he did. He couldn't, so that's that and----"

And then it hit me, full in the face. "Murphy?"

Crewcut and the butcher exchanged glances.

I said, "Lieutenant Murphy, old FBI man, now a narc?"

The two of them stood up. It was time to go.

"Didn't he used to work in Boston?" I said.

"He still does, kid. He's out here following up a smack case. Now, let's go."

And I was out the door and through the office very fast. All the way downstairs, I began to understand.

• • •

Lieutenant John L. Murphy was a familiar name in Boston and a household word in Cambridge. Narc squads are usually distinguished only by their irritatingly obvious presence--you see a freaky guy wearing white socks and you know he's a narc--but Murphy had been doing his damnedest to change the image. He was tough, fast and imaginative. He was also a screaming sadist and a crook.

There were a lot of stories about him, but I'd never taken them too seriously. When somebody on the street tells you about a narc who busts people single-handed, makes deals with them, takes their bread or their dope and then works them over and turns them in anyway--well, that's a little hard to believe. I mean, the image is a bit too desirable to be true. Everybody wants a good reason to hate cops. They're the enemy.

I was converted when Murphy busted Super Spade. Super Spade was a loping, agile, good-time funky beautiful dude whose face had been glowing in Harvard Square for years, long before the college boys had even heard of dope. Super was sort of the grand old man of the street. Everybody liked him and everybody was unhappy when he got busted.

After he got out on bail, he went over to see John to borrow some bread for a lawyer. And he blew our minds when he told us the story, because it was like all the other Murphy stories. Murphy had busted him alone; the warrant was in order; and Super had been caught holding eight bricks. So far, so good. Then Murphy began talking about how much Super's eight bricks were worth and how much time he'd probably draw for that kind of quantity possession. And Super finally made the connection and suggested that perhaps he and Murphy could work something out.

Which they proceeded to do. Super came up with 300 bucks, cash, and laid it on Murphy. After that, Murphy, having already handcuffed him, beat the shit out of him--and then took him in. Next day, Super found out he had three charges against him: possession of marijuana, resisting arrest and attempting to bribe an officer. When he asked the judge how much the bribe had been, the judge told him $50.

So far, it seemed like Murphy was just another rough cop, playing it a rough way. But also in Super's apartment was a glass jar with 500 acid flats. Super hadn't mentioned them to Murphy, but he found when he got home that the flats were gone. And soon after that, a friend in Roxbury had told him about the sudden fast market in the midst of a dry season: all sorts of good acid around and out a-sight smoking dope.

Anyway, people had been telling these stories for a long time and it was getting harder to simply dismiss them as street jive. The street people were unanimously in favor of taking Murphy apart, of busting his ass good. Partly because he'd become something of a legend and something of a symbol--but mostly because he had crossed the line and was playing dirty.

A rough-and-tough cop he could be, and for that he would be hated and respected. But as a thief with a badge, a guy who broke the rules and regulations we all play by, as that kind of person he could never last.

At least everyone hoped not.

• • •

Walking down what seemed like miles of endless corridors, our footsteps echoing, I said: "I'm surprised you have a key."

Sukie laughed.

It was close to midnight and the building around us was silent. The walls were painted light green, a little like jail: the building reminded me of an institution.

"It used to be welfare offices or something." she said, "before it was sold and converted."

"Cheery," I said.

"It gets better."

As we passed them, she showed me the lounges for the performers. They looked like airport lounges or something, sort of plush but impersonal. Very soundproofed. I suddenly began to notice how everything off the corridors was sound-proofed.

Then we came into another room, marked Studio A. Shock: It was like a heavy living room. Persian carpets on the floor, hangings on the walls, colors and textures. "Like a very nice cat house," I said.

"Close," she said. And out came a joint. She lit up as I wandered around the room. There were microphones everywhere and a stand for guitars and a piano in the corner. I sat down at the piano.

"Do you play?" she said.

I shook my head.

"You play anything?"

I shook my head and plunked out chopsticks. She laughed and then said: "Stay there," and left the room. I walked around, breathing in the luxury, and then began to drift into the sense of working with my group, the cigarettes and the quiet talk and everybody getting together, getting their heads and fingers loosened.

"Hello," she said. Her voice was funny. I turned around and saw the drapes pulling back to reveal a glass wall and her behind the glass, staring in at me. The lights in the other room were overhead, harsh and funny. I could see the room was filled with recording equipment, decks and spools and dials and consoles; she was wearing earphones. A flash on the mechanical sense: There was money in all this and manufactured products, industry just like everywhere else. The flash faded. She made a gesture for me to go toward the microphone.

I tapped it. "Is this thing working?" I heard my own voice, from speakers mounted somewhere in the room. It was working.

"We, uh, just want to play a few numbers that we know well, because we've never played together before."

She knew where that line came from and she smiled. I began to get into it.

"My name is, uh, Lucifer Harkness--"

Something happened. The voice was warbling as it came back to me. She was flicking buttons. I laughed. "What're you doing to me?"

Now it was echoing, "Doing to me, to me, to me, me."

"Yeah, well, actually--"

This time it was thin, high, squeaky, with the tone of a certain memory. It startled me. "This is getting to be a drag," I said. I wanted to play something, now was the perfect time to be able to do it, but I didn't know how. It was finally hitting home, the foolishness of it, that I couldn't even do simple chords on a guitar, I couldn't do anything. Hopeless. I began to get depressed and she must have sensed it, because she suddenly came around, opening the studio door, and led me out of there.

"It's because the place is deserted," she said. "Empty buildings are always depressing." She smiled and squeezed my hand.

• • •

Sukie came to the hearing next day with me. I had a clean shirt and tie on and I stood up straight for the judge. She sat in the back of the hearing room; I glanced back once to look at her.

The judge asked me if my legal rights had been properly attended to, since I didn't have a public defender by my side. I didn't mention to the judge that I'd been through that whole rift before and it was a drag, because the P. D. doesn't give a screw about what happens to you, he just wants to look good in front of the judge. So I told the judge that everything had been taken care of but that in this instance, I preferred to defend myself. The judge looked a little amused and a little pleased at that and told me to proceed.

My defense was pretty weak, but logical. It included such helpful hints as the fact that I was scheduled to leave California the next day, providing I didn't get hung up in jail, thus costing the good taxpayers additional expense. I also said that I had no relationship with the primary defendant in the case, i.e., the lid of dope, and that I considered it a freak accident that did not merit my bearing the weight of its consequences any more than I already had.

The judge replied that I had a sharp, clever and discerning mind but that I obviously knew nothing about the law. Which, he added, meant nothing, since all charges had been dropped by the D. A.'s office, and if I would speak to the clerk before leaving the courtroom, I was free to go.

I was pleasantly dazed. I thanked the judge, who told me not to thank him, and I left.

Sukie laughed as we walked out the door.

• • •

The next day, we went up to Tilden, very early, to watch the sun come up over the bay. It was cold and dark when we arrived and we huddled under a blanket, drinking Red Mountain and feeling the dry warmth spread outward. From the top of the ridge you could see everything--Oakland and Berkeley below and Richmond and Mt. Tamalpais in the distance.

Later on, when we got back that afternoon, I found Musty in the kitchen, where I'd first seen him. "Listen, man," he said, "I'm sorry about Lou. He's a little speedy, you know. Bad scene. Does up three bags a day."

"What the hell," I said, feeling magnanimous. "Past tense."

Musty took a knife and sliced the bricks to show me how clean they cut. No rocks, no clay; they were righteous keys. We soaked them in Coca-Cola for a minute, so that they wouldn't smell too bad, and then put them into my aluminum-lined suitcase with the double locks. The ten bricks fit very nicely.

Sukie took me to the airport. We stood around under a billboard that read Get away from it all and made each other uncomfortable until they announced that my flight was boarding.

She kissed me. "Will I see you--" She stopped.

"Sure," I said, squeezing her. "Of course you will. Soon as possible." But the truth was that the East was seeping back into my brain, the East and Boston and wet roads and hour exams, complete with an enormous paranoia about departure scenes and weeping chicks.

"When will I see you?" Very calmly.

"I'll call as soon as my exams are over."

Then I had to hustle for the plane. She'd said she would watch from the observation deck, but by the time I was buckled into my seat, the sun was almost gone and I couldn't see her at all.

• • •

At the airport, the crowds of screaming fans were lined up to greet the sensational new rock sensation, Lucifer Harkness, and his greasy back-up group, The New Administration. Harkness stepped off the plane, resplendent in velvet bell-bottoms and a black-leather T-shirt; from behind thick purple shades he could see the crowd going wild. They broke through the cordons and fought off the cops and ran screaming for him.

He felt a thousand hands touching him, clutching at his clothes, tearing them off his back, covering him with kisses, pulling at his balls, biting his neck affectionately, and it was delirious and wonderful for several minutes before the cops came down on the kids and broke it up, and then Reggie Thorpe, the manager, got the group together and they made it to the waiting Rolls.

As the Rolls pulled away, there were hundreds of screaming teenies all lined up on the road out of the airport. Some of them threw themselves in front of the car, stopping it, while others scratched at the glass and kissed it, all of them screaming. "We want to ball Lucifer, we want to ball Lucifer." And Lucifer was thinking to himself what an unbelievably tedious chore it would be to crack all of those hundreds of prepubescent cherry stones when the guy sitting next to him jabbed him in the side.

"Hey, lookit dat, buddy. Nice pussy." I politely looked over a ham-sized forearm to see a thin, wasted-looking chick with a shaved twat lying guilelessly across the centerfold of Suburban Jaybird.

"Nice." I said. Nice, my ass. The chick was about as ugly as they come, especially without her hair. Hair was mystery, it was sex, it was funky and greasy and it got tangled when you madelove.

"Howdja like to fuck her?" he said, holding up another picture.

I shrugged. The woman behind us on the M. B. T. A. car was doing her best to let us know that she was faint with indignation. She was making small coughing sounds. Out the window, gray and rainy, was the Boston skyline.

"I like 'em with hair," I said. Behind me, I heard the sharp intake of breath from the woman.

My companion turned around and shot her a cold look, then turned back to his magazine. "Holy Jeez." he said in a reverential tone. "Lookit, there's one you'd like."

"Yeah." I said. "Now, there's a nice bush."

"Christ, You're not shittin'." he said.

Unfortunately, he got off at Park Street, leaving me alone with Mrs. Snorts behind me. She got off at Charles Street. I took the subway all the way to the end of the line, Harvard Square.

Shooting out into Harvard Square from the bowels of the M. B. T. A. was about as much fun ashaving a tooth pulled without Novocain. I always felt that way when I got back from the Coast, but somehow I was never prepared for it. Because as much of a drag as I knew it would be to return. I always figured that it would be nothing more than that--a return. And so the ensuing culture shock, the numbing of mind and body that was only later understood to be Boston's charming way of saying, Welcome back, always caught me by surprise.

And what a surprise. A surprise wrapped in thick, heavy air, dimly opaque light, trimmed with an ineffable, oppressive sense of guilt. The air in the square reeked of guilt. Nobody was ever going to be naïve enough to mention it, but it was there just the same and readily assented to by all on the street.

The street. White pasty bodies and zitty faces shuffled past me, eyes on the ground, clutching cigarettes like drowning men. Moving only when the sign commanded them to walk. Old ladies sneered at passers-by and cabbies looked hot and sullen. Three-pieced professors sneaked across the street, clutching their top-heavy wives like illicit Government secrets, and paranoid pristine lags paraded poodles past shattered winos bumming dimes. Truck drivers whistled at towny cunts and sad, stooped teaching fellows picked their noses and read the Daily Flash in 23 languages.

I went across the street to Nini's to get some cigarettes and cut my way through the prepubescent mob outside. The guys slouched against the walls, sucking on toothpicks or nicotine sticks, scratching their crotches stealthily and yelling at the chicks. The chicks were all over the place, big flowsy broads in high school jackets topped by mounds of teased hair, chewing the life out of huge wads of gum and swinging their pocketbooks at the more adventurous guys; all thetime shrieking like cats in heat, shrieking and laughing and again swinging their pocketbooks. It was too much.

Inside Nini's. the adults-only version of the same movie was going on, featuring fat, powdered women engrossed in multicolored tabloids ("I had a change-of-life baby by another man!") and the usual mob of skinny, haunted men in the back of the store, tirelessly leafing through the skin mags. Jesus, what all these poor bastards needed was a good lay, I thought. And a good lay they'd never get--not in Boston, anyway.

I went down Dunster Street, past Holyoke Center and over toward the Houses. It was quieter there and there wasn't any traffic and the trees had tiny flecks of green at the tips. Spring was getting its foot in the door and it suddenly didn't seem so bad.

Once in the House, I stopped to talk to Jerry, who wanted to know all about my vacation. Jerry was the superintendent, a cheerful, sly Irishman who would talk your ear off, given half a chance, besides being a stickler for rules, especially those concerning women in the rooms. But Jerry understands those who understand him, so for a few hours of conversation per term and a couple of bottles of rye on the Savior's birthday, Jerry is the most amenable and considerate super in the college. Hello, Jerry.

Then up to E entry and John's room on the first floor. John has a sign on the door that reads:

Seek and ye shall find

John finds this amusing, since his chicks think he means the truth, while he means the chicks. The door opened to reveal Sandra's lovely form. "How'd it go?" she said.

I was tempted to ask her the same thing, seeing as how she was decked out in one of John's bathrobes. But all I said was "Fine" and went in and sat down.

John called from the bedroom: "That you, Pete?"

"Yeah."

"Just a minute."

Sandra was looking very chic and wealthily whorish as she put a record on the turntable and sat down across from me. She crossed her legs in the extraordinary way she has of crossing her legs, languidly, with a lazy shot of the bush in the process. Nothing offered, of course, but if she knew you and liked you, she didn't mind letting you know her snatch was all still there.

"How'd it go?" she said again.

"Fine," I said again.

"You look bushed."

"I am," I said.

Then John came out, wearing his other bathrobe. He has two Brooks foulard-print bathrobes. One is several sizes too small for him and he tells the girls it was a present to him from his grandmother. But it's handy for the girls. John is well organized about that sort of thing.

"Thanks for meeting me at the airport," I said.

"Hey," he said, "what's this I heard about----"

"A bust?"

John lit a cigarette. "Yeah."

I shrugged. "It happened. I got busted."

"And?"

"They dropped charges," I said. "They couldn't make them stick. It was this other guy's dope in the car and they couldn't make anything stick to me."

John nodded. He didn't seem terribly interested. He pointed to the suitcase. "You get it all?"

"Ten bricks," I said.

"Far out," he said. "Let's have a look." And as I opened the suitcase, he said, in a very casual voice: "Was it Murphy who busted you?"

Typical John. The casual fuck with your head. I looked up. "Why?"

"It was Murphy who busted Ernie, you know."

Thanks for the good news. "Yeah," I said. "It was Murphy who busted me and I got off by agreeing to set you up. All you have to do is go down to Central Square tomorrow at ten, carrying these bricks----"

John managed a pretty realistic, hearty laugh. "You getting paranoid?"

"Me?" I said. "Paranoid? Why should I be? My deal's firm." John laughed again, even more convincingly. Then he cut open a brick and I could sit back and relax while he smoked up.

• • •

The trouble with John is that he had an acid trip last fall where he dropped about 2000 micswith some people he didn't know. The whole thing bent his head around the telephone pole. He never talked about the trip, but from the little he said, you could tell he'd gotten very stoned, and then very afraid, and then decided that the only way he could handle it would be to controlit. So he became a controller. Power trips with everyone, crappy little freak games and manipulations and adrenaline spurts passed out at the door, gratis. I had thought he didn't play those games with me, but he did, of course. He played them with everyone.

Which is why John Thayer Hartnup III, of Eliot House and Cohasset, Massachusetts, was into dealing at all. It was the only way it made sense. The son of the Right Reverend Mr. Walker Win-gate Hartnup and the former Miss Ellie Winston (of South Carolina) hardly needed the bread. Even if the tobacco money went up in smoke and the Reverend's investments died, Grandmother Wingate could be counted on to call down the First National bankers to her Plymouth home and transfera few goodies. It was all very far from a question of bread.

Power was something else. A natural talent, it might be called, an inborn skill. He had been an attentive student at Dreyer Country Day, but he was later dismissed from Kent for what the headmaster, without being specific, had implied was a question of drug abuse. It might have had something to do with John's consumption of the Mexican-grown drug Cannabis sativa during Saturday football games. John had then spoken to the headmaster in private and, a week later, it was announced that John was not being dismissed but, rather, had taken a leave of absence because of overwork and stress. No one ever found out what was discussed at the meeting, but John was fond of noting that even such people as headmasters of distinguished prep schools had soft underbellies.

As a fine-arts undergraduate at Harvard, a field he had chosen for its casual academic demands and its pretty girls, he had further opportunity to refine his techniques. There was, for example, his nervous breakdown at the end of his sophomore year--a six-week stay at Massachusetts Mental Health Center that brought his parents around to a much more sympathetic stance toward him.

Not, perhaps, the nicest person, John, but successful in his way.

• • •

Sandra, silting next to John on the couch, was wiping the dope smoke out of her eyes when she noticed her watch. "Oh," she said, jumping up. "It's time. We're gonna miss it." She went over to the television set and turned it on. I was so stoned I sat there passively and watched her, and then the screen as it glowed to life with the visage of Sally Scott, Eyewitness News, with the Eyewitness news team investigating a paramount concern to the parents of Boston: teenage drug abuse.

"Lieutenant Murphy," Sally Scott asked, as she walked along a table laid out. like a feast, with exhibits, "what is this here?"

"This here is a kilogram of marijuana, which is two point two pounds of the drug. It is dried and pressed into a block for purposes of transportation, as you can see."

"I see," Sally Scott said.

"If you bring the camera closer, you might get a better shot," Lieutenant Murphy said helpfully. The camera came closer. "As you can see, this block of the drug is commonly referred to bytraffickers and illicit users as a key or a brick."

"And this?" Sally Scott asked, moving on.

"Now, this is what the kids buy from the dope peddlers. This is how the drug is sold, in a one-ounce baggie. An ounce may cost as much as fifty dollars."

"Fifty dollars!" John said. "Jesus, maybe in Wellesley or someplace."

"I see," Sally Scott said. "And how much of this, uh, drug is necessary to make a person, uh----"

"High?" Lieutenant Murphy asked. "Not very much. The drug is smoked in cigarettes, called reefers. Just one of these small cigarettes is enough to make a person suffer all the effects of the marijuana plant."

"Suffer?" Sandra asked, genuinely puzzled.

John grinned.

Sally Scott said, "And what exactly are these effects?"

"Mostly unpleasant," Lieutenant Murphy said. "The mouth feels dry and the voice may be painful. The eyes hurt and one may suffer hallucinations. All inhibitions are released and the person under the drug may act in peculiar and bizarre ways."

"In what ways?" Sally Scott had unusually large eyes.

"Someone on this drug, under its effects, stoned, as the psychologically addicted users say, such a person is capable of almost anything."

"I certainly am," Sandra said and got up and switched the television off.

"Hey," John said, turning it back on. "Roll a joint, Sandy."

The sound returned just in time for us to hear Sally Scott ask, "--the magnitude of the drug problem in Boston?"

"Very serious," Murphy said seriously. "There's no question of that. All reports indicate that the center of drug abuse in the country is shifting from San Francisco to New York and Boston. Boston is now the center."

"Why is that?" Sally Scott asked.

"The climate," John said and laughed.

"Primarily because of the influx of college students to the Greater Boston area. We have two hundred thousand college students, most of them from out of state. Unfortunately, some of these students deal in drugs." Murphy paused to get his breath, then went on. "You see, the atmosphere on the college campuses today tends to encourage bizarre behavior and often the responsible adult on the scene, the administrator, and so forth, will pooh-pooh even illicit activities, if they happen to be fashionable. The campuses also provide a gathering place for all types of weirdos, outcasts and hangers-on who wouldn't be able to exist in a normal American environment. These types are often among the offenders. Simply by their presence, they assist the growing drug traffic."

"Oh, Christ," John said, "are you listening to this bullshit?"

Murphy was gone and Sally Scott was saying: "--University's psychopharmacology unit for answers to these and other questions. Doctor, what is the medical evidence on marijuana?"

The doctor was pale and thin and thoughtful-looking. He wore glasses and blinked his eyes a lot and spoke in little shotgun bursts. "Well, the first thing to say ... is that there is verylittle in the way of ... hard medical data on the drug. On the contrary we know remarkably little ... about the effects ... or the hazards ... of this particular compound however ... we can say ... that earlier ideas were wrong ... and the drug is not addicting by this we mean ... there is no tolerance ... phenomenon ... and no psychological dependence or physical ... uh, dependence ... craving no craving ... and we can say the drug does not lead ... to heroin or other narcotics."

"You say heroin or other narcotics. Isn't marijuana a narcotic?"

"Well that depends ... on your definition ... but strictly speaking a narcotic means ... something that produces sleep ... from narke the Greek word for numbness ... and in the usual sense it means pain-killing and sensory-dulling medications ... sleeping pills ... and these drugs as you know are nearly all addicting the term narcotic ... to most people ... means addicting drug ... though not of course ... to doctors." Blink blink.

Sally Scott looked him right in the eye. "How dangerous is marijuana?"

"Well that depends again ... on your definition an automobile ... is pretty dangerous ... and so are aspirin, liquor and cigarettes ... the same thing all medications ... all drugs broadly speaking ... are dangerous and you are better off without them. In terms ... of purely pleasure-producing drugs ... like cigarettes and coffee ... and alcohol ... we can say that marijuana ... so far as we know ... may be a better drug to take ... for pleasure ... that is safer and less addicting ... but then ... we know little about it."

"When you say a better drug----"

"In terms of side effects ... long-term damage ... something like alcohol as you know ... is a terrible drug ... physically addicting ... psychologically disrupting ... literally a poisonto brain cells, a neurotoxin ... and yet it is perfectly acceptable ... to society."

"Alcohol is a poison to brain cells?" Sally Scott asked, astonished. "But alcohol is used in all civilizations around the world."

"Yes," the doctor said. "That is true."

After half an hour of this, I got up to go and said to John: "Lend me a lid?"

John raised an eyebrow. "Studying?"

"The exam's tomorrow," I said, "and 1 don't know a fucking thing about the course."

John shrugged.

"Well, it's not Spots and Dots, you know," I said. Spots and Dots was the toughest course offered by the Fine Arts Department. Modern Western Art 1880--1960. Even blind men had been known to pass.

"Top drawer of my dresser," John said. "But take only one."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," I said. I opened the drawer and took a baggie, one of the fuller-lookingones. Herbie was particular about his payoffs.

When I came back, John said: "By the way, check your desk?"

I shook my head and went into my room to check my desk. There was a stack of mail on it, on top, in a cream-colored envelope, some sort of invitation. The handwriting was Annie's. I tore it open. It was an invitation to attend the Scarab Club Garden Party on Saturday. I looked at the postmark on the envelope; it had been mailed a week before. Too late to give a negative reply. I went back to John's room and threw it in his lap. "Did you rig this?"

John looked shocked. "You mean arrange it?"

"No, damn it, I mean call her up and tell her I was out of town."

John said: "I knew you'd be back in time." He smiled. "To accept," he added.

"Get bent," I said.

"It's a peace offering, you know," John went on. "It means she still likes you."

"Get bent," I said again. John was a member of the Piggy Club and he was having a moment of fun at my expense. We both knew that Annie was now making it with a club member and we both knew that club members were not permitted to invite women to the parties themselves.

"You don't want to go?" John said, now acting surprised.

"Me? Not want to go to the Piggy Club picnic? You've got to be kidding. I can hardly wait."

"Garden party," John amended. He sighed. "Little late to call her up and refuse, isn't it?"

That was unnecessary and as I left the room, I slammed the door behind me. Typical John interaction. I was furious and, in a sense, grateful for the pressures of the coming exam. No chance to brood on it. It feels so good when I stop.

Down the hall was Herbie's room. Herbie was a weird little cat, sort of a cross between Mr. Natural and Dr. Zarkov. He was a senior and 17 years old. He'd come from somewhere in West Virginia, where his father worked in the mines and his mother worked in the mine offices--one of those trips. Mother had noticed very early that Herbie was not like the other children and had taken him to a testing center that the Government ran for mentally retarded children. The testing people had found that Herbie's I. Q. could not be accurately measured--and not because he was retarded. They'd sent him to a special high school in New York and then they'd gotten Harvard interested in him. Herbie hadn't taken a math course that was listed in the catalog since his first year at Harvard, nor, for that matter, an economics course nor a physics course. He was now working up at the Observatory, taking a side degree in astrophysics.

I went in and found him sitting in his bentwood rocker, rocking back and forth. He wore dungarees and a garish print shirt and he was smoking a joint the size of an expensive cigar.

"Peter," he said when he saw me.

"Herbie," I said and sat down across from him.

Herbie scratched his head. "Let's see, now." He looked across the room at a wall calendar. "Economics, is it?"

I nodded.

"All right," he said. "We can take an hour." He held out his hand. I dropped the baggie into it. He squeezed it, feeling the texture, then held it up to the light; finally, tossed it onto his desk. "Sold," he said. "There's paper and pencil on the desk. Let's get started. It's all very simple," he said. "The internal dynamics of the European nation-state, in the early part of the 17th Century, eventually necessitated the manipulation of the economy to serve the political interests of the state. That concept, in turn, led--am I going too fast?"

"Just fine," I said, scribbling as fast as I could. "Just fine."

• • •

The exam next morning was held in Memorial Hall, a cavernous medieval sort of building with desks in long rows. The proctors wandered from desk to desk with their hands clasped behind their backs. The best proctors--the most professional ones--remained entirely and haughtily aloof. But the graduate students and section men who were there to answer questions about the exam questions, as well as to be proctors, were pretty bad. A lot of them liked to walk from student to student and check out what was being written.

About halfway through the hour, one of them stopped to look over my shoulder. He looked and he stayed. I kept writing, getting suddenly nervous. He had a nose cold, this proctor, and he sounded like a horse with pneumonia on a cold winter morning. Finally, I turned back to look at him.

He was shaking his head as he read the page. I shrugged.

He shrugged back, but at least he walked on. The bastard had shaken me up; I began having trouble concentrating on the question. Particularly since I hadn't done any of the reading that was necessary to answer it. I was just sort of going along, putting down words. The answer didn't mean anything, but then, neither did the question.

I began to think of Sukie and how she had looked when I left her at the airport. I wondered if she had made it back all right. It was a drag for a single chick to hitch out to Berkeley at night. And then I wondered if she was meeting somebody afterward. I wondered if she had just wanted a ride to S. F. and that was why she had gone in.

Then I started to think about how she had been in bed. It was obvious that she wasn't learning anything from me, which was completely to be expected, but just then, it seemed outrageous, absurd, that she should have been with anyone but me. Or that she ever would be with anyone but me in the future. I could feel irritation building and I realized that I was jealous. Not even jealous, more--

"Five minutes," the king proctor said, stepping to the microphone.

I looked back down at my bluebook. I still had another essay to go. I stared at the question, praying for inspiration, and I got it at the last minute.

• • •

I have never been jealous. At least, not about women. I have been jealous of objects, of things and sometimes of traits; I remember especially a friend of mine when I was a kid. He held my unbroken admiration for years because of his imagination. He effortlessly devised such wonders as the Burning Bag of Shit Trick, conveniently placed on a neighbor's doorstep--and when the neighbor tried to stamp it out, well, that was his problem.

Also the Good Humor Man Stunt, in which one kid would sprawl out on the road, deathly ill, and enlist the Good Humor Man's help, while another kid went to the back of the truck and climbed into the refrigerated compartment. There he would stay, eating himself sick, for a fuli block, at which time a similar catastrophic mid-road illness would again cause the truck to stop and allow the half-frozen and satiated icecream fiend to escape, giggling and shivering, into the sunlight.

And then I remember I was jealous of a guy who lived down the street from me one summer who had a motorcycle before I even had a driver's license.

But as far as chicks went, I had never really felt anything, and certainly not jealousy. Chicks had been a necessary evil, giggling half-wits who played games until your balls were purpleand then forgot their purses in the theater, or had to be in by midnight, or weren't "that kindof girl," or some other crap. There had been a lot of them around me.

Yet there I was, finished with the exam and, by all reasonable expectations, hot on the trail home, to blow some dope and collapse into bed, after being up almost 48 hours. But that wasn't happening. Instead, I went right back to my room and called her.

The phone rang a long time. Finally, a dull voice said: "Hello?"

"Hello, is Sukie there?"

"Who?" A very dull voice, and then I remembered the time change.

"Sukie Blake, Susan, is she there?"

"What number are you calling?" the guy said. He was being very, very careful about waking up and I couldn't stand it.

"Sukie, man, Sukie, the blonde chick who lives upstairs, the one with the weird eye?"

"Oh." He mulled that one over. "Yeah. Hold on."

Then there was silence. I stared around my room and lit a cigarette and blinked in the smoke.

"Hello?" Dazed voice.

"Hello, Sukie?"

"Who is this?" Really dazed.

"Sukie, what's going on out there?"

"What?" She was beginning to wake up. "Who is this?"

I thought I heard some sound in the background. Some sound in the room. "Are you alone?"

"Goddamn it," she said. "Who is this?"

"Peter," I said.

She laughed. Three thousand miles away, I heard that laugh and it made me smile. "Oh, Peter," she said. "It's seven-thirty in the morning."

"I'm sorry," I said. "I wanted to talk to you."

There was a yawn at the other end, then: "How was your exam?"

That made me happy. She'd remembered I was going back to take an exam.

"Terrible. I thought about you the whole time."

"What kind of exam was it?"

"Economics."

"Peter, that's not good, you thought about me during an economics exam?" And after another yawn: "What did you think?"

Hmm, what did I think? That was a drag over the telephone. "Oh, you know," I said.

There was a pause. A short pause while she woke up still more. "You wanted to know if I was alone," she said, her voice low and amused.

"No," I said, "you weren't awake. I asked how you were."

"I'm not alone, Peter," she said. "When you called. I was in bed with eight puppies."

"I didn't ask you whether you were alone," I said.

She gave a low laugh. "Peter, you're sweet, do you know that?"

Well, that was it. Like walking out on a limb, and finally the limb snaps. I looked around the room, the goddamned dreary room, and I said: "Listen, I want to see you."

She laughed again. "I want to see you, too."

And then, in a sudden rush, I said: "Then why don't you come out here?"

"To Cambridge?"

"Sure."

"How, Peter?"

"I don't know. There must be some way."

She asked me then if I had any money. I didn't. I asked her. She didn't. Swell.

"Swell," I said.

It was quiet on the line. A kind of depressing quiet.

"Maybe," I said. "I can figure out some way to come out there." But I knew it wasn't true. In a few weeks, I would have to start studying for finals.

She must have known it wasn't true, too, because she sounded sleepy again when she said: "All right, Pete."

"No, really. I'll figure something out."

"I know. I believe you."

And I guess, in a way, she did. Finally, she said she was costing me money and I said the hell with the money, but I couldn't really afford to say that, so I got off and hung up and realized that I was very tired and that I wanted to sleep for a long time.

• • •

I didn't wake up until lunchtime the next day. I am a man of few vices, one of them most unquestionably being the time I spend with my eyes closed. But as soon as I was up, I was remembering Sukie and the phone call and all she'd said.

I caught up with John in the dining hall and joined him over a plate of sawdust and beans.

John looked up and smiled. "Peter," he said. "How's the head today?"

"Fine. How're the eats?"

"Awful," said John. "I didn't expect to see you for quite a while. Heard you had a little trouble with that economics exam yesterday."

"Trouble?" I tried to look surprised.

"Heard you barely finished."

I sighed. I thought he'd been talking about the senior tutor. I get messages from the seniortutor three times a year: after fall-term hour exams, after midterms and after spring-term hourexams. I was expecting one any day now, but at least it hadn't arrived yet.

"No, that was no trouble," I said. "Just had better things to think about."

John laughed and then frowned at his potatoes. "Jesus." he said, "what the hell is that?" He held a clump aloft for all to admire.

Somebody said, "A hairpin."

"A hairpin, Jesus." John said. "I could get lockjaw or something from eating this crap. Look at it, it's rusty."

I'd had enough to eat right then.

"Heard from Musty?" I asked.

John looked up sharply. "Any reason why I should've?"

I had to play this one right. I didn't want to keep anything from John, but then again, I didn't want him to fuck me up, which he undoubtedly would if he had time to do so. All I said was: "No. Nothing special."

John dropped his potatoes and lit up a smoke. "OK," he said, "what's the big secret?"

"No secret."

"Well, then, what's all this garbage about Musty? C'mon, Peter, I've known you too long to just think you're wondering out loud when you drop something like that."

"Like what? Christ, you're as paranoid as all these other creeps." I spread an arm out to encompass the dining hall, which was filled with guys studying over their meals. "You've just gota different angle on the paranoia, that's all."

"Uh-huh." John nodded grimly. He blew some smoke in my direction. "Then who were you calling after the exam yesterday? Not Musty, by any chance?"

I had to laugh. John managed to have a finger on everything that went down.

"No, not Musty. I was talking to a chick."

John put his smoke out and laughed heavily. "A chick, eh? Not a California honey, by any chance? Yes?" He sat back and sipped his coffee. "Far out," he said, "far fucking out."

"What's far out?"

"Nothing. It just makes sense, why you've been blowing your mind ever since you got back here two days ago. And me thinking it was the climate." He laughed again. "Far fucking out." He looked suddenly serious and leaned over to me, across the table. "What'd she tell you about Musty?"

"I told you already. Nothing."

"Then what's this riff all about?"

"I was just wondering if you had any more trips lined up in the near future."

"California trips?"

"No, mescaline trips."

"What's wrong with you. you got blue balls after a couple of days around this lady?"

"You might say that. You might just say I want to see her. What difference does that make? You got any trips lined up or don't you?"

John searched his coat for another butt. "Not in the near future. Not till after exams, I'd say." He cocked his head and said: "But even if I had a run lined up, you wouldn't be able to do it ..." letting the statement wander off into a question. I knew what he was asking.

"Aw, hell," I said. "I could probably work something out."

John took a long drag on his smoke and nodded. "That's good," he said. "That's good to hear you say that, Pete, 'cause I wouldn't want you going around with some kind of wild misconception in your head about me letting a chick run the dope in."

I searched around for another smoke and thought that one over. I'd known that he would say that--John never let chicks in on his deals. It was a completely bullshit prejudice, because if anything, chicks were cooler for a run than a long-haired dude could ever be. Most big dealers on the Coast, in fact, used only chicks--but I wasn't on the Coast and I wasn't talking to a Coast dealer. I was talking to John.

"Supposing," I began, "supposing you couldn't get anyone around here to do the run. Would you consider letting her do it then?"

John looked pained. "Peter." he said, "you don't seem to understand. You know how I feel, but you don't seem to understand. Well. I'll tell it to you all over again." He paused and then said, very deliberately and carefully: "Chicks ... fuck ... up." He looked at me.

"I was just wondering."

"Well, you can stop wondering."

"Even if you couldn't get anyone around here and you had a run set up and a courier was all you needed, you wouldn't let her do it?"

John was quiet when he said: "Never. Never never never. I'd change the run, I'd can the run--Christ, I'd even do it myself. But I'd never count on a chick to get anything through. Chicks fuck up."

I shrugged and stood up. There wasn't anything else to say. I knew that if Musty called in afew days and told John that he had only a day or two to get somebody out to San Francisco to make a quick run before he split for Oregon, John would bust his ass to get somebody. What I'd been hoping was that he would at least admit the possibility of letting Sukie be that somebody. But he wouldn't, so I had to get to her. There was no other way.

• • •

I needed $160 to get to the Coast on a plane. I wouldn't have needed anything to hitch, but I didn't have the time for that. So it was $160 or nothing, and after a few minutes in front of the Student Union Jobs board, I was beginning to think it was going to be nothing. I could get $2.50 an hour translating Sanskrit into German for Professor Popcock, which wasn't exactly my field; or I could get $2.80 bartending on weekends. But I'd already turned down a few of the bartending-boys' jobs in order to make the run, and they took an exceedingly dim view of those who didn't exercise the right to work when it was waved in their faces. I could go in there bleeding right now, on my knees, begging for a gig, and they'd tell me to beat it. That left a kitchen job as the only real alternative, at $1.80 an hour, which would be two 50-hour weeks, and I was just about to run down and sign up when I noticed a little note saying that students couldn't work more than 20 hours a week. Far out, that was about all I had to say.

I wandered around the next two days, looking for jobs and asking people what they knew, but nothing turned up. I was just starting to think that hitchhiking wasn't such a bad idea when I got the note from the senior tutor. That was the end. I knew what he'd want. He'd want to tell me that I'd screwed the economics exam--probably royally--and that if I continued to screw things, he wasn't going to be able to help me very much, except to plead my case before the ad board and try to keep them from booting me out. Which was cool, his concern and all, but that wasn't really what went down at a meeting with the senior tutor. Those meetings consisted mainly of his telling you how much he worried about you and your work and your habits, which was a drag; and they always ended with his asking you a lot of nosy questions he didn't really want the answers to but somehow felt compelled to ask. His field was the minor poets of the 18th Century, that was the kind of dude he was. Well, the hell with it. I had to go and see him.

He met me at the door of his study and escorted me to a padded chair with an arm under my elbow.

"Well, sit down."

"Thank you, sir." I sat down. As I did, he turned away from me to look out the window. All I could see of him were his hands, which twisted and turned as he built up steam for our little chat. Finally, he turned again to face me.

"Harkness, you probably know why I've called you in today."

"Yes, sir. I have a fairly good idea."

"A fairly good idea. Ah-ha." He went over to his desk and began to fill his pipe. The seniortutor had a way of repeating things that you'd said as if they were meant to be funny. It was not very amusing.

"And what would that fairly good idea be, may I ask?"

"I suppose that I screwed that economics exam yesterday."

"You suppose that you--ah-ha, yes. You mean to say that you suppose that you did poorly on the exam."

"Yes, sir."

"You did poorly. Harkness, you did very poorly." Pausing to light his pipe. "You flunked it. as a matter of fact."

"Sir."

"I said you flunked it."

"Yes, sir."

"Well," he said, looking up from behind billows of smoke. "Is that all you have to say?"

"What else is there to say?" I said. "What's done is done."

He smiled benevolently at that. It was one of his favorite sayings. "Well, yes," he said. "Now. I assume that you know what your failure means?"

"I think so," I said.

"It means that your period of academic probation will not end this spring but will continue next fall. Until the end of the fall term," he explained.

"Yes, sir," I said.

Having finished with that, the tutor seemed suddenly relieved. He sat down in front of me on the edge of his desk, as if to show me how he was letting his hair down. Business was done and now it was time for an intimate chat.

"Now, Harkness," he said, "I've been looking through your folder. While I've been waiting for you, you see, just glancing through. But I must say that I don't understand your case at all.Not at all."

"Sir?"

"I've been looking at your high school records, both scholastic and athletic. And your recommendations. And the comments of your freshman proctor and advisors, that sort of thing."

"Sir."

"And I don't understand it at all. You're not performing up to expectations, Harkness. You know that, of course."

"Yes, sir."

"Yes. Well, I was wondering if you could give me any clues as to why. From all the indications of your record, you should have been a sort of Harvard Frank Merriwell."

"Thank you, sir." Bloated asshole.

"I've been wondering if there were any problems you might be having. Personal problems, family problems, financial problems? That I might assist you in straightening out?" He looked at me, but I tried to look blank. "After all," he said expansively, "that's what I'm here for."

"No, sir," I said. "I don't think there are. But thank you, anyway." Nosy bastard.

"Well, Harkness," he went on, "I was wondering, because I've noticed a certain trend in your behavioral development, if I may say so. For example, you came here an all-America n in football, and yet you quit alter the first half of the season."

"Well, sir," I said, "if you knew the coach, I think--"

"Now, now," he said, holding up his pipe, "just let me finish. You quit playing football and shortly after that, your grades dropped. The next year, last year, that is, you were involved in one of the radical student political organizations that we tolerate here on campus. And you achieved some prominence in that endeavor. But you quit that, too. Now, during this year, you haven't pursued any organized activities that I know of; and so you haven't quit anything. But it doesn't seem to me that you've been doing anything, either, Harkness, if you will permit me to say so."

"Sir," I said. Nothing more. The imbecile.

"Well," he said, "do you have anything to say?"

"In my defense, sir?" I cocked my head.

"Oh, come now, Harkness," he said, getting off his desk, "that's distorting my meaning quite deliberately, don't you think? I'm not trying to accuse you of anything, I'm trying to help you."

"Thank you, sir. But I don't think I need anyone's help right now but my own."

"As you wish," he said.

"Thank you, sir," again.

"Well," he said, "hope you do better next round. And if anything comes up, don't hesitate to come and see me. My secretary will make an appointment for you." Edging me to the door.

"Thank you, sir," again.

"It's normally a week or so from the appointment to the meeting, but if you feel that you have something important to discuss, we could make it a day or two, you know."

"Thank you, sir," again.

He opened the door, looked out at his secretary and the crowded sitting room and then closed it.

"There is just one more thing I should like to say to you, Harkness. As regards your record."

"Sir." Here we go again. The old fart could never find a last word that really suited him, so he just dribbled on endlessly.

"Sit down, Harkness, sit down." He filled his pipe and smuggled into his chair. "It's not exactly my field," he began, "but I've made a quite extensive study of the man and his work. And I think that in some ways, my conclusions about him can be applied to you as well."

"Sir?" I said. What was this routine?

"De Quincey," he said, "Thomas De Quincey. Are you familiar with his work?" puffing on his pipe fatuously.

"Only vaguely," I said, thinking, Of course I am, moron.

"Yes," he went on, as though he would have been disappointed if I'd said anything else. "A very interesting fellow, De Quincey was." He paused and looked at me. "Is, I should say, in light of your case."

"Sir?"

"Are you, ah, at home with his little volume on the aspects and vagaries of the opium eater's existence?"

"No, sir." God, not this.

"Well, De Quincey was an addict himself, you know, an opium addict. And he wrote a fascinating little study of his addiction, titled Confessions of an English Opium Eater. Fascinating." He glanced over at me to make sure that I was with him and I nodded. "And in the course of his account, he makes some extraordinary observations." Looking at me again. "For instance, at one point, he remarks that 'opium eaters never finish anything.' That's a wonderfully, oh, to-the-point remark, don't you think, Harkness?"

"Telling it like it is," I murmured. The asshole.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Yes, sir, it is."

"Yes," he said, "I quite agree. Well, do you see the connection, then, do you see what I'm driving at?"

"Yes, sir," I said. "I think I do."

"Uh-huh," fumbling with his pipe, which had, as usual, gone out. "And do you have any, ah, comment on the matter? Does it strike a responsive chord, I should say."

"I don't believe so," I said.

"None at all?" he queried. Man, he was begging for it.

"Only an intellectual one," I said finally.

"Ah-ha," he nodded. "And what is that?"

"Artaud," I said. "You're familiar with Artaud, I take it?"

The senior tutor blinked. "Well, he's not in my field, you understand, but, yes, I think that I'm familiar with the rudiments of the man's work." That got his goat, the old turd. I was playing it his way and it hurt.

"Artaud was also an addict, a morphine addict, that is, and his comment on the matter was that"--I paused, trying to get it out right--"his comment was that as long as we haven't been able to abolish a single cause of human desperation, we do not have the right to try to suppress the means by which man tries to clean himself of desperation." I paused and looked at the tutor. "Those were his words on the subject. Of course, Artaud was himself a desperate man when he wrote them, desperate in a sense probably unknown to De Quincey. Because when he wrote his little essay on opium, they were getting ready to cart him off to the madhouse. And not for being an addict," I added.

"I see," said the tutor, who looked as if he didn't know what the hell I was talking about. "Yes, I see. Artaud. I'll have to look into him. He was one of those cruelty fellows, wasn't he?"

"That's right," I said.

"Yes. Well." He stood up again and held out his hand. "It's been good talking to you, Harkness, and remember, if you should think of anything that you want to discuss, or perhaps if you should just feel like a chat, don't hesitate to let Miss Burns know."

"I will," I said, "and thank you, sir."

"Yes, yes," he said, showing me to the door.

• • •

Two days of earnestly anemic study went by and then John marched into my room and plunked down on the bed.

"How's it going?" he said, which I did not bother to respond to, since John didn't give a goddamn how it was going and never had. All he meant was that he had something on his mind. He pulled out a joint. "Want to blow some?"

I shook my head. I was feeling virtuously studious and I knew that the dope would kill that. I also knew that I couldn't sit around and watch him smoke too long, so I said: "What's happening?"

"Well," John said, "I'm thinking about this Lotus, it's in beautiful shape and the cat who's selling it is the original owner. I'm going over to look at it tomorrow." He sucked in a deep drag. "Want to come?"

"Sure," I said, "but you didn't come in here to lay that down."

He laughed and took another hit. "I can see the studying has brought your mind to a keen edge, Peter," he said. "Well, what I wanted to know"--another hit--"fine dope, you sure you don't want any?"

"You wanted to know."

He laughed again. "Quite right," he said. "All business. I wanted to know if this chick is still up for doing it."

Then I remembered. "I meant to tell you," I said. "She called last night and said she'd love to go to New York with you, but she's used up all her overnights."

"No, no," John said, "I meant--is that right? The little bitch. She called last night? I didn't know that. Why didn't you get hold of me?"

"You were in the rack with Sandra," I said.

"Oh, yeah," John said, remembering. "Oh, yeah." He thought about it some more. "She can't go overnight? Jesus, that screws the whole weekend."

"Tell her that," I said.

He laughed and then was silent and finally said, as if remembering suddenly, "No, listen, I was talking about something else--that California chick, what's-her-name, does she still want to make a trip?"

That was surprising, even shocking. John's head was bent, but on one thing he was firm: He never changed his mind. Never, under any circumstances. I didn't know whether it was from obstinacy or pride or his old Boston upbringing, but whatever the reason, it was true.

"Yeah, she'll do it." I didn't hesitate. I knew I could talk her into it--I'd almost done as much when the run wasn't even a sure thing. It was a way to come out and she wouldn't worry about it if I said it was cool.

But I was interested in John's change of mind, in his sudden acceptance of Sukie. Hell, last time I talked to him, he hadn't even considered the possibility.

"What happened?" I said. "Couldn't you find anyone else?"

John shrugged. "Well, let's see. You can't go, because you fucked your exam. And everyone else's wonking their nads off for exams." He laughed. "Not doing a fucking thing, really, just sitting around chewing their nails. But if they're going to worry, they're going to do it here." He shook his heart pityingly, then looked up at me. "The other thing is that Musty called and said he was leaving town for a while. He said if I wanted anything more before July, I had to do it now. So here we are." He smiled and took out another joint, lit it, passed it to me.

I took a long hit. "Musty's leaving town fast, huh?"

"That's the riff," said John.

"Far out," I said and then laughed. Things had worked out better than I had hoped. I'd known that John would be pressed for a runner, but I didn't think he'd offer to let Sukie do it. I thought I'd have to cudgel him into it--and then here he was, asking me if I thought she could make it. I laughed again. "Yeah, she'll do it."

"Good enough," said John. "Everything's set up; you'll send the money to Sukie and Musty's got the bricks ready. So all you've got to do is call the chick and let her in on it."

"Pretty sure of yourself, weren't you, John." It wasn't a question, it was a statement of fact. But John didn't take it that way.

He waved the joint in my direction and said: "You were pretty sure of yourself, Peter." I guessed that he'd been figuring things out with Musty, and laughed.

"Yeah, I guess I was. But what the hell. She's coming. When's she flying in, anyway?"

"Saturday, around two."

I thought that one over and then realized what he had said.

"Saturday, good God! Not Saturday. I'm supposed to go to the Piggy picnic on Saturday."

"That's right."

"Well, the hell with that. Annie Butler can blow her mind at me all she wants, I'm just not going to be able to make it. I'd better let her know as soon as I talk to Sukie--"

"Peter," said John. Nothing more.

"Yeah?"

"You're not going to tell Annie anything. I may have to let this chick make the run, but I don't have to let you two lovebirds fuck things up by prancing around Logan together for every one of Murphy's pigs to see and admire."

"What the hell--"

"Murphy busted you in Oakland, with the chick in the same room, light? And I expect that your mugs are fairly well known by the narc-squad pigs by now."

"Oh, for Chrissake, get off it. Maybe my mug--maybe, if you really stretch it--but Sukie's, never. I'm going to go down and pick her up and Annie Butler can go to hell."

John puffed slowly on what was by this time a dark roach. Finally, he said: "This is my run and we're going to do it my way or not at all. You can tell the chick on the phone why you're not going to be there to meet her--but that's all. I'm not going to have this thing fuck up just to please your absurd sense of decorum, and that's all it is, Peter, so don't go making those bullshit faces at me. When the chick lands in Boston, you're going to be having the time of your life at the Piggy Club Garden Party. Period. I will be down at Logan waiting for her and she'll be in the room about the time that you and Annie fondly bid each other farewell." He paused and looked at me. "Understand?"

There was nothing to say. I left the room to find a pay phone. It was better not to use mine for this call.

• • •

A surprised voice answered, sounding very far away. It was a lousy connection. "Peter?"

"Yeah. How you doing, baby?"

"Fine, just fine. Peter, God, it's good to hear from you."

I didn't say anything for a minute, just got stoned out of my mind on her voice, on the sound, knowing that in a few days the sound would be next to me and not coming through a piece of plastic that demanded more money every three minutes. Then I said: "Listen, honey. I've just been talking to John."

"John?"

"Yeah, you remember, my friend John back here, the guy I scored the bricks for when I was in Berkeley?"

"Oh." It wasn't noncommittal. It was just that she was beginning to understand. I had to keep it moving.

"Well, you remember that conversation we had after my exam?"

"Yeah, I remember. Is this where John--"

"Just listen, honey, just let me finish. Things haven't been going too well for me around here. I mean, I've been trying to get some bread together so I could come out and see you again or so you could come out here--you know, like, the summer's getting here and if we could get together, we could do up the summer--"

"I'll do it, Peter." That was all she said.

"You don't mind? I mean, you know what I'm talking about--"

"I'll do it. I mind, but I'll do it. I want to see you."

I took a deep breath and it felt good. The chick was very, very together. "OK, beautiful honey, that's beautiful. That's so beautiful, I can't even tell you. Listen, soon as you get here, I'll take care of things, you know, a place to stay and eat and that whole riff, you don't worry about it, I'll work it all out. And then if you dig it around here, we can do up the summer, you know, and--"

"Don't, Peter. You're blowing my mind. Just don't talk like that till I'm with you, OK?"

I knew what she was saying. "OK, yeah, OK, you're right. Well, listen, I'll be sending the bread out to you tomorrow and Musty'll know the details, so he'll lay that end of it on you. The only other thing is that I won't be able to meet you at the airport."

I had expected her to wonder about that, but all she said was: "That's cool."

"Out of sight. John'll meet you; he doesn't want me around 'cause of the bust, but John'll meet you and as soon as you get back to Cambridge, I'll see you."

"That's cool."

Suddenly, I didn't have anything more to say. I just wanted to see her and talking business like this was only making it worse.

"Well--"

I started to lay down something mindless, but she cut me off and said: "Peter. Take care of yourself."

I laughed at that. "I will, baby. You do the same."

"Don't worry about me," she said. "You just be good." And then the operator was demanding more bread and Sukie was saying goodbye and it was over.

As soon as I got back to the room, I asked John if I could have a lid from his dresser drawer.

"Gonna can the studying for a bit, Peter, old boy?"

"Not can it, just enjoy myself before I get back on it."

John laughed. "Enjoy yourself, huh? You already look like you're enjoying yourself. You look like you just balled a nun, for Chrissake."

I laughed with him when he said that and thought about Saturday.

The pig came out from behind the desk. "You're a really funny guy, Harkness," he said, and kneed me in the groin.

This is the second of three installments of "Dealing." The final installment of the novel will appear in the February issue.