Hard Rain Falling - Don Carpenter [67]
McHenry had not moved from his place, and the big Negro was still standing on the table. Men held Jack right up to the table, and McHenry said, “We got to hurry this. Those guys will have to go down to the dispensary.” He looked up at Jack and said, “I’m the judge of the sanitary court. You like to killed a couple of my deppities. I’m going to fine you for that. You got to learn the rules of this tank, and I’m going to fine you for not coming along. Do you have any money?”
Within, Jack was amused and distant, but all he could think of to say was, “Fuck you.”
McHenry laughed, his gray eyes almost disappearing behind wrinkles of merriment. “I’m going to fine you for that, too. Matter of fact, I happen to know exactly how much money you got downstairs. Tomorrow, you just tell the deppity to transfer fifteen dollars from your account to mine. It ain’t legal, but he’ll do it. My name’s McHenry. You’ll get the rest of your fine tomorrow night. We got to hurry. Rest of the fine is fifty whacks. You want to know what a whack is? You want to know the rest of the rules, so’s you don’t go around busting the rules?”
“Fuck your mother,” Jack said.
McHenry shrugged, as if it was out of his hands now. “Beat shit out of him and put him back in his cell. Tomorrow night court con-venes again. Get the deppities in here for them guys been fightin.”
The Negro jumped down from the table, and while the men still held Jack, began hitting him in the chest and belly, hard short chops, his breath coming in grunts at each blow, until Jack went blind from the pain and heard himself distantly whimpering. After that he could remember nothing. He was told later that after he was put on his bunk unconscious all the other prisoners started yelling, and after a while the deputy out in the foyer came in, and then brought others up from downstairs, and they carried out the men Jack had wrecked. The one Jack had knocked out came back the next day, but the other two went to the county hospital and Jack never saw them again. If he had he would not have known them.
The next morning he was sitting by himself on one of the benches while the “outs”—men without money who had to do the work—cleaned up. He felt all right, he was still in pretty good condition, and if he ached all over it was not a new sensation. He noticed McHenry sitting at one of the tables with two other men, a big man, heavy, thick, as hard as teakwood. McHenry turned toward Jack and nodded to him, smiling, and then said something to the others and got up and came over. He sat down on the bench beside Jack and said, “A few aches and pains, Levitt?”
“A few,” Jack said.
“We got to have rules,” McHenry said.
“I know it. All you had to do was ask me.”
“Send you a subpoena, hey? Okay, I did it wrong.” He held out his hand. “Shake?”
It was impossible to refuse the hand.
“Breakfast on me this morning,” McHenry said. “While we eat I’ll tell you the rules of the tank. That is, if you want to learn them.”
They sat alone at one of the tables and had buckwheat cakes, bacon, scrambled eggs, and coffee, while McHenry told Jack the rules. They were really very simple and logical, and their function was to make the tank livable. Everyone in the tank is automatically a member of the sanitary court and is fined three whacks or three dollars; everyone must wash himself thoroughly in the weekly shower and keep as clean as possible the rest of the time, or is fined three whacks or three dollars; no one is allowed to make unnecessary noise after lights-out or is fined as the judge sees fit; no one is allowed to resist the judge or is fined as the judge sees fit; no fighting is allowed; no one is permitted to steal from his fellow inmates; no one is allowed to speak out against his fellow inmates, or is brought before the court and fined at least fifty whacks; no one is allowed to make a fuss in the open visitor’s room; anyone caught cheating at cards is banned from the game and fined all the money in his