Keeplock: A Novel of Crime Read Online Free PDF Page A

don’t remember it ever saying anything else. That’s why the board turned me down three times.”
    “It also says I should put my foot on your head and keep it there for the next five years. It says, ‘Intense Supervision.’”
    “I wouldn’t blame you, Simon. You gotta do what you gotta do.”
    “I’m glad to hear that. I’ve been thinking about you ever since I got the assignment and I’ve decided to follow the recommendations of the board. Things have changed in New York since you went inside. Caseloads are way up and I don’t have time to supervise anymore. None of us do. Now it’s all mechanical: check the urine, check the pay stubs, check the residence. Violate for any fuck-up. The media’s all over us. ‘Soft on criminals’ is what they call us. ‘Bleeding hearts.’ They don’t know a fucking thing about what we do, but every reporter’s an expert.”
    “Reality doesn’t sell papers, Simon. We both know that.” I was hoping for a smile, but I didn’t get it.
    “You could always talk a good line. That’s probably why I let you play me for a fool.”
    “It’s not gonna be like the last time. I can’t go back inside.”
    He held up my folder again. “Says here that you got yourself a college degree.”
    “I had a lotta time, Simon, and not much to do with it.”
    “You figure to use that degree to get a job?”
    “Maybe a few years down the road. I don’t think my resume would interest IBM right now.”
    “Yeah, well that’s realistic. In the meantime you’re gonna flip hamburgers or push a broom. I’ll give you a referral after you settle in.”
    “Where am I going?”
    He ignored the question. “You report on time, Pete. Miss an appointment and you’re violated. You pee in the bottle on every visit. Come up dirty and you’re violated. You maintain a residence. You get a job and show up for it. Quit your job or change your residence without my permission, you’re violated.”
    “Look, Simon, something happened to me inside. Or almost happened to me.” I went on to tell him about Terrentini and, to his credit, he heard me out.
    “The first thing, Pete, is that you’re going into a shelter. What they call a Tier II facility. It’s run by a private agency—The Ludlum Foundation. You like that? The Ludlum Foundation? They’ll explain the setup when you get there, but I guarantee it’s a lot better than a six-hundred-bed shelter. You’ll still be associating with other criminals, because we’ve been assigning ex-offenders to The Ludlum Foundation for the last year. The facility is right in the middle of Hell’s Kitchen, which is one of the biggest dope and coke neighborhoods in the city. That’s another problem for you. I expect you did drugs in Cortlandt.”
    “Not all the time. I couldn’t afford it. And I stayed clean while I was in the school program. Stayed away from every kind of trouble.”
    “You said, ‘Shit happens,’ a little while ago. Now you’re telling me that shit didn’t happen to happen while you were going to school?”
    I didn’t have a ready answer to that. I’d managed to avoid a beef during the school year, but caught my share of keeplocks in the summer, when school was out. “Could be somebody was watching out for me. Could be I was just lucky.”
    “Well, you better hope that lucky star is still shining up in heaven, because I’m gonna be on your ass until you prove yourself. This ain’t no courtroom, Pete. You’re guilty until you prove yourself innocent.”
    I’d been living with that reality for a long time, but since I was mostly guilty, I had nothing to complain about. “We’re goin’ in circles, Simon.”
    He drummed on the desk with sausage-thick fingers. “You in a hurry, Pete? You got an appointment?”
    “Maybe I ‘matured out.’ Isn’t that how the penologists like to put it? Maybe I’ve had enough. Life is worthless in Cortlandt. Wait a second, let me take that back. Life does have a value in Cortlandt. It’s