Christopher Sorrentino - Trance

“Well,” Hank says, “I’ve kept you long enough.”

“De nada. I was happy to help you out. You know. People just need to, you know, help each other out. When they need help.”

“Of course.”

“That’s the way I do things. That’s the way we did it for Alice.”

“I appreciate that. And if there’s ever anything I can do for you, be sure and let me know.”

Will he ever, baby. For the modern Samaritan there are scores and scores of hazards waiting on that ancient road between Jerusalem and Jericho.

POLHAUS PACES THE FLOOR in his office. He’s been feeling jumpy lately. A pushy young woman holding a microphone caught him outside the building after lunch, stuck the mike right in his face. Startled the hell out of him. For a long long time, since RFK, since Ruby, he’s carried around a mental image of an individual emerging from a crowd, separating from it, breaking from the communion of its focus to carry forward its secret longing, to consume and destroy the object of that focus. The usual deadbeats were outside trying to get a quote from him in time to make their deadlines, and suddenly, “out of nowhere,” here comes this girl in a pantsuit. He jumped — then gave her the quote. They’re working hard every day to fulfill the hopes, dreams and aspirations of the world. Whatever. A dream is a wish your heart makes. He patted her ass; sue him. Why should he have to put up with this shit all the time?

He has Nietfeldt’s memo reporting a meeting between Hank Galton and Guy Mock. Nietfeldt: a few bricks short but good, perceptive, and he believes Galton’s trying to contact Alice independent of the Bureau’s efforts. Polhaus can just imagine how it’ll play if he has to arrest Hank as a material witness. Nietfeldt compares Galton’s front-page advocacy on Mock’s behalf with the Examiner’ s earlier support of Popeye Jackson. See what that got him. Mock’d be wise to watch his step.

Mention of Jackson makes him think of Sara Jane Moore, who hasn’t haunted his office in a while. He sits behind his desk, pulls out her file; since just before Popeye’s death, word’s been that she’s gone back over to the other side.

Subj. Moore observed leaving residence of known Black Panther Subj. Moore in altercation with merchant Subj. Moore evaded Agent known to her Subj. Moore observed distributing left wing handbills on Memorial Glade Subj. Moore obtained Post Office Box using forged documents

The boundary’s always permeable for someone like Sally. She needs only to be able to say that all that screwball concentration, that single-mindedness, belongs to something, is on a side, supports a cause. Doesn’t matter what.

He glances at the memo. Nietfeldt’s saying, Keep watching Mock. That’s dandy, but if someone fucks up, the guy’s perfectly capable of vanishing. Then they’d have zip. An empty farmhouse. There has to be something beyond Mock and Shimada, though. There has to be another link.

TEKO is LIVING IN a state of bachelor squalor in the dumpy apartment on W Street, a condition that mirrors his mood. Only Jeff is willing to stay with him there, and only occasionally, and only for a night or two at a time, tops, so while Capitol Avenue is always noisy and cheerful, W Street is sullen, made more so by the shrill cheer that emanates from the black-and-white portable that seems constantly to be on, the liveliness of miracle deodorants and mouthwashes.

“Two! — two! — two mints in one!”

The money goes fast. Seven people, two safe houses, some spendthrift overindulgence, and abruptly they’re needy again. No one questions the revolutionary impetus behind the next bakery scheme; it’s all but irrelevant. They need the money, and that’s simply that. Tania sees this very clearly. She’s happy to have Joan nearby, but Joan’s stories of the last several months in San Francisco, her naked contempt for Sacramento, for Teko and Yolanda, make Tania impatient to leave. They drive over to W Street one day to receive their marching orders.

Teko has been scouting large banks in regional centers, looking for a bigger score. As well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb, goes the thinking. Tania herself has been dispatched to Citrus Heights, Davis, and Auburn to check out branches there, returning to read aloud the found poetry of her notes: 5 women + two menl One is young + nervousl Manager is fat + Blackl Guardl Camera/ Peds + traffic. She drives around, from B of A to Wells Fargo, dropping her ashes into a beanbag ashtray on the dashboard. The beanbag has a tendency to slide from one end of the dashboard to the other, depending on whether she’s turning left or right.

Teko announces that their target is a Crocker Bank branch in Carmichael, another unincorporated area. It has no guards or cameras, and the place abuts a vacant lot on one side and has no windows facing the street. Yolanda has observed employees from nearby businesses showing up to cash their paychecks, probably drawn on Crocker payroll accounts, so the branch likely keeps a decent amount of money on hand. Teko also informs them that Yolanda will lead the assault team. Going in with her will be Jeff, Susan, and Roger. Tania and Joan will drive the two switch cars, taking assault team members back to the two safe houses. Teko will observe the operation from across the street, timing the response and providing backup.

After the meeting Teko asks Joan to stay behind. He goes into the bedroom, and warily, Joan follows. She finds him rooting through a footlocker, from which he extracts a stack of familiar-looking cassette tapes and a file folder full of notes. It’s the old SLA book. Teko tells Joan that he wants to revive the book project, as a hedge. So it all comes to money, Joan thinks. Due to Guy Mock’s “very favorable deportment” lately, Teko would like to offer Guy the opportunity to sell the book. Deportment is like a word from your report card if memory serves.

How well Joan remembers the Summer of the Book, the big spiel from Guy about how publishers would be hammering on his door with fistfuls of thousand-dollar bills, how John and Yoko wanted to write and star in a musical about them, all the razzle-dazzle horse-shit that made her realize that there isn’t one single radical in the USA who hasn’t spent a minute or two wondering who’d play him in the movie.

“We have to get in touch with Guy,” Teko says.

“I’ll try,” says Joan.

It turns out that Guy is the only revolutionary fugitive in recorded history who files a change of address with the PO when he goes underground. It takes Joan about a day to find him. She thinks

Teko is disappointed, like he wanted mail drops, coded messages, smoke signals for all she knows. Guy is raring to go. Tells her that he’s all ready to fly to New York and set up meetings, though he’s bugged that he hasn’t got a copy of the manuscript.

“Count your blessings,” she tells him.

They begin the grim work of rehearsal, pretending daily to rob, threaten, and assault one another. It goes poorly from the beginning. Jeff Wolfritz shakily levels a revolver at Tania that has bullets in the cylinder. Working with an automatic, Susan similarly chambers a live round and points the gun at Joan’s head. Yolanda insists on using the same fluky Remington 870 that Jeff carried into Guild Savings. It keeps dry-firing accidentally. The rasping click stops them all dead, every time.

“That’s getting worse,” says Jeff.

“I know how to handle a gun,” she insists.

C URIOUS DOINGS, ACCORDING TO the lights of any respectable California homeowner. A certain Janet White rents a garage to store her mother’s car, so she says. And then asks if the place has an electrical outlet. Well, it does. That is what is known as a modern convenience. But how curious that Miss Janet White should make such an inquiry. What else is a California homeowner to do but to contact his acquaintances in law enforcement?