“Max?”

Wally stood in the door like he was scared to come in. His face was pale and he kept wetting his lips.

Holman said, “What’s wrong? Wally, you having a heart attack, what?”

Wally closed the door. He glanced at a little notepad like something was on it he didn’t have right. He was visibly shaken.

“Wally, what?”

“You have a son, right? Richie?”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“What’s his full name?”

“Richard Dale Holman.”

Holman stood. He didn’t like the way Wally was fidgeting and licking his lips.

“You know I have a boy. You’ve seen his picture.”

“He’s a kid.”

“He’d be twenty-three now. He’s twenty-three. Why you want to know about this?”

“Max, listen, is he a police officer? Here in L.A.?”

“That’s right.”

Wally came over and touched Holman’s arm with fingers as light as a breath.

“It’s bad, Max. I have some bad news now and I want you to get ready for it.”

Wally searched Holman’s eyes as if he wanted a sign, so Holman nodded.

“Okay, Wally. What?”

“He was killed last night. I’m sorry, man. I’m really, really sorry.”

Holman heard the words; he saw the pain in Wally’s eyes and felt the concern in Wally’s touch, but Wally and the room and the world left Holman behind like one car pulling away from another on a flat desert highway, Holman hitting the brakes, Wally hitting the gas, Holman watching the world race away.

Then he caught up and fought down an empty, terrible ache.

“What happened?”

“I don’t know, Max. There was a call from the Bureau of Prisons when I went for your papers. They didn’t have much to say. They wasn’t even sure it was you or if you were still here.”

Holman sat down again and this time Wally sat beside him. Holman had wanted to look up his son after he spoke with Donna. That last time he saw the boy, just two months before Holman was pinched in the bank gig, the boy had told him to fuck off, running alongside the car as Holman drove away, eyes wet and bulging, screaming that Holman was a loser, screaming fuck off, you loser. Holman still dreamed about it. Now here they were and Holman was left with the empty sense that everything he had been moving to for the past ten years had come to a drifting stop like a ship that had lost its way.

Wally said, “You want to cry, it’s okay.”

Holman didn’t cry. He wanted to know who did it.

Dear Max,

I am writing because I want you to know that Richard has made something of himself despite your bad blood. Richard has joined the police department. This past Sunday he graduated at the police academy by Dodger stadium and it was really something. The mayor spoke and helicopters flew so low. Richard is now a police officer. He is strong and good and not like you. I am so proud of him. He looked so handsome. I think this is his way of proving there is no truth to that old saying “like father like son.”

Donna

This was the last letter Holman received, back when he was still at Lompoc. Holman remembered getting to the part where she wrote there was no truth about being like father like son, and what he felt when he read those words wasn’t embarrassment or shame; he felt relief. He remembered thinking, thank God, thank God.

He wrote back, but the letters were returned. He wrote to his son care of the Los Angeles Police Department, just a short note to congratulate the boy, but never received an answer. He didn’t know if Richie received the letter or not. He didn’t want to force himself on the boy. He had not written again.

“WHAT SHOULD I DO?”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know what to do about this. Is there someone I’m supposed to see? Something I’m supposed to do?”

Holman had served a total of nine months juvenile time before he was seventeen years old. His first adult time came when he was eighteen-six months for grand theft auto. This was followed by sixteen months of state time for burglary, then three years for a stacked count of robbery and breaking and entering. Altogether, Holman had spent one-third of his adult life in state and federal facilities. He was used to people telling him what to do and where to do it. Wally seemed to read his confusion.

“You go on with what you were doing, I guess. He was a policeman. Jesus, you never said he was a policeman. That’s intense.”

“What about the arrangements?”

“I don’t know. I guess the police do that.”

Holman tried to imagine what responsible people did at times like this, but he had no experience. His mother had died when he was young and his father had died when Holman was serving the first burglary stretch. He had nothing to do with burying them.

“They sure it’s the same Richie Holman?”

“You want to see one of the counselors? We could get someone in here.”

“I don’t need a counselor, Wally. I want to know what happened. You tell me my boy was killed, I want to know things. You can’t just tell a man his boy was killed and let it go with that. Jesus Christ.”

Wally made a patting gesture with his hands, trying to keep Holman calm, but Holman didn’t feel upset. He didn’t know what else to do or what to say or have anyone to say it to except Wally.

Holman said, “Jesus, Donna must be devastated. I’d better talk to her.”

“Okay. Can I help with that?”

“I don’t know. The police gotta know how to reach her. If they called me they would’ve called her.”

“Let me see what I can find out. I told Gail I’d get back to her after I saw you. She was the one got the call from the police.”

Gail Manelli was a businesslike young woman with no sense of humor, but Holman liked her.

“Okay, Wally,” Holman said. “Sure.”

Wally spoke with Gail, who told them Holman could obtain additional information from Richie’s commander at the Devonshire Station up in Chatsworth, where Richie worked. Twenty minutes later Wally drove Holman north out of Venice on the 405 and into the San Fernando Valley. The trip took almost thirty minutes. They parked outside a clean, flat building that looked more like a modern suburban library than a police station. The air tasted like pencil lead. Holman had resided at the CCC for twelve weeks, but had not been outside of Venice, which always had great air because it was on the water. Living on a short leash like that, cons in transition called it being on the farm. Cons in transition were called transitionary inmates. There were names for everything when you were in the system.

Wally got out of the car like he was stepping into soup.

“Jesus, it’s hotter’n hell up here.”

Holman didn’t say anything. He liked the heat, enjoying the way it warmed his skin.

They identified themselves at the reception desk and asked for Captain Levy. Levy, Gail said, had been Richie’s commanding officer. Holman had been arrested by the Los Angeles Police Department on a dozen occasions, but had never seen the Devonshire Station before. The institutional lighting and austere government decor left him with the sense that he had been here before and would be again. Police stations, courts, and penal institutions had been a part of Holman’s life since he was fourteen years old. They felt normal. His counselors in prison had drummed it home that career criminals like Holman had difficulty going straight because crime and the penalties of crime were a normal part of their lives-the criminal lost his fear of the penalties of his actions. Holman knew this to be true. Here he was surrounded by people with guns and badges, and he didn’t feel a thing. He was disappointed. He thought he might feel afraid or at least apprehensive, but he might as well have been standing in a Ralphs market.

A uniformed officer about Holman’s age came out, and the desk officer waved them over. He had short silvery hair and stars on his shoulders, so Holman took him for Levy. He looked at Wally.