Free Whom Dog Hath Joined by Neil S. Plakcy

city,
then found the round glassy rotunda of the courthouse.
    I parked and took the elevator to the seventh floor. My
heart raced as I opened the door to the Parole Board’s office. I checked in
with the receptionist, ten minutes early for my nine o’clock appointment, and
took a seat on a hard wooden bench in the waiting room.
    As the time ticked away without any summons from Santos, my
tension level rose, as I imagined all the reasons why he was keeping me
waiting. He couldn’t be on the phone to someone in California; it was too early
in the morning for that. But suppose he was reviewing my records, picking away
at details?
    The walls were painted institutional green, and the only
decorations were mounted posters explaining parole board rules. Other parolees
came and went around me, from young men with tattoos up and down their arms to
a cheerful woman in her forties, to a heavyset man in his sixties with a
grizzled beard and a VFW ball cap. I couldn’t help wondering what their
offenses had been. Drugs? Theft? Assault? I knew from Rick that those were the
most common crimes, after DUI violations. Bucks County was not exactly a hotbed
of crime, though our proximity to Philadelphia, and to Trenton across the river
in New Jersey, put us somewhat at risk.
    At nine-forty-five I called Mark Figueroa to reschedule our
eleven a.m. appointment at Friar Lake. “Can you make one o’clock?” I asked.
    “Sure. The store’s closed on Mondays so I’ve got the whole
day free.”
    “Thanks, Mark. I appreciate it.”
    I hung up and debated going up to the receptionist to ask
when Santos would be able to see me. But I held back, unwilling to make a fuss.
    By the time I was called, at ten, my tension level was
through the roof. I was worried about what Santos might say, irritated about
rescheduling the session with Mark,  and nervous that I’d accidentally say
something that might compromise me.
    “Steve! Sorry to keep you waiting, but you know how it is in
government. Come on back.”
    Santos was a stocky Puerto Rican guy a few years younger
than I was, and I’d always felt he was fair and truly interested in helping me.
But at the same time, he’d been very strict whenever I’d come close to a
violation, and sometimes I found his attitude  patronizing, as if I was some
kind of common criminal. Which I guessed I was.
    “No problem,” I said, trying to calm down, as he led me into
a warren of cubicles, and motioned me to sit in the visitor’s chair across from
his desk.
    “You had an attitude problem when we started working
together,” he said, as he sat down. “I’m not sure you’ve overcome it, but
you’ve managed to stay under my radar for two years, and the state says I have
to set you loose.”
    I didn’t know how to respond to that, so I said nothing.
    He sat back in his chair and picked up a yellow rubber
squeeze ball emblazoned with the Doylestown Hospital logo, a series of
piggybacked triangles. “I have a feeling you’ve been flying loose with some of
the conditions of your parole, but I could never catch you.” Santos gripped the
squeeze ball. “That doesn’t mean you won’t get caught again, though.”
    I was about to protest, but he pushed his chair back
abruptly and stood up. “Let’s get this over with.” He dropped the squeeze ball
to his desk, where it bounced a couple of times then fell to the floor.
    I followed him to an office with a floor-to-ceiling window
overlooking Court Street. A middle-aged black woman sat behind a cluttered
desk, wearing a navy business suit with a scarf around her neck. She had a
stack of file folders in front of her.
    “Steve Levitan, this is Barbara Aurum, my supervisor,”
Santos said. “Mrs. Aurum has to sign off on all our parole completions.”
    “Pleased to meet you,” I said. As I shook her hand. I got a
closer look at her scarf. “Is that the Paris metro system?”
    She smiled. “I admit, I’m an absolute Francophile. If I
could, I’d live in