Prisoner in the Kitchen: The Car Thief, the Murderer, and the Man Hired to Feed Them by William Bonham

Author:William Bonham [Bonham, William]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography, Autobiography, Personal Memoirs, Social Science, Penology, True Crime
ISBN: 9781501139512
Google: _5efCgAAQBAJ
Amazon: B015WNZ4LY
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2016-03-28T23:00:00+00:00

18

O, CHRISTMAS TREE

It was the middle of December and I was trying to walk through two feet of snow. I pulled my left foot up and out, shoved it forward, and let it sink. I did the same with my right foot. Both legs were lost now, buried in snow that rose over my boots and up my legs, ending a few inches below my knees. Snow clung to my jeans, and my body heat had melted it. My knees felt like two frozen, aching knobs.

I stood there, breathing hard.

Deer Lodge was a mile and a half behind and below me. If I turned my head, I could see it sitting in the white valley. From high on this hill it looked like a winter diorama; you could see the little churches and houses surrounded and covered with snow, smoke coming out of the chimneys, and a few cars moving slowly down the highway. Snow and distance had bestowed an icy beauty on Deer Lodge, and even the prison had a cold grandeur.

Anne was out here, too, ahead of me by a long way, marching through the snow, not winded at all. I’d led the search for the first hour, crisscrossing the hillside, but Anne had paced herself; I’d burned myself out. Now I had to catch up. I picked up a foot and moved on.

We had trekked out on this freezing day because of something Bill and Charlie had said to me at 4B’s. I’d mentioned that Anne and I were going to get our Christmas tree that night.

“Where?” Charlie asked.

I said probably the Christmas tree lot on Main Street. Charlie shook his head.

“Only a jackass buys a Christmas tree,” Charlie proclaimed.

Bill, sitting next to Charlie, agreed. “A waste of money,” he said.

“What I meant,” Charlie continued, “is where are you going to cut one down? If you want a Christmas tree, you just go out in the damned woods.”

“That’s right,” said Bill. “Just make sure you take one on state land.”

Charlie sipped his coffee and Bill puffed on his pipe. Why did I have to take a tree on state land?

“Because if you take one on private land, it’s stealing,” said Bill, “and you could be fired.”

Although I had no interest in breaking the law, I had no idea where private land ended and state land began. Charlie took a napkin and drew a map to a road southeast of town that led to all the public land anyone could hope for.

While I was sitting in a nice warm restaurant, cutting down my own tree sounded like fun, kind of old-fashioned and Christmas-y. As was true for most people, all the Christmas trees of my life had been purchased at a lot in a city. This year could be different. I took the map from Charlie, put it in my pocket, and went to work. That day I fell into a kind of Currier and Ives reverie, picturing myself striding out of the woods with a tree over my shoulder.

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