Bob and Bernard became partners in canning. Bob’s addiction to stimulants, however, turned out to be insatiable. Because canning brought in so little money, Bob developed his skills as a con artist and master crook. Bob had something childish and naïve about him, and thanks to his charm, nobody, not even his victims, was able to stay angry with him for long.
Chris Pape once told me how he fell for one of Bob’s tricks; it cost him twenty dollars. Bob had played a master game over some rental videotapes, and had tricked even the very streetwise Chris Pape. Bernard was so embarrassed by Bob’s behavior that he even offered to pay back Pape little by little.
The first time I saw Bob, I was struck by the likeness of Pape’s portrait of him. Bob was a white man with a brash, protruding under-lip. His face was marked by thousands of wrinkles in which shiny eyes twinkled between swollen eyelids. Like a protennis player, he had a white sweatband around his head, keeping together his wild electric hair that still stuck out to all sides.
He was funny, outrageous, and ridiculous. Bob giggled and snickered, unable to utter one sensible word apart from a compliment about my coffee-making capacities. I liked him immediately.
We inspect Bob’s bunker. Sometimes, Bob comes down for a weekend to visit Bernard, but on weekdays his place is empty. It is in the middle of a row of bunkers. On a wooden door is a small padlock to which Bernard has the key. With candles and a flashlight we light up the interior. It is a spacious room, nine feet high, twelve feet deep and twenty feet wide. On the left side there is a king-size bed with blankets neatly pulled over it. I smell the blankets: they are a little damp but clean.
An ashtray and a candle stand on a little cupboard near the bed. Next to it is a large table with some chairs and an oil lamp. On the right side of the room there are two lounging chairs, a sofa, and a coffee table filled with empty cigarette packs, crack vials, and molten candle wax. In the opposite corner Bob has an unused, empty fridge.
“Perfect,” I say. Just needs a bit of dusting and clean sheets, and it is an excellent accommodation. “Well, well, that Bob,” Bernard says, a bit surprised. “He sure had it good together here.”
We discuss the house rules. There is no toilet, so to urinate, I have to go outside, preferably as far away as possible. To take a dump, there is a special designated place in a dark spot of the tunnel with a pile of sand. “Just dig a hole and cover it with sand once done, just like a cat,” Bernard explains. “I don’t want it to smell like at these dirty bums’ at the South End.” These are the only house rules. I promise to keep everything as tidy as possible, and contribute my fair share in getting food, water, and wood.
My only concern is how to make coffee. Bernard laughs. No problem. Bob also was a hardcore coffee addict. There are a few coffeemakers and three big thermos cans, so there can be hot coffee around the clock.
Bernard is more into herbal tea, he says. He prefers chamomile tea, with a piece of lemon.
It’s a done deal. We go up top to make copies of the keys of the North Gate and Bob’s bunker. That way, I don’t have to call Bernard through the grate and I can come and go when I want. On our way out, Bernard tells me about my interview requests with the other tunnel people. Marcus, who lives down a little farther, wants to talk. But Ramon and Estoban are stubborn. They are Cubans who live at the South End. Williams had already showed me Little Havana—four, five sloppily constructed wooden shacks. “They asked me what’s in it for them,” Bernard says shaking his head. “Ramon and Estoban live here out of shame. They are not receptive.”
It is maybe better if I approach them myself of these days. Halfway to the North Gate, just opposite the Mona Lisa painting, Bernard calls out above him. “Marcus! Are you home?” Behind a small opening in the tunnel wall, a staircase leads to an emergency exit. Next to it is a deep cave between the walls and the ceiling. We hear a rustling coming from the black hole, and someone sticks his head out. He crawls out of his cave and balances over a wall towards the stairs. Bernard introduces me as the reporter from Brussels.
“Ah, bonjour,” Marcus says. He says he doesn’t want to talk to journalists, but proceeds immediately in an unstoppable monologue. Marcus is from Maine but learnt to speak French in nearby Quebec. We discuss Walter’s murder. “It would not have happened here in the tunnel,” Marcus says. “Ici, nous sommes des copains.”
Marcus is an old hippy. His jean jacket is covered in stains and smudges. Long, greasy hair sticks out from under a purple cap; his long beard rests on a purple sweater. Since it is quite chilly, he has also wrapped a purple shawl around himself. Marcus, who wears a chain with a huge yin and yang sign, explains that he is into health food. With winter approaching, he is preparing himself for his annual migration to Florida. He has been living in the tunnel for five years already, but has spent all his winters in Florida. Once there, he will hang around with the Rainbow People, an international movement of vegetarians, dropouts, potheads, and other alternative folks.
Marcus tells Bernard about his new cat. He has only had him a few days, and has tied him to a rope. Once the cat is used to him and no longer jumps out of the cave, Marcus will let him loose so he can catch rats.
When we have left Marcus, Bernard is shocked. “Unbelievable,” he says. “Tying a cat on a rope. How the hell can you do that?”
At the end of the day I return to the playground on my bike with my luggage in my back pack. Clean sheets, radio, alarm clock, flashlight and candles, and a pound of coffee. That’s all I need to make Bob’s space habitable.
With my new key I unlock the padlock and open the rusty, squeaky gate. I look over my shoulder to make sure no one has been following me and quickly enter the tunnel. Next to the tracks is a small path where I can ride my bicycle. The Amtrak police use this for inspection rounds.
A few minutes later I arrive at Bernard’s camp. He sits at the grill, stirring pots and pans, and offers me a chair and a tea. We listen to the radio. It is tuned to Bob Grant, presenting his notorious talk show at the evening rush hour. He and Rush Limbaugh are Public Enemies No. 1 and No. 2 with politically-correct America.
Grant has been called an anti-Semitic, homophobic, racist, sexist pig. The guests on his talk show always seem to be decent but concerned citizens who deplore the moral disintegration of America.
Bernard loves to listen to the show while cooking his evening meal. “Bob Grant has at least the guts to call bullshit bullshit,” Bernard says. “And that has become pretty rare these days.”
In his criticism of greedy, capitalist American society, Bernard sometimes has views that might seem left. But at the same time, he can say things that would make Archie Bunker cringe. For one thing, he hates liberals who see every homeless person, thief, or junkie as innocent victims of society.
Once we hear about a murderer who got the electric chair. I did not go so far as to question the death penalty, but suggested that electrocution was pretty cruel and that gallows or guillotines work quicker and more humanely. “Hey man, what that killer did was cruel as well,” Bernard commented. “Back then in the biblical times they knew how to handle these cases. Bang, down in the lion’s den. No bullshit.”