Policewoman

by Uhnak, Dorothy

  A tall, young, dark-haired man, dressed neatly in charcoal gray, white shirt and dark tie, stood in the doorway. “Excuse me, officer, I’m Lieutenant Bouvreau, squad commander of the precinct’s detectives.”

  “Yes, sir. I’m Policewoman Uhnak.” I started to rise but he waved me back with a friendly gesture.

  “Yes, the desk sergeant told me your name. Dorothy, isn’t it?” His voice was soft and polite and friendly, and I warmed at the recognition that was invoked by his use of my first name—finally an acceptance of the fact that I was there. “We have a bit of a problem here.” Lieutenant Bouvreau pulled up a rickety chair and straddled it backward, his long hands dangling over the ribs of the chair. Quietly and in some detail he explained that they had three girls in custody and that he felt sure one of the girls would break and tell which of the boys did the actual knifing. Louise Wilcox, he told me, was seventeen years old and they didn’t know much about her, except that she didn’t seem to be a regular “gang girl.” She seemed too timid, too scared by what was going on. He wanted me to talk to her. He looked at me earnestly, ran a long-fingered hand over a boyish cowlick that stood stiffly on his neatly cropped black head, then nodded. “I think you’d do just fine; you’re young, not much older than those girls in there. I think Louise is going to need a little sympathy pretty soon.” Then he hesitated, the corners of his eyes crinkled. “This is your first assignment, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, sir.” I felt a certain relief in his knowing my circumstance; his silent nodding indicated his awareness of my feelings—an understanding of my resolve to do a good job.

  “Well,” he said pleasantly, “I want you to come inside with me. Now, you’re going to have to play this by ear, Dorothy.” Again, the friendly earnestness, but his voice was softer now, and his words were a kind of plea. “Whatever you see or hear in our office is necessary. It’s like a game, almost. We have the good guys and the bad guys. The loudmouths are the bad guys; you’re going to be a good guy. Get the picture? Louise is going to need a shoulder. We’re going to scare the devil out of her. Then she’ll want to talk to someone who is sympathetic. Do you feel sympathetic?”

  I felt nervous. “I guess I could be.”

  “I’m sure you will be.” His confidence seemed old and familiar, as though based on years of expectation fulfilled.

  For the first time, I entered the Detective Squad Room on official business. There were five surly Negro youths standing against one side of the room, and three equally surly Negro detectives aligned in front of them, growling various things at them individually and collectively. One angry young Irish detective was smashing the keys of a reluctant typewriter, muttering at the letters that were appearing on his paper. Detective Harris was whispering into a telephone, his hand cupped around his mouth, his eyes furtive.

  In the inner room, the cot was nowhere in evidence, and three young Negro girls were standing together by the window, staring through the grating. They turned and viewed me blankly.

  “This is Policewoman Uhnak,” Lieutenant Bouvreau said politely. None of us acknowledged the introduction. The lieutenant indicated two chairs and left. A moment later, one of the detectives brought in two more chairs, then slammed the door behind him.

  “I think you’d better sit down,” I said, keeping my voice low to control my uncertainty. The three girls didn’t move, so I stood up and picked up the pad and pencil that were on the desk against the wall. These were kids. In my settlement house days, some of my best friends were kids. These were no different. I turned and faced them.

  “You,” I said pleasantly, matter-of-factly, but certain that I meant what I said, “sit here.” The girl stood motionless, taking my measure, reading my face and my voice. “Now.”

  Languidly and with a kind of dignity, she slid herself forward, twisting her mouth into a grimace of annoyed amusement. She’d go along with the gag. But she did sit down, and the two others, watching her, followed her lead.

  “No,” I said to the second girl, “not there. I want you over here.” We watched each other wordlessly, and the tall, thin girl glanced at the first girl, then changed her seat.

  I could have picked Louise Wilcox out without help. She was light-skinned, almost yellow; her face was drawn and tired and her fear was shining from her large eyes. She was an unattractive girl, of medium height, flat-chested and shapeless in a mottled pink sweater and stained brown skirt. Her hair was pulled behind her ears in daggers of unruly kinks, and her bangs stood out from her forehead stiffly.

  The first girl, obviously the leader here, was pretty and she knew it full well. Her hair was teased high and perched on her head like a tumbleweed, perfectly round. It looked like it would blow away with any sudden gust of wind. Her face was skillfully made up, her eyes bright and black as Chinese checkers. She wore a tight red skirt and sweater, and her figure was slender and graceful.

  “Whut for they grab us in here and push us aroun’? We didn’t do nuthin’.”

  Her speech, I felt, was something of an affectation. She had an intelligent face; she was playing a game.

  “Well, I guess you know why. Those boys in there—they’re your friends?”

  “Friends? Ha, hear that police-lady?” She pointed at me and the girl next to her grinned. “Friends? Man, them cats in there, they don’t call their chicks friends!”

  She laughed uproariously, but without humor, without any sounds of joy, and her eyes watched me closely. It was meant to be an insulting sound, and the other girl joined in, cued and careful. Louise’s hands trembled and she was silent. Her fingers were bony and yellow. She kept her head down.

  The door opened so unexpectedly that I dropped my pencil. It was the Negro detective I had seen the night before in the hallway. He glared in meanly, his eyes darting over the girls. “Which one of these is Louise?” His voice was low and menacing.

  Louise looked up, panic twitching her mouth. He looked at her, then nodded his head up and down, pulled at his mouth. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah.” He stood for a fraction of a moment, then left, slamming the door.

  We sat silently now; Louise was at the edge of her chair, the toes of the scuffed shoes digging into the floor.

  “Hey,” the first girl said, poking her sharply, “that’s just their tricks. Like they tryin’ to scare you is all.”

  “I think you’d better shut up,” I said pleasantly to girl number one, and she drew her head up, pushing her pointed chin at me and making a small clicking sound with her tongue against her teeth.

  Lieutenant Bouvreau’s calm face appeared at the doorway. “Miss, I want you to come with me, and you too, please,” he said, nodding at the two girls. Louise started to rise, but the lieutenant shook his head at her. “You’re Louise, right? No, you stay here.” There was no hint, no message in his voice.

  Louise stared at him, her mouth slack and her teeth shining.

  Girl number one swayed herself to the door, thrusting her hips out before her, then turned. Her eyes blazed and her voice was a hiss. “Hey, you Louise-girl, keep your fat mouth shut!” Some dark hand pulled her quickly through the door, and we could hear her insulted voice calling out curses. There was a great deal of clamor and banging and shouting.

  Louise gaped at me; the skin around her mouth seemed to tighten and pale. Her face was yellowish-gray now, pulled by fear.

  “How come,” she asked softly, “how come they keep looking in an’ sayin’ ‘Louise’ at me? I didn’t do nuthin’. How come?”

  Her voice was thin and it broke on her words. I couldn’t look at her. “Louise, how old are you?” We went through a long list of questions: anything I could think of to keep from seeing her face. I knew she kept watching the door, trying to steel herself to the sudden opening, the peering hostile faces looking at her, saying her name. The use of your first name, I thought, could evoke many feelings.

  The door swung open again. This time the Irish detective pushed his way in. He had a middle-aged Negro by the arm, a small, roundis
h man with horn-rimmed glasses on his smooth face. He propelled the man into the room and placed him directly in front of Louise’s chair. Then he twisted the neck of the small lamp on the desk so that it shone on the girl’s face, paling her features. Her eyes sparkled with terror.

  “Now,” the detective said, “you take a real good, slow, careful look, Mr. Morris. This is probably going to be a homicide case, and we don’t want any mistakes.” And then, very carefully, his words ringing like a bell, “Is this the girl?”

  Louise seemed to turn to clay as the man studied her, circled her, came and stood in front of her. He took off his glasses, held them against his round body, then put them on again.

  “Yes,” he said firmly. “No question about it. It’s her.”

  And then they left without another word. Louise leaned forward to me as I continued to write words on the paper. She tapped her hand compulsively on the desk. Her voice was a sick sound. “Hey, how come they keep on doin’ that? How come they keep lookin’ at me? I don’t know that man, I never seen that man. Hey, what they doin’ here?”

  I handed the girl a cigarette, and my hand trembled when I lit hers and then my own. Her panic was infectious and I felt somehow intimidated, accused by the opening door, the knowing faces. “How long have you been hanging around with that crowd, Louise?”

  Her shoulders jerked. “They just ‘the kids.’ You know. They just live on the block.”

  “Do you like them?” I asked. She shrugged, inhaling and blowing smoke into her eyes. I realized that she wasn’t a smoker, but she seemed unaware of what she was doing. “You know, it seems strange to me; you don’t seem like those other girls. You know, they’re pretty tough—that’s what they think, anyway. You don’t seem like that kind of girl, the kind of girl to get into trouble like this.”

  “But I didn’t do nuthin’. I’m not a bad girl, never got no police trouble.”

  “Well, you’ve got it now, big trouble,” I said cruelly, ignoring my own voice, my own words. “You know what I think, Louise? I think those ‘friends’ of yours in there are setting you up.”

  She jerked her face up; her lips were dry and her left eye had started to twitch.

  “I mean it. You don’t know what they’re saying in there. I don’t think they’d try to put it on those other two girls: I think they’re putting it all on you.”

  The possibility of it encompassed her. She was fully aware of her status with the “kids”; she was the logical one to put something on, the one who didn’t matter. I was being a “friend” to Louise. Talk to me, Louise, you can trust me.

  There was an explosion of sound and action in the next room, and we both looked toward the door. Heavy masculine voices were shouting, booming. There was a scuffling, tussling, grunting sound, but then it was subdued. The girl stared at me.

  “You know what, Louise? I don’t think they’re worth your little finger. You go to school—you said you’d like to be a nurse someday. What are they going to be, those other two girls? Not much more than what they are right now. You’d better take care of number one, Louise—that’s what they’re doing in there. How come they left you here, how come they keep looking in at you, and asking for Louise?” The next time the door opened, I thought it was going to come off at the hinges. A distraught woman, held back by two detectives, came shrieking into the room, sailing right at the girl. I jumped up and stood between them, but someone pushed me aside. Louise cringed back in her chair and the woman, a heavy-set Negro woman with an impassioned face, lunged for her, but was restrained.

  “That the bitch kill my boy? That the bitch?” the woman howled. And then they dragged her out and there was a terrible silence in the room. Louise was gray. Her hands were pale and shaking violently, and she didn’t move from the chair. Her feet, were drawn tightly around the legs, her body hunched forward, her eyes rolling wildly.

  Lieutenant Bouvreau entered the room, stepped inside and closed the door behind him. He regarded Louise, a sad expression on his handsome; even features; he shook his head.

  “That was Maceo’s mother. He died fifteen minutes ago. Listen, Louise,” he spoke gently, squatting beside her chair, “I don’t think it was murder, I really don’t.” The girl regarded him with popping eyes, and there were small bubbles of saliva in the corners of her mouth. “I think he did something to you. Something bad. Did he hurt you?” He spoke as gently as one does to an injured child, assuring his sympathy, his understanding. “Did Maceo do something bad to make you stab him?”

  Louise made gulping sounds in her throat but no words reached her mouth.

  “Hey, look,” he said, “I think maybe you’d rather talk to Policewoman Uhnak. You can tell her what Maceo did, you don’t have to be ashamed. I’m on your side. If he did what I think he did, you have nothing to worry about. I’ve heard a lot of bad things about Maceo.” Lieutenant Bouvreau stood up, put his hand on the girl’s shoulder. “You tell Mrs. Uhnak here all about it.” He winked solemnly at her, then left us alone.

  Louise began to sob now, convulsively, in great dry, gasping breaths. “They puttin’ it on me. I’m scared. Oh, lady, I’m scared they kill me.”

  I tried not to see her face, but the clutching, wringing spasms of her hands were even worse. “I don’t believe it, Louise. I think they’re putting it on you because they don’t care a thing about you. Listen, Louise, I believe you. I can see what kind of a girl you are, but they’re going to stick together unless we can prove it was different. Don’t you worry about them. They’re not worrying about you. Tell me what really happened. I believe you.”

  I was telling the girl: You are nothing—not a thing in the eyes of the people most important in your narrow little world. You are nothing. That’s exactly what I was saying.

  Louise looked up in one great effort, in one tormented resolve. “It were Frenchy. He cut Maceo ’cause Maceo was foolin’ with his girl, that little snip Marci in there, and Maceo told Frenchy he could take any ole bitch he felt like and he could take Marci if he felt like it, and they started to fight like that. Marci give Frenchy the knife, and we wuz all there. I seen it, but I swear to God I didn’t have nuthin’ to do with it.” And then, in some remote puzzlement, her face blank, “Nobody would fight over me. She had the knife, Marci, and then Frenchy give her the knife again and she put it in her bra and we all run in different ways, up and down the street, and I got picked up about an hour later in my house, and the cops brung us all here. But I swear to God, they kill me, they know I talk about it. They said, they said.” And there was no question but that Louise believed it, for she sobbed uncontrollably into the handkerchief I had given her, a tearless, strangulating sound.

  In less than an hour, after being confronted with a first-degree murder charge, Marci revealed where she had hidden the knife. By then, Frenchy was boasting openly that he had killed his enemy and proved his manhood, and was asking if the reporters were going to take his picture for the newspapers.

  But the victim hadn’t died; it had all been part of the plan. When questioned at the hospital, swathed in bandages, blood feeding into him through tubes, he sneered at the idea of mentioning his assailant’s name. It was the code; he would plan his own street vengeance when his hero’s wounds had healed.

  By three o’clock in the morning, the office had emptied out. The girls had been taken to Girls’ Youth House by officers from the J.A.B. unit and the boys, according to their ages, were similarly detained. I helped the men type their reports: statements taken from the boys and from the other two girls. Long, rambling, almost irrational accounts of the same event viewed from different eyes: a heroic event, a matter-of-fact event, a justified event, a Friday-night event. I was a great success in the Squad room because of my fast touch-typing. They got me a container of tea, and I drank it even though the luncheonette man had loaded it with sugar.

  My own office seemed even emptier now: the gray walls had a greenish cast. My eyes were tired and smarting. My throat hurt from smoking too many cigare
ttes, and my mouth tasted stale and dirty. Lieutenant Bouvreau came in and smiled.

  “You did a nice job in there, Dorothy. I want to thank you.”

  I was too tired for feelings, yet there was a feeling there behind the weariness. “What will happen to Louise?”

  “Nothing,” he said. Then watching me closely, he added, “It was a nasty thing, wasn’t it? But then, stabbing a boy on the street seven times is a nasty thing, too.”

  “And Louise doesn’t count?” I hadn’t meant to sound angry, but I was too exhausted to regulate my emotions.

  “No,” he said evenly, “not really. That sounds awful to you, doesn’t it? But it’s true. Louise just doesn’t count.” He stood up then. “Why don’t you stretch out for a while. It’ll be quiet for the rest of the tour.” I shook my head.

  “Aren’t you tired?” he asked. “How do you feel?” His eyes were bright, studying me in a curious, interested way.

  “Dirty,” I said. “I feel so dirty that I don’t think I’ll ever scrub the dirt off me, that’s how I feel!”

  Lieutenant Bouvreau smiled without amusement, and his voice was tinged with just a trace, just a hint of annoyance. “Oh, it’ll scrub off. Just don’t scrub too hard and rub the skin off, too. You’ll need it. Tomorrow it’ll be Saturday night. This was just a warm-up.”

  On Saturday night-Sunday morning, the squad made a big narcotics pinch. I heard the feet thumping up the stairs at about 1:30 A.M. and I put aside the Sunday papers. There was loud talking. It was a moment before I realized that it was Spanish. Detective Tyewells, the Negro with his hat forever clinging to the back of his head, ducked in.

  “Hey, Uhnak,” he said in his musical voice, “we’ve got a woman in here. Want a complete search and right now.” I left my charges, two prostitutes, tossing and mumbling in semi-sleep and followed Detective Tyewells into the Detective’s Room. One of the Negro detectives was shouting in Spanish at a small Puerto Rican who regarded him blankly. Then he turned and said to no one in particular: “That bastard pretends he can’t understand my Spanish!” He sounded insulted.