Policewoman

by Uhnak, Dorothy

  “I’m the complainant. I saw the larceny.”

  He smiled knowingly. “You won’t make a grand larceny stick.”

  I knew he was right, and it made me all the more determined. “We’ll see.” I started, to walk away again. He caught my arm.

  “Now about the assault—you’re not badly hurt. Hell, look at what you guys did to Ralph—the poor slob’s a mess. Even the picture in the paper—you see him in the center of the late News?” I pulled away, and he called after me down the hall, “It’ll be reduced to simple assault, officer. He’s really a good guy.”

  And, of course, Schmidt’s attorney was right. The larceny was reduced to petit larceny, and the felonious assault was reduced to assault in the third degree, and they copped out to a 30-day sentence in the workhouse. Any cop can tell you that an assault on a police officer counts for nothing. It is almost always reduced to third degree. Except if the suspect kills you, and then they give you a big funeral with a color guard and a flag and lots of uniformed men in attendance.

  Two days later, I arrived home a few minutes after Tony. (They put me on light duty for a week.) All my pains were throbbing. Tony’s face was pale with anger. “Did you see this?” he asked, shoving the evening paper at me, folded back to the letters-to-the-editor page.

  There was a one and a half column letter signed by a Mrs. Anna Kempler and headed: DISGRACEFUL POLICE BRUTALITY! Mrs. Kempler had put down the angry words of the righteous citizen, calling attention to the disgraceful incident she had witnessed in the lobby of the building where she had worked, day after day, for fifteen years, and never, never had she seen anything so frightening, so disturbing, so outrageous. These two men and one girl, pounding and beating this helpless man who had not done anything, not a thing. She knew, she had seen the entire incident from start to finish. Somebody had better do something about this. Somebody had better find out about this. This was not the 1930s, after all. And the sergeant had tried to cover up the whole thing. She was sending a copy of this letter to the mayor and the police commissioner and to all the newspapers. That’s how strongly she felt about this dreadful incident in our city.

  I handed the paper back to Tony and he flung it into the wastebasket. I sat down in a chair, my legs over the arm, my head back, looking at the ceiling. I held my hand up when he started to speak.

  “No, wait,” I said, “I have a better one for you. Sergeant Cornelius—you know, that nice big loudmouth I told you about—he called me at the Bureau office today.” I put my hand over my eyes, I was talking into my chest. “He was notified that the Corporation Counsel’s office has received a notice of claim. A notice of claim.” I shook my head.

  “What does that mean?” Tony asked.

  I stretched and yawned. “It means that that woman, the pregnant woman I got pushed into—I mean whom I ‘assaulted,’ it turns out she is the wife of an attorney with offices in that building. They put their scheming little heads together and decided that in case she has a miscarriage between now and the next two months, they intend to have the city pay them enough to build themselves a nice new house and give themselves a vacation in Bermuda or maybe a trip around the world—or maybe to the moon. I don’t know.”

  Tony flung his lighter on the table and looked around for a match. “I don’t get it, what do you mean?”

  “Well, they filed a notice of claim, put the city on notice that this poor pregnant woman, standing there in a public place, waiting for her husband to take her to lunch, was caused ‘grievous bodily harm’ by this police officer, and that if she suffers a miscarriage the city, on behalf of this police officer, shall be required to pay her upward of a million bucks!”

  “God damn!” That was all either of us could think of to say or were willing to put into words. We didn’t bother with supper. Neither of us was hungry, and I was beginning to get a nagging pain in my right side: a nipping, biting little pain which was getting a little too persistent to ignore. I took the few phone calls from relatives and friends; explained, rather shortly, that I was fine. No, I hadn’t heard it on the radio; yes, I did save the pictures and articles from the newspaper.

  The next day I received a summons at the Women’s Bureau to go home and get into uniform and present myself at headquarters for an interview with some inspector from the Commissioner’s office. They were acting on a request from the mayor in response to Mrs. Kempler’s special delivery, registered letter.

  A stenographer took down my statement as the inspector interrogated me without expression—just the facts as I reported them. He advised me that a statement had been taken from Hank Ludlow at the hospital. He didn’t tell me not to worry, just had me wait until the typist wrote up the report. I signed it and checked back to the Women’s Bureau, finished my tour, and went home.

  My bruises healed in time, although that TAT shot caused some trouble. Two weeks after it had been administered, I noticed a sense of heat in my right upper arm. I took off my sweater and was startled to see a huge red swelling, a kind of tight band hugging my arm. I was headachy, irritable, and within an hour, started to feel “out of things”—not with it. My speech became forced and stammering and unnatural. I called the hospital and reported to the nurse in charge. She advised me, in tones somewhat less than reassuring, to report to the hospital immediately. Tony took me to our family doctor, and he administered some drugs to fight off the poison in my system.

  Apparently, the attorney’s wife had her baby without unusual difficulties. At any rate, I never heard anything further about their notice of claim turning into a full-fledged suit.

  Mrs. Kempler’s accusations in the newspaper went unanswered. The police department was satisfied that we had acted properly and issued a report to the mayor’s office, and carbon copies were inserted into Hank’s and my personnel folders. That was to serve as our official vindication. Officially, we had taken proper police action.

  During the week I stayed home on sick report, nursing the headaches and feelings of disorientation and heat, I had a lot of time to think—about people and who they are and what they do, or do not do, and why. Tony and I had rehashed it to the point of frustration: it only led to empty anger, and at whom? Who wants to get involved? Who wants to take a chance? Who wants to know about things?

  What could you do—write a letter to the editor? No. You pass it all by and chalk it up to experience.

  8

  “I have grown hard, and my heart has turned to stone”

  EVERYONE THINKS HE HAS premonitions or foresight, based on thoughts or feelings he seems to remember having had before an event actually occurred. Thinking over some significant event, some large or unusual or disastrous or wondrous happening, our minds glide and waver backward and forward in time, and we believe we did have some mysterious hint, some forewarning. I’m not sure if these things are genuine or if they’re just a mixed-up jumbling, a misplaced kind of remembrance. But I do know that I had this kind of feeling about my Fulton Street assignment. I knew from the first interview I had that I was to be the one to catch the man who had beaten, robbed and viciously attacked several women in the recesses of the intricate tunnelings of that far downtown subway station. I even believe that I mentioned this to Tony after that interview with the director of the Policewomen’s Bureau, but he doesn’t seem to recall the particular discussion.

  I had, of course, seen the director many times in the office, walking briskly about her business, her slim body erect and businesslike. I had had some glancing pangs of envy, tempered, perhaps, by an awareness that her job was not an easy one. I was only slightly aware of the pressures placed upon her. She kept herself apart, and she was subject to criticism for her stiff insistence on formality. We were always Miss So-and-so or Mrs. So-and-so, and even her secretary was devoid of a first name. She interviewed three of us who had been selected, I suppose, on the basis of our records or immediate availability. During my interview, she sat behind her desk, neatly filled with stacks of paperwork and charts and sharpened pen
cils and shining ash trays (she did not smoke, nor did anyone who entered this domain), and spoke briefly and to the point, glancing once at her wrist watch and then increasing her speed.

  “It is admittedly a dangerous assignment,” she said, “and while it is not open to volunteers, I will give the girl selected an opportunity to decline without prejudice.” I nodded, believing her, and she spoke without passion. “The culprit,” she stated in official police language and referring to a report before her, “has attacked these women viciously, has rendered two of them unconscious: two rapes, one sodomy and three beatings. He is armed, once used a knife on a victim, and on all other occasions displayed a revolver. You would be assigned, of course, with a very competent detective from the 1st Precinct, and would have good coverage.” She held up a maplike drawing to me. “If you are assigned—and accept the assignment—you will have to become familiar with the Fulton Street station. It is a hub station: the BMT, IRT and Independent Subways all cross here, accounting for the great number of tunnels and passageways. Apparently, according to the location of the various attacks, the mugger prowls about the station and attacks wherever he locates a victim.” And then she regarded me levelly, her face noncommittal; “I will let you know tomorrow if you are to be assigned, and you will let me know your feelings.” And I was dismissed by her quick glance at her wrist watch and her pushing aside of the subway map in favor of some papers requiring her signature.

  And so, the following morning, it was given to me like a prize, and I accepted it like a prize, not concentrating on her words but glancing down at the map in my hands. “Mrs. Uhnak, I will caution you just once in this matter: it is not going to be easy. Your record shows you to be very competent, but I will warn you to take all necessary precautions. In other words”—my head shot up at her sudden cold tone—“no grandstanding. Good luck.” She dismissed me abruptly and expected no answer, and I rode to the 1st Precinct brooding over her words. Then I pushed them aside, feeling the excitement go through me like a tonic. I spoke to the squad commander of detectives, was introduced to my partner, and sent home after being told that this was a 4 to 12 assignment.

  My partner was a man named Paul Durkee. He had a tremendous, fat face with pendulous red cheeks, and the sockets of his eyes were incredibly big. His blue eyeballs swam around loosely, as though looking for some safe harbor, but at no point did they touch the edges of the sockets. Speaking to him, or rather listening to him—for he was a compulsive talker—I found myself stretching my own eyes wide, subconsciously trying to match his. He told me endless stories, in a rapid succession of words and in unrelated bits and scraps with many whisperings and mutterings. He covered his mouth with his beefy hand, his eyes wandering wildly, so I was sure he was revealing the most confidential information imaginable in the realm of the police department’s history—but I couldn’t follow anything he told me. He gave an odd little click at the end of every gasp of information, and at the end of two tours with him, I found myself beginning to click, too. It is a terrible weakness of mine: picking up other people’s mannerisms, gestures, intonations and habits. I feel myself doing it, time after time, echoing someone else’s choice expletive, in his tone of voice, with his expressions and motions.

  Working with Paul Durkee was quite an experience. While he was excessively heavy, even for his large frame, he was quick on his feet and in endless motion. We patrolled the station from end to end, up and down the intricate stairways, racing about as though pursued by demons. Durkee had an air of impending doom. Everyone was suspect and was thoroughly examined by his rolling eyes. He was full of secret signals, nodding, motioning, jerking his thumbs, pushing his hat back or forward, taking it off, smashing it back on. I couldn’t figure out what he was doing, or what I was supposed to do in response, but apparently my just standing motionless and observing him fitted into his scheme of things, for he never spoke about my lack of reaction. Watching him hurrying down the platform, his great bulk a massive shadow on the dark platforms, he seemed like a living oval: very wide in the middle and tapering at each end. I had met his son in the squad room the first day we worked together: a pale, limp little boy with wet hands who slipped his hand into mine on a signal from his father, let it drip there for a moment, then removed it with a little nod of his curly head. His father, beaming and roaring above him, was very proud of his son’s fine manners. He seemed to me for all the world like some little trained monkey, for the boy was completely devoid of expression and took his actions strictly from his father’s wild signals. Paul thumped the boy on his thin back and winked one crazy eye and thundered: “That’s my boy—Turkey Lurkey Durkee.”

  The relationship between partners, even in a temporary arrangement, is a delicate thing, particularly when you are together on a potentially dangerous assignment. Though Durkee strained my ears and nerves and credibility to piece together his stories, at the center of our working relationship was the definite knowledge that Paul Durkee was what you’d call a “stand-up” guy. He was there. He was a full, complete, entire cop, and no matter what happened or what you encountered, Durkee would be right there, in the middle of it. You get to know a lot about a man in eight steady hours—eating together, patrolling together, watching each other. I knew that Durkee was loud and boisterous and given to boasting about his past achievements, but I knew, aside from all that, that he would live up to his claims.

  By the fourth night, we both started to get a little stale. There was no action, nothing was happening. You start out at top pitch, expectant and ready, but the hours grind you down. Durkee slowed down a little. Not his eyes, which kept racing wildly up and down the platforms, seeming able, almost, to penetrate the walls and see around corners. But he slumped on a bench occasionally, his thick legs stretched before him, his hat tilted over his face, his eyes, probably, peering through the felt. He could sense the approach of a subway train long before there were any faint rumbling vibrations, the vibrations that grew into echoes and then into the full thunder of a train entering the station. And his whole posture changed, almost without movement, into a waiting and a watching. Then his body would relax, again without moving, and we would observe the doors slide closed and the train leave the station.

  We went for a meal at eight o’clock; our relief was a wiry old detective with a bad cold who complained bitterly that the steel dust was bad for his allergy. He proved his point by sneezing wetly all over us and blowing his nose like a trumpet.

  “You have walking pneumonia,” Durkee told him, shaking his head. “Can kill you like that!” He snapped his fingers at the relief man, shook his head again, grabbed my arm suddenly and dragged me along with him.

  At the restaurant, a dimly lit greasy joint, Durkee, his face flushed and puckish, started a loud conversation in the middle of nowhere, widening his eyes. “You’d just better not let me catch you with that bum again, that’s all I’m gonna say about it!” he bellowed.

  And the waitress, a fat redhead jammed into a greenish nylon uniform, looked quickly at me, then at Durkee, then at me again, her eyes blinking. She raised the pencil inquiringly at me and Durkee pulled the menu out of my hand and thrust it at her.

  “I’ll order for her,” he said. “Give her a rare burger and a cuppa tea. I’ll have the specialty—beef stew and some extra French fries on the side!”

  He waved the waitress away with his heavy hand, and she glanced back at us, her face puzzled. Durkee winked at me.

  “See? She thinks we’re just a typical married couple.”

  It was his way of stirring things up, for we were both weary and stiff from the endless hours of patrol. He enjoyed playing little games, creating impressions and play-acting. I ate the hamburger—which was what I always ordered—without tasting it. There was an odd feeling of tension, starting somewhere on my right side and traveling into my chest and hitting the back of my throat. An oddly familiar warning sign: something going to happen; something not right.

  I called Tony before we returned to our
post, and he caught my mood, my vague, uneasy sense of caution. “You okay, Hon?” he asked. Of course. I am always okay. And then, just before I hung up, he said, “Listen, you take care of yourself; you stay close to that nice big partner of yours, okay?”

  Durkee bought himself an early edition of the morning paper; it was eight-thirty. We made a ring from the change booth, and then, because two elderly, tight-lipped, nervous middle-aged women were entering the turnstile, Durkee grabbed my arm and hustled me through the exit doors calling thunderously to the agent: “I’m takin’ my prisoner through now, Mac!” flashing his shield. And the two women stared with frozen faces, whispering excitedly as we marched down the platform. Our relief man departed on the same train with the women, and I caught a glimpse of them peering at us through the window with outraged faces.

  Paul handed me a section of the paper and settled on the bench. I walked to the far end of the station and leaned against a pillar, feeling the dampness and coldness of the place. Outside, the air was crisp and fresh; here, the season was eternal. It made your bones ache with the unhealthy chill; the steel dust smudged your hands and face and clothing, and you couldn’t take a deep breath without coughing.

  For no reason, for no discernible reason, a feeling of anxiety was shooting through me: a roiling, uneven wave of uneasiness.

  A train slid into the station. It was heralded by the low rumble far down the track, soft at first, then getting louder and filling the long cavern. The doors glided open and three people got out: a man and woman walking arm in arm and a tall, heavy-set Negro. He was about forty feet from me, almost in front of Durkee, who was on the bench. He stood for a moment, surveying the platform, watching the couple exit, then turned to watch the train pull away. He walked past Durkee to the other end of the station. He hadn’t seen me. Durkee had his face down over his paper and was completely motionless. The man passed the bench again, walking lightly, tentatively seeking direction. I pressed hard against the pillar and could hear his feet moving closer. Then he stopped and began the descent, slowly, on the stairs of the passageway to the Independent subway.