Yellowthread Street

by William Marshall

  Auden indicated a dark patch of something on the roadway. It looked like an old blanket someone had set fire to, stomped on, and then pulverised with rocks. Auden said, ‘That’s him there. More or less. The Mongolian again.’

  Feiffer’s eyes stayed on the body of Constable Cho. He asked O’Yee, ‘Did you know him well?’

  O’Yee shook his head.

  ‘Neither did I. Married?’

  O’Yee shrugged.

  ‘He was,’ Spencer said, ‘I met his wife once in Nathan Road. He had two children.’

  The two constables came back, Sun and Lee. They both looked at where Cho’s body lay. Constable Sun said, ‘We can get the body, Inspector.’ They also knew he had a wife and two children, more familiarly than a chance meeting in Nathan Road. Constable Lee said, ‘He was a friend of ours.’

  Feiffer glanced at the building. ‘First we get the people who did it.’ He said to Lee and Sun, ‘They’re in that building.’

  ‘They’re armed,’ Constable Lee stated as a rehearsal for the coroner’s inquest which would ask why it was that he and Constable Sun had been unable to wound any of the people, only kill them. He drew his pistol. He said, ‘Sun and I’ll go in, Inspector.’

  ‘We’re going to do this properly,’ Feiffer said. ‘We’re going to converge on the inside of the building in a logical way and we’re going to arrest everyone inside, whoever they are.’

  ‘If possible,’ Constable Lee said. He looked to Inspector O’Yee for support.

  O’Yee said, ‘Policemen get killed the same as anyone else—’

  Constable Sun said, ‘Yes, sir.’ He drew his pistol as well.

  ‘O.K.,’ Feiffer said. He considered the building and the other structures around it, ‘O.K., this is the way we’ll do it . . .’

  He thought to himself, ‘And I’d better be right.’ He caught the look on Spencer’s face: frightened. And Auden: anxious to try out that damned gun of his. And O’Yee: he had already had one gun, real or not, pointed at him so far tonight. And the two constables—

  He thought, ‘I’d better be right the first time,’ and wondered what he himself looked like right about now.

  ‘Yellowthread Street Police Station, WPC Oh speaking.’

  ‘Minnie?’ Nicola Feiffer’s voice queried, ‘this is Nicola Feiffer. Is my husband there?’

  ‘No, Mrs Feiffer,’ Minnie said. She was the only one there. ‘He is out at the moment. Should you not be asleep? Is anything the matter?’

  ‘No,’ Nicola’s voice said, ‘I should be asleep. It’s almost four o’clock in the morning.’ She said, ‘I suffer from insomnia when Inspector Feiffer’s on night duty.’ She said, ‘You’re not married, Minnie?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you know where he’s gone? Do you expect—’

  ‘I could not say, Mrs Feiffer.’ She glanced at the printed notices she had marked for distribution to the roof-top schools in the morning. Incongruously, they dealt with the need for road safety on the way to school. She said, ‘It is only a routine matter, I think.’

  ‘So are the multitudinous seas incarnadine.’ She said, ‘Do you know what an ounce is, Minnie?’

  ‘It is a European measurement of weight.’

  There was a brief silence on the line. Mrs Feiffer said, ‘I’m sorry I—’ She said, ‘—disturbed you. It was just that—’

  ‘Everything is very quiet here, Mrs Feiffer,’ Minnie lied. ‘It is probably just a routine matter. Inspector Feiffer will be back soon I am certain.’

  ‘Is Inspector O’Yee there to keep you running about for him?’

  ‘Inspector O’Yee is also out with your husband.’

  ‘Oh,’ Mrs Feiffer said. She sounded very alone and lonely. ‘Um, is Inspector Auden there?’

  ‘He is also out. There is no one here but myself. I am sorry, Mrs Feiffer.’

  There was another pause. Minnie said quickly, ‘It is nothing to worry about.’

  The line was silent. Minnie said, ‘Mrs Feiffer? Are you still there?’

  ‘Yes.’ Minnie had a picture of her touching her hand to her face. She had a picture of Mrs Feiffer’s eyes. ‘Yes,’ Mrs Feiffer said again, ‘you can’t break the rules about—you can’t say where he is because it’s against the rules.’ There was no malice in her voice. It was a fact she accepted. She said, ‘I understand.’

  ‘Perhaps if you telephone a little later he will be here—’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I’ll do that. I’m sorry I—I’m very sorry I bothered you—’

  ‘It is no bother.’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’ Mrs Feiffer knew what it meant when more than two detectives were sent out together at four o’clock in the morning. She said, ‘Yes—’

  There was another pause.

  ‘Mrs Feiffer—’

  ‘Yes,’ Mrs Feiffer’s voice said. ‘Yes. It’s—it’s all right. I—I just couldn’t sleep, that was all. Um—goodnight, Minnie, and thank you.’

  ‘Goodnight,’ Minnie Oh said.

  The line went dead.

  In their apartment, Nicola Feiffer put her hand to her mouth. She looked at the open window in her bedroom. In the absence of a breeze, the curtains were very still.

  The night was so dark.

  The gangsters’ plan was this: two of them, Crushed Toes and an eastern-end parked car gangster named The Shot In The Back Of The Head, would go back down to the third floor and begin working downwards room by room. The Chopper Man would take the fire escape through the window of the third room and move carefully up to the roof. The Club (With Nails) would move up to the fifth floor and check the rooms there. If nothing was found, they would retrace their routes, the men on the roof and the fifth floor down towards the ground floor, and the two on the ground floor up towards the roof.

  The detectives’ plan was to send one man up the fire escape to cover the roof while the others entered the building through its main and only entrance. On the ground floor the uniformed officers would cover O’Yee and Feiffer from the stairs while the third man, Auden, covered them in the corridor. In that manner, with safety in numbers, they would work their way up to the roof and effectively search the entire building.

  They were both good plans, each concocted independently of the other, but it was inevitable that on about the third floor, without a possibility in the universe of avoiding it, the two groups of belligerents, each searching for a third belligerent, would run head-on into each other.

  Feiffer went over his plan for a second time. He said, ‘If we run into the gangsters along the way I want them arrested, disarmed, and handcuffed to the nearest railing.’ He said to Sun and Lee, ‘Is that clear?’

  Sun and Lee looked at him. Their heads moved imperceptibly in the most unclear of nodding agreements.

  Feiffer looked at Spencer. This was, as far as Feiffer knew, his first piece of armed violence—he was still an unknown quantity. Feiffer asked him, ‘All clear, Bill? Anything you want to ask?’

  Auden waited with the contemptuous carelessness of a man who owned a Colt Python. Auden said to Spencer, ‘It’s all fairly straightforward.’

  Spencer shrugged. He put a suggestion forward hesitantly. He said, ‘Don’t you think this is more in the Riot Squad’s line, Inspector? After all, they’re trained for this sort of thing.’

  ‘It isn’t a riot!’ Auden told him. It was ridiculous. ‘It’s just a simple gunfight with a few gangsters!’

  ‘It isn’t a gunfight either,’ Feiffer said. He didn’t want those bullets from Auden’s gun tearing holes in anything that moved. He said to Spencer, ‘The Riot Squad are already committed to the water thing. This is our problem. I wouldn’t feel justified calling them in.’ He added, with a trace of annoyance at people who kept putting up the damned Riot Squad as the saviours of the northern hemisphere, ‘We can handle it quite well enough by ourselves.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Bill Spencer said. ‘It was just a suggestion.’

  ‘You take the fire escape,’ Feiffer told him. ‘All you have
to do is keep a watch that no one comes out of a window and tries to get on to the roof. I don’t think anyone will. We’ll meet you on the roof.’

  Spencer began to say something. He changed his mind. He said, ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘O.K.,’ Feiffer said, ‘Then let’s get on with it.’

  They all drew their pistols and went quickly across the road towards the entrance to the building.

  ‘Around the back,’ Feiffer ordered Spencer, and Spencer disappeared down the dark alley at the side of the building towards the fire escape.

  At twenty-three minutes past four in the morning, they entered the building to do battle.

  In the cells in Yellowthread Street, Mr Skilbeck and the African were discussing police brutality with Chen and The Fourth Gangster.

  Since Chen spoke not a word of English and Mr Skilbeck and the African spoke only American, and The Fourth Gangster did nothing but groan, it was very much a one-way conversation.

  They were each in separate cells, but if they leaned against the barred doors they could see each other.

  The African said to Mr Skilbeck, ‘Fucking cops.’

  Mr Skilbeck nursed a bruise on the back of his neck where someone had hit him. He said, ‘Yeah!’

  ‘Fucking cops,’ the African said.

  ‘That’s right,’ Mr Skilbeck said. He leaned out and called to Chen, ‘That’s right all right, isn’t it?’

  Chen did not speak. The Fourth Gangster groaned.

  ‘He doesn’t talk English,’ the African said. ‘They probably scared the crap out of him.’

  ‘Poor bastard,’ Mr Skilbeck said. ‘What could an old guy like him have done?’

  ‘What did I do?’ the African called back, ‘It was just a joke—what did I do?’

  ‘Right,’ Mr Skilbeck said. He couldn’t have agreed more. ‘I’ve got a wife who’s probably half out of her skull with worry. And they lock me up in here. What am I supposed to have done? You tell me that. They broke the other one’s leg.’

  ‘Right!’ the African said. It was a conversation between a congregation of the converted. ‘Right!’ the African said. He shouted at the top of his lungs, ‘Hey, you! I want my lawyer!’ The steps leading up from the detention cells to the Station were empty of life. He shouted, ‘I know my rights! I want a lawyer from the Navy brought down here!’

  ‘Right,’ Mr Skilbeck said. He yelled at the steps, ‘Hey! We’re American citizens and you can’t keep us locked up!’

  The African kicked at the bars of his cell door. They made a loud ringing sound. He kicked them again. The African yelled, ‘Hey!’

  ‘Hey!’ Mr Skilbeck yelled.

  ‘Hey!’

  ‘Hey!’

  ‘You up there!’

  ‘Hey! Hey!’

  ‘Hey, you people up there! Hey-hey-hey, you people!’

  ‘Hey!’ they yelled in unison.

  ‘HEY-HEY-HEY—HEY!’

  ‘Keep quiet,’ Minnie Oh said. They saw her come down the stairs. She wasn’t much.

  ‘Hey,’ the African said, ‘get that cop who arrested me!’

  ‘He’s not here,’ Minnie Oh said. She glanced at Chen. Chen stood against the bars and looked at her wistfully. She said to the African, ‘Shouting is a waste of time.’

  ‘I want to get out,’ Mr Skilbeck said, ‘you can’t keep me here. My wife—’

  ‘Your wife knows you are here,’ Minnie Oh said. ‘You will both appear in Court in the morning.’

  ‘What about him?’ the African demanded. He meant Chen. ‘What about him? He’s got no rights, right? Poor old guy. What’s he done? Did you beat him up too? What’s he done?’ He demanded, ‘Get me the pig in charge. I want a lawyer right now.’

  ‘In the morning,’ Minnie Oh said. She turned to go.

  ‘What’s he done?’ the African demanded, ‘Hey? The old guy? What have you conned him into thinking he’s done?’ He said to Skilbeck, ‘Right?’

  ‘Right!’ Mr Skilbeck said. ‘Get me the chief cop!’

  Minnie thought of Mrs Feiffer awake by the telephone. She said, ‘There is nobody else here.’

  ‘I’ll bet!’ Mr Skilbeck said. He felt very aggressive and deprived of his constitutional rights. He felt like Captain Dreyfus wrongly imprisoned on Devil’s Island. He said, ‘Yeah! What are we supposed to be guilty of?’ He turned his head to the silent Chen. He said, ‘What’s that poor old guy supposed to have done if we’re all hardened criminal types in here? You tell me that? Hey? Tell me that!’

  Against all the regulations, Minnie told him.

  The Mongolian was in a room on the fifth floor. He heard The Chopper Man clang stealthily up the metal rungs of the fire escape. He waited by the window to yank him in, but The Chopper Man was already on his way to the roof. His footsteps stopped clanging on the metal rungs as he stepped off on to the roof.

  The Mongolian rubbed his fingers into his palms and listened for the others.

  The Club (With Nails) was on the landing of the fifth floor. He touched the points of nails driven through the end of his wooden club and moved to the first door. The Mongolian heard the door squeak as The Club (With Nails) pushed it gently open. The Mongolian heard the floor of the first room squeak as The Club (With Nails) went across it. The Mongolian heard The Club (With Nails) open a cupboard or a closet in the room and then close it quietly again. The Mongolian went out into the corridor.

  The Mongolian peered carefully over the corridor railing. He saw a group of people on the ground floor looking down at the body of the gangster who had gone down from the fourth floor with bits of the splintered railing. Two of the group were uniformed constables. The Mongolian saw Crushed Toes and The Shot In The Back Of The Head moving on the stairs at the third floor. They glanced at each other and then went quietly out of sight into the corridor. The Mongolian moved silently on the balls of his feet and stood to one side of the doorway to the first room. The Club (With Nails) came out of the first room looking down the corridor and did not see the Mongolian. He went into the second room. The Mongolian moved to one side of the door to the second room and waited.

  On the third floor, as the cops came up to the first floor, Crushed Toes and The Shot In The Back Of The Head went into the first door.

  Sun and Lee took up their positions on the stair landing of the first floor.

  Feiffer said softly, ‘Christopher—’ and he and O’Yee went towards the first door on the first floor. The door hung open and light from a naked bulb swinging on a length of flex spilled out into the gloomy corridor. Auden came down behind them and stood at combat range against the railing.

  O’Yee and Feiffer went into the first room. Auden cocked his revolver. Constable Sun took his revolver in two hands and drew a bead on the first door. Constable Lee rested his weapon on the stairhead and cocked it.

  Feiffer and O’Yee came out. They shook their heads. They moved down the corridor towards the second room. O’Yee’s hands were clammy with perspiration. He wiped them, one after the other, on his trouser leg and took a firmer grip on the revolver. He and Feiffer went into the second room.

  On the roof, The Chopper Man took up position behind the tipped over plywood table the Mah-Jong players had deserted. A broken neon sign a street away intermittently flash-lit the roof every two or three seconds, but it was not a good light.

  On the fire escape, Spencer was between two buildings and there was no light at all. Most of the windows to the rooms had muslin curtains pulled or newspaper pages stuck across them. He went as quietly as he could up the ringing metal rungs. He was at the fourth floor. He paused, listened, but there were no sounds. He heard his own breathing. He stopped to get control of it.

  The Shot In The Back Of The Head on the third floor shook his head at the end of the corridor. No more rooms. Crushed Toes nodded. He jerked his head back to the landing. The Shot In The Back Of The Head nodded. They moved towards the landing to the stairs to the second floor.

  ‘Nothing,’ O’Yee said.

 
Feiffer nodded. He glanced at Auden and then, further back, at the two constables. He shook his head to signify that so far they had drawn a blank.

  ‘Going up,’ O’Yee said like a hoarse lift-driver with laryngitis.

  Feiffer nodded. He and O’Yee and Auden went back down the corridor to the stairs.

  ‘Commandos Strike At Dawn,’ O’Yee tried softly. He couldn’t remember whether the Commandos in the film had all been killed or not.

  ‘Shut up—’ Feiffer hissed. They went excruciatingly quietly and carefully up the stairs to the second floor.

  The Chopper Man heard someone coming up the fire escape. The Chopper Man drew himself further back behind the psychological cover of the plywood table and fingered his chopper.

  The neon sign a street away went flash-pause-pause-flash-pause-flash-flash-pause—

  Crushed Toes went into the second room on the second floor. He pointed to The Shot In The Back Of The Head to wait by the side of the door to give him cover. The Shot In The Back Of The Head nodded. He crouched against the wall and gave his full attention to the sounds from the second room. There was the creaking of Crushed Toes’ shoes on the floor as he moved carefully. The Shot In The Back Of The Head craned his attention to the unseen interior of the second room.

  The Chopper Man began counting the infinitely careful climbing steps of the man coming up the fire escape to the roof.

  The Club (With Nails) crept out of the second room on the fifth floor and went along the corridor into the third and last room. He did not see the Mongolian. The Mongolian’s eyes glittered and watched him go. Then the Mongolian padded silently to one side of the third room.

  The cops stopped. Constable Sun glanced at Constable Lee and froze. O’Yee saw him too. Then Feiffer and then Auden. It was The Shot In The Back Of The Head. He had his back to them. He stood in the corridor with his back to them listening for something. Constable Sun started to move forward. He looked at Feiffer for approval. Feiffer nodded. Constable Lee asked silently for the same privilege. Feiffer flicked his finger at him to go. Constable Lee and Constable Sun went noiselessly down the corridor towards The Shot In The Back Of The Head.

  The Chopper Man counted the footsteps. They were ever so minutely louder. He thought it was the Mongolian. He was coming closer. The Chopper Man tapped his fingers against his chopper in anticipation. The sign went flash-pause-flash-pause-flash—