by Ed McBain
"He's gonna be a dead god soon, that's for sure," Parker said. "He's gonna pay for every damn heartache he ever gave this city."
Carella, watching the children, said simply, "The city gave him a few too, Andy."
"Sure," Parker agreed. "It's the neighborhood. A kid grows up here, what the hell do you expect? Miranda was cutting up people before he knew how to walk."
"Maybe nobody ever took the trouble to teach him to walk," Hernandez said.
"Hey, you ain't getting sore at me, are you?" Parker asked, his eyes opening wide. "I thought he was no landsman of yours."
"He isn't. He's a punk. He's going to die. That doesn't make it all his fault."
"I can understand how you feel," Parker said. "There's a blood tie that..."
"There's no blood tie between me and..."
"I didn't mean a real blood tie, for God's sake. I know he's not your relative or anything. But, you know, you're both Spanish. That sort of makes you brothers, you know what I mean?"
"No. What the hell do you mean, Parker?"
"Aw, forget it. If you're gonna get sore, there's no sense talking. You're the touchiest guy I know, Frankie. I mean it. You oughta get over that. It don't help you none, believe me." He smiled at Hernandez and put his arm around his shoulder. "All I was saying, in a manner of speaking, is that I'm gonna kill your brother up there. I'm gonna put a dozen bullets in his goddamn skull and watch him bleed all over the sidewalk."
Hernandez shook the arm free. "You know something, Parker?"
"What?"
"He's more your brother than he is mine."
A half-dozen patrolmen had begun erecting barricades across the street. The people crowded the barricades. The kids began sitting on them, spilling over onto the side where the policemen and the squad cars waited for the word from the next street. Byrnes came out of the squad car and yelled, "All right, everybody back! Step back! Back of the barricade! Let's go!" He walked rapidly to Hernandez, pulling a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiping at his sweating face. "Frankie, do me a favor, will you?" he said. "Make with some Spanish. These people are gonna get shot up if they don't respect that barricade. Get them to move back, will you?"
"Sure," Hernandez said. He moved up to the wooden horses with their supporting crossbars, the stenciled police department letters shrieking against the white paint. "Bueno!" he shouted. "Todos retroceder, Detrds de la barricada! Todos retroceder!"
The crowd began moving back from the barricade. On the edge of the crowd, Zip grabbed Cooch's arm and said, "You hear that? You hear what that bull said? There's gonna be shooting!"
"With Miranda up there, there's gotta be shooting," Cooch said, his eyes wide.
"Who's Miranda?" Papa asked.
"Don't you know nothing, you dumb tiger?" Cooch said, shoving at him. "Miranda's the greatest thing ever happened to this neighborhood." He turned to Zip. "How you like this jerk? Don't know Miranda."
Zip shook his head, his eyes searching the first-floor windows for a sign of life. He could see nothing.
"When he lived around here," Cooch said to Papa, "this neighborhood really jumped, I kid you not."
"Even in my old neighborhood we knew about him," Zip said, his eyes never leaving the first-floor windows. "He was down there once, you know. I seen him. He was driving a big yellow Caddy."
"No crap?" Cooch said.
"Sure, I seen it. And he had this blonde with him. Man, you could see she was gassed completely out of her skull, just being with him. This was before things got so hot for him. Man, he was swinging then, swinging."
"A Caddy, huh?" Cooch said. "That's for me. Give me the wheel, man. I'll know just what to do with it."
"You should see the way this guy walks, Cooch," Zip said. He stepped away from the barricade and did a quick imitation. "This real cool glide, you know? Like he owns the world. That's the way to walk. Pepe walks with his head up. He ain't afraid of nothing or nobody!"
"Look at the way he got out of that Riverhead apartment!" Cooch said. "A dozen cops, and they couldn't touch him."
"Nobody can touch him," Zip said.
"Man, when he lived here, Zip, you shoulda been here, I mean it. A nice guy, you know? I mean, you think him being a big shot an' all, like he'd think us kids was dirt. But he was always nice to us, I swear. Used to hand out nickels, like that, you know? And stories? Man, the stories he used to tell us. You know, real straight-from-the-shoulder stuff. Not like the crap you get from your people."
"Man, I read you," Zip said, "If my old man gives me his pitch about the island one more time, I'm gonna lose control. Who gives a damn about customs on the island, huh? Who cares about the hospitality there, or the sunshine there, or the way the people close the doors when a stiff goes by, huh? This is here, man! This is where people are living!"
"You can bet Pepe knows how to live."
"Ohhh, brother, does he? This cat knows the story, dad! Hey, hey, look at that!"
"What?" Cooch said.
"Over there."
Two patrolmen were entering the tenement. They moved cautiously and with their revolvers drawn.
"It's about to start," Zip said, straining to see over the heads of the people in front of him. "We gotta get something to stand on, Cooch. We won't be able to see nothing this way."
"What about our other business?" Cooch asked.
Zip glanced cursorily over his shoulder, looking into the luncheonette where Jeff sat at the counter. "The sailor? Forget him. We scared him half to death."
"I mean Alfie," Cooch whispered.
For a moment, Zip seemed to have forgotten something that had kept him awake most of the night, something that had accompanied him as he'd got out of bed this morning, roaring in his mind as he dressed. For a moment, Zip seemed to make no association with the name "Alfie" and puzzlement showed plainly on his face. And then, as if being called away from something which was extremely pleasant and entertaining to take care of some simple task which was at best boring, he said, "Well, what about him?"
"We got a date, remember?"
"Of course I remember," Zip said angrily. "But how we gonna get to the church? The block's shut off. Besides, the kids with the pieces are on the other side of the street."
"Iss better this way, Zip," Sixto said. "We let heem..."
"Oh, shut up, will ya, Sixto?" Zip snapped. "Man, where'd we scrounge up this yo-yo?"
Papa burst out laughing. "You a yo-yo, Sixto," he said.
Cooch looked thoughtful for a moment. Then he said, "Zip, I can cut around the avenue and reach the kids that way. I can get those pieces for us."
Like a business magnate who cannot be bothered by a petty administrative detail, Zip answered, "Yeah, good. Gc ahead, get them. Bring them back here." His eyes wanderec up to the first-floor window again. "Man, I wonder how manj pieces Miranda has in that pad with him."
"They say he took guns from all them cops in the..."
"Oh, man, this is gonna be the unholiest! Jee-sus, is he gonna give it to them bastards! Go ahead, Cooch. Go get the pieces. Come on Sixto!"
"Where we going?"
"Get something to stand on. There's always a million boxes in that empty lot on..."
The shots exploded from inside the building, a short volley with the echoing roll of distant thunder. The crowd went instantly silent. The silence hung over the street, and then was shattered instantly when a woman in the crowd screamed. An instant chorus went up after the scream, filling the street A wisp of smoke drifted from the mouth of the building. The smoke hung on the air for an instant, silencing the crowd again, as if they had been a crowd in St. Peter's Square waiting for the smoke to rise from the Sistine Chapel, announcing the new pope, and now that they had seen the smoke, they still did not know who the pope was, and so they fell silent, and they waited.
From inside the building, a voice shouted, "Lieutenant! Lieutenant!"
9
The policemen on the rooftops and on the fire escapes, dangling from open window
s perched behind parapets, seemed like a band of monkeys who had climbed into an intricate zoo gymnasium and now didn't know what to do with themselves. To say that Pepe Miranda was completely surrounded would certainly have been the understatement of the century. There were two tenements facing La Gallina, within the rather narrow confines of the cordon. These two tenements bristled with cops of every size, shape and rank and each of these stalwart defenders of the peace was carrying a loaded and drawn revolver. An additional armory which seemed sizable and formidable enough to have stormed the gates of Stalingrad included such choice delicacies of destruction as rifles with affixed telescopic sights, submachine guns, regulation hand grenades, gas masks, tear-gas pellets, and even a flame thrower or two.
Nor did the siege confine itself to the two buildings facing La Gallina. The police had moved into the adjoining block as well, entering apartments which faced the back windows of the apartment in which Miranda, like an animal driven into a hole, was trapped. Clean white wash fluttered on the back-yard lines. Policemen leaned out of open windows, pistols drawn, peering between the fluttering underpants and brassieres. There were policemen facing the front of the apartment and policemen covering the back of it, and policemen on the roof of the building itself, ready to descend upon Miranda from above.
The adjoining rooftops were covered with the citizenry of the city. Like a bunch of hicks who had come to see a circus daredevil dive eight hundred feet into a thimbleful of water, the people of the neighborhood were anxious to see whether or not Miranda could make the dive without splattering his brains out on the sawdust. To many of these people, Miranda was simply the rebel and the underdog. Consciously or not, they were rooting for him. They wanted him to stand up to this formidable army of men in blue, blast his way out of that goddamn apartment, tip his hat, throw a kiss to the ladies, and ride off into the sunset. Perhaps all of them knew how it would really end. Perhaps they all knew that a single man, no matter how mighty, could not withstand such forces arrayed against him. But many of them nurtured the secret hope that for once, just for once, the rebel would win, the revolutionary would defeat the incumbent dynasty, the anarchist would throw his bomb and escape.
For many others, there was an undeniable cultural tie between themselves and the man in the apartment. The tie was a curious one in that they all knew Miranda was a criminal. In all probability, none of them would have welcomed Miranda into their homes. He was a dangerous man, an unreliable man, a thief and a murderer. But he was Spanish. And, in much the same way that they took pride in the work of Pablo Picasso, they took a strangely curious pride in the fact that Miranda was causing so much excitement. In their minds, there was a very thin line between fame and infamy. Miranda, whatever he had done, was a celebrity. And he was a celebrity whom most of his audience knew on a first-name basis.
For the others who watched, there was only curiosity. A man was trapped in an apartment. The other men wanted to get him out of that apartment. This was a baseball game. There were no good guys or bad guys, only two teams which were trying to win.
At the moment, Miranda's team seemed to have scored the first run. The cry of "Lieutenant! Lieutenant!" which had come from the hallway of the tenement was followed almost immediately by the sight of the man who'd shouted the words. He was a police sergeant, and he had a patrolman's arm draped over his shoulder as he dragged him into the street. The patrolman had been shot. The blood on his blue shirt was plainly visible even to the people who crowded the edges of the rooftops. The sergeant carried the man out and put him on the ground beside the radio motor patrol car. The cop inside the car immediately picked up the hand microphone and requested an ambulance. The crowd watched all this with the eyes of prophets who are noting an interesting development, but who are aware that the final outcome will have little or nothing to do with this minor incident. Miranda had shot one of the cops. That was interesting. But the fireworks were yet to come. Patiently, they awaited the fireworks. It is a rare year that has two Independence Day celebrations.
Standing alongside the wounded patrolman, sweating profusely, Lieutenant Byrnes asked, "How bad is it, Sergeant?"
"His shoulder, sir," the sergeant said. He paused, catching his breath. He was a big beefy man with graying hair. His uniform was a little too tight for him, but he didn't want to buy a new one because he expected to retire next year. When a man pays for his own working clothes, he's apt to consider replacements carefully. "Sir, you shoulda heard Miranda," he said, wedging the words in between his gasps for breath. "We was just making sure all the tenants was out of the building, sir. He began cursing in Spanish and shooting through his door. He must have fired about six shots. Two of them clipped Cassidy."
Byrnes stared at the man lying in the street. "Well, we're getting an ambulance, Sergeant. Stay with him, will you? Do whatever you can to make him comfortable."
"Excuse me," a man on the other side of the barricade said. He was a tall, thin man with penetrating blue eyes. He wore a tan tropical suit and a blue straw Panama. "Did I understand the sergeant to say...?"
"Who the hell are you?" Byrnes asked.
"I'm a reporter. I work for the city's largest afternoon tabloid. I couldn't help overhearing..."
"I know your paper," Byrnes said flatly.
"Did I understand the sergeant to say..."
"I'm busy, mister," Byrnes replied, and he went around to the other side of the squad car and picked up the hand mike.
"Nice guy, your landsman" Parker said to Hernandez. "Couple of inches lower, and Cassidy'd be dead."
"I didn't do the shooting," Hernandez said. "Miranda did."
"So who's blaming you? Listen, every race has its crumbs, ain't that so?"
"Knock it off, Parker."
"Ain't nobody blaming all the Puerto Ricans for a foul ball like Miranda. Look at yourself, for God's sake. Didn't you come from this neighborhood? So look at you now. A detective third grade. It took guts to do what you did. Hell, think of all your own people you had to arrest."
"I do my job, Parker."
"No question about it. You're a good cop, Hernandez. And it sure don't hurt to talk Spanish in a precinct like this one, does it?" He began chuckling. "Listen, who cares if you're taking unfair advantage of the rest of us poor slobs? You keep on the way you're going, and some day you'll be commissioner. Then your father can hang another picture in his candy store."
"Why do you needle me, Parker?"
"Who? Me? I needle you?"
"Why?"
"I don't needle nobody," Parker said innocently. "I'm just like you, pal. I do my job."
"And what's your job?"
"My job is keeping the streets clean. I'm a street cleaner with a gun. That's a cop's job, ain't it?"
"That's not all of a cop's job."
"No? Maybe you think I should go around holding junkies' hands, huh? I used to be that way, Hernandez. I used to be the kind of cop who felt sorry for people. Used to break my heart to tag a car even."
"I'll bet it did."
"You don't have to believe me. Ask any of the old-timers at the station. But I learned my lesson, all right. I learned my lesson."
"How?" Hernandez asked.
"Never mind," Parker answered, and he turned away.
He had been turning away for a long time now, for fourteen years, to be exact. He had been turning away from his duty as a cop, and from his duty as a man, but he excused his negligence by telling himself that he had once been the kind of cop who'd felt sorry for people, and that he'd learned his lesson since. There was a slight inaccuracy to his rationale. Andy Parker was not the kind of man who had ever felt sorry for anybody in his life. It was simply not in his make-up to exude sympathy for his fellow humans. What he probably meant was that one time he felt a closer identification with the people of the precinct than he did now.
And, to give the devil his due, Parker had once approached this somewhat elusive task of law and order with a distinctly different viewpoint. When he was a patro
lman though it never broke his heart to tag a car he was inclined to be lenient with petty offenders, letting them off with a whack of his billet and a warning. There was, he had concluded, enough real crime going on in this precinct without persecuting decent people for minor infractions. He learned in those days that the law was open to interpretation long before it reached the law courts. He learned that the lowest arbitrator in the city's judicial system was a man who wore no legal robes at all; he was the patrolman on the beat. And so he handed down a dozen decisions each day, and his decisions definitely leaned toward giving the petty offender a break. At the same time, he felt he was tough and uncompromising with the out-and-out thief. He considered himself a good cop.
One day, the good cop who was Andy Parker was walking his beat when the proprietor of a dry goods store called him over. The man was holding the wrist of a young kid who had allegedly stolen a bolt of silk from the sidewalk stand. Parker questioned the owner, and Parker questioned the kid, and then he donned his judicial robes and said, "Well, we don't want to cause this kid any trouble, do we? Now, can't we just forget about all this?" The proprietor of the store was loath to forget about all this because the kid had allegedly passed the bolt of silk to an accomplice who had made his escape with the merchandise. But Parker kept administering his sidewalk practice, and finally everyone seemed satisfied to let the entire matter drop.