Make Room! Make Room! (21 page)

“Let me get into bed and I’ll work the flash for you—will that be all right?”

“It’ll have to do.”

He opened his notepad on top of the dresser, lay one of the reusable forms next to it, then began copying information into the report. With his left hand he kept a slow and regular squeezing on the flashlight that produced steady illumination. The city was quiet tonight with the people driven from the streets by the cold and the rain; the whir of the tiny generator and the occasional squeak of the stylo on plastic sounded unnaturally loud. There was enough light from the flash for Shirl to get undressed by. She shivered when she took off her outer clothes and quickly pulled on heavy winter pajamas, a much-darned pair of socks she used for sleeping in, then put her heavy sweater on top. The sheets were cold and damp, they hadn’t been changed since the water shortage, though she did try to air them out as often as she could.

“What are you writing up?” she asked.

“Everything I have on Billy Chung, they’re still after me to find him—it’s the most stupid thing I ever heard of.” He slammed the stylo down and paced angrily back and forth, the flashlight in his hand throwing twisting shadows across the ceiling. “We’ve had two dozen killings in the precinct since O’Brien was murdered. We caught one killer while his wife was still bleeding to death—but all of the other murders have been forgotten, almost the same day they happened. What can be so important about Big Mike? No one seems to know—yet they
still want reports. So after I put in a double shift I’m expected to keep on looking for the kid. I should be out tonight, running down another phony spotting report, but I’m not going to—even though Grassy will ream me out tomorrow. Do you know how much sleep I’ve been getting lately?”

“I know,” she said softly.

“A couple of hours a night—if that. Well, tonight I’m going to catch up. I have to sign in again by seven in the morning, there’s another protest rally in Union Square, so I won’t get much sleep anyway.” He stopped pacing and handed her the flashlight, which dimmed, then brightened again as she worked the lever. “I’m making all the noise—but you’re really the one who should be complaining, Shirl. You had it a lot better before you ever met me.”

“It’s bad for everyone this fall, I’ve never seen anything like it. First the water, now this thing about a fuel shortage, I don’t understand it….”

“That’s not what I mean, Shirl—will you shine the light on this drawer?” He took out a can of oil and his cleaning kit, spreading the contents out on a rag on the floor next to the bed. “It’s about you and me personally. Things here aren’t up to the standards you’ve been used to.”

She skirted around mentioning her stay with Mike just as carefully as he did. It was something they never talked about. “My father’s place is in a neighborhood just like this one,” she said. “Things aren’t that different.”

“I’m not talking about that.” He squatted and broke open his revolver, then ran the cleaning brush back and forth through its barrel. “After you left home things went a lot better for you, I know that. You’re a pretty girl, more than just pretty, there must have been a lot of guys who were running after you.” He spoke haltingly, looking at his work.

“I’m here because I want to be here,” she said, putting into words what he had not been able to say. “Being attractive makes things easier for a girl, I know that, but it doesn’t make everything all right. I want … I don’t know exactly … happiness, I suppose. You helped me when I really needed help and we had more fun than I ever had before in my life. I never told you before, but I was hoping you would ask me to come here, we got along so well.”

“Is that the only reason?”

They had never talked about this since the night he had asked her here, and now he wanted to know all about her feelings without revealing any of his own.

“Why did you ask me here, Andy? What were your reasons?” She avoided his question.

He clicked the cylinder back into the gun without looking up at her, and spun it with his thumb. “I liked you—liked you a lot. In fact, if you want to know,” he lowered his voice as though the words were shameful, “I love you.”

Shirl didn’t know what to say and the silence lengthened. The dynamo in the flashlight whirred and on the other side of the partition there was a creaking of springs and a subdued grunt as Sol climbed into bed.

“What about you, Shirl?” Andy said, in a low voice so Sol wouldn’t hear them. He raised his face for the first time and looked at her.

“I … I’m happy here. Andy, and I want to be here. I haven’t thought much more about it.”

“Love, marriage, kids? Have you thought about those things?” There was a sharp edge to his voice now.

“Every girl thinks about things like that, but …”

“But not with a slob like me in a broken-down rat trap like this, is that what you mean?”

“Don’t put words into my mouth, I didn’t say that or even think it. I’m not complaining—except maybe about the awful hours you’re away.”

“I have my job to do.”

“I know that—it’s just that I never see you any more. I think we were together more in those first weeks after I met you. It was fun.”

“Spending loot is always fun, but the world can’t be like that all the time.”

“Why not? I don’t mean all the time, but just once in a while or in the evenings, or even a Sunday off. It seems like weeks since we have even talked together. I’m not saying it has to be romance all the time….”

“I have my job. Just how much romance do you think there would be in living if I gave it up?”

Shirl found herself close to tears. “Please, Andy—I’m not trying to fight with you. That’s the last thing I want. Don’t you understand …?”

“I understand damn well. If I was a big man in the syndicate and running girls and hemp and LSD, things might be different. But I’m just a crummy cop trying to hold things together while the rest of the bastards are taking them apart.”

He stabbed the bullets into the cylinder while he talked, not looking at her and not seeing the silent tears that ran down her face. She hadn’t cried at the dinner table, but she could not stop it now. It was the cold weather, the boy with the knife, the water shortage, everything—and now this. When she laid the flashlight on the floor the light faded and almost went out as the flywheel slowed. Before it brightened again in his hand she had turned her face to the wall and had pulled the covers up over her head.

She did like Andy, she knew that—but did she love him? It was so hard to decide anything when she hardly ever saw him. Why didn’t he understand that? She wasn’t trying to hide anything or avoid anything. Yet her life wasn’t with him, it was in this terrible room where he hardly ever came, living on this street, the people, that boy with the knife…. She bit into her lip but could not stop crying.

When he came to bed he did not say anything, and she did not know what she could say. It was warmer with him there, though she could still smell the gun oil, it must have got on his hands and he could not wipe it all off, and when he was close she felt much better.

She touched his arm and whispered “Andy,” but by then it was too late. He was sound asleep.

“I smell trouble brewing,” Detective Steve Kulozik said as he finished adjusting the headband in the fiberglass helmet. He put it on and scowled out unhappily from under the projecting edge.

“You smell trouble!” Andy shook his head. “What a wonderful nose you got. They have the whole precinct, patrolmen and detectives, mixed together, like shock troops. We’re issued helmets and riot bombs at seven in the morning, locked in here without any orders—and you smell trouble. What’s your secret, Steve?”

“A natural talent,” the fat detective said placidly.

“Let’s have your attention here,” the captain shouted. The voices and foot shuffling died away and the ranks of men were silent, looking expectantly toward the far end of the big room where the captain stood.

“We’re going to have some special work today,” the captain said, “and Detective Dwyer here, of the Headquarters Squad, will explain it to you.”

There was an interested stir as the men in the back rows tried to see past the ranks ahead of them. The Headquarters Squad were trouble shooters, they worked out of Centre Street and took their orders directly from Detective Inspector Ross.

“Can you men in the rear there hear me?” Dwyer called out,
then climbed onto a chair. He was a broad, bulky man with the chin and wrinkled neck of a bulldog, his voice a hoarse, bass rumble. “Are the doors locked, captain?” he asked. “What I have to say is for these men alone.” There was a mumbled reassurance and he turned back to face them, looking over the rows of uniformed patrolmen and the drab-coated detectives in the rear.

“There’s going to be a couple of hundred—or maybe a couple of thousand—people killed in this city by tonight,” he said. “Your job is to keep that figure as low as possible. When you go out of here you better realize that there are going to be riots and trouble today and the faster you act to break them up the easier it’s going to be for all of us. The Welfare stations won’t open today and there won’t be any food issued for at least three days.”

His voice rose sharply over the sudden hum of voices. “Knock that noise off! What are you—police officers or a bunch of old women? I’m giving this to you straight so you can get ready for the worst, not just yak-yak about it.” The silence was absolute.

“All right. The trouble has been coming for days now, but we couldn’t act until we knew where we stood. We know now. The city has gone right along issuing full food rations until the warehouses are almost empty. We’re going to close them now, build up a backlog and open again in three days. With a smaller ration—and
that
is classified and not to be repeated to anyone. Rations are going to stay small the rest of the winter, don’t forget that, whatever you may hear to the contrary. The immediate cause of the shortage right now is that accident on the main line north of Albany, but that’s just one of the troubles. The grain is going to start coming in again—but it still won’t be enough. We had a professor from Columbia down at Centre Street to tell us about it so we could pass it on, but it gets technical and we haven’t got that much time. But here’s what it boils down to.

“There was a fertilizer shortage last spring, which means the crop wasn’t as good as expected. There have been storms and flooding. The Dust Bowl is still growing. And there was that trouble with the poisoned soybeans from the insecticide. You all know just as much about it as I do, it was on TV. What it adds up to is that a lot of small things have piled up to make one big trouble. There have even been some mistakes made by the President’s Emergency Food Planning Board and you’re going to see some new faces there. So everyone in this town is going to
have to tighten his belt a bit. There is going to be enough for all of us as long as we can keep law and order. I don’t have to tell you what would happen if we had some real good riots, some fires, big trouble. We can’t count on any outside help because the Army has got plenty of other things to worry about. It’s going to be you men on foot out there that do the job. There isn’t one operational hovercraft left, they’ve all either got parts missing or broken impeller blades, and there aren’t any replacements. It’s up to you. There are thirty-five million people here counting on us. If you don’t want them to starve to death—do your jobs. Now … any questions?”

A buzz of whispered talk swept across the crowded room, then a patrolman hesitantly raised his hand and Dwyer nodded to him.

“What about the water, sir?”

“That trouble should be licked soon. Repairs on the aqueduct are almost finished and the water should be coming through within a week. But there is still going to be rationing because of the loss of ground water from the Island, and the low level of the reservoirs. And that brings up another thing. We been putting the announcement on TV every hour and we got as many guards as we can spare along the waterfront, but people are still drinking river water. I don’t know how they can—the damned river is just an open sewer by the time it reaches us, and salty from the ocean—but people do it. And they’re not boiling it, which is the same as taking poison. The hospitals are filling up with typhoid and dysentery cases and God knows what else, and
that
is going to get worse before the winter is over. There are lists of symptoms posted on the bulletin boards and I want you to memorize them and keep your eyes open, get word to the Health Department about anything you see and bring in any cases you think will get away. Keep your shots up to date and you got nothing to worry about, the department has all the vaccine you’re going to need.” He cupped his ear toward the nearby ranks and frowned.

“I think I heard someone say ‘political officer,’ but maybe they didn’t. Let’s say they didn’t, but I’ve heard it before and you may be hearing it again yourselves. So let’s get one thing straight. The Commies invented that name, and the way they use it it means a guy who pushes the Party line to the troops, sells them a snow job, a lot of crap. But that’s not the way we work it
in this country. Maybe I’m a political officer, but I’m leveling with you, telling you all the truth so you can get out there and do your job knowing just what has to be done. Any more questions?”

His big head looked around the room and the silence lengthened; no one else was asking the question, so Andy reluctantly raised his hand.

“Yes?” Dwyer said.

“What about the markets, sir?” Andy said, and the nearby faces turned toward him. “There’s the flea market in Madison Square, they have some food there, and the Gramercy Park market.”

“That’s a good question, because they are going to be our sore spots today. A lot of you will be on duty in or near those markets. We are going to have trouble at the warehouses when they don’t open, and there will be trouble in Union Square with the Eldsters there—they are
always
trouble.” A duly appreciative laugh followed his words. “The stores are going to sell out and board up, we’re taking care of that, but we can’t control the markets the same way. The only food on sale in this city will be there, and people are going to realize it soon enough. Keep your eyes open and if anything starts—stop it before it can spread. You’ve got night sticks and you have gas, use them when you have to. You’ve got guns and they’re best left in their holsters. We don’t want indiscriminate killing, that only makes things worse.”