Short Stories: Five Decades (53 page)

“Perfectly all right,” Fitzsimmons said, trying to screen his wife’s face from Tarloff by bending over to search for the nickels in his pocket.

Helen went off, disdainfully holding her long formal skirt up with her hand, as she walked down the spit- and butt-marked corridor of the police station toward a pay telephone. Fitzsimmons reflectively watched her elegant back retreat down the hallway.

“I am tired,” Tarloff said. “I think I will have to sit down, if you will excuse me.” He sat on the floor, looking up with a frail, apologetic smile on his red face worn by wind and rain and traffic-policemen. Fitzsimmons suddenly felt like crying, watching the old man sitting there among the spit and cigarette butts, on the floor against the wall, with his cap off and his great bush of musician’s gray hair giving the lie to the tired, weathered face below it.

Four men threw open the outside doors and walked into the police station with certainty and authority. They all wore the same light-gray hats with the huge flat brims. The young man who had hit Tarloff greeted them guardedly. “I’m glad you’re here, Pidgear,” he said to the man who, by some subtle mixture of stance and clothing, of lift of eyebrow and droop of mouth, announced himself as leader.

They talked swiftly and quietly in a corner.

“A Russian!” Pidgear’s voice rang out angrily. “There are 10,000 cab drivers in the metropolitan area, you have to pick a Russian to punch in the nose!”

“I’m excitable!” the young man yelled. “Can I help it if I’m excitable? My father was the same way; it’s a family characteristic.”

“Go tell that to the Russian,” Pidgear said. He went over to one of the three men who had come in with him, a large man who needed a shave and whose collar was open at the throat, as though no collar could be bought large enough to go all the way around that neck. The large man nodded, went over to Tarloff, still sitting patiently against the wall.

“You speak Russian?” the man with the open collar said to Tarloff.

“Yes, sir,” Tarloff said.

The large man sat down slowly beside him, gripped Tarloff’s knee confidentially in his tremendous hairy hand, spoke excitedly, winningly, in Russian.

Pidgear and the young man who had hit Tarloff came over to Fitzsimmons, leaving the other two men in the gray hats, small, dark men with shining eyes, who just stood at the door and looked hotly on.

“My name is Pidgear,” the man said to Fitzsimmons, who by now was impressed with the beautiful efficiency of the system that had been put into motion by the young driver of the Ford—an obviously legal mind like Pidgear, a man who spoke Russian, and two intense men with gray hats standing on call just to see justice done, and all collected in the space of fifteen minutes. “Alton Pidgear,” the man said, smiling professionally at Fitzsimmons. “I represent Mr. Rusk.”

“Yeah,” said the young man.

“My name is Fitzsimmons.”

“Frankly, Mr. Fitzsimmons,” Pidgear said, “I would like to see you get Mr. Tarloff to call this whole thing off. It’s an embarrassing affair for all concerned; nobody stands to gain anything by pressing it.”

Helen came back and Fitzsimmons saw by the expression on her face that she wasn’t happy. “They’re at the soup by now,” she said loudly to Fitzsimmons. “Adele said for us to take all the time we want, they’re getting along fine.”

“Mr. Rusk is willing to make a handsome offer,” Pidgear said. “Five dollars for the car, five dollars for the nose …”

“Go out to dinner with your husband,” Helen muttered, “and you wind up in a telephone booth in a police station. ‘Excuse me for being late, darling, but I’m calling from the 8th Precinct, this is our night for street-fighting.’”

“Sssh, Helen, please,” Fitzsimmons said. He hadn’t eaten since nine that morning and his stomach was growling with hunger.

“It was all a mistake,” Pidgear said smoothly. “A natural mistake. Why should the man be stubborn? He is being reimbursed for everything, isn’t he? I wish you would talk to him, Mr. Fitzsimmons; we don’t want to keep you from your social engagements. Undoubtedly,” Pidgear said, eyeing their evening clothes respectfully, “you and the madam were going to an important dinner party. It would be too bad to spoil an important dinner party for a little thing like this. Why, this whole affair is niggling,” he said, waving his hand in front of Fitzsimmons’ face. “Absolutely niggling.”

Fitzsimmons looked over to where Tarloff and the other Russian were sitting on the floor. From Tarloff’s face and gestures, even though he was talking in deepest Russian, Fitzsimmons could tell Tarloff was still as firm as ever. Fitzsimmons looked closely at Rusk, who was standing looking at Tarloff through narrow, baleful eyes.

“Why’re you so anxious?” Fitzsimmons asked.

Rusk’s eyes clouded over and his throat throbbed against his collar with rage. “I don’t want to appear in court!” he yelled. “I don’t want the whole goddamn business to start all over again, investigation, lawyers, fingerprints …”

Pidgear punched him savagely in the ribs, his fist going a short distance, but with great violence.

“Why don’t you buy time on the National Broadcasting System?” Pidgear asked. “Make an address, coast to coast!”

Rusk glared murderously for a moment at Pidgear, then leaned over toward Fitzsimmons, pointing a large blunt finger at him. “Do I have to put my finger in your mouth?” he whispered hoarsely.

“What does he mean by that?” Helen asked loudly. “Put his finger in your mouth? Why should he put his finger in your mouth?”

Rusk looked at her with complete hatred, turned, too full for words, and stalked away, with Pidgear after him. The two little men in the gray hats watched the room without moving.

“Claude?” Helen began.

“Obviously,” Fitzsimmons said, his voice low, “Mr. Rusk isn’t anxious for anyone to look at his fingerprints. He’s happier this way.”

“You picked a fine night!” Helen shook her head sadly. “Why can’t we just pick up and get out of here?”

Rusk, with Pidgear at his side, strode back. He stopped in front of the Fitzsimmonses. “I’m a family man,” he said, trying to sound like one. “I ask yuh as a favor. Talk to the Russian.”

“I had to go to Bergdorf Goodman,” Helen said, too deep in her own troubles to bother with Rusk, “to get a gown to spend the evening in a police station. ‘Mrs. Claude Fitzsimmons was lovely last night in blue velvet and silver fox at Officer Kraus’s reception at the 8th Precinct. Other guests were the well-known Leopold Tarloff, and the Messrs. Pidgear and Rusk, in gray hats. Other guests included the Russian Ambassador and two leading Italian artillerymen, also in gray hats.’”

Pidgear laughed politely. “Your wife is a very witty woman,” he said.

“Yes,” said Fitzsimmons, wondering why he’d married her.

“Will yuh for Christ’s sake
ask?
” Rusk demanded. “Can it hurt yuh?”

“We’re willing to do our part,” Pidgear said. “We even brought down a Russian to talk to him and clear up any little points in his own language. No effort is too great.”

Fitzsimmons’ stomach growled loudly. “Haven’t eaten all day,” he said, embarrassed.

“That’s what happens,” Pidgear said. “Naturally.”

“Yeah,” said Rusk.

“Perhaps I should go out and get you a malted milk,” Helen suggested coldly.

Fitzsimmons went over to where Tarloff was sitting with the other Russian. The others followed him.

“Are you sure, Mr. Tarloff,” Fitzsimmons said, “that you still want to prosecute?”

“Yes,” Tarloff said promptly.

“Ten dollars,” Rusk said. “I offer yuh ten dollars. Can a man do more?”

“Money is not the object.” With his cap Tarloff patted his nose, which was still bleeding slowly and had swelled enormously, making Tarloff look lopsided and monstrous.

“What’s the object?” Rusk asked.

“The object, Mr. Rusk, is principle.”

“You talk to him,” Rusk said to Fitzsimmons.

“All right,” Officer Kraus said, “you can go up there now.”

They all filed in in front of the lieutenant sitting high at his desk.

Tarloff told his story, the accident, the wanton punch in the nose.

“It’s true,” Pidgear said, “that there was an accident, that there was a slight scuffle after by mistake. But the man isn’t hurt. A little swelling in the region of the nose. No more.” He pointed dramatically to Tarloff.

“Physically,” Tarloff said, clutching his cap, talking with difficulty because his nose was clogged, “physically that’s true. I am not badly hurt. But in a mental sense …” He shrugged. “I have suffered an injury.”

“Mr. Rusk is offering the amount of ten dollars,” Pidgear said. “Also, he apologizes; he’s sorry.”

The lieutenant looked wearily down at Rusk. “Are you sorry?” he asked.

“I’m sorry,” said Rusk, raising his right hand. “On the Bible, I swear I’m sorry.”

“Mr. Tarloff,” the lieutenant said, “if you wish to press charges, there are certain steps you will have to take. A deposition will have to be taken. Have you got witnesses?”

“Here,” Tarloff said with a shy smile at the Fitzsimmonses.

“They will have to be present,” the lieutenant said sleepily.

“Oh, God,” Helen said.

“A warrant will have to be sworn out, there must be a hearing, at which the witnesses must also be present …”

“Oh, God,” Helen said.

“Then the trial,” said the lieutenant.

“Oh, God!” Helen said loudly.

“The question is, Mr. Tarloff,” said the lieutenant, yawning, “are you willing to go through all that trouble?”

“The fact is,” Tarloff said unhappily, “he hit me in the head without provocation. He is guilty of a crime on my person. He insulted me. He did me an injustice. The law exists for such things. One individual is not to be hit by another individual in the streets of the city without legal punishment.” Tarloff was using his hands to try to get everyone, the Fitzsimmonses, the lieutenant, Pidgear, to understand. “There is a principle. The dignity of the human body. Justice. For a bad act a man suffers. It’s an important thing …”

“I’m excitable,” Rusk shouted. “If yuh want, yuh can hit me in the head.”

“That is not the idea,” Tarloff said.

“The man is sorry,” the lieutenant said, wiping his eyes, “he is offering you the sum of ten dollars; it will be a long, hard job to bring this man to trial; it will cost a lot of the taxpayers’ money; you are bothering these good people here who have other things to do. What is the sense in it, Mr. Tarloff?”

Tarloff scraped his feet slowly on the dirty floor, looked sadly, hopefully, at Fitzsimmons. Fitzsimmons looked at his wife, who was glaring at Tarloff, tapping her foot sharply again and again. Fitzsimmons looked back at Tarloff, standing there, before the high desk, small, in his ragged coat and wild gray hair, his little worn face twisted and grotesque with the swollen nose, his eyes lost and appealing. Fitzsimmons shrugged sadly. Tarloff drooped inside his old coat, shook his head wearily, shrugged, deserted once and for all before the lieutenant’s desk, on the dry rock of principle.

“O.K.,” he said.

“Here,” Rusk brought the ten-dollar bill out with magical speed.

Tarloff pushed it away. “Get out of here,” he said, without looking up.

No one talked all the way to Adele Lowrie’s house. Tarloff opened the door and sat, looking straight ahead, while they got out. Helen went to the door of the house and rang. Silently, Fitzsimmons offered Tarloff the fare. Tarloff shook his head. “You have been very good,” he said. “Forget it.”

Fitzsimmons put the money away slowly.

“Claude!” Helen called. “The door’s open.”

Fitzsimmons hated his wife, suddenly, without turning to look at her. He put out his hand and Tarloff shook it wearily

“I’m awfully sorry,” Fitzsimmons said. “I wish I …”

Tarloff shrugged. “That’s all right,” he said. “I understand.” His face, in the shabby light of the cab, worn and old and battered by the streets of the city, was a deep well of sorrow. “There is no time. Principle.” He laughed, shrugged. “Today there is no time for anything.”

He shifted gears and the taxi moved slowly off, its motor grinding noisily.

“Claude!” Helen called.

“Oh, shut up!” Fitzsimmons said as he turned and walked into Adele Lowrie’s house.

Noises in the City

W
eatherby was surprised to see the lights of the restaurant still lit when he turned off Sixth Avenue and started up the street toward the small apartment house in the middle of the block in which he lived. The restaurant was called the Santa Margharita and was more or less Italian, with French overtones. Its main business was at lunchtime and by ten-thirty at night it was usually closed. It was convenient and on nights when they were lazy or when Weatherby had work to do at home, he and his wife sometimes had dinner there. It wasn’t expensive, and Giovanni, the bartender, was a friend, and from time to time Weatherby stopped in for a drink on his way home from the office, because the liquor was good and the atmosphere quiet and there was no television.

He nearly passed it, then stopped and decided he could use a whiskey. His wife had told him she was going to a movie and wouldn’t be home before eleven-thirty, and he was tired and didn’t relish the thought of going into the empty apartment and drinking by himself.