I hauled myself up the hill, my breath rasping. I turned the corner into a circle of bushes.
A horse reared over me. A grim rider raised a sword.
I cried out. I stumbled back. I fell on my ass.
Another goddamn statue. A king on horseback. He peered down at me crossly.
I sat on the pavement under him. I cursed. I coughed. I fought for breath.
Around me the trees moved and rattled in a chill wind. Their branches made a lacework against the purple sky. Even here, the wind’s whisper mingled with the whisper of cars passing. Otherwise the park was quiet, empty.
I bowed my head between my knees. I hacked hoarsely. I spat into the darkness beside me.
I heard the killer’s footsteps coming up the hill. I raised my head a little. On the other side of the statue, the path continued. Down through the shrubs, out of sight. I stared at that exit. I was too tired to run anymore. If I fought with him, he’d kill me. I didn’t know what to do.
With a breath that sounded like a squeaky door, I climbed painfully to my feet. I staggered to the statue. I hid behind the pedestal. I rested my head against it.
Around the edge of the concrete, I saw the assassin come into the little grove. With a cry, he swung his gun up at the mounted king. He lowered the gun. He cursed softly. He chuckled.
He stood there amid the bushes, a silhouette surrounded by the shaggy darkness of their branches. He surveyed the platform around the king. I forced myself to breathe through my nose.
I watched the gunman. For a moment he seemed bewildered. He looked around him again. He swept the bushes with the gun. Finally he settled on the pedestal. He came toward it slowly, circling wide, so I couldn’t slug him when he came around.
I was out of choices. It was run or die. My legs felt wobbly. My chest felt like it was on fire. I gave one great push off the pedestal, like a swimmer pushing off the pool for another lap. The shove sent me half running, half reeling backward. In that single instant, there weren’t fifteen feet between me and the guy who wanted me dead. The assassin saw his chance. He wheeled. He pulled the trigger.
I left my feet, diving for the way out. I heard two shots fired fast before I hit the ground.
I came down on pavement. It tore the skin off my forehead as I slid. Then I was going over and over in a somersault. I came up to my feet and stumbled on down the hill.
I was dazed. The side of my face was damp with blood. I careened this way and that, reaching out with my hands for purchase like a drunk. The shadow of the assassin crested the hill just above me. He raised his gun again.
There was a flash. I was blinded by it. There was an explosion of noise. It filled my ears. Confused, I saw the assassin lower his pistol. A massive shape whipped by me, obscuring the killer from my view.
It was gone. He lifted the gun again. Again, the light, the wailing noise. The massive shape blocked his fire.
I was on the park’s eastern drive. Cars were honking at me as they slashed by. They blocked the killer’s line of fire. He couldn’t get off a shot.
I made my way across the road. The cars passed. One, then another, then another. I waved my hands at them. They didn’t even slow. The assassin was now making his way down the hill after me. I jogged away from him, south along the road.
At first, as I went, I looked back over my shoulder. I waved at the passing cars. I was hoping for a cab.
A cab came. Its toplight was on. It was free. I spun in my tracks and waved both arms over my head. The cars’ headlights dazzled me. The long honk of its horn peaked and died. The cab whizzed by. It vanished around the corner. Unless you happen to have a bazooka, the odds for getting a car to stop in Central Park after nightfall are pretty slim.
So now we played cat and mouse. My friend the murderman had reached the snow at the edge of the road. I was jogging away from him along the opposite curb. Car after car flashed in between us as he followed after me, waiting for an opening to get across.
Desperately, I sought for an opening of my own. A place to run where I wouldn’t have to test myself against his swiftness and his youth. Next to me was the darkness. A darkness carpeted by the eerily gleaming snow, roofed by the shifting halo of the branches against the moon. Past that—not very far past that—there was a low stone wall. On the other side, the pink-whiteness of Fifth Avenue streetlamps flashed and vanished behind thick clusters of sycamores. I was about ten blocks from home.
I jogged slowly down the road. The killer jogged across the street from me, a few steps behind. The cars kept passing. I wondered whether I should go for the wall. Once I made my move, I was committed. Without a long head start, he would surely run me down—then shoot me down—before I gained the Avenue.
I decided to go. Too late. The last car rushed by us. The assassin came dashing across the drive, his gun half-raised. Another group of cars had come whipping around a corner, bearing down on him. But he had it beat easy.
I crossed the other way. I ran out in front of the traffic. The glare of headlights washed over me. The horns, the screeching brakes bore down.
Then I was over. The wall of cars was again between me and my assailant. With all that was left of my energy, I ran along the roadway’s snow-covered edge.
I ran on blindly. The cars kept going by. More pulled out ahead of me. There was an intersection. I plunged into it. Horns, lights, screaming brakes heralded my crossing.
With the cars from the intersection feeding into the drive, the traffic was heavier now. It was tougher for the murder-man to make his way across. He sidled along the road, waiting for his moment. Somehow my legs kept carrying me forward. I was putting some distance between us.
I was on a path again. A stone wall rimmed it. The wall was topped with boulders and bushes. They peered down at me as I stumbled past.
The road turned. I came around it. For a few seconds, I was out of the hunter’s sight. It was then I looked up. I stopped short. I nearly screamed.
This time it was a panther. A great black cat poised to pounce on the rocks two feet above me. It seemed to have just emerged from the bushes that surrounded it on either side. It was bent forward, its head jutting out, its eyes pinning me.
The thing was so real it took a long moment before I could completely convince myself it was just another statue. It took another moment still before I could break its hypnotic stare and move again. By then my mind was racing, grabbing at a possibility. With my wind gone and my legs close to giving, it was the only possibility left.
I jumped. I reached up. I grabbed the panther around its lowered neck. My feet found niches in the wall. I pulled myself upward. My hands scrabbled over the back of the beast. I crested the wall.
I moved behind the bushes. I took a step away from the panther, then another. I crouched down, inching toward the edge of the wall.
On the drive below me, car after car raced by. Then a break. The road was quiet. I heard the killer’s footsteps padding across the pavement. He came around the corner. He came walking by the wall. I crouched down even lower, hiding behind the cat, peeking over at him.
He was coming on fast. His eyes were going over the path in front of him inch by inch. He’d lost me, but he knew I couldn’t be far.
About a step before he came under the panther, he stopped. I could see him clearly. I could see his long, brown, youthful face. I could see his sharp, brown, ruthless eyes. He was thinking. It didn’t make sense. I couldn’t have vanished like that. I could almost hear his mind working. He was about to think of the wall, about to look up and spot me.
But before he did, he took another tentative step forward. He was directly under the panther.
I growled.
I did it deep in my throat. I let the hoarse rasp of my breath run through it. It came out harsh and real: the sound of an animal. A grinding sound under the sough of the traffic.
The assassin looked up. He saw the cat. He let out a high-pitched shriek, waving the gun but too scared to fire. I jumped off the wall,
landing on the path beside him. He whipped around, his mouth still open on the scream. I slugged him.
It wasn’t much of a punch. I didn’t have much to put into it. It was an old-fashioned haymaker, though, and it came a long way before it scored. It crashed into his teeth. I felt one of them snap beneath my knuckles. I felt my knuckles sliced by the blow. I followed through, falling forward with the motion of the punch as he fell backward with the force of it. We both went down to the ground, several feet apart.
I wasn’t happy. I’d been going for his nose. I figured it was hurt already, if I connected, it might put his lights out. As it was, I don’t even know if he let go of the gun when he fell. I do know that by the time I fought my way to my feet, he had the pistol in his fist again. He was climbing to his knees, looking around for me. His chin was running with blood.
I could not cover the distance between us before he shot me. If I turned tail, though, there was a chance I might make it to the Fifth Avenue wall. It was a small chance. It was the only chance. The road was still empty in front of me. I ran into the darkness.
I was across the street in a moment. I was on the grass. I was on a flat plain of lacy snow, broken by the black, towering trunks of the oaks and sycamores. Branches danced and rattled above my head. My feet fell hard. The snow broke under them. The low wall bobbed before me as I ran, coming closer and closer. The lights of the Avenue flashed and bobbed beyond it.
I reached my hands out. I touched the wall. I grabbed it.
I do not know if he was close behind me. I don’t know if he tried to shoot again. I vaulted that little wall as if West Berlin were on the other side of it. I went over the top, expecting bullets to bring me down.
I hit the ground. My momentum carried me out onto the sidewalk. I went to one knee. I sobbed for lack of breath, kneeling there on the gray octagonal stones, the same stones that paved the side of the park from which I’d come.
I lifted my eyes. There was the Avenue. A steady stream of Friday traffic passed south along it. On the sidewalk, two lovers were coming toward me from the north. They were arm in arm. A middle-aged man was walking his German shepherd up from the other direction. The eager dog strained at the leash, panting. On the opposite sidewalk, a band of young people were swaggering downtown. I could hear them calling to each other. Laughing.
I got to my feet and looked back at the wall. There was only darkness beyond it. That weird darkness, gleaming eerily with the moon and the snow.
I was out of the park.
I’d ducked the little son of a bitch again.
Then I got arrested.
I had stumbled out to the sidewalk’s edge. I raised my hand to hail a cab. The headlights of another car started to pull over. It did not have a toplight. He’s back, I thought. I edged away from the curb.
When the car was about fifteen yards away from me, its flashers popped on. Its siren blooped once and died. I squinted into the spinning red and white lights as the cruiser pulled up beside me. The cab I’d been trying to hail passed by and into the night.
A young patrolman jumped out through the driver’s door into the street. An old patrolman grunted his way out on the passenger side. The old one rose up in front of me like a whale from the deep. I knew him. His name was Rankin. He was gutter dirt. Not smart enough for promotion, but shrewd enough for the take. Not tough enough for the big collar, but mean enough to shut off a perp’s windpipe with the web of his hand. He was big, paunchy. He had an enormous head with tiny black eyes in it. Those eyes held me like a snake’s eyes hold its prey. He towered over me.
The kid was a stranger. He was long and thick and muscular. He had a mustache to hide his big, soft Irish features. He had the dull, dangerous, openmouthed expression they teach at the academy.
I responded with a friendly—not to say shit-eating—grin.
“Who says there’s never a cop around when you need one?” I said.
“Shut the fuck up, asshole,” said Rankin. He was not, on the whole, my biggest fan. Every time I wrote about him, he seemed to get suspended. “Watts is looking for you. Get in the car.”
My lungs were already collapsing. Now my heart sank. “Watts? What the hell does he want?”
Rankin licked his thin, white lips. They twisted into a smile. “Get in the car,” he said almost dreamily. I didn’t like the sound of it.
“There’s a guy in the park with a gun,” I said.
“That’s funny,” said Rankin. “Usually there’s a lot more than one. I don’t want to have to cuff you, Wells.”
“He shot at me.”
“No accounting for people’s tastes. Get in the fucking car.”
The young cop’s eyes shifted between us nervously. The lovers walked by behind me. Then the guy with the dog. They walked around me carefully, as if I were a puddle. They rubbernecked to get a glance at me. Then they were gone on their own business.
“Aren’t you going to do anything about it?” I said.
“I sympathize, Wells. I really do,” said Rankin.
“How about reading me my rights?”
“You have the right to a Christian burial.” He reached out and laid a big hammy hand on my shoulder. He squeezed. It hurt. The young cop’s eyes shifted faster and faster. He leaned forward, as if he were about to interrupt.
“Open the door for Mr. Wells,” said Rankin without looking at him.
The young cop jumped to it. He wanted this over, fast. He opened the cruiser’s back door. Rankin gripped my arm, shoved me toward it.
“I want a lawyer,” I said.
“Write to Santa Claus,” said Rankin.
He tossed me inside. I had to duck fast not to hit my head. I went sprawling over the backseat. I dragged my feet in just as the door slammed. Good thing I was press or they might have mistreated me.
Rankin and the young cop got in front. Their doors slammed in unison. Rankin flicked on the siren. The young cop took the cruiser away from the curb. They hurtled down Fifth at high speed, flashers spinning, sirens screaming. Just like real policemen.
The back of the car seemed very small, very cramped. It seemed far away from the rest of the city. It seemed like no one would hear me if I called for help. I thought about Holloway being taken to Imperial House. I thought about Tom Watts.
Tom Watts was not a good-news kind of guy. He was a lieutenant. He used to be a captain. He’d been a captain, in fact, right up to the very moment I did a series of stories on the precinct he commanded. It was a precinct in the Bronx with a heavy traffic in drugs. The traffic so heavy, rival dealers had to fight for the selling territory. At least, they did until Watts got there. Watts organized a permit system, sort of like the pretzel vendors use. The permits kept things organized, kept the hardworking dealers safe from unfair competition. They also kept them safe from the police. In fact, the police were selling the permits. And a goodly portion of the permit fees were channeled to former Captain now Lieutenant Thomas W. Watts.
Six patrolmen took the fall for that little scam, and two detectives. One cop even did some time. But as for Watts, the DA never got a thing on him, and the courts never tried him. This seemed to me a grievous oversight. So I tried him. I tried him in the Star. He was convicted in the city’s corner taverns. When the people’s verdict came in, the department finally had to bust him to lieutenant. It wasn’t much; still, it seemed very small and cramped in the back of the car.
Rankin and his pal took me to midtown south. It’s a square brick building set amid the towering warehouses of the garment district. Rankin kept his paw on my arm as he led me through the front door.
There was a woman crying in the broad lobby. She was crying to the desk sergeant. The desk sergeant was shaking his head. There was a man lying facedown on the floor. He was groaning or snoring, I’m not sure which. None of these people looked up at us. We weren’t even an interruption. The desk sergeant simply reached out and pressed a button. A buzzer went off, and the young cop pushed open a door with heavy wire mesh on it
. He went through. Rankin followed, dragging me with him.
I was escorted down a hall. Into an elevator. Down another hall. It was dismal there. One of the ceiling fluorescents had burned out. Another was giving off no more than a dull purple flicker. The shadowy figures of cops passed by us. They turned to the side to let me and Rankin go by. The young cop followed behind us.
At the end of the hall, Rankin reached out with his right hand and opened a door. He used his left hand to shove me through the door into a room.
“Have a seat,” he said.
He left me there alone.
The room was small. A rectangle. Small and stark. The walls were lined with green tiles. The floor tiles were green, too. There was a spiral of fluorescent light on the ceiling. Parts of the curling tube gave off light, parts didn’t. There was a window onto the alley next door, but the blinds were drawn. The room was only a little brighter than the hall.
There was a clock on the wall. It read 11:05. There was a table in the center of the room. There were plastic chairs around the table. I took off my overcoat, draped it over the back of a chair. I leaned against the edge of the table and crossed my arms. I tried to look like the prospect of being alone in here with Tom Watts didn’t bother me a bit. I tried to look like it was my idea of a vacation. I couldn’t quite get it. I tried lighting up a cigarette. I let it dangle from my mouth. I let the smoke curl up around my squinting eyes. I sneered. That was much better. I faced the door. I waited.
I kept waiting. Watts took his time. I sneaked a look at the clock. It was eleven-fifteen, then eleven-thirty. I went through two more cigarettes. My sneer got tired. My eyes started to tear.
Tom Watts came in. He had a cigarette pasted in his face, too. He also had a sneer, a pretty good one. He waved a hand at me.
“Knock it off, Wells,” he said. “I know you’re terrified.”
“Okay,” I told him, “but that doesn’t mean you can push me around.”