"I'm asking you, Pop: what's the matter with this subway?"
"I come in here," said H.M. "I put a dime in the slot beside that turnstile. I get into a train, as good as gold."
"All right so what?"
"The first station I get to," said H.M., "is called Times Square. Fine! I look out the window at the next station, and it says Grand Central. 'Lord love a duck,' thinks I, 'it must be confusin' as hell to have two stations with the same name.' The train goes hopperin' on, and burn my heavenly britches! if it ain't Times Square again. The next station is Grand Central."
Officer O'Casey spoke gently.
"Look, Pop. This is the shuttle! It only goes between here and Times Square!"
"That's what I mean," said H.M.
"Howdja mean-whatcha mean?"
"What in Esau's name is the good of a subway that only goes to one station?"
"But you can change for any place from there! It's a service, see? It's..." Officer O'Casey, swallowing hard, was seized with inspiration. "Listen, Pop," he pleaded. "Where do you want to go?"
"Washington, D.C."
"But you can't go to Washington by subway!"
H.M. extended his hand, palm upwards, in a lordly and insulting. gesture towards Officer O'Casey's subway.
"See what I mean?" he inquired.
"You're drunk. I ought to run you in," said the policeman, after a deadly pause.
"You see those turnstiles?" said H.M., leering up at him.
"I see 'em, all right! What about 'em?"
"I've just magicked ‘em," said H.M. "I put the old voodoo spell on 'em." Then he advanced his unmentionable face. "What d'ye want to bet I can't walk through any of the turnstiles and never drop a dime in the slot?"
"Now look here, Pop!..."
"Ho!" said H.M. "You think I'm kiddin', hey?"
He rose to his feet, the tweed plus fours adding more of a barrel shape. Majestically preceded by his corporation, he approached the nearest turnstile. Then, gracefully holding both arms in the air like a ballet dancer, he just as gracefully maneuvered his corporation against the turnstile. It clanked, and he went through.
"You come back here!" yelled Officer O'Casey.
"Sure," said H.M., instantly returning through the turnstile and just as instantly going back through another one—still without benefit of any fare.
"Voodoo," he explained with a modest cough.
For a moment the policeman stared at him. Then Officer O'Casey charged at that turnstile like a bull at a gate. But it held him.
"Y'see, son?" H.M. inquired pityingly. "You can't do it unless you know the voodoo words. And I expect," he pointed, "that feller in the money-changing box is just about having high blood pressure, ain't he?"
It was true, as Officer O'Casey’s glance confirmed. The young man who gave change was gibbering behind the bars.
"What the hell's going on out there?" he screamed.
The great man was paying no attention.
"I keep telling you," he rumbled patiently, "that they're all magicked. You can't get through without payin' unless you know the voodoo words."
Officer O'Casey's colour changed again. The .38 police-positive revolver shook in its holster against his hip. But his flaming curiosity was stronger than his instinct for law and order.
"Listen, Pop," he said in a low voice. "I’ll bite. I know it's a gag. But what are these voodoo words?"
"'Hocus pocus,'" H.M. said instantly. "'Allagazam. Cold iron and Robin Goodfellow.' That's all."
"But I can't say that!" "Why not?"
"I don't know," admitted the policeman, with a red colour coming up his face from under the uniform collar, "But it sounds crazy. It sounds..."
Then his whole tone changed.
"'Hocus pocus!'" said the policeman, extending his finger at the turnstile."'Allagazam! Cold iron and Robin Hood!'" He charged at the turnstile, and went through so easily that he nearly pitched headlong down the stairs.
But neither Officer O'Casey nor Sir Henry Merrivale had anticipated what happened next
A thunderous wave of applause, hand-clapping rising above the cheers, swept through that sour cavern and echoed back from its walls. Officer O'Casey had forgotten the crowd which can assemble in an instant, as though "magicked," at the least sign of monkey business. They poured down through the arcade from Grand Central, and through the two other entrances to the shuttle.
Office O'Casey was as red as a beet But H.M., whose worst enemy could not have called him bashful, assumed a dignity like Napoleon at Austerlitz and bowed as low as his corporation would permit He also raced in and out of two more turnstiles before the policeman collared him.
"Keep back!" shouted Officer O'Casey to the crowd. "I'm warning you now: keep back!"
Officer O'Casey was wearing a gun. They kept back.
"Jake!" he yelled to the consumptive-looking youth who kept the change booth. Jake hurried out being careful to lock the door behind him.
"Now look, Jake! There's something wrong with these turnstiles!"
"I tell you," Jake replied passionately, "there ain't nothing wrong with them' turnstiles! People been using 'em all day! You seen it for yourself!"
"It's voodoo, that's all," said H.M.
"Pop, you be quiet Jake, there's a coil of rope over there against the tile wall." The policeman pointed to it "You tie one end of that rope to the bars of your window, and the other end to the iron post at the end turnstile over at that side. Nobody gets through until... get going!"
Officer O'Casey, supervising the lying of the rope, was slowly losing his mind.
"Looky here, son!" H.M. told him in consoling tones. "Let's face it! If you know the password, you can get a free ride in the subway. You don't even have to crawl over or climb under."
It was unfortunate that H.M.'s powerful voice carried these words, or a part of them, out over a boiling and swaying crowd. Scattered words rose and were audible above the crowd, like the spurts of small skyrockets.
"What are they doin', anyway?"
"Didn't you hear it? The subway's hoodooed."
"You get a free ride in the subway," a voice was heard clearly to say, "if you care to leap the turnstile or crawl under it."
An electric tremor ran through the crowd. Though a dozen hoots and catcalls greeted the remark, the news spread.
"I assure you, sir," cried the little man who was honestly repeating what he thought he heard,
"you get a free ride in the subway!"
"That's gospel truth!" shouted a travelling salesman who wanted to get out of the mob. "If s a psychological experiment."
"And all you've got to do is get the hell over the turnstile?"
"Yes!"
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go!"
And the crowd, converging from two directions, crashed forward.
There are certain moments when the chronicler, accurate though he is compelled to be, would prefer to shudder and draw a veil. Besides, established facts here are meagre.
It was not a crowd; it was a tidal wave. As the rope broke, it yanked the grilled window out of the money booth with a clang like the gong for round one. Nobody could afterwards agree who started the fight, though interlocked bodies were rolling down the stairs from the first.
It is unquestioned that somebody dived through the open cash window and began to scoop up money. But all that could be seen of him was the seat of a pair of blue denim trousers, at which some old lady was savagely walloping with an umbrella. Officer O'Casey, swept backwards, tripped over H.M.'s bag and lay stunned. Sir Henry Merrivale (to quote his own words) was merely standing there, as good as gold, not bothering anybody.