For some time before this, even despite my worries and troubles, I had been studying for the sergeant’s examinations. At the new station I met Captain James Post who had organized a school among his men, and right, there my ambition took a spurt. It was the turning point in my police life.
I can never repay Captain Post for the encouragement he gave me. The captain was the new type of superior officer, intelligent, strict in discipline, but square. He worked on the theory that the policeman needed to be as handy with his head as with the night stick. The captain sought to make his men ambitious, and spurred on those who were.
Most of us became so enthusiastic that we carted our books around on post. I studied law, city ordinances, and rules and regulations of the police department while squatting on lumber piles along the Harlem River at the Willis and Third Avenue bridge. A funny sight that would have been to some of the cops I had known while a youngster on the Bowery.
It was at this period that I met “Happy” Houlihan, a patrolman of the Thirty-Fifth Precinct. The popular comic strip of the day, “Happy Hooligan,” accounted for the nickname. Every man in the station house was his friend. He had a fine wife and several children and his intentions were the best.
But Happy couldn’t leave liquor alone and was drunk when he shouldn’t have been. Several complaints for intoxication had been made against him and it looked like the end.
I’ve pulled many tricks in my life, but I don’t think anything quite equaled the stunt that saved Happy. He was my side partner on post and cops can’t let down their pals. Jim Skehan, a patrolman with whom I did a good deal of studying for the sergeantcy, was in on things with me from the start.
We had a council of war at Happy’s home with Happy and his wife. It was a glum meeting, for Happy’s trial was due. If he pleaded guilty he was gone. If he denied the charges, they had the evidence. Happy was sure he would be busted and was heartbroken over what would happen to his family. He couldn’t see hope anywhere, even after we’d talked things over for hours.
I don’t know how we came to think of aphasia, but we did. Then we were off.
“Go over to Newark. Remove all the identification marks from your clothing and get lost over there. Stay in a hospital for a while, remembering nothing about who you are, where you live, or what you do. Then come to yourself again. It’s the only chance.”
That’s what we advised Happy, and that’s what he did. The next day things started to pop. His wife came sobbing to the station house, with the word that Happy had been gone all night. The alarm was sent to all station houses. Every hospital in the city was searched — even the morgue. But no Happy.
Ten days went by without a trace, with the whole department mystified. Then a hospital in New Jersey called up police headquarters and reported that a patient had just been cured of aphasia and that he was a patrolman.
Police surgeons were rushed to the hospital — and Happy stalled beautifully. He was brought back to the city and suspended for trial, with enough complaints against him to paper the walls of his home.
Happy had a good lawyer and the trial was a scream. They read complaint after complaint to Happy and asked him to plead.
“I don’t remember getting it — how can I plead?” Happy wanted to know.
Deputy Commissioner Hanson, presiding officer, was at a loss. Such a sad state of affairs had never existed before under the laws as he knew them. So he sent out a hurry call for the Corporation counsel to advise him on proceedings. The Corporation counsel showed up.
A psychiatrist came into our fold. He took the stand and so did other doctors. It wasn’t long before the court room began to think that Happy was a much abused man, the innocent victim of mental impulses which he didn’t even know he possessed. Happy almost began to think so himself.
Medical history was raked over by Happy’s lawyer. It developed that other cases such as Happy’s had existed in the past. The New Jersey witnesses told of his dazed, helpless condition when found.
I’ve never seen a farce like it on any stage. We didn’t dare to share the joke with anybody. By the time the medical men and the lawyer were finished, even Mr. Hanson seemed convinced that Happy had been non compos mentis every time he’d taken a drink. So they had to dismiss the complaints and restore the shield to Happy.
Superiors are suspicious people and there were those who figured the department was being buncoed. So Happy was transferred to another station whose captain was noted for his toughness. The game, of course, was to “break” our friend at the first false step. But Happy fooled them all. From the day of his trial he became a teetotaler. He remained in the department until he retired honorably on his pension. His family was protected — and that’s what concerned Jim Skehan and me.
Chapter XXXI
Sergeant’s Stripes
The Thirty-Fifth Precinct had another unusual character, the type of man it’s hard to find in any modern police department. He was James Farley, a patrolman with more than fifty years of service to his credit.
Jim was in my platoon and slept alongside me in the station when we were on the reserve. He was a grand fellow, and every other man in the station felt just as I did about him. Every inch of him was policeman despite his seventy odd years. With his Vandyke beard and erect figure, he was an imposing man. He had plenty of money, but that made no difference to Jim. His life began and ended at the station house, and he dreaded even the mention of the word retirement.
Jim liked his little nip and he smoked regularly. He was a leader in the pranks of the station house and he always kept a bottle of good liquor in his locker. At morning or night when we were getting ready to return to post after a reserve trick at the station, we’d always gather around Jim’s locker and complain about the cramps, or a cold or a sore toe. It was a regular ceremony and the talk sounded like a hospital clinic, but it made Jim mighty happy.
“Cramps, damn ye! If I didn’t have liquor you wouldn’t be hanging around here. You’ll get none from me. The idea, policemen!”
But the bottle always turned up. All would have a little drink and Jim was happy.
Jim Farley’s greatest day came in his fifty-fourth year in the department. He was then the oldest policeman in point of service in the city and his record was spotless. On parade day, when the policy force marched up Fifth Avenue, Jim was given the place of honor in the reviewing stand at the orders of Commissioner Bingham.
The department finally ordered Jim retired and I don’t think there was a dry eye in the station that day, because we all knew what it meant. It was even more pathetic than we thought, too, for Jim couldn’t stay away or keep out of uniform. On every late tour he reported at his post in blue uniform, but without his precious shield and then would patrol the beat with the man who had the right to wear the shield — on duty. I couldn’t talk much whenever he walked with me. The old man wasted away and didn’t live many years after the blow fell.
Meanwhile, all of us younger men in the station were anxiously waiting for. news. The examinations were over and the announcement of the sergeant list was due. One day at home I got a forthwith from Captain Post to report at the precinct. I found the list waiting.
“Hey, Dutch,” he greeted me, “you did great. You are thirty-seventh on the list. You got 92.50 in the mental.”
I felt good. Michael Walsh, one of our own crowd, stood at the head of the list, which covered the patrolmen for the whole city. I had very little seniority, so I had to make up for it by my; mark in the mental tests.