"Sh-sh-sh-shit, p-p-p-piss cocksucker. L-l-l-leave him al-l-lone!" Warren didn't normally stutter, as well as cuss, but it was d-d-damn cold. "D-d-didn't they ta-ta-ta-teach you pigs about the r-r-r-right of the pa-pa-pa-people to assemble or…ma-ma-ma-motherfucker vagina…the fah-fah-fah-freedom of speech at the academe-meme? D-damn ass-wipe, ball-licker sons of wh-wh-wh-whores!"
Whatever had prompted the newspaper vendor to hold forth originally had now degenerated into a rant directed at the NYPD officers, who were trying to figure out a way to come at a large man they had surrounded.
Small wonder, Karp thought and smiled when he saw the man, whose massive head was covered with a filthy mane of dark curly hair that seemed to sprout over most of his face as well, and what wasn't covered with hair was nearly black with dirt and grease. The man was wearing what appeared to be four or five coats, the colors of which had long since faded. He'd stuffed his hair into a filthy Santa Claus hat and was waving his arms wildly as he shuffled back and forth in front of the cops like an enraged bear, which he resembled. He bellowed, "Back ov, 'u fuggin' pigs. Let Warren 'peak. Freedom ov 'peech! Freedom ov 'peech!"
The officers seemed reluctant to close and Karp knew why. Even from the back of the crowd-maybe twenty feet-he could smell the Walking Booger, another one of the legions of homeless street wanderers he'd known for years. Legend had it that Booger, whose explorations of his nasal cavities with any one-and sometimes two at a time-of his sausagelike fingers had earned him his nickname, had neither bathed nor washed his clothes in the nearly two decades since he'd first shown up on the streets. Not unless standing in the rain counted as a shower or a visit to the laundromat. His breath alone might have qualified as a weapon of mass destruction. Every way he turned, the cops and the crowd on that side took two steps back with horrified looks.
Karp would have walked on, but Warren spotted him from his milk crate and yelled to him. "H-h-hey, Karp. Would you p-please…scumbag piss drinker…explain to New York's finest that th-th-there's such a thing as…fa-fa-fuck me naked…a Constitution?"
One of the older officers with the chevrons of a sergeant on his sleeve turned to see whom Warren was yelling to and looked relieved to see him. "Hey, Mr. Karp, Sergeant Seamus, nice work this summer nailin' that slimebag Kane and the slimebag cops who was doin' his dirty work-gave us all a black eye," he said, removing a glove and sticking out a big, meaty hand.
Karp shook the proffered hand. "Thanks, but there were a lot more people involved than just me. Not to mention that I think the reputation of the NYPD isn't going to be dictated by a few bad apples."
"Thanks, I appreciate the sentiment," Seamus said with a nod. He turned his attention toward Warren and Booger. "Would you mind explaining to these gentlemen that they need to settle down before one of my boyos decides to end this 'peaceful assembly' by busting heads?" He nodded to a steroidal-looking younger cop who already had his nightstick out and was growing redder in the face with each profanity launched from Warren's mouth.
Karp grimaced. "I'd call off the dogs, Seamus. The last time someone hit Booger-the big one there-that I know of, it was with a crowbar right between the eyes. Would have killed a cow. Instead it only made him mad enough to stuff his assailant-some skinhead bully who had a thing for homeless people-down a storm sewer… Not to mention I don't know that your boy could get close enough without being overcome by the fumes."
Seamus wrinkled his nose. "Know what you mean. Still, we need to move this crowd along."
"I'll see what I can do," Karp replied. He turned and walked up to the soapbox orator. "Yo, Warren, come down from there. I need my paper."
Warren hurled a few more epithets toward the police, who shook their heads and moved on, then stepped down from his perch. Booger held up his arms as if to give him a hug. " 'arp, boy am I glad a see choo."
Karp sidestepped the hug and instead shook Booger's filthy hand, making a mental note to burn his glove as soon as he got home. "Glad to see you, too. What was all this anyway? The sergeant says his guys were trying to move people out from in front of storefront doors. They've been doing that since Tammany Hall."
"Yeah, piss face," Warren replied. "But they've p-p-p-picked up the pace, and on a Sunday morning in w-w-eather…ohhh SHIT!…like this, harassing street people like B-b-b-booger and the others when they're just t-t-trying to stay warm. It's all about the c-c-city's image…bitch son of a ba-ba-ba-bitch…so that the tourists won't have to be exposed to guys like Booger here. Ba-babut they don't want to do anything…lick my nuts…to help, just sh-sh-shove them out of sight, the darker the hole the better. Tiny-brained wipers of other people's bottoms."
Karp narrowed his eyes. "Wasn't that a line from a movie?"
"You…you…you tell me?" Warren grinned, playing their old game of "guess the movie" trivia.
"Monty Python and the Holy Grail," Karp said.
"Too easy, th-th-that one didn't count," Warren giggled while Booger guffawed.
Karp tried not to smile. No sense encouraging them. "Tell you what, if you can keep this on the QT, I'm on my way to meet with the new mayor, and if I get a chance, I'll quiz him about his plans for the homeless."
"Yeah, right," Warren said. "They're all the s-s-same. The more things change the more things remain the same…or…butthole…get worse."
" 'ah, worse," Booger chimed in.
"Well, we can always hope," Karp said. "I kind of like this guy."
"Yeah, we'll see. H-h-hey, you need a paper, right?" Warren said, as they approached his newsstand.
"Yeah, I need the Post," he said, handing over a ten. "Keep the change and maybe go get yourself and Booger a cup of coffee and a couple of doughnuts. And try to behave; the Cossacks are right around the corner waiting for you two anarchists to act up again."
Warren grabbed the bill and stomped off, muttering, with Booger shuffling alongside him, loudly repeating every third obscenity and raising his fist like a Cuban revolutionary.
Karp shook his head-never a dull moment in the Big Apple. He walked on past 100 Centre Street, the gray monolith that housed the city courts, the grand juries, the Manhattan house of detention-known affectionately as the Tombs-and the NY DAO.
He climbed the stairs and saw a familiar figure waiting for him at the door. "Why, Harry, what brings you to City Hall on a Sunday morning?" he asked.
Harry "Hotspur" Kipman was tall and thin to the point where he would have made a good Ichabod Crane for a stage production of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. He had a pair of piercing blue eyes set a little too close together over an eagle's beak nose, but they saw through bullshit better than anyone Karp had ever known.
It was Karp who'd given him the nickname Hotspur for his temperament. Harry wasn't one to pull punches. He was a crusader against hypocrisy, and his directness was sometimes more off-putting than he intended. But he was at heart a good, gentle man with a dry wit and quick mind that made him a pleasure to be around.
Karp wouldn't have traded Harry, who'd become the head of the appeals bureau, for a dozen courtroom litigators. A lawyer's lawyer, Kipman had an almost total recall of the New York Penal Code, as well as the citations to major pivotal cases. He personally prepared the legal briefs and argued the People's case against the big-enchilada convicted murderers who sought their last legal refuge the system provided in the appellate process. His win-loss record was right up there with Ivory Snow's purity. He also insisted on "preemptive lawyering" by personally reviewing the high-profile or legally challenging cases before they went to trial. The idea was to advise the assistant district attorneys trying the case to create an error-free record.