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Mighty Man himself was standing at the top of the steps.

I was not armed, you know, I have already told you that. I know you don't believe me, but that's the absolute truth. I was not armed. It was not me who killed Mighty Man. I don't know who did it. Whoever did it was a very good shot. Two bullets took Mighty Man right between the eyes, one bullet right over the other, bang, bang, two neat little holes drilled right between his eyes, it was beautiful. He fell dead on the spot, and we climbed over him and ran into this big room they got up there, smelling of nigger sweat and piss, and all the guys were scrambling and realizing this was a raid and they were about to get wiped out. Doc took a bullet just when I heard the sirens. He took a bullet in the gut. Everybody was shooting and yelling, and beginning to run out of the place because they knew sirens meant fuzz, and this was designed to end the war, not to get busted and rot in jail. People were climbing all over me. Doc tried to get up. He was holding his guts together. Somebody had shot him with a very big caliber gun, probably a .45, those niggers like big guns. He fell against me, and I tried to hold him up, but he was slippery and wet, and my hands got all covered with blood, and that's when I heard somebody downstairs yelling, 'Police officer, hold it right there!' and that's when you guys came up, and put handcuffs on me, and brought me here.

So when you ask me why I did it, I got some questions to ask you right back. The first question is why I did what? Why I tried to bring peace to the neighborhood? Why I tried to end this war that's been going on between the cliques for God knows how long? Why I tried to solve it with honor and with pride? Why I tried to rid the streets of two cliques who were a danger to maybe the whole city? If that is the question you're asking, then the answer is like I said before.

I did it because I'm the president, that's why. I'm the elected leader, and it is my duty and my responsibility to take care of the people I am serving.

That's all there is to it. That's all I got to say.

They led Randall Nesbitt out of the squadroom in handcuffs. He walked with his head high, that peculiar television-personality smile on his mouth. At the end of the corridor he turned and gave a short chopping wave of his hand to the detectives who were watching him.

'He still doesn't know what he did,' Kling said.

'He never knew,' Carella answered.

'The jury'll remind him.'

'Yes. Thank God there are still juries.'

Meyer Meyer, who had passed Nesbitt and his police escort on the steps outside, came into the squadroom now, took off his hat and coat, and said, 'Who was that?'

'That was the president,' Carella said. 'We've got a whole cageful of his people downstairs. And Broughan up at the 101st has two other gangs locked up. Too many of them to fit in one station house.'

'Yeah?' Meyer said. 'What'd he do?'

'He ended the war,' Carella said.

'Where're you coming from?' Kling asked.

'Me? I just got taken to dinner by a writer.'

'Dinner?' Kling said, looking up at the clock. It was twenty minutes past eleven.

'Dinner, yes. In a very fancy restaurant. And then we took a walk up Hall Avenue while I told him my views on the relationship of television to acts of violence.'

'What'd you tell him?' Carella asked.

'I told him there are worse influences in this country than television. I told him if anybody needed violent heroes to imitate, he could find plenty of them around without ever turning on a television set.'

'Who did you have in mind?' Carella asked.