“Three strikes and you’re out,” Penny told him. “And here’s my bus. Ta-ta.” Her skirt hiked up as she mounted the bus-step. She paid her fare and took a window seat.
The window was open, and the pest’s face peered up at her. “What do you want now?” she asked, annoyed at his persistence. “I won the bet. Now shoo!”
“Yeag. Okay. Only one thing. Just to satisfy my curiosity. What is in the container?”
Penny leaned out of the bus window and placed her pout-shaped lips against his ear intimately to whisper the answer. “It’s a sample for a urine analysis,” she told him.
He jumped back and whirled around as if he’d been struck as the bus pulled away from the curb. Penny saw nothing of the quick sequence of events which followed. He cleared his throat frantically and spat blindly on the sidewalk. He was just starting to expectorate again when the cop grabbed him.
“You’re under arrest!” the officer roared.
“What?” The young man was taken so by surprise that he spat directly into the bluecoat’s eye.
“You’re under arrest!” The officer wiped his eye with a handkerchief and sniffed at it suspiciously. “A lightly brewed ale,” he judged.
“Wrong!” the young man told him.
“I’m the law. I’m never wrong. Don’t you know you can’t go around spitting on Fifth Avenue? Sixth, or Seventh, okay. Maybe even the skating rink in Rockefeller Plaza, or the fountain at Lincoln Center. But never on Fifth Avenue! One of them storekeepers sees you and the next thing you know the whole Fifth Avenue Merchants Association is screaming for a shake-up in the Police Department cause they ain’t getting adequate pertection. You done a real serious thing, Mac, and now you’re under arrest!”
“But, officer, I can explain!”
“Tell it to the judge.”
“He’d never believe it,” the young man said dejectedly.
“Excuse me.” A dapper little man stepped up and handed the young man a card. “I’m an attorney. Can I be of service?”
“Beat it, shyster. Go chase an ambulance!” the cop told him. He grasped the young man loosely by the arm and started to lead him away.
“Police brutality!” The little lawyer threw back his head and crowed like a rooster greeting an Arctic dawn after six months of night. “Police brutality!”
“Now, wait a minute,” the cop said, glancing uneasily at the faces of the crowd which had gathered. “I never laid a finger on him. I only used the minimum of necessary force to arrest him for committing a felony. And I got witnesses to prove it.”
“What witnesses?” The lawyer looked around slowly and pointedly.
The cop followed his gaze. The crowd had evaporated as completely and suddenly as trees in a defoliated forest. The cop spotted a gnarled old man dressed like a Bowery bum and crouching in the doorway of Cartier’s. The derelict, busy rummaging through a woman’s purse, hadn’t noticed the quick flight of humanity from the area.
“Him!” The cop pointed at the derelict dramatically. “He’s my witness. You saw this guy spit on the sidewalk, didn’t you, old man?”
“I didn’t see nuttin’. I don’t wanna get involved,” the tramp whined.
“You saw him,” the cop insisted. “I know you did ’cause I was just gonna grab you for snatchin’ that purse when this heinous crime was committed. Don’t try to deny it!”
“I didn’t see nuttin’! I don’t wanna get involved! An’ besides, I ain’t no stool-pigeon!”
“So you won’t talk, eh?” The cop was an inveterate watcher of old G-man movies on the Late Late Show. “Well, we got ways of making you talk!” Even without a monocle his face testified that he’d made the transference to the Gestapo character of the early war films.
“Maybe we can make a deal?” the aging purse-snatcher pleaded.
“You hear that? A deal!” the lawyer exploded. “An officer of the law swapping immunity for perjured testimony right before my very eyes! Why don’t you arrest him for stealing instead of harassing my client?”
“The Fifth Avenue Merchants’ Association is insured for theft,” the cop explained. “But they ain’t covered for spitting on the sidewalk!”
“Look,” the unfortunate young man said, “I can explain-—”
“Shut up!” the lawyer told “Nothing but name rank and serial number! Understand?”
“No,” the young man said bewilderedly.
“Hey, I saw that one,” the cop enthused. “Errol Flynn played this here RAF pilot what’s shot down and he’s got this little capsule of strychnine fillin’ a cavity in a tooth and when Eric Von-what’s-his-name wants to know where he took off from, he grits his teeth and then Flynn’s marching over this rainbow in his flight jacket while this here chorus of angels is singin’ the Marine Hymn. Yeah, real arty, too, the way he was transparent at the end with the British flag wavin’ through his behind.”
“’Scuse me, Captain, but what about me?” the purse-snatcher whined.
“Collaborationist!” the lawyer hissed. “You’ll get yours! Some day they’ll shave your head!”
The old purse-snatcher’s hand fluttered to his scalp. “There ain’t hardly no hair to shave,” he protested. “See: only a little piece.”
“A little peace!” A new voice, high and shrill, sounded out. “That’s all any of us want, brother!” A bearded youth in torn T-shirt and green jeans suddenly appeared on the scene. “A little peace.”
“That’s what got me into this mess,” the first young man muttered. “A little piece I never even got near.”
“Peace! The young men of America cry out for it!” The bearded youth unrolled a placard, fastened it to a pole, and then hefted it high in the air. FREE SPEECH FOR LENNY BRUCE! the sign read.
“I don’t get it.” The cop scratched his head, puzzled.
The bearded youth glanced up at the placard. “Oh, Hell!. Wrong sign!” He quickly turned it around. MOTHERS MARCH FOR PEACE! it proclaimed now.
A woman came rushing up pushing a baby carriage.
“I"m with you,” she said breathlessly. “I am with you! I am committed. And we’re all in this together.” She thrust the handle of the carriage into the hands of the old purse-snatcher. “We’ll march together until they ban the bomb,” she assured him. “And I’ll be shoulder to shoulder with you all the way. Only first, would you do me a favor and keep an eye on little Mervin while I just run into Saks for a minute? They’re having this sale on arch supports and my feet are killing me. I’ll be right back, and meanwhile the little darling will lend a touch of authenticity to the demonstration. Thanks so much!” And she was gone.
The baby wailed. The old derelict picked him up. Immediately, the baby wet the pavement.
“Look at that! Look at that!” the lawyer screamed. “You persecute my client for merely spitting on the sidewalk and then you stand idly by while a genuine desecration takes place. You call that justice?” he demanded of the cop.
“Please, counselor,” the cop said. “Can’t you see I got my hands full?”
This was certainly true. A young girl with lank, dank hair had fallen in beside the derelict wheeling the baby carriage, and as she followed the bearded youth she began strumming a guitar. Her clear, baritone voice rang through the air, sounding out the stirring words of a protest song, It was at this point that a Girl Scout troop across the street broke ranks to rush upon the scene. “It’s Joan Baez!” one little girl cried out, and the others took up the cry. “Joan Baez! It’s Joan Baez!” They fell into line with the protest march. “Hey, lady?” The nearest of them tugged at the shirt-tails of the female folk singer. “Are you really Joan Baez?”
“No, I’m not,” the singer replied between choruses. “But I certainly am glad to see you kids rebelling against regimentation and militancy.”
“You sure you ain’t Joan Baez?” the little Girl Scout said disappointedly.