Dorfman came on almost immediately. “’Lo, Captain, Enjoying your day off? Beautiful day.”
“Yes. What’s happening?”
“Nothing unusual, sir. The usual. A small demonstration at the Embassy again, but we moved them along. No charges. No injuries.”
“Damage?”
“One broken window, sir.”
“All right. Have Donaldson type up the usual letter of apology, and I’ll sign it tomorrow.”
“It’s done, Captain. It’s on your desk.”
“Oh. Well…fine. Nothing else?”
“No, sir. Everything under control.”
“All right. Switch me back to the man on the board, will you?”
“Yes, sir. I’ll buzz him:”
The uniformed operator came back on.
“Captain?”
“Is this Officer Curdy?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Curdy, you answered my original call with: ‘Two hundred and fifty-first Precinct.’ In my memo number six three one, dated fourteen July of this year, I gave very explicit orders governing the procedure of uniformed telephone operators on duty. I stated in that memorandum that incoming calls were to be answered: ‘Precinct two five one.’ It is shorter and much more understandable than ‘Two hundred and fifty-first Precinct.’ Did you read that memo?”
“Yes, sir. Yes, Captain, I did read it. It just slipped my mind, sir. I’m so used to doing it the old way…”
“Curdy, there is no ‘old way.’ There is a right way and a wrong way of doing things. And ‘Two five one’ is the right way in my precinct. Is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.”
He hung up and went back to his wife. In the New York Police Department he was known as “Iron Balls” Delaney. He knew it and didn’t mind. There were worse names. “Everything all right?” she asked.
He nodded.
“Who has the duty?”
“Dorfman.”
“Oh? How is his father?”
He stared at her, eyes widening. Then he lowered his head and groaned. “Oh God. Barbara, I forgot to tell you. Dorfman’s father died last week. On Friday.”
“Oh Edward.” She looked at him reproachfully. “Why on earth didn’t you tell me?”
“Well, I meant to but-but it slipped my mind.”
“Slipped your mind? How could a thing like that slip your mind? Well, I’ll write a letter of condolence as soon as we get home.”
“Yes, do that. They took up a collection for flowers. I gave twenty dollars.”
“Poor Dorfman.”
“Yes.”
“You don’t like him, do you?”
“Of course I like him. As a man, a person. But he’s really not a good cop.”
“He’s not? I thought you told me he does his job very well.”
“He does. He’s a good administrator, keeps up on his paperwork. He’s one of the best lawyers in the Department. But he’s not a good cop. He’s a reasonable facsimile. He goes through all the motions, but he lacks the instinct.”
“And tell me, oh wise one,” she said, “what is this great cop’s instinct?”
He was glad to have someone to talk to about such things. “Well,” he said, “laugh if you like, but it does exist. What drove me to become a cop? My father wasn’t. No one in my family was. I could have gone on to law school; my marks were good enough. But all I ever wanted was to be a cop. As long as I can remember. And I’ll tell you why: because when the laundry comes back from the Chinaman-as you well know, my dear, after thirty years-I insist on-”
“Thirty-one years, brute.”
“All right, thirty-one years. But the first year we lived in sin.”
“You are a brute,” she laughed.
“Well, we did: the most marvelous year of my life.”
She put a hand over his. “And everything since then has been anti-climax?”
“You know better than that. All right, now let me get back to the instinct of a true cop.”
“And the Chinaman’s laundry.”
“Yes. Well, as you know, I insist on putting my own clean clothes away in the bureau and dresser. Socks are folded once and piled with the fold forward. Handkerchiefs are stacked with the open edges to the right. Shirts are stacked alternately, collar to the rear, collar to the front-so the stack won’t topple, you understand. And a similar system for underwear, pajamas, and so forth. And always, of course, the freshly laundered clothes go on the bottom of each pile so everything is worn evenly and in order. That’s the word: ‘order.’ That’s the way I am. You know it. I want everything in order.”
“And that’s why you became a cop? To make the world neat and tidy?”
“Yes.”
She moved her head back slowly and laughed. How he loved to see her laugh. If only he could laugh like that! It was such a whole-hearted expression of pure joy: her eyes squinched shut, her mouth open, shoulders shaking, and a surprisingly full, deep guffaw that was neither feminine nor masculine but sexless and primitive as all genuine laughter.
“Edward, Edward,” she said, spluttering a little, taking a lace-edged hanky from her purse to wipe her eyes. “You have a marvelous capacity for deluding yourself. I guess that’s why I love you so.”
“All right,” he said, miffed. “You tell me. Why did I become a cop?”
Again she covered his hand with hers. She looked into his eyes, suddenly serious.
“Don’t you know?” she asked gently. “Don’t you really know? Because you love beauty. Oh, I know law and order and justice are important to you. But what you really want is a beautiful world where everything is true and nothing is false. You dreamer!”
He thought about that a long time. Then they rose, and hand in hand they strolled into the park.
In Central Park, there is an inclosed carousel that has been a delight to generations of youngsters. Some days, when the wind is right, you can hear its musical tinkle from a distance; the air seems to dance.
The animals-marvelously carved and painted horses-chase each other in a gay whirl that excites children and hypnotizes their parents. On a bench near this merry-go-round, Barbara and Edward Delaney sat to rest, shoulders touching. They could hear the music, see the giddy gyrations through trees still wearing summer’s green.
They sat awhile in silence. Then she said, not looking at him, “Can you tell me now?”
He nodded miserably. As rapidly as he could, he delivered a concise report of what Dr. Bernardi had told him. He omitted only the physician’s fleeting reference to a “Proteus infection.”
“I see no choice,” he said, and gripped her hand harder. “Do you? We’ve got to get this cleared up. I’ll feel better if Bernardi brings in other men. I think you will, too. It only means five days to a week in the hospital. Then they’ll decide what must be done. I told Bernardi to go ahead, get the room. A private room. Barbara? Is that all right?”
He wondered if she heard him. Or if she understood. Her eyes were far away, and he did not know the smile on her soft lips.
“Barbara?” he asked again.
“During the war,” she said, “when you were in France, I brought the children here when the weather was nice, Eddie could walk then but Elizabeth was still in the carriage. Sometimes Eddie would get tired on the way home, and I’d put him in the carriage with Liza. How he hated it!”
“I know. You wrote me.”
“Did I? Sometimes we’d sit on this very bench where we’re sitting now. Eddie would ride the merry-go-round all day if I let him.”
“He always rode a white horse.”
“You do remember,” she smiled. “Yes, he always rode a white horse, and every time he came around he’d wave at us, sitting up straight. He was so proud.”
“Yes.”
“They’re good children, aren’t they, Edward?”
“Yes.”
“Happy children.”
“Well, I wish Eddie would get married, but there’s no use nagging him.”
“No. He’s stubborn. Like his father.”
“Am I stubborn?”
“Sometimes. About some things. When you’ve made up your mind. Like my going into the hospital for tests.”
“You will go, won’t you?”
She gave him a dazzling smile, then unexpectedly leaned forward to kiss him on the lips. It was a soft, youthful, lingering kiss that shocked him with its longing.