The backup had not arrived. The Jake was alone.
In his mind, it was easy for Corman to get a good clear picture of what was happening on 174th Street and Broadway. A foot patrolman had responded to an EDP call. The EDP, Emotionally Disturbed Person, was now wandering the halls of a large apartment building with a gun in his hand. The Jake was following him, moving cautiously up the dim stairwells or along the empty corridors, his hands already on his pistol. He was sweating under his arms, and he could feel a tightening in his muscles. He jumped a little, each time his radio clicked on.
Click: Any response on the Ten-17?
Click: Negative.
Click: I can hear him. He’s right above me. I can hear him yelling. It’s really loud. It sounds like … like … he’s stomping up and down, too.
Click: Did you say stomping?
Click: Yes.
Click: And yelling?
Click: Affirmative.
Click: Is he yelling at other people?
Click: I don’t know.
Click: Can you make out what he’s saying?
Click: Negative.
Click: Are civilians involved?
Click: I can just hear the guy. I don’t hear anybody else.
Click: I read you.
Click: Please advise.
For a moment, there was silence. The SOD central dispatcher was young, inexperienced. He wasn’t sure what to tell the Jake. For an instant, he hesitated. Then he made his decision.
Click: Proceed with caution.
Corman leaned forward in his chair. The dispatcher had made a serious mistake. The Jake was alone. A Ten-17 was in place, on the way. He should wait. There were no civilians in danger. He should wait. The dispatcher had screwed up. If everything went well, he’d be chewed out in the morning. If anything happened to the Jake, he’d never pin on a badge again.
Click: Proceed with caution.
The Jake didn’t respond. He was afraid. Corman could hear his fear, smell it. The Jake thought he was going to die in this little shitcan apartment house high above Broadway; he was going to open a grimy metal door, peek out and take a bullet in the face.
Click: Repeat.
Click: Proceed with caution.
Click: Ten-4.
He was going to do what he’d been told, follow the dispatcher’s orders. He wasn’t going to wait. He was going ahead, slowly, cautiously, the sweat now beading on his forehead, gathering in a little pool in his navel. But he was going ahead, and he was wrong.
In the meantime, restaurants were burning, cars colliding, and at the southern tip of Manhattan, yet another EDP was dancing around a smoldering ashcan while he hurled small stones at passing cars.
Corman took a sip of coffee and continued to listen as radio cars and emergency vehicles were sent hurtling along the empty, early morning streets, their sirens echoing through the towering glass corridors.
Click: EDP in sight.
It was the Jake on 174th Street. He’d spotted the EDP.
Click: Request location.
Click: Ninth floor. Southeast, no, south … southwest corner.
Click: Describe him.
Click: White male. About thirty years old. He’s wearing jeans, I think, some kind of blue pants. He went around the corner, that’s all I could see.
Click: Did you see a weapon?
Click: Negative. Any word on the backup?
Click: Ten-17. Proceed.
Again, the radio went silent very briefly, before the usual round of calls began. Through the city, the usual night’s work went on, but Corman found his attention now entirely focused on the ninth floor of a building that was over a hundred and thirty blocks away.
Click: Okay, he’s at the end of the corridor.
Click: Where are you?
Click: Southwest corner.
Click: Are there exits?
Click: Negative.
The EDP had gotten himself into a corner. He was facing three blank walls and a corridor with a single patrolman at the end of it.
Click: He still screaming.
Click: He’s alone?
Click: Affirmative. He’s stomping, too. He keeps stomping.
Click: Ten-17 is in place.
Click: But where?
Click: We have confirmation on the Ten-17.
Click: Just a minute …
There was a sudden silence, then the SOD dispatcher called again.
Click: Unit 4. Ten-2.
The dispatcher was trying to raise him.
Click: Unit 4. Just a …
Corman leaned forward. He could hear the screams of the EDP, the stomping.
The SOD dispatcher was getting worried.
Click: Unit 4. Please respond. Ten-2. Ten-2.
Silence.
Click: Unit 4. Ten-2. Ten-2.
There was no response. Corman could feel the air electrify around him, hear the frantic care in the dispatcher’s voice when he finally acted.
Click: All units. We have a possible Ten-30 at 2942 Broadway. Repeat, we have a Ten-30. Officer in danger. Respond immediately. Ninth floor. Southwest corner. 2942 Broadway. Request all available units to respond immediately.
The silence continued for a few more seconds, then, suddenly, the patrolman’s breathless voice broke through the steadily vibrating air.
Click: Uh, we had a problem here. The EDP charged me. But it okay now. It was a water pistol. Repeat. Water pistol. Subject is under control. Request medical unit and backup. Repeat. The subject is under control.
Corman felt a small rush of air whistle through his teeth. Something had turned out well. A threat had been met, mastered, and the feeling which followed was unexpectedly sweet and exhilarating. He felt a barely controllable urge to wake Lucy up, tell her that somewhere nine floors above the sleeping city, the beast had been driven back. Joanna needed to know that such things were possible, despite the downward pull. Everyone needed to know it, Groton, the little man at the ticket window, everybody. He even thought of the Hell’s Kitchen jumper, saw her long dark hair still wet with rain, wondered if such knowledge might have urged her from the ledge in time to amaze Julian’s phantom audience with a happy ending.
CHAPTER
EIGHT
ON SATURDAY MORNING Corman spent several hours arguing intermittently with Lucy over what movie they’d see that afternoon. Lucy sat cross-legged on the floor, carefully going over the entertainment section of the Times. She preferred movies that edged cautiously into the forbidden zone of sex and violence, but Corman suspected that this had less to do with the actual film than with her need to feel grown-up. It was the sort of attitude that could become a way of living, so that in the end you grew to adolescence hating childhood, then to adulthood hating adolescence, went all the way to death, hating life.
“How about this one?” Lucy asked suddenly. She pointed to a full page advertisement that showed a grim-looking cop nuzzling a forty-five automatic against his cheek.
“Not my thing,” Corman said.
“How about a play then?” Lucy said. “You promised you’d take me to a play.”