A Dog's Ransom Read online

  Ed opened the door. “Get her to make a complaint. I wish you luck, Clarence. Can you find your way out?”

  “Oh, yes. Thanks, Mr. Reynolds.”

  16

  Clarence went back to his apartment and telephoned Marylyn. He wanted to tell her that he had been to Bellevue, and that he was going to show Rowajinski’s letter to his precinct house tonight.

  Marylyn didn’t answer.

  At 5:30, there was still no answer. Marylyn was perhaps out on a job, typing in someone’s house, or delivering something. At 7 p.m., he tried Marylyn again. Still no answer. He imagined her going out to dinner, or staying to dinner, with a man, maybe a writer whose work she was typing. Evidently Marylyn didn’t care enough about what he was doing in regard to Rowajinski’s letter to telephone him in all these hours.

  That evening Clarence saw Manzoni in MacGregor’s office when he arrived at the station house. Manzoni was going off at eight, Clarence supposed, though he hadn’t yet changed out of uniform. Clarence put on his uniform at his locker. Manzoni was coming into the locker room as Clarence went out, and jerked his head in greeting, with a smirk, as if he had something on Clarence, but Manzoni greeted other men going on duty with great heartiness. “Stevie! How’s the missus? Nothin’ doin’ yet?” Stevie’s wife was pregnant, but Clarence felt he didn’t know Stevie well enough to ask about his wife.

  Clarence went into MacGregor’s office and showed him the letter from Rowajinski. He wanted to discuss the letter before the briefing started.

  “The girl who got the letter is a friend of mine,” Clarence said.

  “Hm-m. Well?”

  “Well—he obviously isn’t discouraged because he was caught once. He’s still annoying people. He even spoke to Miss Coomes on the sidewalk in front of her house.—What do you think they’re going to do about him?” The last sentence Clarence had prepared beforehand. “They” not “we” and not “ought to do about him,” which would sound personal, but “are going to do about him,” which was routine.

  “It depends what Bellevue says. We haven’t had the report yet.”

  “They found a room for him on Morton Street. He’s living there. But isn’t he going to have some kind of a trial?”

  “Not if Bellevue calls him a nut,” said MacGregor. “Bellevue’s handling him.”

  “But he frankly seems to be a nut, and Bellevue’s let him loose,” Clarence said. “I spoke with a doctor at Bellevue today. It seems Bellevue is leaving it up to the police what to do with him.”

  “You went to Bellevue?”

  “Yes, sir. With the letter, I thought that was what I should do, sir.”

  “This is the friend of yours on Macdougal Street that Pete was talking about?”

  “I suppose. Yes, sir.” Clarence felt the start of a blush.

  “Then I see why you’re interested. There are more important things on in this precinct than a screwy letter to a girl on Macdougal, Dummell, even if you know her.”

  What, Clarence wondered. A couple of junky house robberies? “I’d feel the same, sir, if I didn’t know the girl. It was letters like this that led to the killing of a dog and getting the two thousand dollars’ ransom from Edward Reynolds.”

  “Oh, that,” said MacGregor, as if it was a little problem of the past. “All right, Clarence, I’ll send the letter on to Bellevue. Didn’t they want to keep the letter by the way?”

  “No. They didn’t ask to.” Shouldn’t we at least alert the precinct house nearest Rowajinski to keep an eye on him, Clarence thought, but was shy about suggesting this to his Captain, and maybe it had been done.

  “Let’s let it ride,” MacGregor said. “He’s being checked on twice a week, Bellevue told me. It’s their headache now. Dummell, there was a rape in an apartment hallway on a Hundred and first and Broadway today at four p.m.—reported by a witness, not the girl. The guy got away, natch, but here’s his description. May as well read it now. It’s for all you guys tonight.” He handed Clarence a piece of paper.

  Clarence read: Black or black-Puerto Rican, 5 ft. 6 to 8, about 35, mustache, stocky build, wearing dark trousers, brown plastic jacket, brown shoes, dark turtle-neck sweater.

  “More important than a dog, that. A kid saw that. His mother rang us up. We checked with the girl. It’s true all right.”

  It was already dark when Clarence went out on his patrol. Tonight he was with Rudin, a heavyset fellow whom Clarence hardly knew. On 104th Street, they shooed some kids out of a basement alley where they were apparently trying to open a door. One of the kids, about twelve years old, threw the remains of an apple which hit Clarence in the chest. He brushed the front of his tunic with one hand and went down the iron steps into the alley and tried the door. It was locked.

  “Who the hell’s that?” yelled a man’s voice from inside.

  “Police!” Clarence replied. “Checking your door. Anything the matter?”

  “Get the hell away! That door’s locked!”

  Clarence went back up the steps to Rudin. The kids laughed. (“Pigs! Shit pigs!”) The man, maybe a super, had been too afraid to open the door to see if he was a policeman, Clarence supposed. A year ago, Clarence might have asked for the door to be opened—just to make sure it was an ordinary apartment house basement and not a junky shooting gallery or a floating brothel. A strange anger began to stir in him. It was frustration, Clarence thought. Nothing seemed to move. Nothing progressed logically from one point to the next. No one drew logical conclusions, and made the next move—like himself just now, not investigating the voice in the basement. On Broadway, slowly and dutifully with Rudin they tried the doors they were supposed to try—a hardware shop, several apartment houses too small to have doormen, a cleaner’s shop, a bakery. They walked westward on 101st, where the rape had taken place at 4 p.m. Apartment windows glowed with cozy, yellowish lights. Music and television sounds came faintly. What window was the girl’s who had been raped? He supposed she would be worried about pregnancy. Rape was not merely humiliation and shock, but that—possible pregnancy and possible venereal disease. A pity that New York had been overrun by blacks and Puerto Ricans instead of by some more advanced race that might have improved things. Other countries and cities had had better luck in the past. Clarence especially detested rapists. He had seen at least six brought in since he had been at this precinct house. Like thieves, they avoid looking people in the eye. Clarence was watching out for the five-foot-six-to-eight-inch-tall black or black-Puerto Rican with the plastic jacket. You could never tell.

  “You like skin flicks?” asked Rudin.

  Clarence thought of Marylyn who actively disliked them. “No,” said Clarence.

  “My wife’s brother—he makes ’em. With his friends. Ah, what the hell, you’ve seen one you’ve seen ’em all. But he shows ’em every Saturday night at his place in Brooklyn. His house, y’know. Charges admission but it covers the beer. I just thought if you were interested—”

  Clarence didn’t know what to say to be agreeable. He desperately wanted to speak to Marylyn, now, to hear her voice. “They’re for people maybe who haven’t got the real thing, eh?” Clarence said finally.

  “That’s a point.” Rudin chuckled. He might have been taking a Sunday stroll. His hands behind his back twiddled his nightstick.

  Clarence looked at his wrist-watch. His ring time was 17 tonight, seventeen minutes past the hour. Twenty minutes or so till he had to call in. “Look, uh—”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Hold the fort while I call my girlfriend? Round the corner.” Clarence meant there was a bar round the corner. Rudin knew.

  Rudin waited outside, while Clarence went into the bar to the telephone at the back.

  Marylyn answered and Clarence gave a sigh of relief.

  “I’ve been trying to get you since four-thirty!” Clarence said. />
  “I was walking and I went out for dinner. What’s the matter?”

  “I went to Bellevue—” Suddenly Clarence didn’t want to tell her over the telephone about Bellevue, or about seeing Mr. Reynolds at his office. He wanted to see her. And Marylyn was there, her voice was there, but she was struggling, Clarence felt, to put a distance between them, pulling herself back.

  “Well, what happened? Can’t you talk?”

  “I want to see you. If I could, I’d come down now.” He was thinking it was remotely possible, but it wasn’t. One of the captains or a lieutenant strolled the patrol beats, and you never knew when one would turn up.

  “Aren’t you on duty now?”

  “Yes. Well—Bellevue—isn’t very interested. I gave the letter to my precinct. It sort of depends on the Pole’s mental status. The legal part of it, I mean. What they’ll do with him.” He was telling the truth, but it was so inadequate. “Marylyn, can I see you tomorrow night, if you’re busy all day? I’m free tomorrow night. I’ve got to see you for a few minutes.”

  “All right,” with a terrible sigh, more breath than words. “I have to work tomorrow night. Maybe I’ll be finished by nine, nine-thirty. Call me first.”

  Clarence went back to Rudin.

  That morning at four, Clarence wore his gun when he left the precinct house. Patrolmen were allowed to take their guns, and several men, who had to arrive at the precinct house or go home during night hours, did. Clarence was feeling mistrustful and vaguely scared.

  HE SLEPT LATE THE NEXT DAY, because he had not got to sleep until after 7 a.m. He bought groceries, went to the library, and the whole time he was thinking about Marylyn, trying to plan how to make the best of the evening tonight, or of the time she would agree to see him, which might be hardly an hour if she had more work to do tonight, or if she had to get up very early.

  Before 9 p.m. he telephoned her, but she didn’t answer until 9:35. Yes, he could come down if he wanted to.

  Clarence walked to Union Square, took the Canarsie to 14th Street west, then the local to Spring Street. Then it was a short walk to Macdougal. He had been on the lookout the whole way for a flower shop still open, or a street vendor of flowers, and hadn’t seen any. Clarence still had Marylyn’s keys. At least she hadn’t asked for them back, or had she forgotten? Clarence was wearing his gun in its belt. He had a crazy idea of killing himself tonight in case Marylyn wanted to break off with him. Not in her apartment, because that would be too messy and dramatic, but maybe in one of the dark streets that led downtown or west towards the Hudson River.

  Marylyn’s two windows showed a diffused light behind her green curtains. Clarence hesitated, then used his key to open the downstairs door. He ran up the steps, and knocked at her door.

  “Clare?”

  “Yes.”

  She opened the door. She was wearing a skirt and an old white shirt with its tails hanging out. Some of her long hair hung in front of her shoulders, down to her breasts.

  Clarence took her in his arms. He kissed her neck under her ear.

  “What’s happened?” Gently but firmly she pushed him away.

  “Not much. I mainly wanted to see you.” He kept looking at her, but feeling that she was annoyed, he turned away, took a breath and was aware of the familiar smell, faint and mingled, of Marylyn’s perfume, of coffee, of books, of the cream-colored radiators under the window. It seemed he had not been here in six months. Only one lamp was on. Her typewriter was on the round table where she worked.

  “And what happened at Bellevue?”

  Clarence told her. He told her about visiting Mr. Reynolds at his office. “Bellevue’s dumping it on the police and the police are dumping it on Bellevue. I can’t get either of them to lock the guy up—as yet.” Clarence removed his topcoat and laid it over the back of a straight chair.

  She saw his gun. The belt showed under his unbuttoned jacket. “You’re carrying that thing around?”

  “It’s allowed. You’ve see it before.”

  “Worse than Texas.”

  “I’ve never used it. Never had to. Except in practice,” Clarence said in a mild self-defense, but he doubted if Marylyn was interested. She wasn’t sitting down, and Clarence remained standing too. “I’m sorry Mr. Reynolds isn’t willing to back me up a little. I couldn’t persuade him to say anything to my precinct.—I don’t suppose you would.”

  “I’m afraid not,” Marylyn said. “This is a case of ordinary citizens being pestered, and I don’t think the police give a damn. Do you?—Besides I don’t want to be leered at again by that greasy wop.” Marylyn lit a cigarette. “You came here tonight just to tell me you can’t get anywhere?—I can see why Mr. Reynolds doesn’t want to say any more. He knows it won’t do any good. Then the creep’s maybe going to hit back at him.”

  Clarence sat down on a straight chair by Marylyn’s table.

  “I’d—I’d like you to meet Mr. Reynolds some time. And his wife.”

  “I think you said that before. I’m a little fed with all this, Clare. Why should I meet Mr. Reynolds?—And that psycho! He could be spying on all of us. He probably is. That’s how he gets his kicks. And he’s as free as the breeze. On Morton Street. That prick!”

  “He’s not—really free.”

  “Why isn’t he? Living just a couple of blocks away? I had dinner tonight with Dannie at the Margutta, then he walked me home, even though it’s close. You think I’d walk out alone at night now? God, it’s sick-making!” Marylyn pulled her curtains so that they would cover more window. “He could be out there now.” She turned to him. “You may as well take off now, Clare. I’ve still got work tonight. I’m sorry.”

  “Oh, hell.” Clarence wanted desperately to stay with her, tonight, all night. Tonight, this moment, seemed crucial. “I’m going to quit the force, Marylyn. Very soon.”

  “Quit? I don’t believe it.”

  “Can I stay with you tonight?” He stood up by the table. “Please, Marylyn. Don’t be angry.”

  “I’m just not in the mood. Not to mention—”

  “I don’t mind if you work. Would you like me to come back later?”

  “No-o, Clare.” Gentle but very definite.

  “You think I don’t do enough about—this, but I’m trying.” I have to work within the framework of Bellevue, or of the law, he wanted to say, but he was afraid of her laughter. “You think I’m not tough enough but—”

  “I never said that.”

  “You didn’t say it, but you think I don’t do enough.”

  Marylyn shook her head slowly, so slowly her hair did not stir. “You’re not cut out for the police, Clare, and that’s something. But we’re not cut out for each other. We’re too unlike. It’s like you told me about Cornell—the student demonstrations.”

  “Oh, that!” He was suddenly impatient. He had told Marylyn he had balked at wrecking the library and the faculty’s offices, having gone along with the anti-war demonstrators, even made a speech or two at the rallies, up to that point, the point where they had talked of destroying what Clarence still remembered he had called “perfectly innocent, perfectly good and even beautiful books—and furniture!” Marylyn had turned against him because of this: she professed to see a reason why “everything old” had to be destroyed before something new and better could be built. But it was such an abstract problem, so irrelevant compared to them, standing so close now, people who loved each other, he was sure.

  “You’d better go, Clare.”

  Clarence felt suddenly weak. He was standing straight, though he felt as if he might faint. “I do love you.” He was thinking of the night they met, in a bar on Third Avenue of all places, Marylyn with a lot of people he still didn’t know, and himself drinking a beer with a college chum. Clarence had approached Marylyn out of the blue, and tried to strike up an acquaintance,
and she had given him her telephone number, saying, “You won’t remember it, so what does it matter?” But he’d remembered it (written it down right away) and things had gone on from there. It was certainly true that they hadn’t a friend in common. Clarence embraced her, and kissed her on the lips, a brief kiss, because she pushed him away, a little angry—or was it really anger?

  “Go!” she said, smiling a little—perhaps at him.

  What the hell did women mean?

  Clarence left, buttoning his coat as he went down the stairs, and he nearly fell when his heel caught on the edge of a step. He walked northward, in the direction of his apartment. He’d walk home, he thought.

  He saw Rowajinski. Or he thought it was the Pole, a smallish figure that disappeared to the left at the west corner of Bleecker Street. Clarence trotted after him, because it was twenty yards to the corner and Clarence wanted to make sure it was the Pole. Clarence bumped into a man, and went on with a mumbled “Sorry.”

  Clarence was now at the corner, and he didn’t see Rowajinski. There were several stores still open with lighted fronts, cars moving on Bleecker, people on the pavement, but he could not see the limping figure anywhere. Maybe he hadn’t seen him. Clarence walked quickly west on Bleecker, trying to keep his eyes on both sides of the street and see ahead in the rather dark distance. The Pole might be heading for home, Clarence thought, because west was the direction of Morton Street.

  At Seventh Avenue, Clarence definitely saw him, and his heart gave a thump. Rowajinski was hopping fast across the Avenue to escape the traffic just as the light changed to green. This green held Clarence up, and he danced from foot to foot waiting to cross over. When Rowajinski reached the opposite curb, Clarence saw him look back, and Clarence knew Rowajinski saw him, and had probably seen him coming out of Marylyn’s house, too. Rowajinski dashed westward, but Clarence could not brave the five- or six-lane rush of cars, mostly taxis, down Seventh Avenue. Clarence thought the Pole had gone into the first narrow street west—Commerce, Clarence saw as he ran at last across Seventh Avenue. Commerce was a short street with a small theater at the end of it. The marquee of the theater was lighted. Now Clarence had lost Rowajinski again.