The Blue Knight (9 page)

For a few seconds it could’ve gone either way and then the door to my car opened and hit me in the back, scaring the shit out of me.

“Get your butt in here, Bumper,” said a familiar voice, which I obeyed. The second I closed the door something hit the window almost hard enough to break the glass and several people started kicking at the door and fender of my black-and-white.

“Give me the keys,” said Stan Ludlow, who worked Intelligence Division. He was sitting behind the wheel, looking as dapper as always in a dark green suit and mint-colored necktie.

I gave him the keys from my belt and he drove away from the curb as I heard something else clunk off the fender of the car. Four radio cars each containing three Metro officers pulled up at the induction center as we were leaving, and started dispersing the group.

“You’re the ugliest rape victim I ever saw,” said Stan, turning on Ninth Street and parking behind a plainclothes police car where his partner was waiting.

“What the hell you talking about?”

“Had, man. You just been had.”

“I had a feeling something wasn’t right,” I said, getting sick because I was afraid to hear what I figured he was going to say. “Did they set me up?”

“Did they set you up? No, they didn’t have to. You set yourself up! Christ, Bumper, you should know better than to make speeches to groups like that. What the hell made you do it?”

Stan had about fifteen years on the job and was a sergeant, but he was only about forty and except for his gray sideburns he looked lots younger. Still, I felt like a dumb little kid sitting there now. I felt like he was lots older and a damn sight wiser and took the assbite without looking at him.

“How’d you know I was speechmaking, Stan?”

“One of them is one of us,” said Stan. “We had one of those guys wired with a mike. We listened to the whole thing, Bumper. We called for the Metro teams because we knew what was going to happen. Damn near didn’t get to you quick enough though.”

“Who were the leaders?” I was trying to save a grain or two of my pride. “The bitch in the yellow dress and the guru in the headband?”

“Hell no,” said Stan, disgustedly. “Their names are John and Marie French. They’re a couple of lames trying to groove with the kids. They’re nothing. She’s a self-proclaimed revolutionary from San Pedro and he’s her husband. As a matter of fact he picked up our undercover man and drove him to the demonstration today when they were sent by the boss. French is mostly used as errand boy. He drives a VW bus and picks up everybody that needs a ride to all these peace marches. He’s nothing. Why, did you have them figured for the leaders?”

“Sort of,” I mumbled.

“You badmouthed them, didn’t you?”

“Sort of. What about the two in the Russian hats?”

“Nobody,” said Stan. “They hang around all the time with their Panther buttons and get lots of pussy, but they’re nobody. Just opportunists. Professional blacks.”

“I guess the guy running the show was a tall nice-looking kid named Scott?” I said, as the lights slowly turned on.

“Yeah, Scott Hairston. He’s from U.C.L.A. His sister Melba was the little blonde with the peachy ass who was hanging on his arm. She was the force behind subversive club chapters starting on her high school campus when she was still a bubblegummer. Their old man, Simon Hairston’s an attorney and a slippery bastard, and his brother Josh is an old-time activist.”

“So the bright-eyed little baby was a goddamn viper, huh? I guess they’ve passed me by, Stan.”

Stan smiled sympathetically and lit my cigar for me. “Look, Bumper, these kids’ve been weaned on this bullshit. You’re just a beginner. Don’t feel too bad. But for God’s sake, next time don’t start chipping with them. No speeches, please!”

“I must’ve sounded like a boob,” I said, and I could feel myself flushing clear to my toes.

“It’s not that so much, Bumper, but that little bitch Melba put you on tape. She always solicits casual comments from cops. Sometimes she has a concealed hand mike with a wire running up her sleeve down to a box in her handbag. She carrying a big handbag today?”

I didn’t have to answer. Stan saw it in the sick look on my face.

“They’ll edit your remarks, Bumper. I heard some of them from the mike
our
guy was wearing. Christ, you talked about stick time and putting teeth marks on your baton and kicking ass and collecting names.”

“But all that’s not how I meant it, Stan.”

“That’s the way your comments’ll be presented—out of context. It’ll be printed that way in an underground newspaper or maybe even in a daily if Simon Hairston gets behind it.”

“Oooooh,” I said, tilting my hat over my eyes and slumping down in my seat.

“Don’t have a coronary on me, Bumper,” said Stan. “Everything’s going to be all right.”

“All right? I’ll be the laughingstock of the Department!”

“Don’t worry, Melba’s tapes’re going to disappear.”

“The undercover man?”

Stan nodded.

“Bless him,” I breathed. “Which one was he? Not the kid whose arm I almost broke?”

“No,” Stan laughed, “the tall black kid. I’m only telling you because we’re going to have to use him as a material witness in a few days anyway, and we’ll have to disclose his identity. We got secret indictments on four guys who make pretty good explosives in the basement of a North Hollywood apartment building. He’s been working for me since he joined the Department thirteen months ago. We have him enrolled in college. Nice kid. Hell of a basketball player. He can’t wait to wear a bluesuit and work a radio car. He’s sick of mingling with all these revolutionaries.”

“How do you know he can get the tape?”

“He’s been practically living in Melba’s skivvies for at least six months now. He’ll sleep with her tonight and that’ll be it.”

“Some job,” I said.

“He doesn’t mind that part of it,” Stan chuckled. “He’s anxious to see how all his friends react when they find out he’s the heat. Says he’s been using them as whipping boys and playing the outraged black man role for so long, they probably won’t believe it till they actually see him in the blue uniform with that big hateful shield on his chest. And wait’ll Melba finds out she’s been balling a cop. You can bet she’ll keep that a secret.”

“Nobody’s gonna hear about me then, huh, Stan?”

“I’ll erase the tape, Bumper,” said Stan, getting out of the car. “You know, in a way it worked out okay. Scott Hairston was expecting a hundred marchers in the next few hours. He didn’t want trouble yet. You wrecked his game today.”

“See you later, Stan,” I said, trying to sound casual, like I wasn’t totally humiliated. “Have a cigar, old shoe.”

I was wrung out after that caper and even though it was getting late in the afternoon, I jumped on the Harbor Freeway and started driving south, as fast as traffic would permit, with some kind of half-baked idea about looking at the ocean. I was trying to do something which I usually do quite well, controlling my thoughts. It wouldn’t do any good at all to stew over what happened, so I was trying to think about something else, maybe food, or Cassie, or how Glenda’s jugs looked today—something good. But I was in a dark mood, and nothing good would come, so I decided to think of absolutely nothing which I can also do quite well.

I wheeled back to my beat and called the lieutenant, telling him about the ruckus at the induction center, leaving out all the details of course, and he told me the marchers dispersed very fast and there were only a few cars still at the scene. I knew there’d hardly be any mention of this one, a few TV shots on the six o’clock news and that’d be it. I hung up and got back in my car, hoping the cameraman hadn’t caught me smoking the cigar. That’s another silly rule, no smoking in public, as if a cop is a Buckingham Palace guard.

SEVEN

I
DROVE AROUND SOME MORE
, cooling off, looking at my watch every few seconds, wanting this day to end. The noisy chatter on the radio was driving me nuts so I turned it off. Screw the radio, I thought, I never made a good pinch from a radio call. The good busts come from doing what I do best, walking and looking and talking to people.

I had a hell of an attack of indigestion going. I took four antacid tablets from the glove compartment and popped them all but I was still restless, squirming around on the seat. Cassie’s three o’clock class would be finished now so I drove up Vermont to Los Angeles City College and parked out front in the red zone even though when I do that I always get a few digs from the kids or from teachers like, “You can do it but we get tickets for it.” Today there was nobody in front and I didn’t get any bullshit which I don’t particularly mind anyway, since nobody including myself really likes authority symbols. I’m always one of the first to get my ass up when the brass tries to restrict my freedom with some idiotic rules.

I climbed the stairs leisurely, admiring the tits on some sun-tanned, athletic-looking, ponytailed gym teacher. She was in a hurry and took the stairs two at a time, still in her white shorts and sneakers and white jersey that showed all she had, and it was plenty. Some of the kids passing me in the halls made all the usual remarks, calling me Dick Tracy and Sheriff John, and there were a few giggles about Marlene somebody holding some pot and then Marlene squealed and giggled. We didn’t used to get snickers about pot, and that reminded me of the only argument concerning pot that made any sense to me. Grass, like booze, breaks the chain and frees the beast, but does it so much easier and quicker. I’ve seen it thousands of times.

Cassie was in her office with the door opened talking to a stringy-haired bubblegummer in a micro-mini that showed her red-flowered pantygirdle when she sat down.

“Hi,” said Cassie, when she saw me in the doorway. The girl looked at me and then back at Cassie, wondering what the fuzz was here for.

“We’ll just be a minute,” said Cassie, still smiling her clean white smile, and I nodded and walked down the hall to the water fountain thinking how damn good she looked in that orange dress. It was one of the twenty or so that I’d bought her since we met, and she finally agreed with me that she looked better in hot colors, even though she thought it was part of any man’s M.O. to like his women in flaming oranges and reds.

Her hair was drawn back today and either way, back or down, her hair was beautiful. It was thick brown, streaked with silver, not gray, but real untouched silver, and her figure was damn good for a girl her age. She was tanned and looked more like a gym teacher than a French teacher. She always wore a size twelve and sometimes could wear a ten in certain full styles. I wondered if she still looked so good because she played tennis and golf or because she didn’t have any kids when she was married, but then, Cruz’s wife Socorro had a whole squad of kids and though she was a little overweight she still looked almost as good as Cassie. Some people just keep it all, I guess, which almost made me self-conscious being with this classy-looking woman when we went places together. I always felt like everyone was thinking, “He must have bread or she’d never be with him.” But it was useless to question your luck, you just had to grab on when you had the chance, and I did. And then again, maybe I was one of those guys that’s ugly in an attractive sort of way.

“Well?” said Cassie, and I turned my head and saw her standing in the doorway of her office, still smiling at me as I went over her with my eyes. The kid had left.

“That’s the prettiest dress you have,” I said, and I really meant it. At that moment she’d never looked better, even though some heavy wisps of hair were hanging on her cheeks and her lipstick was almost all gone.

“Why don’t you admire my mind instead of my body once in a while like I do yours?” she grinned.

I followed her into the office and stepped close, intending to give her a kiss on the cheek. She surprised me by throwing her arms around my neck and kissing me long and hot, causing me to drop my hat on the floor and get pretty aroused even though we were standing in an open doorway and any minute a hundred people would walk past. When she finally stopped, she had the lazy dazzling look of a passionate woman.

“Shall we sweep everything off that damned desk?” she said in a husky voice, and for a minute or two I thought she would’ve. Then a bell rang and doors started opening and she laughed and sat down on her desk showing me some very shapely legs and you would never guess those wheels had been spinning for forty odd years. I plopped down in a leather chair, my mouth woolly dry from having that hot body up against me.

“Are you sure you won’t come to the party tonight?” she said finally, lighting a cigarette.

“You know how I feel about it, Cassie,” I said. “This is
your
night. Your friends and the students want to have you to themselves. I’ll have you forever after that.”

“Think you can handle me?” she asked, with a grin, and I knew from her grin she meant sexually. We had joked before about how I awoke this in her, which she said had been dormant since her husband left her seven years ago and maybe even before that, from what I knew of the poor crazy guy. He was a teacher like Cassie, but his field was chemistry.

We supposed that some of her nineteen-year-old students, as sex-obsessed as they are these days, might be making love more often than we did, but she didn’t see how they could. She said it had never been like this with her, and she never knew it could be so good. Me, I’ve always appreciated how good it was. As long as I can remember, I’ve been horny.

“Come by the apartment at eleven,” she said. “I’ll make sure I’m home by then.”

“That’s pretty early to leave your friends.”

“You don’t think I’d sit around drinking with a bunch of educators when I could be learning at home with Officer Morgan, do you?”

“You mean I can teach a teacher?”

“You’re one of the tops in your field.”

“You have a class tomorrow morning,” I reminded her.

“Be there at eleven.”

“A lot of these teachers and students that don’t have an early class tomorrow are gonna want to jive and woof a lot later than that. I think you ought to stay with them tonight, Cassie. They’d expect you to. You can’t disappoint the people on your beat.”

“Well, all right,” she sighed, “But I won’t even see you tomorrow night because I’ll be dining with those two trustees. They want to give me one final look, and casually listen to my French to make sure I’m not going to corrupt the already corrupted debs at their institution. I suppose I can’t run off and leave
them
either.”

“It won’t be long till I have you all to myself. Then
I’ll
listen to your French and let you corrupt the hell out of me, okay?”

“Did you tell them you’re retiring yet?” She asked the question easily, but looked me straight in the eye, waiting, and I got nervous.

“I’ve told Cruz,” I said, “and I got a surprise for you.”

“What?”

“I’ve decided that Friday’s gonna be my last day. I’ll start my vacation Saturday and finish my time while I’m on vacation. I’ll be going with you.”

Cassie didn’t yell or jump up or look excited or anything, like I thought she would. She just went limp like her muscles relaxed suddenly, and she slipped off the desk and sat down on my lap where there isn’t any too much room, and with her arms doubled around the top of my neck she started kissing me on the face and mouth and I saw her eyes were wet and soft like her lips, and next thing I know, I heard a lot of giggling. Eight or ten kids were standing in the hall watching us through the open door, but Cassie didn’t seem to hear, or didn’t care. I did though because I was sitting there in my bluesuit, being loved up and getting turned on in public.

“Cassie,” I gasped, nodding toward the door, and she got up, and calmly shut the door on the kids like she was ready to start again.

I stood and picked up my hat from the floor. “Cassie, this is a school. I’m in uniform.”

Cassie started laughing very hard and had to sit down in the chair I’d been in, leaning back, and holding her hands over her face as she laughed. I thought how sexy even her throat was, the throat usually being the first thing to show its age, but Cassie’s was sleek.

“I wasn’t going to rape you,” she said at last, still chuckling between breaths.

“Well, it’s just that you teachers are so permissive these days, I thought you might try to do me on the desk like you said.”

“Oh, Bumper,” she said finally, holding her arms out, and I came over and leaned down and she kissed me eight or ten warm times all over my face.

“I can’t even begin to tell you how I feel now that you’re really going to do it,” she said. “When you said you actually
are
finishing up this Friday, and that you told Cruz Segovia, I just went to pieces. That was relief and joy you saw on my face when I closed the door, Bumper, not passion. Well, maybe a
little
of it was.”

“We’ve been planning all along, Cassie, you act like it was really a shock to you.”

“I’ve had nightmares about it. I’ve had fantasies awake and asleep of how after I’d gone, and got our apartment in San Francisco, you’d phone me one bitter night and tell me you weren’t coming, that you just could never leave your beat.”

“Cassie!”

“I haven’t told you this before, Bumper, but it’s been gnawing at me. Now that you’ve told Cruz, and it’s only two more days, I know it’s coming true.”

“I’m not married to my goddamn job, Cassie,” I said, thinking how little you know about a woman, even one as close as Cassie. “You should’ve seen what happened to me today. I was flimflammed by a soft-nutted little kid. He made a complete ass out of me. He made me look like a
square
.”

Cassie looked interested and amused, the way she always does when I tell her about my job.

“What happened?” she asked, as I pulled out my last cigar and fired it up so I could keep calm when the humiliation swept over me.

“A demonstration at the Army Induction Center. A kid, a punk-ass kid, conned me and I started blabbing off about the job. Rapping real honest with him I was, and I find out later he’s a professional revolutionary, probably a Red or something, and oh, I thought I was so goddamn hip to it. I been living too much on my beat, Cassie. Too much being the Man, I guess. Believing I could outsmart any bastard that skated by. Thinking the only ones I never could really get to were the organized ones, like the bookmakers and the big dope dealers. But
sometimes
I could do things that even hurt
them
. Now there’s new ones that’ve come along. And they have organization. And I was like a baby, they handled me so easy.”

“What the hell did you
do
, Bumper?”

“Talked. I talked to them straight about things. About thumping assholes that needed thumping. That kind of thing. I made
speeches
.”

“Know what?” she said, putting her long-fingered hand on my knee. “Whatever happened out there, whatever you said, I’ll bet wouldn’t do you or the Department a damn bit of harm.”

“Oh yeah, Cassie? You should’ve heard me talking about when the President was here and how we busted up the riot by busting up a skull or three. I was marvelous.”

“Do you know a
gentle
way to break up riots?”

“No, but we’re supposed to be professional enough not to talk to civilians the way we talk in police locker rooms.”

“I’ll take Officer Morgan over one of those terribly wholesome, terribly tiresome TV cops, and I don’t think there’s a gentle way to break up riots, so I think you should stop worrying about the whole thing. Just think, pretty soon you won’t have any of these problems. You’ll have a real position, an important one, and people working under you.”

“I got to admit, it gets me pretty excited to think about it. I bet I can come up with ways to improve plant security that those guys never dreamed of.”

“Of course you can.”

“No matter what I do, you pump me up,” I smiled. “That’s why I wanted you for my girl in spite of all your shortcomings.”

“Well, you’re my Blue Knight. Do you know you’re a knight? You joust and live off the land.”

“Yeah, I guess you might say I live off my beat, all right. ’Course I don’t do much jousting.”

“Just
rousting
?”

“Yeah, I’ve rousted a couple thousand slimeballs in my time.”

“So you’re my Blue Knight.”

“Wait a minute, kid,” I said. “You’re only getting a
former
knight if you get me.”

“What do you mean, ‘if’?”

“It’s okay to shuck about me being some kind of hero or something, but when I retire I’m just a has-been.”

“Bumper,” she said, and laughed a little, and kissed my hand like Glenda did. That was the second woman to kiss my hand today, I thought. “I’m not dazzled by authority symbols. It’s really
you
that keeps me kissing your hands.” She did it again and I’ve always thought that having a woman kiss your hands is just almost more than a man can take. “You’re going to an important job. You’ll be an executive. You have an awful lot to offer, especially to me. In fact, you have so much maybe I should share it.”

“I can only handle one woman at a time, baby.”

“Remember Nancy Vogler, from the English department?”

“Yeah, you want to share me with her?”

“Silly,” she laughed. “Nancy and her husband were married twelve years and they didn’t have any children. A couple of years ago they decided to take a boy into their home. He’s eleven now.”

“They adopted him?”

“No, not exactly. They’re foster parents.” Cassie’s voice became serious. “She said being a foster parent is the most rewarding thing they’ve ever done. Nancy said they’d almost missed out on knowing what living is and didn’t realize it until they got the boy.”

Cassie seemed to be searching my face just then. Was she thinking about
my
boy? I’d only mentioned him once to her. Was there something she wanted to know?