Joseph Wambaugh - The Blue Knight

The marchers across Broadway caught my eye when two of them, a guy and a girl, were waving for me to come over. They seemed to be just jiving around but I thought I better go over for several reasons. First of all, there might really be something wrong. Second, if I didn’t, it looked like hell for a big bad copper to be afraid to approach a group of demonstrators. And third, I had a theory that if enough force could be used fast enough in these confrontations there’d be no riot. I’d never seen real force used quick enough yet, and I thought, what the hell, now was my chance to test my theory since I was alone with no sergeants around.

These guys, at least a few of them, two black guys, and one white, bearded scuz in a dirty buckskin vest and yellow headband, looked radical enough to get violent with an overweight middle-aged cop like myself, but I firmly believed that if one of them made the mistake of putting his hands on me and I drove my stick three inches in his esophagus, the others would yell police brutality twice and slink away. Of course I wasn’t sure, and I noticed that the recent arrivals swelled their numbers to twenty-three. Only five of them were girls. That many people could stomp me to applesauce without a doubt, but I wasn’t really worried, mainly because even though they were fist shaking, most of them looked like middle-class white people just playing at revolution. If you have a few hungry-looking professionals like I figured the white guy in the headband to be, you could have trouble. Some of these could lend their guts to the others and set them off, but he was the only one I saw.

I drove around the block so I didn’t have to make an illegal U-turn in front of them, made my illegal U-turn on Olympic, came back and parked in front of the marchers, who ignored me and kept marching and chanting, “Hell no, we won’t go.” And “Fuck Uncle Sam, and Auntie Spiro,” and several other lewd remarks mostly directed at the President, the governor, and the mayor. A few years ago, if a guy yelled “fuck” in a public place in the presence of women or children, we’d have to drag his ass to jail.

“Hi, Officer, I love you,” said one little female peace marcher, a cute blonde about seventeen, wearing two inches of false eyelashes that looked upside-down, and ironed-out shoulder-length hair.

“Hi, honey, I love you too,” I smiled back, and leaned against the door of my car. I folded my arms and puffed a cigar until the two who had been waving at me decided to walk my way.

They were whispering now with another woman and finally the shorter girl, who was not exactly a girl, but a woman of about thirty-five, came right up. She was dressed like a teenager with a short yellow mini, violet panty hose, granny glasses, and white lipstick. Her legs were too damned fat and bumpy and she was wearing a theatrical smile with a cold arrogant look beneath it. Up close, she looked like one of the professionals and seemed to be a picket captain. Sometimes a woman, if she’s the real thing, can be the detonator much quicker than a man can. This one seemed like the real thing, and I looked her in the eye and smiled while she toyed with a heavy peace medal hanging around her neck. Her eyes said, “You’re just a fat harmless cop, not worth my talents, but so far you’re all we have here, and I don’t know if an old bastard like you is even intelligent enough to know when he’s being put down.”

That’s what I saw in her eyes, and her phony smile, but she said nothing for a few more minutes. Then a car from one of the network stations rolled up and two men got out with a camera and mike.

The interest of the marchers picked up now that they were soon to be on tape, and the chanting grew louder, the gestures more fierce, and the old teenybopper in the yellow dress finally said, “We called you over because you looked very forlorn. Where’re the riot troops, or are you all we get today?”

“If you get me , baby, you ain’t gonna want any more,” I smiled through a puff of cigar smoke, pinning her eyeballs, admiring the fact that she didn’t bat an eye even though I knew damn well she was expecting the businesslike professional clichés we’re trained to give in these situations. I’d bet she was even surprised to see me slouching against my car like this, showing such little respect for this menacing group.

“You’re not supposed to smoke in public, are you, Officer?” She smiled, a little less arrogant now. She didn’t know what the hell she had here, and was going to take her time about setting the bait.

“Maybe a real policeman ain’t supposed to, but this uniform’s just a shuck. I rented this ill-fitting clown suit to make an underground movie about this fat cop that steals apples and beats up flower children and old mini-skirted squatty-bodies with socks to match their varicose veins in front of the U.S. Army Induction Center.”

Then she lost her smile completely and stormed back to the guy in the headband who was also much older than he first appeared. They whispered and she looked at me as I puffed on the cigar and waved at some of the marchers who were putting me on, most of them just college-age kids having a good time. A couple of them sincerely seemed to like me even though they tossed a few insults to go along with the crowd.

Finally, the guy in the headband came my way shouting encouragement to the line of marchers who were going around and around in a long oval in front of the door, which was being guarded by two men in suits who were not policemen, but probably military personnel. The cameraman was shooting pictures now, and I hid my cigar and sucked in a few inches of gut when he photographed me. The babe in the yellow dress joined the group after passing out some Black Panther pins and she marched without once looking at me again.

“I hear you don’t make like the other cops we’ve run into in these demonstrations,” said the guy with the headband, suddenly standing in front of me and grinning. “The L.A.P.D. abandoning the oh so firm but courteous approach? Are you a new police riot technique? A caricature of a fat pig, a jolly jiveass old cop that we just can’t get mad at? Is that it? They figure we couldn’t use you for an Establishment symbol? Like you’re too fucking comical looking, is that it?”

“Believe it or not, Tonto,” I said, “I’m just the neighborhood cop. Not a secret weapon, nothing for lumpy legs to get tight-jawed about. I’m just your local policeman.”

He twitched a little bit when I mentioned the broad so I guessed she might be his old lady. I figured they probably taught sociology lA and lB in one of the local junior colleges.

“Are you the only swine they’re sending?” he asked, smiling not quite so much now which made me very happy. It’s hard even for professionals like him to stay with a smirk when he’s being rapped at where it hurts. He probably just loves everything about her, even the veiny old wheels. I decided, screw it, I was going to take the offensive with these assholes and see where it ended.

“Listen, Cochise,” I said, the cigar between my teeth, “I’m the only old pig you’re gonna see today. All the young piglets are staying in the pen. So why don’t you and old purple pins just take your Che handbooks and cut out. Let these kids have their march with no problems. And take those two dudes with the naturals along with you.” I pointed to the two black guys who were standing ten feet away watching us. “There ain’t gonna be any more cops here, and there ain’t gonna be any trouble.”

“You are a bit refreshing,” he said, trying to grin, but it was a crooked grin. “I was getting awfully sick of those unnatural pseudoprofessionals with their businesslike platitudes, pretending to look right through us when really they wanted to get us in the back room of some police station and beat our fucking heads in. I must say you’re refreshing. You’re truly a vicious fascist and don’t pretend to be anything else.”