Joseph Wambaugh - The Blue Knight

“Ramona Convent? I thought you were a Moslem.”

“I’m nothing.”

We got in the apartment and Laila guided me past the soft couch, which looked pretty good to sleep on, and dumped me in a straight-backed kitchen chair after taking off my sport coat and hanging it in a closet.

“You even wear a gun off duty?” she asked as she ladled out some coffee and ran some water from the tap.

“Yeah,” I said, not knowing what she was talking about for a minute, I was so used to the gun. “This job makes you a coward. I don’t even go out without it in this town anymore, except to Harry’s bar or somewhere in the neighborhood.”

“If I saw all the things you have, maybe I’d be afraid to go out without one too,” she shrugged.

I didn’t know I was dozing again until I smelled Laila there shaking me awake, a tiny cup of Turkish coffee thick and dark on a saucer in front of me. I smelled her sweetness and then I felt her cool hand again and then I saw her wide mouth smiling.

“Maybe I should spoon it down your throat till you get sober.”

“I’m okay,” I said, rubbing my face and head.

I drank the coffee as fast as I could even though it scalded my mouth and throat. Then she poured me another, and I excused myself, went to the head, took a leak, washed my face in cold water, and combed my hair. I was still bombed when I came back, but at least I wasn’t a zombie.

Laila must’ve figured I was in good enough shape. “Let me turn on some music, Bumper, then we can talk.”

“Okay.” I finished the second cup almost as fast as the first and poured myself a third.

The soft stirring song of an Arab girl singer filled the room for a second and then Laila turned down the volume. It’s a wailing kind of plaintive sound, almost like a chant at times, but it gets to you, at least it did to me, and I always conjured up mental pictures of the Temple of Karnak, and Giza, and the streets of Damascus, and a picture I once saw of a Bedouin on a pink granite cliff in the blinding sun looking out over the Valley of the Kings. I saw in his face that he knew more about history, even though he was probably illiterate, than I ever would, and I promised myself I’d go there to die when I got old. If I ever did get old, that is.

“I still like the old music,” Laila smiled, nodding toward the stereo set. “Most people don’t like it. I can put on something else if you want.”

“Don’t touch it,” I said, and Laila looked in my eyes and seemed glad.

“I need your help, Bumper.”

“Okay, what is it?”

“I want you to talk to my probation officer for me.”

“You’re on probation? What for?”

“Prostitution. The Hollywood vice cops got three of us in January. I pleaded guilty and was put on probation.”

“Whadda you want me to do?”

“I wasn’t given summary probation like my lousy thousand-dollar lawyer promised. I got a tough judge and I have to report to a P.O. for two years. I want to go somewhere and I need permission.”

“Where you going?”

“Somewhere to have a baby. I want to go somewhere, have my baby, adopt it out, and come back.”

She saw the “Why me? Why in the hell me?” look in my eyes.

“Bumper, I need you for this. I don’t want my sisters to know anything. Nothing, you hear? They’d only want to raise the baby and for God’s sake, it’s hard enough making it in this filthy world when you know who the hell your two parents are and have them to raise you. I’ve got a plan and you’re the only one my whole damned tribe would listen to without questions. They trust you completely. I want you to tell Yasser and Ahmed and all of them that you don’t think I should be dancing for a living, and that you have a friend in New Orleans who has a good-paying office job for me. And then tell the same thing to my P.O. and convince her it’s the truth. Then I’ll disappear for seven or eight months and come back and tell everyone I didn’t like the job or something. They’ll all get mad as blazes but that’ll be it.”

“Where the hell you going?”

“What’s it matter?” she shrugged. “Anywhere to have the kid and farm it out. To New Orleans. Wherever.”

“You’re not joining the coat hanger corps are you?”

“An abortion?” she laughed. “No, I figure when you make a mistake you should have the guts to at least see it through. I won’t shove it down a garbage disposal. I was raised an Arab and I can’t change.”

“You got any money?”

“I’ve got thirteen thousand in a bank account. I’d like you to handle it for me and see that the girls have enough to get them through the summer while they’re living here in my apartment. If everything goes right I’ll be back for a New Year’s Eve party with just you and me and the best bottle of scotch money can buy.”

“Will you have enough to live on?” I asked, knowing where she got the thirteen thousand.

“I’ve got enough,” she nodded.

“Listen, goddamnit, don’t lie to me. I’m not gonna get involved if you’re off somewhere selling your ass in a strange town with a foal kicking around in your belly.”

“I wouldn’t take any chances,” she said, looking deep in my eyes again. “I swear it. I’ve got enough in another account to live damn well for the whole time I’ll be gone. I’ll show you my bankbooks. And I can afford to have the kid in a good hospital. A private room if I want it.”

“Wow!” I said, getting up, light-headed and dizzy. I stood for a second and shuffled into the living room, dropping on the couch and laying back. I noticed that the red hose on Laila’s crystal and gold narghile was uncoiled. Those pipes are fine decorator items but they never work right unless you stuff all the fittings with rags like Laila’s was. I often smoked mint-flavored Turkish tobacco with Yasser. Laila smoked hashish. There was a black-and-white mosaic inlaid box setting next to the narghile. The lid was open and it was half full of hash, very high-grade, expensive, shoe-leather hash, pressed into dark flat sheets like the sole of your shoe.

Laila let me alone and cleared the kitchen table. What a hell of a time. First the decision to retire. And after I told Cassie, everything seemed right. And then Cassie wants a kid! And a goddamn pack of baby Bolsheviks make an ass out of me. Humiliate me! Then perjury, for chrissake. I felt like someone was putting out cigars on the inside of my belly, which was so hard and swollen I couldn’t see my knees unless I sat up straight. But at least I got a back office, even if I did almost die in the pigeon shit.

“What a day,” I said when Laila came in and sat down on the end of the couch.

“I’m sorry I asked you, Bumper.”

“No, no, don’t say that. I’ll do it. I’ll help you.”

She didn’t say anything, but she got up and came over and sat on the floor next to me, her eyes wet, and I’ll be a son of a bitch if she didn’t kiss my hand!

Laila got up then, and without saying anything, took my shoes off, and I let her lift my legs up and put them on the couch. I felt like a beached walrus laying there like that, but I was still swacked. In fact, I felt drunker now laying down, and I was afraid the room would start spinning, so I wanted to start talking. “I had a miserable goddamn day.”

“Tell me about it, Bumper,” said Laila, sitting there on the floor next to me and putting her cool hand on my hot forehead as I loosened my belt. I knew I was gone for the night. I was in no shape to get up, let alone drive home. I squirmed around until my sore shoulder was settled against a cushion.

“Your face and hands are cut and your body’s hurting.”

“Guess I can sleep here, huh?”

“Of course. How’d you get hurt?”