Alison Lurie - The Nowhere City

He got up again, and knocked on the door, and called out “Hey!” as loud as he could: “Hey, hey! Let me out!” He heard an edge of panic in his own voice.

“Whassa trouble?” the cop said, unfriendly now. He did not open Paul’s door, but looked in through the window.

“You can let me out now,” Paul called. “I’ll see my wife.”

“Let yourself out,” the cop said, grinning. “The door’s not locked.”

Paul turned the handle. It was quite true. Feeling foolish on top of everything else, he followed the policeman up the corridor, a broad back covered in serge. And what he was wearing himself—how would he explain that? Well, he would just have to say—

“Paul!” Ceci cried, jumping up from a bench as he walked into the room. “Are you okay?”

Paul looked nervously around him. Four cops, a clock reading 2:15, but Katherine was not there. Understanding what had happened, he let Ceci put her arms about him, and even reciprocated, though with a sense of policemen watching. “Sure, I’m okay. Are they going to let me out?”

Ceci shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

Holding on to Ceci by one arm, Paul advanced towards the nearest cop and asked the same question. Nah, the cop said. They couldn’t let him go, see, until they found out what the stuff was he had on him. There wasn’t anybody around now to analyze it, and there wouldn’t be until nine next morning. So he would have to spend the night, wasn’t much left of that anyway. “But I can’t do that!” Paul protested. The cop shrugged, indifferent. It was likely, he implied, that Paul would turn out to be a drug addict, but he would not be very interested either way.

“I can’t stay here,” Paul said. “I’ve got to get out before eight tomorrow morning; I’ve got to be at work.”

“Yeah? Where?” The cop looked at him: dirty clothes, sandals, beard now almost two days old.

Paul hesitated; then he decided to plunge. “Nutting Research and Development,” he said. “And listen, I’ve already been investigated and cleared by their security department. You know Nutting wouldn’t have cleared me if I took dope. They would have found that out. Now why don’t you let me go on home? I can come back here tomorrow in my lunch hour if you want.”

“You work for Nutting?” Paul nodded. “Lessee your badge.”

For Reasons of Security this Badge Should Be Carried upon the Person AT ALL TIMES was printed upon the back of Paul’s badge. It had been pinned to his jacket, but his jacket was at Ceci’s. Had he remembered to take it off? Paul searched through his pockets. No, no, no. The policeman and Ceci were watching. Wait a moment. Hadn’t he pinned it to his shirt? Yes! There it was, underneath Ceci’s dirty sweater. He fumbled to unfasten it and get it out.

“Huh.” The cop looked at Paul’s badge as it lay in his hand, Secret Paul Cattleman staring solemnly at the ceiling of the police station, in his real clothes. Then he handed it to the cop nearest him. Both then went to the far end of the room and entered into consultation with the head cop. Paul’s image was passed from hand to hand.

Paul and Ceci stood waiting. They exchanged a glance, and she squeezed his arm, but he did not feel that any message or information actually passed.

Finally the policemen turned towards him.

“Okay,” the one at the desk called out. “You can go.” He held out Paul’s badge. “Lemme give you some advice, mister,” he added as Paul went over to take it. “Don’t come down here again. Stay out of joints like that one, and you’ll stay out of trouble.”

“Thank you,” Paul replied mechanically. He put the badge into his pocket.

The heavy golden-oak door, barred with iron, swung shut behind them, and Paul took a big breath of air. “Jesus!” he said, balancing on the step. “I feel like I’d been in there for years.”

“Come on,” Ceci urged him. “Around the corner.” She pulled him along the street and into an alley. In the shadow there a car was parked, or more accurately, a hearse—complete with black curtains at the windows. Paul had a moment of absolute panic, as if he had fallen from one bad dream into another. “Hi!” Ceci called.

“Wow, you made it,” Steve Tyler said, opening the door of the hearse. “What happened?”

“It was way out,” Ceci said, climbing in beside him. “C’mon. He pulled it on them how he worked for the government, like he was investigated by the F.B.I. already. He really laid it on.” She laughed.

“Cool.” Steve turned the car out of the alley and drove south, while the events in the police station were described to him. Soon they drew up in front of the coffee house.

“Say,” Paul asked. “Could you drive me over to Ceci’s place? I left my car there.”

“Aw, make the scene for a minute,” Steve said. “All the cats want to see you.”

“Okay,” Paul said, not very enthusiastically, thinking that it must be almost three A.M.

The coffee house did not look like a place that had recently been raided. It was just as before: candles burning softly, dim figures sitting before them. But this time, as they entered, a wave of recognition, and then almost a cheer, ran round the room. Before the door had shut behind him Paul was surrounded. People were slapping him on the back, congratulating and thanking him, while Steve and Ceci told the story, now expanding into a saga of cunning and heroism, of his release. Dinny, the waitress, clung to his hand, smiling silently like a delighted child.

“Sit down, have some coffee on the house,” her husband urged. “Have something to eat. Hey, Dinny! Bring him something good.” Paul allowed himself to be propelled into a chair.

“You practically saved my life,” John told him. “Man, was I happy when they busted you! I was shaking, waiting for them to make me open up the guitar case.”

“You were shaking?” said someone else. “Listen, man, I had my shirt pocket full of gage. Like you could smell it a mile off.”

More expresso and another, double-sized slice of cake were placed on the table. To Paul they signified insomnia and indigestion. But he knew he had to make a gesture of ritual consumption. Without trying, he had become a hero. And after all, why not enjoy it?

“Hey, you know you were great,” Steve told him. The crowd around them had dispersed; most people had gone home. Ceci had vanished too, probably to the washroom. “It was so cool, the way you made like you didn’t know me. That was really thinking fast. I guess you saved me a night in slam.” He looked down, rotating his coffee mug on the table. “I was all wrong about you before,” he apologized. “I’m sorry I tried to put you down all the time and all like that.”

“That’s okay,” Paul said.

“Josie was right,” Steve went on. “She always thought you were a good cat from the start.”

“That’s all right.” Paul felt acutely that he was in a false position with Steve, who had taken his instinctive revulsion for loyal strategy. He opened his mouth to explain, but could not manage it. “I mean, no reason you should have liked me,” he said instead. “After all, I’m mixed up with your best friend’s wife.”

“Aw shit, no,” Steve protested. “That wouldn’t make any difference. I mean, that’s between them. No, it was just the way you came on looking so square. And you were working for Nutting, and that really bugged me. I mean most of these cats don’t dig what a place like that is about, but I used to have a gig with one of them. Yeah,” he answered Paul’s look of inquiry. “I was a physicist.” He turned round in his chair to face Paul. “I know how it is; it took me a while to catch on too. Sure, you’re just in the P.R. department, maybe you’re telling yourself the lies they’re putting out are harmless, or anyway what you’re doing is harmless. Yeah, only it’s not.”