Neal Pollack

The Police Superintendent watched the unbuttoning without comment, blinking each time a button snapped free. He stirred heavily in his seat, then pushed himself up from his chair and walked to a third massive window. He extended his arm stiffly out in front of him as if preparing to bend it in salute, caught the soiled shirt cuff between the thumb and forefinger of his other hand, unsnapped the button, and rolled the sleeve to the elbow, revealing dense wiry hair on his wrist and forearm. He did the same with the other sleeve. Stood still a moment with his arms hanging at his sides. He brought both hands to his chest and pulled violently at his shirt, buttons catapulting into air, like some high-story flasher exhibiting himself to the world. He twisted backwards and began freeing himself of the shirt, tilting his torso to one side then the other until both sleeves were free. That done, he crumpled up the shirt between both hands, his violent belly hanging like a mound of descending lava over his belt, and moved forward, the sausage rolls of his sides quivering with each step and the shirt trailing along the carpet behind him. He dropped the garment into a wicker wastebasket and resumed his station behind his desk, hands folded in his lap, watching Ward with murderous hate. His chest rising and falling. He cupped his hands underneath his belly and began rocking in the chair. Continued:

“As you know, in this suspect we are dealing with a man who has been fortunate enough to travel in some of our most distinguished circles, not to mention the access he has

”

“I’'ve been thinking,” Ward said. “Would you take my hand in marriage?”

The Police Superintendent grabbed the edges of the desk and leaned in close. “Look! I am appealing to your—”

“Don’t refuse me.”

“—better nature.” His nostrils blew hot air onto Ward’s face. “A selfless act. Lives in the balance. After all, you gain as well. Your time to shine.”

“So thoughtful of you. Such abundance of caution and concern.”

The Police Superintendent glared at Ward and remained poised over his desk like some indecisive highwire acrobat.

It was cold where Ward lay. The yellowed glow of streetlamps seeping under and around the edges of the window shade, frail wisps of light spinning like ballet dancers in the dark. A reserved wind tapped modest applause against the paned glass. He shut his eyes and let the world spin free. The next thing he knew he had spun out of orbit, his brain ricocheting off the black walls of his skull. He opened his eyes and found darkness in slow dissolution.

“Everything all right in there?”

A hand pounded muffled words into the door.

Ward turned his face in the direction of the sound. No visual evidence that the door even existed, but he knew it was there. Shadowy crabs crawling in the strip of light under its frame.

He listened to the wet whine of the rusty radiator.

“Hey!”

“Just relax.”

“The Police Superintendent will be here soon.”

“Just relax.”

He turned back the bedcovers. Shivered to a cold greeting of air. Kicked his feet from under the sheets. Sat upright in the bed, a cot really, a narrow iron frame small and set low. The lax springs sagging under his insignificant weight. He placed his feet on the cold wooden floor. Bent forward and fingered the shade, which snapped back upon its roller, allowing morning light to rush like gate-crashers into the room. He shut his eyes.

“Hey!”

“Relax. I'’ll be right out.” Ward placed a blanket across his shoulders.

Hands shoved in his pockets, a young officer who had spent the entire night outside Ward’s door sat slumped over on a stool wearing his department-issued cap and jacket, the side of his young face barely visible in sixty-watt gloom. He turned his head and peered up at Ward, one corner of his mouth twisted as if he were biting down on something. The sight of Ward changed the look in his eyes, the angle of his chin, the red polish of his cheeks. He pulled his hands from his pockets, sat as straight as he possibly could on the stool, and redirected his gaze to a neutral wall.

Ward pulled one side of the blanket tighter about his shoulders. “Fine job,” he said.

The young officer remained perfectly still, like someone sitting for a photograph, though Ward detected fain't suggestions of some forbidden emotion rising to the surface of his face.