Manwell told his cameraman to stay behind and ducked under the police tape. He strode straight toward Bixbie, intending to talk to the man straight up, to rattle his cage a little bit, to push his fifth amendment rights around; but he stopped short when he heard the Sergeant’s radio crackle then come to life. He ducked behind a cruiser and took the cigar from his mouth. Holding it between two sausage fingers, he cocked one ear up to listen.
“Serge, this thing’s spun out of control; I don’t think we can contain it without upping the ante,” Fern’s voice said through the Serge’s handset.
Bixbie shifted his weight from one foot to the other and unclipped the handset from his shoulder. “Under no circumstances are you to draw your firearms. I don’t want this thing to turn into a shooting match. We have a lot of innocent people down there.”
So that’s what this was all about, Manwell thought. He had covered the Officer Greer story himself and had done pretty well with it. He had even won a Golden Leaf award. Manwell smiled. If Bixbie knew anything, it was that no force of man or God could keep the press, especially when it came to Archie Manwell, from covering a scoop as big as Officer Greer, or the altercation that had broken out on Columbus’s most sacred holiday.
Another voice broke over Bixbie’s radio: the voice of Smash Williams. “Serge, Fern’s right, we got a war on our hands. You gotta get us some help down here.”
“I’m working on it,” Bixbie said into his handset. “You are just going to have to contain the situation until help arrives.”
“Shouldn’t we call the Commissioner or something? I think we are going to need at least one riot unit,” Smash said.
Bixbie groaned out loud and wiped the sweat from his forehead with a sleeve. Manwell smiled afresh, reading dread in the Sergeant’s face. Manwell understood the Serge’s dilemma, but, damn, wouldn’t that be some good drama. Commissioner Stillman was a tramp, a megalomaniac, and a pain in the ass. Manwell could hear the sound bites already.
Bixbie crushed down the button of his handset and spoke: “I’m not going to bother the commissioner unless we absolutely have to. Last thing we need is to go crying to him with our tails between our legs. Just hold tight; help will be on the way shortly.”
A set of strong hands clamped down on Manwell, one on each shoulder. A Mr. Hyde of a cop with a chiseled chin and deep eyes yanked Manwell up and around. “How’s it hanging, slugger?” Manwell said around his stogie, then blew a plume of smoke into the big cop’s face.
“Sergeant, look what the cat dragged in,” the Mr. Hyde cop said as he dragged Manwell out from behind the cruiser.
Bixbie wheeled around and visibly winced as he recognized Manwell. “We have set a perimeter, you are free to watch from behind the police tape.”
“Don’t be such a hard-ass, Bixbie; we’re old friends, you and I,” Manwell said.
“We’ve never been friends. I’m going to give you exactly five seconds to move behind the police line. If you do not comply, I will have you put under arrest for abstracting justice.”
“That’d be a treat for the moms and pops to watch on their boob tubes at home, wouldn’t it.” Manwell thumbed over his shoulder toward his poorly dressed cameraman, who had taken the initiative and begun to roll film.
“I’m not going to ask again,” Bixbie said. “I don’t care who’s on camera or why, I want you behind that police line.”
“I’m just doing my job, man, just like you. The public has the right to know.”
Bixbie looked up at the Mr. Hyde officer. “Would you please deposit this scab behind the police line?” He glanced at Manwell’s cameraman then back at the Mr. Hyde officer. “Do it as gently as possible.”
“Yes, sir,” the Mr. Hyde cop said.
Manwell struggled, wresting back and forth, trying to either escape or force the big man to put up a fight. The Mr. Hyde officer cop crimped down on both shoulders, sending spears of pain all the way to Manwell’s elbows. He stopped struggling. “This way, please, sir,” the Mr. Hyde officer said. Manwell moved along. Manwell threw a couple of fits as the Mr. Hyde cop escorted him back to the police line; but each time he struggled, the Mr. Hyde stopped him with a fresh jolt from his vice-grip fists clamped on his shoulders.
Mr. Hyde lifted the police tape and pushed Manwell gently underneath. Then he stood his full height and shouted loud enough to quell the outrage coming from the throng of newsmen. “If you would please remain behind the police line for your own protection, as soon as we have the situation under control, we will be glad to answer all of your questions.”
Hands shot up and a din of voices rose in a cacophony of shouting. Mr. Hyde ignored the onslaught of voices, turned on his size 13 leather heel, and moved back to his post near Sergeant Bixbie.
Manwell rubbed one of his shoulders gingerly, pinching down on the cigar with his yellowing teeth. “For our own protection, my ass,” he said under his breath. He pushed up to his toes so he could get a better glimpse at the growing violence down the parade route. Somehow he was going to cover this event in full color, in full controversy, or his nickname wasn’t Hardline.
Bixbie shouted into his radio, new beads of sweat standing out on his forehead: “Captain, where are you. I asked for that motorcycle unit five minutes ago.”
His handset crackled. A voice, obscured by the grind of a Harley Davidson engine, responded. “We are en route, sir. We should reach you within two minutes.”
“Well step on it. We have a battle on our hands and I’m not about to give my city to a bunch of stoned out longhairs.”
Bixbie clipped the handset back to his shoulder and planted his fists on his hips. He had been offered an early out by that son of a bitch Commissioner Stillman two years ago. It was a gross cut in pension and a measly severance package. At the time, he had felt like mopping the floor with Stillman’s face over the proposal. But as he watched the violence unravel up and down the parade route, he wondered if it might have been a better decision after all to have taken Stillman’s offer.
Chapter 22
Eddie Pearlman looked through the viewfinder of his Bell and Howell 8mm camera and framed the ruckus that had broken out further down the parade route. Things had escalated so quickly that he didn’t know what to shoot. He had heard a pop—could have been a gunshot, could have been a firecracker, could have been a backfire—he had heard a few threats shouted back and forth between distant NRPL and the Vietnam vets, then all hell had broken loose. Eddie had no idea who had started the fight; but he knew it would look great on film.
He pulled the trigger on the camera’s pistol grip. The motor whirred, accompanied by the rhythmic click as the claw brought frame after frame of 8mm celluloid through the gate. With only 8 minutes of film, he would have to be judicious. He decided to grab a 6-second long shot, then he would try to get closer. He zoomed in as far as he could, extending the lens to its full 70mm focal length. He panned across the action, filming what he planned to edit into his final piece as an establishing shot of the expanding brawl. Just before he ended the pan and closed the shot, Dierdrie grabbed his elbow and yanked his camera off kilter. Eddie released the Bell and Howell’s trigger and whipped around to face his wife.
“Why you messin’ around with your little toy camera. Can’t you see what’s going on?” Dierdrie said, shooting Eddie her canned expression of censure, an expression that he had learned to despise.
“Dee, I only have eight minutes of film. You’ve just screwed up six seconds of it.”
Dee put her hands on her hips and cocked her head sideways. “You’re such a child.”
Eddie bit his bottom lip.
“Always in it for you, aren’t ya?”
Here it comes, Eddie thought.
“I’m getting out of here before one of those