Flash crowd

"How bad is it?"

"Well, nobody's been hurt, last I heard. And they aren't breaking things. It's not that kind of crowd, and there's nothing to steal but sand, anyway. It's a happy riot, Jansen. There's just a bitch of a lot of people."

"Another flash crowd. It figures," said Jerryberry. "You can get a flash crowd anywhere there are displacement booths."

"Can you?"

"They've been around a long time. It's just that they happen faster with the long-distance booths. Some places are permanent floating flash crowds. Like Tahiti… what's wrong?"

Wash Evans had a fu

"All day." Jerryberry dug out the Minox. "I've been everywhere I could think of. Some of this goes with taped interviews." He produced the tape recorder. "Of course there isn't much time to sort it out-"

"No. Gimme." Evans took the camera and the recorder. "We can follow up on these later. Maybe they'll make a special. Right now the news is at Hermosa Beach. And you sound like you know how it happened and what to do about it. Do you still want to do that interview?"

"I-sure."

"Go get a C.B.A. camera from George Bailey. Let's see, it's-nine fifteen, dammit. Spend half an hour, see as much as you can, then get back here. Find out what you can about the-flash crowd at Hermosa Beach. That's what we'll be talking about."

George Bailey looked up as Jerryberry arrived. He pointed emphatically at the single camera remaining on the table, finger-combed the hair back out of his eyes, and went back to monitoring half a dozen teevee screens.

The camera came satisfyingly to life in Jerryberry's hands. He picked up a list of Hermosa Beach numbers and turned to the displacement booths. Too much coffee sloshed in his belly. He stopped suddenly, thinking:

One big riot-control center would do it. You wouldn't need a police network.-just one long-distance receiver to serve the whole country, and a building the size of Yankee Stadium, big enough to handle any riot. A federal police force on permanent guard. Rioting was an interstate crime now anyway. You could build such a center faster and cheaper than any network.

Not now. Back to work. He stepped into a booth, dialed, and was gone.