The Main

LaPointe guesses what the young man is thinking. He thrusts out his lower lip and shakes his head. “No. He’s been on the Main for years. Used to be a roofer. Then one day when the slates were covered with snow, he took a bad fall. That’s why he fears the snow. People on the street give him a little something now and then. He’s too proud to beg like the other bommes, so they give him old knives to sharpen. They never get them back. He forgets who gave them to him, and he sharpens them until there’s nothing left.” LaPointe cuts across the street. “Come on. One more loop and we’ll call it a night.”

“Got a heavy date?” Guttma

LaPointe stops and turns to him. “Why do you ask that?”

“Ah… I don’t know. I just thought… Friday night and all. I mean, I’ve got a date tonight myself.”

“That’s wonderful.” LaPointe turns and continues his beat crawl, occasionally making little detours into the networks of side streets. He tests the locks on iron railings. He taps on the steamy window of a Portuguese grocery and waves at the old man. He stops to watch two men carrying a trunk down a long wooden stoop, until it becomes clear that they are helping a young couple move out, to the accompaniment of howls and profanity from a burly hag who seems to think the couple owe her money.

They are walking on an almost empty side street when a man half a block ahead turns and starts to cross the street quickly.

“Scheer!” LaPointe shouts. Several people stop and look, startled. Then they walk on hurriedly. The man has frozen in his tracks, but there is a kinesthetic energy in his posture, as though he would run… if he dared. LaPointe raises a hand and beckons with the forefinger. Reluctantly, Scheer crosses back and approaches the Lieutenant. In the forced swagger of his walk, and in his mod clothes, he is very much the dandy.

“What did I tell you when I saw you in that bar last night, Scheer?”

“Oh, come on, Lieutenant…” There is an oily purr to his voice.

“All right,” LaPointe says with bored fatigue. “Get on that wall.”

With a long-suffering sigh, Scheer turns to the tenement wall and spread-eagles against it. He knows how to do it; he’s done it before. He tries to avoid letting his clothes touch the dirty brick.

Guttma

“Listen, Lieutenant…”

“Off!”

Three children emerge from nowhere to watch, as Scheer tugs his overcoat off and folds it carefully before holding it out to LaPointe, each movement defiantly slow.

LaPointe chucks the coat onto the stoop. “Now empty your pockets.”

Scheer does so and holds out the comb, change, wallet, and bits of paper to LaPointe.

“Drop all that trash down into the basement well there,” LaPointe orders.

His mouth tight with hate, Scheer lets his belongings fall into the well fenced off by a wrought-iron railing. The wallet makes a splat because the bottom of the well is covered with an inch of sooty water.

“Now take out your shoelaces and give them to me.”

By now the onlookers have grown to a dozen, two of them girls in their twenties who giggle as Scheer hops to maintain balance while tugging the laces out of the last pair of grommets. Petulantly, he hands them to LaPointe.

The Lieutenant puts them into his pocket. “All right, Scheer. After I leave, you can climb down and get your rubbish. I’ll keep the shoelaces. It’s for your own good. I wouldn’t want you to get despondent over being embarrassed in public and try to hang yourself with them.”

“Tell me! Tell me, Lieutenant! What have I ever done to you?”

“You’re on the street. I told you to stay off it. I wasn’t giving you a vacation, asshole. It was a punishment.”

“I know my rights! Who are you, God or something? You don’t own the fucking street!” He would never have gone that far if there hadn’t been the pressure of the crowd and the need to save face.

LaPointe’s eyes crinkle in a melancholy smile, and he nods slowly. Then his hand flashes out and his slap sends Scheer spi

LaPointe turns and strolls up the street, followed after a moment by the stu

“What was all that about, Lieutenant?” Guttma

“No one. A pimp. I ordered him off the street.”

“But… if he’s done something, why don’t you pick him up?”

“I have. Several times. But his lawyers always get him off.”

“Yes, but…” Guttma

“But, sir… isn’t that harassment?”

LaPointe stops and looks at the young officer appraisingly, his glance shifting from eye to eye. “Yes. It’s harassment.”

They walk on.

Guttma

While LaPointe is telephoning from a booth attached to the outside of the café, Guttma

When the Lieutenant returns from the telephone booth a girl of eighteen or nineteen comes from the back room to serve them little cups of strong coffee, her eyes always averted with a shyness that advertises her awareness of men and of her own sexual attractiveness. She has long black lashes and the comfortable beauty of a Mado

“How’s your mother?” LaPointe asks.

“Fine. She’s in back. Want me to call her?”

“No. I’ll see her next time I drop by.”

The girl lets her damp brown eyes settle briefly on Guttma

“Pretty girl,” Guttma

LaPointe grunts noncommittally. Years ago, the mother was a streetwalker on the Main. She was a lusty, laughing woman always in good spirits, always with a coarse joke to tell, pushing her elbow into your ribs with the punch line. When, every month or two, LaPointe felt the need for a woman, she was usually the one he went with.

Then suddenly she was off the street. She had got pregnant; by a lover, of course, not a customer. With the birth of the child, she changed completely. She began to dress less flashily; she looked for work; she started attending church. She didn’t often laugh, but she smiled a lot. And she devoted herself to her baby girl, like a child playing dolls. She borrowed a little money from LaPointe, who also countersigned her note, and she put a down payment on this back-street café. At five dollars a week, she paid LaPointe back, never missing a payment except around Christmas, when she was buying presents for her girl.

They never made love again, but he made it a habit to drop in occasionally during quiet times. They used to sit together by the window and talk while they drank cups of thick Greek coffee. He would listen as she went on about her daughter. It was amazing what that child could do. Talk. Run. And draw? An artist! The mother had plans. The girl would go to university and become a fashion designer. Have you ever seen her drawings? How can I tell you? Taste? You wouldn’t believe it. Never pink and red together.