the New Centurions (1971)

by Wambaugh, Joseph

  "Show yourself, you bastard," the young policeman shouted to the invisible sniper and then turned his back on them and walked slowly away. "This isn't real," he muttered to Roy. "Is it?"

  Then Roy saw something extraordinary: a young black with a full beard and a black beret and silk undershirt and huge natural under the beret, a fiercely militant-looking young man, stepped in front of a mob of fifty and told them to go home and that the police were not their enemies, and other things equally provocative. He had to be removed from the area in a car under guard when the mob turned on him and kicked him unconscious in less than a minute, before the policemen could drive them off.

  The sirens shrieked and two ambulances and a police car containing six policemen drove up. Roy saw there was a sergeant with them. He was young and almost everyone ignored him as he tried in vain to create order at least among the squad of policemen, but it took almost an hour to get the dead and wounded to the hospital and the temporary morgue. The Watts riot had begun in earnest this Friday afternoon.

  Roy was ordered by the sergeant to arrest a wounded man in a red shirt, and he was teamed with two other policemen. They took the man to the prison ward of the County Hospital in a radio car with a windshield and rear window completely destroyed by rocks. The paint on the white door was scorched from a fire bomb and Roy was glad to be taking the long drive to the hospital. He hoped his new partners would not be too anxious to return to the streets.

  It was after dark when they were driving again toward Seventy-seventh Street Station and by now Roy and his partners knew each other. Each had started the afternoon with different partners until the chaos at Manchester and Broadway, but what the hell did it matter, they decided, who was working with whom. They made a pact to stay one with the other and to provide mutual protection, not to stray far from each other, because they had only one shotgun, Roy's, and it was not reassuring at all, not on this night, but at least it was something.

  "It's not nine o'clock yet," said Barkley, a ten-year policeman from Harbor Division with a face like a bruised tomato who had, for their first two hours together, mumbled over and over that "it was unbelievable, all so unbelievable," until he was asked to please shut up by Winslow, a fifteen-year policeman from West Los Angeles Division who was the driver and a slow careful driver he was, Roy thought. Roy was thankful he had a veteran driving.

  Roy sat alone in the back seat cradling the shotgun, a box of shotgun shells on the seat next to him. He had not fired the gun yet, but he had made the decision to fire at anyone who threw a rock or fire bomb at them, and at anyone who shot or aimed a gun at them or looked like he was aiming a gun at them. They were shooting looters. Everyone knew it. He decided he would not shoot looters, but he was glad some of the others were doing it. They had seen a semblance of order begin in the bursts of initial gunfire. Only deadly force could destroy this thing and he was glad they were shooting looters, but he decided he would not shoot looters. And he would try not to shoot anyone. And he would shoot no one in the stomach.

  In one of my rare displays of humanity I will blow their heads off, he thought. Under no circumstance will I shoot a man in the stomach.

  "Where you want to go, Fehler?" asked Winslow, rolling a cigar from side to side in his wide mouth. "You know the area best."

  "Sounds like Central Avenue and Broadway and a Hundred and Third are getting hit the hardest," said Barkley.

  "Let's try Central Avenue," said Roy, and at 9:10 P.M. when they were only two blocks from Central Avenue the fire department requested assistance because they were being fired on in a six-block stretch of Central Avenue.

  Roy felt the heat when they were still a half block from Central and Winslow parked as close to the inferno as he could get. Roy was perspiring freely and by the time they jogged the five hundred feet to the first besieged fire truck they were all sweating and the night air was scorching Roy's lungs and the pop pop pop of gunfire was coming from several directions. Roy began to develop a fierce stomachache, one which could not be relieved by a bowel movement, and a ricochet pinged off the concrete sidewalk. The three policemen dived for the fire truck and huddled next to a filthy, yellow-helmeted, wide-eyed fireman.

  It was not Central Avenue, Roy thought. It was not even possible that the signpost which pointed Forty-sixth Street east and west and Central Avenue north and south could be right. He had worked Newton Street. He had patrolled these streets with dozens of other partners, with partners now dead even, like Whitey Duncan. This street was a vivid part of his learning. He had been educated in southeast Los Angeles and Central Avenue had been a valuable schoolroom, but this hissing inferno was not Central Avenue. Then Roy for the first time noticed the two cars overturned and burning. He suddenly could not remember what kind of buildings had been there on Forty-seventh and Forty-sixth that were now sheets of flame two hundred feet high. If this had happened a year ago I would certainly not believe it, he thought. I would simply believe that it was a fantastic seizure of d. t.'s and I would take another drink. Then he thought of Laura, and he was astonished that now, even now, as he lay by the big wheel of the fire engine and the sounds of gunfire and sirens and growling flames were all around him, even now, he could get the empty ache within him that would be filled warmly when he thought of holding her, and how she stroked his hair as no one, not Dorothy, not his mother, no woman, had done. He had guessed he loved her when the yearning for drink began to wane, and he knew it when, three months after their affair began, he realized that she aroused the same feeling within him that Becky did, who was now talking clearly and was assuredly a brilliant child--not simply beautiful, but stunning. Roy ached again as he thought of Becky, ethereal, bright, and golden--and Laura, dusky and real, altogether real, who had begun to put him together, Laura, who was five months younger than he, but who seemed years older, who used pity and compassion and love and anger until he stopped drinking after he was suspended sixty days for being found drunk on duty, and who lived with him and kept him for those sixty days in her apartment, and who said nothing, but only watched him with those tawny tragic eyes when he began to resemble a man again and decided to return to his own apartment. She said nothing about that since, and he still came to her three or four nights a week because he still needed her badly. She watched him, always watched him with those liquid eyes. With Laura the sex made it perfect but was far, far from all of it, and that was another reason he knew he loved her. He had been on the verge of a decision about her for weeks and even months and he began to tremble as he thought that if it weren't for the ache and the warmth which always came when he thought of Becky or Laura, if it weren't for this feeling he could evoke in himself, then now, now in the blood and hate and fire and chaos, he would turn the riot gun around and look in the great black eye of the twelve gauge and jerk the trigger. Then he guessed he was far from healthy yet, despite Laura's reassurance, or he wouldn't think such thoughts. Suicide was madness, he had always been taught to believe, but what was this around him, if not madness? He began to get light-headed and decided to stop thinking so hard. His palms were dripping wet and leaving tiny drops of moisture on the receiver of the shotgun. Then he worried about the moisture rusting the piece. He wiped the receiver with his sleeve until he realized what he was doing and laughed aloud.

  "You guys come with me!" shouted a sergeant, crouching as he ran past the fire engine. "We got to clean these snipers out and get the firemen working before the whole goddamn city burns down."

  But though they walked along Central Avenue in groups of three for over an hour they never saw a sniper but only heard, and they chased and occasionally shot at shadowy figures who scurried in and out of gutted storefronts that were not in flames. Roy did not shoot because the conditions had not been met. Still, he was glad the others were shooting. When Central Avenue reached the point that it was burning more or less quietly and there was little left to steal, Winslow suggested they go elsewhere, but first they should stop at a restaurant and eat. When they asked wh
ich restaurant he had in mind, he waved an arm and they followed him to the car and found that the two remaining unbroken windows had been smashed out in their absence and the upholstery had been cut, but not the tires strangely enough, so Winslow drove to a restaurant on Florence Avenue that he said he had noticed earlier. They walked through a gigantic hole in the wall of the cafe where a car must have smashed through. Roy guessed the car had probably been driven by some terrified white man passing through the riot area who had been attacked by the mobs that were stopping traffic and beating whites earlier in the day when they owned the streets before the shooting started. Then again it could have been a looter's car which the police had chased until he crashed through the restaurant in spectacular fashion. What difference did it make? Roy thought.

  "Shine your flashlight over here," said Winslow, removing six hamburger patties from the refrigerator which was not running. "They're still cold. It's okay," said Winslow. "See if you can find the buns in that drawer, Fehler. I think the mustard and stuff is behind you there on the little table."

  "The gas still works," said Barkley, propping his flashlight on the counter with the beam directed on the griddle. "I'm a pretty good cook. Want me to get them started?"

  "Go head on, brother," said Winslow in an affected Negro accent, as he squeezed a head of lettuce he found on the floor, peeling away the outer leaves and dropping them in a cardboard box. They ate and drank several bottles of soda pop which were not cold enough, but it wasn't at all bad there in the darkness and it was after midnight when they finished and sat smoking, looking at each other as the ceaseless crackling small arms fire and ubiquitous smell of smoke reminded them that they had to go back. Finally it was Barkley who said, "Might as well get back out there. But I wish they hadn't broke our windows out. You know, the one thing that scares me most is that a cocktail will come flying in the car and bust, and fry us. If we only had windows we could roll them up."

  Roy was more impressed with Winslow as the night wore on. He drove through Watts and west and north through the rest of the gutted city as though he were on routine patrol. He seemed to be listening carefully to the garbled endless, breathless calls that were blaring out at them over the radio. Finally one of the operators with a girlish voice began sobbing hysterically as she was jabbering a string of twelve emergency calls to "any unit in the vicinity," and she and all of them must realize by now that there were no units in certain vicinities, and if there were they were hard pressed to save their own asses and to hell with anything else. But at 2:00 A.M. Winslow stopped the car on Normandie Avenue which was exceptionally dark except for a building burning in the distance and they watched a gang of perhaps thirty looters ransacking a clothing store and Winslow said, "There's too many of them for us to handle, wouldn't you say?"

  "They might have guns," said Barkley.

  "See the car out front, the green Lincoln?" said Winslow. "I'm going after them when they leave. We'll get some of them at least. It's about time we threw some looters in jail."

  Three men got in the car and even from a half block away in the darkness, Roy could see that the back seat of the Lincoln was filled with suits and dresses. The Lincoln pulled away from the curb and Winslow said, "Dirty motherfuckers," and the radio car roared forward. Winslow turned on his headlights and red lights and they passed the clothing store and crossed Fifty-first Street at eighty miles per hour and the chase was on.

  The driver of the Lincoln was a good driver but his brakes were not good and the police car had tremendous brakes and could corner better. Winslow ate up the ground which separated them and didn't listen to Barkley who was shouting directions at him. Roy sat silently in the rear seat and wished they had seat belts in the back seat too. He could see that Winslow was oblivious of both of them and would catch that Lincoln if it killed all of them and then they were going northbound on Vermont. Roy did not look at the speedometer but knew they were traveling in excess of one hundred and this was of course absolutely insane because there were thousands of looters, thousands! But Winslow wanted _these__ looters and Barkley shouted, "Soldiers!" and Roy saw a National Guard roadblock two blocks north and the Lincoln's driver, a hundred feet ahead, saw it too and burned out the rest of his brakes trying to turn left before reaching the roadblock. A National Guardsman began firing a machine gun and Winslow jammed on his brakes when they saw the muzzle flashes and heard the clug-a-clug-a-clug-a-clug and saw the tracers explode on the asphalt closer to them than to the Lincoln. Roy was horrified to see that the Lincoln did not crash as he was sure it would. The driver made the turn and was speeding west on a narrow dark residential street and Winslow doggedly made the turn and Roy wondered if he could lean out the window and fire the riot gun, or perhaps his revolver because that Lincoln had to be stopped before Winslow killed them all. He was surprised to discover how badly he wanted to live now, and he saw Laura's face for an instant and was thrown against the door handle when Winslow made an impossible right turn and picked up two hundred feet on the Lincoln.

  Winslow, trying to conserve power, wasn't using his siren and Roy had lost count of the other cars they had almost hit, but he was thankful that at this hour in this part of the city, there were few civilian autos on the street and Barkley uttered a joyful whoop when the Lincoln bounced over the curb turning left again, and slammed against a parked car. The Lincoln was still skidding in a tight circle when the three looters were leaping out, and Winslow, jaw set, was driving across the sidewalk at the fleeing driver, a slim Negro who was running down the middle of the sidewalk with an occasional terrified glance over his shoulder at the approaching headlights. Roy realized that Winslow was going to run him down as he drove the radio car down the residential sidewalk taking corners off fences and running over shrubbery with the radio car that was too wide for the sidewalk. They were less than thirty feet from the looter when he turned the last time and his mouth opened in a soundless shriek as he dived over a chain link fence. Winslow skidded past him, cursed, and leaped out of the car. Roy and Barkley were out in a second but Winslow, amazingly agile for his size and age, was already over the fence and crashing through the rear yard. Roy heard four shots and then two more as he threw the riot gun over the fence and scrambled after it, ripping his trousers, but in a moment Winslow came walking back reloading his revolver.

  "He got away," said Winslow. "The motherfucking nigger got away. I'd give a thousand dollars for one more shot at him."

  When they got back in the car Winslow circled the block and returned to the looter's green Lincoln which sat awkwardly in the middle of the street, steam hissing from the broken radiator.

  Winslow stepped slowly from the radio car and asked Roy for the riot gun. Roy gave him the gun and shrugged at Barkley as Winslow stepped to the car and fired two flaming blasts at the rear tires. Then he stepped to the front of the car and smashed out the headlights with the butt of the gun and then broke the windshield. Then he circled the car, his shotgun ready like it was a dangerous wounded thing that might yet attack, and he slammed the gun butt into both side windows. Roy looked toward the houses on both sides of the street, but all were dark. The residents of southeast Los Angeles, who had always known how to mind their own business, were not curious at any sounds they heard _this__ night.

  "That's enough, Winslow," Barkley shouted. "Let's get the hell out of here."

  But Winslow opened the car door and Roy could not see what he was doing. In a second he emerged with a large piece of fabric and Roy watched him in the beam of the headlights as he put his pocket knife away. He removed the gas cap and shoved the piece of material into the tank and dripped gasoline on the street beneath the tank.

  "Winslow, are you nuts?" shouted Barkley. "Let's get the hell out of here!"

  But Winslow ignored him and made his trickle of gasoline extend a safe distance from the Lincoln and then he shoved the soaked piece of cloth back into the tank except for two feet of it which hung to the ground. He ran to the mouth of the gasoline stream and lit it
and there was a small smothered explosion almost instantly and the car was burning well as Winslow got back in the radio car and drove away in the relaxed careful manner of before.

  "How can you fight them without getting just like them?" said Winslow finally to his silent partners. "I'm just a nigger now, and you know what? I feel pretty good."

  Things became a little quieter after three, and at 4:00 A.M. they drove to Seventy-seventh Station, and after working a fifteen-hour watch, Roy was relieved. He was too tired to change into his civilian clothes, and was certainly too tired to drive to his apartment. And even if he weren't, he would not go home tonight. There was only one place in the world he would go tonight. It was exactly four-thirty when he parked in front of Laura's apartment. He could not hear the pop of gunfire now. This part of Vermont had been untouched by fire and almost untouched by looting. It was very dark and still. He only knocked twice when she opened the door.

  "Roy! What time is it?" she asked, in a yellow nightgown and robe, and already he felt the pleasurable ache.

  "I'm sorry to come so late. I had to, Laura."

  "Well, come in. You look like you're about to fall on your face."

  Roy entered and she switched on a lamp and held his arms as she watched him in her unique way. "You're a mess. You're really a filthy mess. Take your uniform off and I'll fill the bath. Are you hungry?"

  Roy shook his head as he walked into the familiar comfortable bedroom and unhooked the Sam Browne, letting it fall to the floor. Then, remembering how tidy Laura was, he pushed it with his foot into the corner by the closet and sat heavily in a padded, hot pink and white bedroom chair. He took his shoes off and sat for a minute wanting a cigarette but too tired to light one.