We live in an age when pizza gets to your home before the police.
—Jeff Marder
Wispy clouds fled across the moon, leaving striated shadows on the brick courtyard. It hadn’t rained since this afternoon, but the air felt heavy and thick. I trotted across the square, which stretched endless and enormous in the filtered moonlight without the buzz of street performers and tourists. As I reached the opening of the alley that led past the Waterfront Playhouse and out to the street, I heard another firecracker. Then a muffled but high-pitched cry. And then a splash.
I spun around. Toby was not where I’d left her. My cell phone in my hand, heart pounding, I hurried back toward the edge of the pier where we’d talked. No sign of her, but there was someone splashing frantically in the water.
“Help!” a small voice cried.
I pressed 911. “Woman overboard at Mallory Square!” I yelled, and then stuffed the phone in my sweater pocket.
I ran up to the edge of the water. “Toby, is that you?”
“Help!” she cried again. “I can’t swim.” She swatted at the water, sank briefly, then burst to the surface again, sputtering. The harder she struggled, the more quickly the current pulled her away from the dock.
I glanced around, shouting for assistance. But no one appeared. And there was no lifesaving ring, nor even a long stick that I might have used to drag her to safety.
“Lorenzo! Tony!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, my hands cupped into a megaphone, first in the direction of the tarot table, then toward the spot where I’d noticed the gathering of homeless men. “The cops are coming—tell them we’re over here. My friend is in trouble!”
I couldn’t wait to see whether either of them heard me. So I shucked off my sandals, dropped my cell phone and pack on top of them, and my sweater on top of that. I had no idea how deep the water was or what obstacles might lurk underneath. But I took a deep breath and pushed off the pier into a shallow dive.
If my mouth hadn’t been full of salt water, I would have screamed out at the shock of cold. Not cold like the ocean in New Jersey in January, but still unpleasantly chilly. I surfaced, struggling to push away a disgusting, slimy hunk of seaweed, and dog-paddled in place, looking for Toby. Already the current was pulling me away from the pier.
Toby splashed frantically a few yards from me. I breaststroked over. She slapped at the water, gasping and choking, and grabbed onto my head.
I frog-kicked, trying to make a little space between us. She held on tighter, now with a death grip on my hair. Her weight pushed me under and I had to fight to get back to the surface and breathe.
“Toby,” I sputtered, my adrenaline surging, mouth full of salt water, “I’m trying to help. But you have to let go.”
“I can’t swim,” she shrieked, and floundered until she sank a second time, pulling me down with her. I bobbed to the surface, panicked at the idea of her fastened to me like a barnacle as the current swept us away. A fact from the lifeguarding class that I’d flunked flashed through my brain: To break the stranglehold of a panicked victim, drop down low into the water and then approach again from behind.
If I didn’t try something, we would both drown. So I kicked hard and shot lower into the water. Flailing madly to stay at the surface, Toby let go of my hair. Then I surged up on her far side. Slinging one arm across her chest, I started an awkward sidestroke toward the extension of the pier that hosted cruise ships during the city’s three-boat days. Toward the closest way out—a slippery-looking ladder attached to the concrete. She continued to flop and thrash like a hooked marlin as I kicked against the current. Finally, we reached the ladder; I grabbed her hand and wrapped it around the rusty metal. I was exhausted and breathless. And frightened and cold.
“You’re okay,” I said, shaking the water and some green glop out of my eyes. “The cops will be here soon.”
She reached for the bottom rung with her other hand, sucking in great gulps of air. Her hair, plastered to her scalp, was covered with an oily sheen—something cruise-ship related I was sure—and some strands of brown sea grass. And her eyes looked wild.
My friend Tony’s worried, whiskered face appeared thirty feet away, at the top of the ladder attached to the main pier. “Lorenzo’s gone to show the cops the way. See if you can swim over here and grab my hand. They’ve got the gates locked so I can’t get over to you.” He dropped his battered cowboy hat on the cement, wiggled prone, and reached out for us. But Toby wouldn’t let go of the rung she was gripping and I was afraid to leave her there alone. In fact I was afraid to try fighting the current again myself.
The welcome sound of a siren split the air. Once it bleated to a stop, we could see the lights of emergency vehicles flashing off the clouds. Then thin beams of flashlights pierced the darkness.
“Over here!” Tony shouted. “Over here!”
When he’d gotten the attention of the officers, he melted away into the shadows. He’d taken a forced march to the police department last week on charges of disturbing the peace—he would not be eager to be seen by the cops, however positive the circumstances this time.
After what felt like an hour, two policemen approached the edge of the pier, with Lorenzo in his white shirt, black tie, and black vest decorated with the moon and stars right behind them. All three struggled over the fence and then ran across the dock to our ladder. The smaller cop, a wiry guy with thinning blond hair, descended the ladder until he was wet to his knees.
“Take her first,” I said, flutter-kicking out of the way and tipping my chin at Toby.
The cop grasped her arm and pulled her up so she could get a foothold on the ladder’s lowest rung. Then she slipped her other foot on the ladder, too, this one still clad in a black leather sandal. The second policeman lay out flat on the concrete above us and reached for Toby’s hand.
“Ma’am,” said the first cop. “You’re going to have to let go.”
“You’ll be okay,” said Lorenzo, who hovered above him. “They’ve got you. You’re safe.” He squeezed his face between his hands and shook his head at me. “Good lord, woman, what were you thinking? I told you how strong the current is here.”
“I couldn’t let her die,” I muttered, trying not to picture what might have happened if we’d gotten swept away. My teeth had begun to chatter as I realized how close I’d come to drowning, trying to save a woman I barely knew.
Finally, Toby was hoisted out, then the cops helped me. I flopped onto the concrete, my chest still heaving from fright and exertion.
“What happened?” I asked her, once I had scrambled to my knees and then to standing. “How in the world did you end up in the water?”
Toby crouched in a shivering heap, breathing hard, her eyes closed. Lorenzo took off his vest and wrapped it around her shoulders. She nodded her thanks. A town employee arrived to unlock the gate and we staggered over to the main pier.
Once I reached my pile of belongings, I wiped my face with my sweater, then pulled it on and slipped my feet into my sandals.
“Get a couple of blankets from the cruiser,” said the wet cop to the dry one. Then he addressed Toby, repeating my question. “What happened here?”
But Toby was shaking too hard to speak.
“I was working across the square,” Lorenzo offered, pointing to his table where the lanterns still flickered, carving out geodes of light in the darkness. “Unfortunately, I didn’t see exactly how it happened. I heard a splash and then my friend Hayley yelled for help. And then there was another splash.”
The cop looked at me. “And you are?”
“I’m Hayley Snow. This is Toby Davidson. We’d just walked over from the Westin,” I said, “working off a few calories after the Mallory Square Stroll tasting event. As if walking a couple of blocks could make up for all that fried stuff.” I smiled but got no reaction. “And then I left to meet up with some friends. I was halfway across the plaza when I heard a noise, like something hit the water.” I gestured at Toby. “I was afraid she’d gone over because I didn’t see her anywhere. Sure enough, she had.”
The dry policeman returned with a shiny silver space blanket and wrapped it around Toby, over the top of Lorenzo’s vest. “Why did you jump, miss?” he asked gently.
“I didn’t plan on j-j-jumping,” she stuttered. “A shot went off and I swear a bullet went right over my head.”
One cop’s eyes flickered up to meet his partner’s gaze. They didn’t believe her.
“I heard the cracking noises, too,” I said.
“There was no place to hide—I was an easy target,” Toby explained. “I was afraid for my life. I threw myself down to the ground but I misjudged how close I was to the water.”
Another look exchanged between the cops. “Are you injured?” asked the dry man.
“No,” Toby said, running her hands down her arms as if to check for wounds. But she winced when she came across an ugly scrape that reached from the inside of her elbow to her palm. And then I noticed the blood oozing from a shallow gash on her temple. I touched my own face.
“You’re bleeding. Did you hit your head on something?”
Toby put her hand to her head and just stared at the blood that came away on her fingers.
The dry cop frowned, looking as though he still didn’t buy her story. “You said you heard a shot. Did you see a shooter?”
She shook her head.
“Was there a flash of light?”
“I don’t think so. I can’t remember.”
“Did you smell anything, like gunpowder? Or sulfur?”
She dropped her chin to her chest. “I only heard the noise.”
He stared at her a little harder, then turned his attention back to me.
“So you heard a shot, too?”
“I did hear a cracking noise—that must have been what got my attention in the first place.” Had it been a gunshot? My adrenaline had caromed off the charts as I tried to rescue her, shutting off my brain’s usual whirl of curious questions. I touched my ears with my hands and shrugged.
“There have been firecrackers going off most of the night. I ran over after I heard the splash. When I saw it was Toby in the water and there was no one else around to help, I dove in. Once we got close to the ladder, one of the homeless guys tried to help us out.”
“Where is he?”
I glanced around. Tony was gone.
“When we first got to the square, they were talking over there.” I pointed to the now-empty bench where the men had been drinking.
“We’ve had a number of noise-related complaints tonight, especially from the folks over at the Truman Annex and the Westin hotel,” said the cop. “We’ve tracked down two groups of kids who were shooting off illegal fireworks.” He paused and squinted at Toby, shivering, wide-eyed in a wet heap. “Would you say this popping sounded similar to a firecracker, or different?”
“Like a gunshot—I thought that’s what I heard.” She crossed her arms over her chest and frowned. “I know what fireworks sound like. This was different.”
While the cops went over Toby’s story again, I put in a quick call to Connie. “I’m not coming after all. It’s a long story but I’m soaking wet and absolutely freezing.” Now that the adrenaline had ebbed away, I could feel how chilled I was.
“Wet T-shirt contest?” she yelled over the background noise of the bar. “I didn’t think you had it in you.”
“Ha-ha, so funny,” I said. “One of the other TV show judges fell in the water off Mallory Square and I had to help her out.”
“You went in that water? Do you need a ride home?” she asked, suddenly all business and concern. “We can swing up and get your scooter tomorrow. Where are you?”
“Behind the Waterfront Playhouse,” I said, feeling suddenly relieved—the idea of a cold, wet scooter ride held zero appeal. “My former roommate is on the way over—she would be happy to give you a ride,” I told Toby once I’d hung up.
“We’re going to keep Ms. Davidson here until the paramedics can check her out,” said the cop in a firm voice. “Then we’ll take her home.”
“I’ll see you on the set tomorrow,” Toby told me, as if none of this had happened. “Eleven, right? And thank you for coming in after me. I can’t imagine what I would have done…” Her chin quivered and her lips trembled as her words trailed off.
The truth was, she probably would have been swept off to sea and drowned.
Four little judges, judging for TV. One swinging from the mast, and then there were three. Three little judges, tasting wine and roux. One couldn’t swim, and then there were two….