Skeletons in the lead danced the parade toward Washington Square, cavorting in head-to-toe black costumes with white bones painted on them. They looked like figures from a newswire picture of the Day of the Dead. One spun and offered his hand to a chubby lady on the sidewalk next to Taylor and Samantha. She joined in the dance at the exact same moment a child on the other side of them burst into tears. Friday night was always busy in the Village, yet this was something different—organized and chaotic at the same time.
The puppets followed. Towering, articulated things, they appeared to move of their own accord, floating over the street. A dragon in the Chinese style. A bigheaded man with a grin so wide it was threatening. Humpty Dumpty cracked in half and a yellow silk yolk whipped over the heads of the spectators on the sidewalk. Laughter and applause.
Farther back, music from a group that sounded more Dixieland than marching band set a cadence no one could really march to, but some were trying anyway. The sweet burning-hay perfume of pot tickled Taylor’s nose. He wondered what all this would look like if you were under the influence of a hallucinogen. It was crazy enough sober. Well, sort of sober. No other New York parade—St. Patrick’s, Columbus Day, Easter—came off like this one. Even with its lurching drunks, the St. Patrick’s Day parade seemed very much a part of New York City. Greenwich Village had come up with a march that was from some other world. Perfect for Halloween. Perfect for the Village.
At the door of a hole-in-the-wall bar, a waitress held a tray of beers.
Taylor pointed. “How much for two?”
“Just say trick or treat.”
He did and she handed two over.
Across the street leaning against a light pole was a uniformed cop. He was tall with arms that looked too long. The cop’s eyes caught Taylor’s through the marchers then slid over to Samantha. His I-don’t-give-a-shit mask turned to one of startled anger. He left the pole and walked along parallel to them as Taylor and Samantha continued toward the rear of the parade. Taylor wanted to see as much as he could, as fast as he could.
He nudged Samantha with his elbow. “You know the one across the street?”
“Saw him. Carmichael. A bastard. He hit on me when I first got to the Oh-Nine. As he explained so romantically, ‘If we got to have you here, we ought to get something out of it.’ Like the rest, blames me for what happened.”
Carmichael reached the next uniformed cop and they both walked together, becoming their only little police parade. The second had an ugly face and was giving Samantha an uglier look. Taylor stopped to let some marchers pass, jotting down descriptions of the costumes. When he looked across the street again, the two officers were gone. This made Taylor more nervous. With the stares they were giving Samantha, he’d rather know where they were.
As it grew darker, streetlights, neon beer logos and store signs lit the parade, which moved like no other. Instead of marching in even files, groups of people jumped and swirled. Paraders continued to beckon costumed trick-or-treaters to join in.
A giant elongated head with a pointed nose and red pyramid of pimples stooped down toward Taylor. A red tongue slowly emerged and ran rough papier-mâché up Taylor’s cheek.
Two college-aged women and a man on the sidewalk laughed hard at this. Samantha joined in.
“I think you made a friend.”
“Yeah, it’s a friendly parade. Let’s go back to the square.”
He found a woman with a megaphone by the stage in Washington Square making loud, garbled announcements no one could understand.
“You with the organizers?”
“A volunteer.”
“How’d all this come about?”
“Do you know Ralph Lee?”
“No.”
“Well you should.” A snobby Greenwich Village look of disappointment. “He wanted to create a mile-long theater of the street for Halloween. As you see, performers, giant puppets, and music. Last year was the first. He’s an incredible puppeteer in his own right. He put a hundred puppets and masks from other productions into this parade. People are supposed to join in.”
As the parade flowed into the square, more revelers had indeed joined in, such that you couldn’t tell the official marchers—if official was the right word—from the people who didn’t know they were going to be in a parade until half an hour earlier.
Samantha had stood a few paces back while Taylor talked to the megaphone lady. He rejoined her as she was finishing her beer and dropping the cup in a garbage can. “Interview for the story?”
Taylor nodded.
“So reporters don’t just make it all up.”
“Many of us actually ask questions. We’re not allowed to beat the answers out of people either.”
She hit him in the arm, but smiled. “Not much you could get out of me. I told you everything.”
The triumphal arch of Washington Square, looking like something dropped there from a European capital, towered over the stage. Several uniformed patrolmen were at the perimeters of the square. None were the pair they’d seen, and this detail nagged at Taylor.
The vaudeville show that concluded the parade was as ragtag as they came. One comedian, in the heart of hip and groovy Greenwich Village, was determined to do a routine that must have played back in the days of actual vaudeville. A lot of groans. A ukulele duo was followed by a decent magician—baffling card tricks—who was followed by a tumbling, juggling trio.
As the performance went on, Samantha and Taylor drifted farther from the stage and the crowd. His buzz was gone. He could use a bar and more of those little beers. Would Samantha be interested? Her face was thoughtful. She’d been this way most of the time they’d been in the Square, except to groan along with everyone else at the comedian’s string of jokes about his wife’s girth.
She turned to find him looking at her. “You did tell me a lot. You said you would. I don’t know what to do about it.”
They were now several yards from the back of the crowd under trees partly blocking the streetlights. A breeze flipped the leaves and moonlight flashed on their reds and golds for an instant.
Three Halloween revelers came from the even darker corner of the park behind Taylor and Samantha, having emerged it seemed from the gloom. They wore street clothes and masks—Frankenstein’s monster, Dracula, and the Wolfman—the great horror-movie triumvirate of Taylor’s youth. The masks were store-bought plastic, oddly old fashioned after all the artistic stuff this evening. They made him smile.
“Enjoying the parade?” Taylor reached for this notebook to get a couple quotes from the group.
Dracula brought a Billy club from behind his back. He slapped the stick into his palm in that cop way. A meaty sound. “We need to talk to the little lady here.”
“Those sticks look pretty regulation. Got regulation badges?”
“Shut up, shithead.” With both hands on the stick, Dracula shoved Taylor hard in the chest back toward the dark corner of the park. He almost fell on his ass, except Samantha grabbed his arm and steadied him.
“That’s really nice. She’s taking care of him. Didn’t take care of your partner. Talking to the press. How many ways can you turn traitor?”
Samantha didn’t answer. Instead, she reached behind. The nightstick was faster, swinging onto her forearm with a crack. Her off-duty gun clattered as it fell, and Dracula kicked it down the walkway into the gloom. Grabbing her arm, Samantha clenched her jaw like she was trying not to make any sound at all. Still, a quiet groan escaped.
The men backed Taylor and Samantha farther and farther into the dark. Three bad guys who it was a fair chance were dirty cops, Samantha disarmed, and his gun a long way down at his ankle. Why even consider it? Terrible odds. He needed to negotiate their way out of this.
He held up his hands. “All right, enough with the stick. What do you want?”
Negotiation apparently wasn’t on the agenda.
Dracula hit him hard on his right side, and the air rushed out of his lungs. He sunk to his side, his ribs howling in pain, and rolled onto his back. That’s what you were supposed to do when you got the wind knocked out of you. Even if it felt like you were never going to inhale again. Like right now.
Breathe. C’mon breathe.
Samantha stepped toward Dracula. “You bastard—”
“Shut up. If we wanted to take you out, we’d have done that already. Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to stop talking about this made-up radio call—”
“Didn’t make up the fucking call.”
Dracula’s stick cracked on the side of her left thigh. Samantha cried out and dropped to her knees. “Goddamn you.” The words hissed through clenched teeth. With great effort, she stood back up, putting her weight on her good leg.
“See, that’s your problem. You don’t listen. That’s the problem with all of you. You come on the job thinking you know how it’s done. Like you can do the job.”
“What I don’t know how to do is lie. Why was Dodd set up to die alone? What’s going on?”
Dracula brought the nightstick up for a backhand to the head, and Wolfman spoke. “You knock her out, how’s she going to hear how it’s gotta go?”
Dracula slowly lowered the club. “You’re going to admit you left your partner on his own to take on the mugger. You’re going to take whatever punishment comes your way. Do you understand?”
Samantha stood silent, leaning on her right leg, her face set. Taylor, breathing again, slowly sat up. His ribs burned every time he took in one of those breaths. Dracula pointed the nightstick at him as a warning to stay where he was.
Frankenstein’s monster stepped over to Samantha and pressed against her, the plastic mask up against her face. “How about we take a little taste of police lady?” His voice had a slurpy lisp. She tried to back away. He grabbed her belt with his left hand and rubbed the end of his nightstick roughly under her chin. “We deserve a little something for this shitty detail.”
“You know, you really do.” Samantha’s voice was sexy. “How about this?”
She slammed her knee into his crotch once, twice, the second time even harder, wincing herself at using the leg that had been hit.
She doesn’t give up. Ever.
As the man bent over, her knee came up again, crashing into the Halloween mask. The cracking noise wasn’t just plastic. Frankenstein’s monster fell with a hoarse cry. Dracula’s nightstick swung at her head, and Samantha just ducked. The movement put her weight on her hurt leg. She lost her balance and went over. Dracula and Wolfman crowded in on her, sticks raised.
They’re not watching me. Ignore the odds. Samantha did.
He pulled the pistol from the ankle holster and climbed to his feet, his ribs complaining all the way up.
“That’ll be enough.” They turned to see the gun. They’ll have backups too. “No moves, fast or slow.”
He stepped to Samantha’s gun in the dirt, picked it up and stuffed it in his jacket pocket.
“Get away from her.” They hesitated. He flicked with the gun. “Get the fuck away from her.”
Dracula and Wolfman moved. Frankenstein’s monster couldn’t. He was still moaning on the ground, blood leaking from his mask’s nose holes.
In two steps, he was in front of Samantha and out of striking distance of the men. The gun was shaking in his hand.
Dracula laughed. “You’re out of your league, bub. She knows what she needs to do. We’re not the only accident waiting to happen.”
Samantha reached the hand of her good arm to him. Taylor gently helped her up while keeping the gun trained on the men. She held the injured arm to her stomach.
“Let me have my gun.” Samantha spoke slowly through the pain.
Taylor handed her the .38. Limping, she stepped over to Dracula. With the gun in her left hand and held at arm’s length, she put the barrel in the eyehole of his mask.
“Maybe I settle this here. Maybe I spread blood all over the inside of that mask.”
Taylor kept his gun trained on Wolfman, who squeezed his nightstick. Wolfman was within reach. He could easily swing at Samantha. Taylor didn’t want to have to shoot.
“Let’s just get out of here.” He backed down the path. “C’mon, Samantha.”
She followed slowly. When they came out into the light, they put the guns away and walked faster. The crowd was breaking up after the show, costumed revelers moving in every direction.
He eyed her injured arm. “The way you walloped that one guy, they’re going to come after us.”
“We don’t even know how many of them there are. But I’ll make it.”
They trotted toward the southwest corner of the park. Adrenaline eased the pain in his ribs. For now. Samantha grimaced the whole way.