Backteria and Other Improbable Tales Read Online Free PDF Page B

there. I saw the bastid with my own eyes. Take my woid.
    The guy even unloads his club and takes a swat at the broad.
    Yeah! That’s right. Boy, what a kick. It was like a crappin’ movie.
    Get a cop, get a cop! the broads start yellin’, jumpin’, out o’ their pants. They’re all the same. Somethin’ happens and they go runnin’ for cops.
    Yeah, and some old character is standin’ in an ashcan and yellin’ — Police! Police! Help, police! Yeah! Ya shoulda seen the slob. You woulda died.
    So everybody is excited and the crowd’s breakin’ it up. But there’s more crowds pushin’ in, see? To see what’s goin’ on. So everybody’s shovin’ and pushin’, pushin’ and shovin’. Scene from a crappin’ movie.
    What? The guy with the club? Aah, he’s back against the window again. Sure. His eyes is rollin’ around like crazy. All the time he’s showin’ his teeth. It was a riot Mack, take it from me.
    So somebody
gets
a cop. No, wait a second. That ain’t all.
    This cop pushes through the crowd, see?
Big
son of a bitch. You know the kind. All right,
break
it up,
break
it up, he says. Same old crap all the time.
Break
it up.
    He comes up to the guy with the club.
    And who do you think
you
are, he says, Superman? He gives the guy a shove. Come on ya bum, he says, you’re under…
    And all of a sudden, boppo! The guy swings his club and whacks the bull over the nut.
Jeez did he slug him
! The cop goes down like a sack of potatoes. Blood comes out his ears.
    Everyone gives a yell. Dot grabs my hand and pulls me down towards Eight Avenue.
    But the guy isn’t chasin’ anybody. So I pulls away from Dot.
    Come on Mickey, she says, let’s go to the show. Is
she
scared. She’s goin’ in her…haah? Awright!
    So I says I ain’t missin’ this for nothin’. What a broad.
    You’d think a guy got a chance everyday to see a show like that.
    She keeps whinin’. You
told
me you was takin’ me to the Paramount, she says.
    Look baby, I says, Look, you’ll get to the Paramount, see? Just keep your pants on. Did I tell her right? What the hell. Ya can’t let ‘em walk on ya. Am I right or am I wrong?
    Haah? Oh yeah.
    Well I leave her down by the Automat down the street. I says I’ll be right back. I just wanna get a good look at the knocked out cop.
    So I go back. There isn’t many people around. They was all scared I guess. Jeez how that guy cracked that cop! I could still hear it, Mack.
    So the cop is out cold see? But there’s
another
cop comin’. He has his gun out. Sure, whattaya think. You think they take a chance? Hell no. Pull out their rods. What do they care they might hit innocent bystanders. Aah,
you
know cops.
    Stand back
everybody! yells the cop.
Stand back
! Jeez. All the time! They say the same things.
    So-o, I watch him move in on the guy with the club. He’s still standin’ by that store window. The caveman I’m talkin’ about. Pay attention will ya!
    So the cop says—
put down
that club if you value your life. Uh-huh. How do you like that?
    Well this character just
growls
. He don’t know what the hell the cop is talkin’ about. He starts to
scream
. Like a animal. Gets down in a crouch like Godoy used to, remember? Yeah.
    Does he drop the club? Are you kiddin’? He has it in his mitt so tight you couldn’t drag it out with ten horses. Yeah.
    And he’s kinda
bouncin’
on his feet too. Yeah. Like that ape in the movies, what the hell’s its name?
    Anyway, bouncin’ and puffin’. Yeah. Jeez, it was funny. Ooop, ooop, ooop, the guy is sayin’. You shoulda been there.
    So the cop holds up his gun, see?
    I’m
warnin’
ya, he says. You put down that club and come along peaceably or else.
    The guy growls.
    Then,
get this
, the store’s front door opens all of a sudden.
    Officer, officer! yells the guy. Don’t you shoot out my brand new window!
    Laugh! I t’ought I’d die.
    But the cop keeps comin’. Everybody’s quiet and watchin’. All the cars are stopped. Horns was