Sally Wheelan looked over the list of tissue sections which the hospital director had just handed her. The director had called a special meeting in his office, primarily for her benefit, just to go over the list. Only Wheelan, the director and the corporate attorney were present.
As Wheelan flipped through the pages of the list, she saw nothing that seemed to be of any great importance. It was a nearly complete inventory of the expendable components of the human body. Three gallbladders; two pairs of tonsils; a couple of moles. She allowed herself a slight smile when she came to the entries for the ingrown toenail clipping and the thrombosed hemorrhoid. She wondered at the measure of the Mayor's disappointment when he saw the slim pickings of his harvest.
Still, she was worried. The first batch of tissues might contain nothing that could be used for any untoward purpose, but it did establish a precedent. Once that first set of vials was turned over to the medical examiner's office, Wheelan knew, it would become all the more difficult to block the confiscation of future tissues.
"Has the court made any ruling on our motion to block this?" the director asked the attorney.
"No, not yet," the attorney replied. "I've tried to get it moved up on the docket, but the judge is not sympathetic to our position. It's going to be another two weeks before we can get a hearing, and even then I don't have a good feeling about it. If the judge thought we had a compelling argument he would have moved it up. I'm afraid I can't offer much in the way of optimism right now."
The director nodded solemnly and then looked at Wheelan. "Okay, Sally, I think we are out of options for the moment," he said. "We've got to turn this first batch over. The M.E.'s office called me yesterday and said that they would have a van over here at nine o'clock this morning. I wish there was more we could do, but unfortunately there isn't. I'm sorry."
Wheelan looked glumly at the list.
"Hey, look on the bright side," the director said, trying to cheer her up. "We're going to get back at these guys. I made sure nobody washed the toenail or that other thing before sealing them in their vials."
* * *
Allison and Carl chatted amicably as they walked up and down the sidewalk in front of the Heritage County Medical Clinic. It was a few minutes before nine o'clock, and fewer than half of their normal number had yet arrived. The group tried to maintain a presence in front of the clinic whenever the opposing group was there, which generally meant from eight o'clock in the morning until four or five in the afternoon. Allison and Carl were usually the first to arrive—Allison because she worked nights and so was already up at that hour, and Carl simply because he was assiduously prompt. The others tended to drift in intermittently over the course of the morning.
The group normally walked in alternating shifts for fifteen minutes each. One half of the group would walk while the other half rested, then the two squads would switch places. This tactic allowed them to march for hours on end without tiring. At mid-day an entire shift change would occur. The afternoon marchers would arrive between noon and one o'clock, and the morning crew would go off to their jobs or to attend to their other business. They liked to have at least twelve to fifteen people present whenever they assembled in front of the clinic so that their membership did not appear weak. Many in their group, however, were less than punctual, especially in the mornings, and so the first hour of the day was often sparsely populated.
Such was the case this morning as Allison and Carl walked with four others at a leisurely pace. The demonstrators on the opposite end of the block were equally slow in building up to their normal complement of marchers, so Allison did not feel so badly about her group's slow arrival.
It had been several days since Judy had told the group about the Mayor's intention to collect tissues from the medical center. Allison, Rachel and Carl had worked together to formulate a plan for their response, and they were all pleased with the result. It was a measured and disciplined response, Allison thought, less aggressive than some in the group had wanted, but one which would be enormously effective nevertheless. She smiled to herself when she considered the elegance and simplicity of the plan, and she gave Carl and herself most of the credit for having devised it. If things played out the way she envisioned they would, the Mayor would be sorry he ever even thought about collecting anything from this clinic.
Allison liked Carl. Along with Rachel, Carl was the only member of their organization that she really respected. The others, in her opinion, were a decidedly rag-tag collection of misfits, malcontents and half-hearted progressives who joined the organization for a variety of flimsy reasons. Some were sixties throwbacks who had joined simply because they loved protest for protest's sake. Others were atheists or agnostics who joined out of a fuzzy notion that all ideas posited by any church on any social or political matters must be opposed. Still others joined only because some other member of the group had cajoled them into doing so. Only a few, like Carl and Rachel and Allison herself, leant any sense of vision to the organization. The three of them formed the core of the group, as Allison saw it. They set the group's goals, planned the group's strategy for achieving those goals, and generally handled most of the organizational work required to manage the others and keep them focused. They even gave the group its name: Freedom For Women. If it were not for the three of them there would be no group, Allison told herself, and therefore no organized opposition to the Mayor and his group of lackeys at the other end of the block.
Allison could see that Carl had some smarts. He was exceedingly intelligent, even brilliant at times, but in an academic sort of way. He had studied pre-med in college for two years before changing his major to architecture. His creative side, he explained, needed more room to express itself than the study of medicine allowed. He was easily the most well-read member of the group, and he had traveled extensively, studying firsthand the architecture of Greece and Rome and much of the rest of Europe. And he had a head for numbers as well, which made him a natural choice for treasurer of the organization, notwithstanding the fact that their funds were always meager. He described the job as one in which his primary function was to tell the others what they couldn't do for want of money.
Above all, Allison liked Carl because he fit very nicely into her longer-term plans for the organization. He contributed his time and effort towards their goals without showing the slightest desire to wield influence over the others. In meetings and group discussions he would state his opinion and explain his preference, if indeed he held one, on each particular issue, but then he would sit back and leave the final decisions to the others. Often he agreed with Allison's point of view, and she came to think of him as a reliable ally in most situations. Allison had goals for the organization and she didn't need any control freaks standing in her way. She needed a trusted, competent lieutenant or two to make things work, and she believed Carl was a good candidate. For several weeks now she had been confiding things to Carl as a way of gaining his support for her initiatives. With Carl backing her up, she felt that she could weed out the nonconformists in the group and start recruiting some better members. Eventually the organization would be composed entirely of those who recognized her as the leader, and from there they could start to make some real progress. Abortion was, after all, only one issue that needed to be addressed. The Mayor had managed to put the town decades behind the rest of the country on many social issues, and Allison saw the potential of her organization to become a primary force behind a new way of thinking in the city.
As she and Carl conversed, Allison noticed the police car which constantly watched over the demonstrators pull away from its normal parking spot at the curb on Division Avenue. She stopped walking and watched the car with curiosity as it rolled up to the end of the street directly in front of the clinic. The car made a right turn onto Main Street, then made a left onto North First and pulled into the circular driveway in front of the main entrance to the hospital.
The car's movement seemed peculiar to Allison, since the only times she had ever seen the car move from its regular location were on those occasions when an altercation broke out between the two groups of demonstrators, or on shift changes when one officer would be replaced by another. At all other times the police car was as immobile as the telephone poles and the fire hydrants.
She watched the officer park the car near the entrance to the hospital and say something into his radio handset. Then he stepped out of the car and placed his hat on his head, looking all the while directly toward the sidewalk, where two sets of puzzled demonstrators looked back at him.
At that moment Judy came hurriedly up the sidewalk from the visitor's parking lot on the west side of the building. She moved as quickly as her heavy frame would allow, advancing at a pace somewhere between a fast walk and a slow run.
"They're comin' for 'em!" she called out breathlessly. "I just heard from Lizzy. She says they're comin' for 'em this mornin' at nine o'clock. She heard it from the director himself a few minutes ago."
Suddenly it dawned on Allison. The police car's movement now made perfect sense. She looked at her watch—it was exactly nine. She turned to Carl to quickly review the plans which they had made for handling this event.
"Do we have enough people here to do this?" she asked.
"I wish we had a few more," replied Carl, "but I guess this many will have to do. Damn. Why can't people show up on time when you tell them to?"
Allison hastily counted heads. "Okay," she said to Carl, "we've got seven all together now that Judy's here. I'll take the others over to the entrance with me. You stay here and call everyone else on your cell phone. Tell them to get down here immediately, and tell them why. Then come over and join us. We'll do the best we can until the others arrive."
With that, Allison rounded up the other members of her group and led them over to the hospital entrance at a jog. As they crossed the courtyard, she saw a white van round the corner of Main onto North First and head toward the driveway. Emblazoned on the door of the van was the insignia of the Heritage County Medical Examiner's office.
"Hurry up, guys," Allison said to her group. "We don't have any time to spare."
The opposing set of demonstrators were caught in a state of confusion, intrigued as well by the movement of the police car, and then alarmed by the corresponding movement of their adversaries, but as yet not perceiving the reason for the commotion. The determined reaction of their opponents, however, like a sudden stampede of game in the sights of a predator, spurred them to action. They dropped their signs and placards on the ground and hurried over to the main entrance of the building.
Allison thought through the plan of action again. It was a more aggressive plan than she had originally wanted to undertake, but at least she had been able to talk the others out of their more militant ideas. It had taken a great deal of effort to convince Judy and a few of the others that using force in this type of situation was a losing gambit. Billy's pugnaciousness had gotten them all fired up for battle, and even Rachel had briefly expressed a desire to forcefully oppose her father's actions. But they were not as cunning as Allison was, and their patience was not as strong. It had taken all of her diplomatic skills to get them to think more rationally. After much persuasion she had gotten them to accept a nonviolent response, but in the process she was forced to give in to their demands for a confrontation of some kind. She could not convince them to do nothing. The final plan, hashed out by Carl and herself, was a compromise that all except Billy could accept.
For that reason, she thought, the timing of the medical examiner's arrival was not altogether unfortunate. At least Billy, assigned to the afternoon shift, wasn't around at the moment to cause trouble. She would have to deal with him in due course; the organization was not big enough for the both of them. If her strategy worked in this confrontation, she might be able to strengthen her leadership role within the group and force Billy out. He did not have many friends among the other members. They found him persuasive only to the extent that his knee-jerk reactions appealed to their baser instincts to lash back at an opponent. With him out of the way, she would have much less difficulty controlling the group.
Allison and her compatriots came up to the building. They immediately arranged themselves in a row between the medical examiner's van and the sliding glass doors of the hospital, standing shoulder to shoulder between the outermost pillars of the portico which covered the entranceway. One member of the group stood a few feet away from the others. He raised a video camera to eye level and began filming the scene. With only five people in their line they could not span the entire width of the portico from one pillar to the other, so they centered themselves in the middle of the entranceway, leaving narrow gaps on both ends.
Two men stepped hesitantly out of the medical examiner's van. They both appeared to be in their mid-to-late-twenties. They wore clean white shirts and professional-looking ties, and they sported short, conservative haircuts. Together they presented an entirely non-confrontational appearance—just a couple of laboratory workers trying to do their jobs.
The men observed the group of demonstrators standing in the entranceway, but they did not approach. One of the men took a pen from the breast pocket of his shirt and began writing into a notebook. The other man stood with his hands in his pockets and looked toward the police officer, who stood next to his squad car and glowered at Allison and her fellow demonstrators.
The opposing set of demonstrators arrived at the scene. "What's going on here?" demanded one of them, a short, burly man of about fifty with a bushy gray mustache.
"None of your business," snarled Officer Caldwell. "So just stay off the driveway and don't give me any trouble."
The newly arrived group gathered on the edge of the driveway and scowled at the group in the entranceway. "They're up to something," said the mustached man, pointing his finger accusingly at the other group, "and we want to know what it is." He looked at the two men from the van. "And who are those guys?"
Caldwell stepped away from his car and approached the second group. He drew his nightstick from his belt and stood directly in front of the mustached man. "I told you to get back off the driveway," he said, leveling his nightstick menacingly at the man. "Now do as I say or I'll start arresting people, and I'd be happy to start with you."
"All right," replied the mustached man, deferring to the officer's authority. "We'll step back, but we're not going anywhere until we find out what's happening here." The man turned and herded his group backward. They shuffled reluctantly back a few feet until they were just off the blacktop.
Caldwell turned and approached the group in the entranceway. He walked up to Allison, who stood in the center of the line formed by her group.
"Okay, sister," Caldwell said impatiently. "Are you in charge of this little party?"
"Yes, I'm in charge, officer," said Allison, "but this is not a party. We are here to exercise our rights. We object to the seizure of anything from this hospital by the city government. This is a public facility. It belongs to the people, not to the government. The Mayor's office has no right to confiscate tissues or anything else from this place. It's covered under both state and federal law. Here, you can read it for yourself." Allison held a piece of paper out in Caldwell's direction.
Caldwell glanced at the paper in Allison's hand without making any move to accept it. The paper contained several paragraphs of printed text, each paragraph having at least one sentence underlined or highlighted in yellow. Across the top of the page were printed the words "INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS" in large, bold type. Caldwell looked back at Allison.
"Obviously you don't recognize my uniform," he said. "I'm a cop, not a judge. I'm not here to interpret the law for you or anyone else; I'm just here to keep the peace and to make sure that these men can do their job. If you have some objection to that, you can take it to court; that's what it's there for. Now step aside and let these men through."
None of the group in the entranceway moved. The member with the video camera circled around behind the officer to get the entire scene into view.
"All right," said Caldwell, tapping his nightstick firmly into his open palm. "If you want to play your games, that's fine. You just stand right where you are. I'm going to escort these two gentlemen around your little wall here and through those doors. And the first one of you that moves one inch to block us is going to get a ride across town in the back of my car."
"This is a peaceful protest, officer," said Allison. "We will not use violence as a weapon. I must let you know, however, that your actions are being videotaped, and we plan to use that tape for whatever purposes we deem appropriate to defend our rights."
"Yeah," Caldwell said, unimpressed. "I have eyes. I can see the video camera. You can tape whatever you like, just don't get in our way."
Caldwell turned toward the two men from the van and motioned them forward. He walked around one end of the wall of demonstrators and watched as the two men followed behind him. The demonstrators stood in place and let them pass. The sliding glass doors of the building opened automatically at their approach. Caldwell accompanied them into the building and stood inside the doorway as the doors slid closed behind them.
The two sets of demonstrators remained outside and glared at each other suspiciously. They were now in much closer proximity than they normally were when they occupied their assigned places on the sidewalk. Out there they were always safely out of earshot from each other, and over the past few weeks they had grown accustomed to marching only within those clearly defined boundaries and raising their voices and shouting at each other when they wanted to be heard. Now the two groups felt uncomfortably close to one another, their established territories temporarily abolished. Each group huddled together amongst themselves and spoke in hushed whispers, trying to keep their conversations private, afraid that the other side might overhear their words.
A car pulled up to the curb and parked hastily at a crooked angle. Rachel and Jennifer jumped out of the car and ran up the driveway to the entranceway. Carl came running up from the sidewalk and arrived at the same time.
"I called everyone," he said. "I couldn't get through to some of them, but I reached ten or twelve people. They should all be here in a few minutes."
"What's happened so far?" asked Rachel.
"The first part went exactly as we planned," said Allison, "except we didn't have as many people here as we had hoped. We didn't have much warning. It shouldn't matter though; we got it all on tape. It should look good. Let's get into position for the next shot."
The group moved a few yards down the driveway to the spot where the van was parked. There they stopped, milling about the vehicle, waiting for the order to take their final positions. Every two or three minutes another car would pull up in front of the building and one or two more people would join their ranks. After ten minutes they had two dozen members present.
The other group of demonstrators grew increasingly agitated with the arrival of each new member of the opposing group. It was obvious that their opponents were better informed as to the events that were unfolding in front of them, events that remained very much a mystery to them. Their opponents were also clearly prepared in their response. They had planned and perhaps even rehearsed every move that they were making. The video camera, the flyer which the one woman had shown to the police officer, the way they had all assumed their positions in the entranceway and around the van without confusion or hesitation, the unheard call to arms which brought more of them to the scene every few minutes—all of these things gave to the other group the impression that they were being outmaneuvered and outfoxed.
Disorientation led to frustration, and then to anger. A wave of unrest began moving through their ranks. Several members stepped forward in the direction of Allison's group, shouting threats and insults. Unlike countless other confrontations in which the two groups had engaged in weeks past, however, not a single angry word was shouted back in response. Allison and her group maintained a stone-faced silence, some looking back at the other group dispassionately while the rest simply walked about, indifferent to their taunts. The video camera continued to record the entire scene.
Allison smiled inwardly. She had coached her team well, and the resulting contrast between the two groups would play wonderfully on film: the aggressive, belligerent rabble-rousers versus the well-behaved, peace-loving civilians. She saw no way that the Mayor could make use of this event for his political advantage. To the contrary, she began to feel that the video recording of these happenings might be the beginning of a public relations coup for the Freedom For Women organization. She knew people who would be very interested in seeing it—influential people; people who knew how to market propaganda. And if the video attracted widespread attention, she would receive most of credit within the organization for having produced it. That part of the plan, after all, had been her idea—a brilliantly conceived tactic to rebut the crudely aggressive instincts of the others. Nobody looked good when they were caught angry on film, she had told them, and nobody agreed with you if you were.
The sliding glass doors of the hospital opened again, and the two men from the van reappeared with the police officer at their side. Each of the men carried a black case in one hand. They hesitated for a moment when they saw Allison and her group standing near the van. The officer again drew his nightstick from his belt and approached the group. Before he could utter a word commanding them to disperse, however, Allison turned to her comrades and gave them the signal. "Now!" she said.
Instantly they split into two subgroups. Allison, Rachel, Judy and nine other members moved to the front of the van, while Carl, Jennifer and the rest of the group went to the rear. All except Allison and the cameraman laid themselves flat on the ground in rows, blocking the van's path to move in either direction.
Caldwell drew in a deep breath of air through his mouth, his chest expanding to its maximum volume, then he let it escape in a rush through his nostrils.
"All right," he said angrily, looking straight at Allison, "I'm through playing games with you. You and your crew are going to move out of the way—now—or I start making arrests. And I promise you, sister, you will be the first one to go."
Allison looked back at Caldwell placidly. She could see the video camera out of the corner of her eye capturing the encounter.
"You can arrest as many of us as you like, officer," she said with exaggerated volume. "We will not be intimidated. What is occurring here today is a violation of the privacy rights of every citizen of this city, and we will not sit idly by and allow it to happen unopposed."
"Whatever you say, honey," replied Caldwell. "You're under arrest."
Caldwell stepped forward and grabbed Allison by the wrists. She offered no resistance as he pulled a pair of handcuffs from his belt and clicked them closed behind her back. The officer then looked at the men from the van.
"Go on and get in your van, guys," he said. "I need to call for some other units to drive all our friends here across town. It shouldn't take more than a few minutes to get them rounded up."
The two men climbed into the van and waited. Caldwell put Allison into the back of his car and then called the dispatcher on his radio to request assistance. He walked to the back of his car and opened the trunk, from which he pulled a handful of white plastic ties. He then walked to the front of the van and smiled down spitefully at Rachel.
"Get up, honey. You're under arrest."
Rachel did not move.
Caldwell reached down and grabbed Rachel by a shoulder and by one leg. He rolled her over forcefully onto her front side and drew her hands together behind her back, then he wrapped a plastic tie around her wrists and drew it closed. He did not attempt to move her any further just then, since he knew from experience that she would not stand up voluntarily.
"You know, these ties come in real handy sometimes," Caldwell said to Rachel with a smirk. "I got these at the hardware store the other day. Best thing I've picked up there in a long time."
Rachel heard Caldwell chuckling to himself as he moved on to the next member of the group. She wanted to scream out a string of invective insults at him, but she remembered the purpose of their demonstration, and she held her tongue. She found compensation in the thought that the entire episode was being recorded on video, and that one day soon this despicable cop's swaggering attitude would be used against him. He would then look to the whole world exactly like the chauvinist swine that she knew him to be.
Caldwell went about the business of placing the other members of the group under arrest one by one. The opposing set of demonstrators cheered loudly as the officer methodically rolled each person over and secured their hands behind their backs. In a few minutes all of the people on the ground around the van had been restrained.
Two more patrol cars and a police wagon arrived on the scene, and the three newly arrived officers assisted Caldwell in transferring the arrestees into the vehicles. The demonstrators made no attempt to resist their transfer, but neither did they assist in the process by standing up or walking voluntarily. As a result, each person had to be lifted bodily and carried to a vehicle by the four officers—one lifting from under each arm and the other two from the legs. The officers worked efficiently as a team, and they soon had all of the demonstrators moved into the vehicles with the exception of Judy.
Caldwell and the other officers stood in front of the medical examiner's van and surveyed the great bulk of the woman who lay on the ground before them. The muscles in their arms and shoulders were already spent from the strain of hauling the other arrestees, so they rested their hands on their hips and paused to catch their breath. They looked at each other and grimaced at the thought of lifting the obese woman and carrying her to the back of the police wagon, even though it was only a few feet away.
Caldwell bent down and looked Judy in the eye. "I don't suppose," he said to her, "that you would care to save yourself the embarrassment of having everyone around here watch four able-bodied police officers grunting and groaning to lift you into that wagon, now would you?"
Judy stared back at Caldwell with a hard look and did not speak a word.
No, of course not, Caldwell thought to himself with disgust. You can't shame these people into doing anything. If they cared at all about how they looked to others they wouldn't be lying on the ground in the first place. Hell, if this one cared about how she looked she would go on a goddamn diet.
The four officers reluctantly positioned themselves around Judy's body and strategically grabbed hold at whatever places seemed to provide the greatest leverage. Caldwell counted to three aloud and the men lifted simultaneously, raising Judy off the pavement with a collective grunt. They struggled for a moment to get their equilibrium, then proceeded to shuffle their feet slowly toward the police wagon.
The driver of the van started the engine and waited for the officers in front of him to move out of his path. He had seen enough protesting for one day, thank you very much, and he was anxious to leave the whole unruly scene behind him and get back to his desk.
As the driver put the van into gear, his ears were deafened by a loud bang. The windshield in front of him instantaneously cracked across its entire length, and the sound of shattering glass rattled the air. The four officers, startled by the sudden noise, lost their grip on Judy's limbs, and she fell back onto the asphalt driveway with a thud. Her head smacked against the blacktop and her shoulder was wrenched into a painful contortion. The driver lost control of the van and the vehicle jumped forward several feet. The front bumper struck one of the officers at the hips and sent him sprawling to the pavement. One of the van's front tires rolled over Judy's left leg below the knee, snapping her tibia with an audible crack, and she screamed in pain.
Caldwell stared dumbstruck at the front of the van. A dark, foamy liquid was splattered across the fractured windshield and ran down across the hood and the grill and dripped onto the ground. The shattered remnants of a beer bottle lay in a thousand tiny pieces at his feet and sparkled strangely in the sunshine. He whirled around quickly and scanned the surrounding area in all directions, looking for the source of the assault.
A second object came flying through the air and struck the hood of the van with a metallic clang. The rock bounced off the hood and landed unbroken on the asphalt next to Judy's head. Caldwell spotted a wiry young man dressed in a T-shirt and blue jeans standing on the lawn about thirty yards away in the direction from which the projectiles had come. The young man bent down, picked up another rock and hurled it with all his might at the van. Caldwell did not wait to see where the rock would strike. He took off running towards the assailant, and two of the other officers followed closely behind him, fanning out on both sides to keep the young man contained if he decided to try to make a flanking run around Caldwell.
To Caldwell's surprise, however, the young man made no attempt to run away. Nor did he simply stand his ground and wait for Caldwell to run up on him, perhaps then to duck aside and attempt to escape. Rather, he made an all out charge at full speed right back at Caldwell. When the two men had closed to within a few feet of each other, Billy jumped into the air and drop kicked at Caldwell with both feet. Caldwell managed to lean to one side at the last instant, and the bottoms of Billy's feet landed against the front of his left shoulder. Caldwell was spun halfway around from the force of the glancing blow. He lost his balance to his forward momentum and fell to the ground ungracefully on his rump.
Billy landed on the grass on his right side and skidded to a stop. He leaped back up to his feet and faced off against the other two police officers. One of them lunged forward and tried to grab Billy in a headlock, but Billy ducked under his arms and landed a hard punch to the officer's upper lip. The third officer grabbed Billy in a bear hug from behind and wrestled him roughly to the ground. The three officers then converged on top of him at once and held him down with their collective weight while Caldwell pulled his arms behind his back and another officer handcuffed him. Billy cursed and spat and shrieked at them with the fury of a rabid animal. He kicked at them spastically with his feet until one of the officers sat on his ankles.
One officer carelessly placed a hand near Billy's face and immediately wailed in pain as Billy sank his teeth into his flesh. Caldwell unbelted his nightstick for the third time that morning and began beating Billy viciously about the head. After seven or eight of his most powerful blows failed to force the young man to open his jaws, Caldwell put the nightstick across the front of Billy's throat, placed his knee against the back of his neck and pulled up on both ends of the nightstick with all of his remaining strength, compressing Billy's trachea well past the point where he could breathe. Given the amount of pressure that he was applying to the young man's throat, Caldwell would not have been at all surprised to feel his windpipe crack, but that thought did not cause him to withhold the slightest bit of power from his effort. He was not concerned in the least with Billy's well being at that moment. The more he heard his fellow officer screaming in agony from the pain of Billy's bite, the harder he pulled on his nightstick. Police brutality, my ass, Caldwell thought. I'll break this cocksucker's neck if I have to.
After several more interminable seconds, Billy finally unclenched his teeth from the officer's hand and fought against the nightstick at his throat to catch a breath of air. The officer withdrew his hand quickly from Billy's mouth and held it up to inspect the damage. The skin was torn away across almost half of his hand, and an angry swath of red inner flesh was exposed. Blood flowed steadily from the open wound, and the officer looked down and saw more of his own blood smeared across Billy's lips and teeth.
Caldwell's adrenaline surged through his veins as he continued to pull up mightily on his nightstick. Billy gagged and twisted his head back and forth like a wild animal caught in a noose. After several more seconds, during which Caldwell did not relax his vice-like grip across the young man's throat, the officer sitting on Billy's ankles reached out and put a hand on Caldwell's shoulder.
"Okay, Scott, relax," he said. "The kid let go."
Caldwell gave no indication that he had heard anything. His emotions were such that his body behaved according to its own rules, which were indistinguishable in many ways from those of the younger man he struggled to control. His teeth were clenched tightly in his jaws and he held his breath like a prisoner in his chest, not daring to resuscitate his lungs for fear that doing so might cause him to lose for that brief instant the strength which he needed to subdue his foe.
Finally the officer who had been bitten reached out with his good hand and grabbed Caldwell by the arm.
"Come on, Scott, let go," he commanded. "The fight's over now. Take it easy."
Caldwell looked at the injured officer and, gradually, as reality came back to him, relaxed his pull. He allowed himself a long overdue breath as he released his grip on one end of the nightstick and withdrew it from the front of Billy's throat. For several seconds he remained seated on Billy's back, his exhausted body now flaccid and bowed, as he and his captive panted in unison. Finally he placed the stick flat across Billy's upper back and used it as a lever to push himself up onto his feet. For a few moments he stood wearily astride Billy's body, his hands on his hips, looking down at the squirming, manacled zealot. As he stepped away, the officer kicked Billy roughly in the back of the head with his boot.
Caldwell bent over, placed his hands on his knees and drew in several more recuperative breaths. He turned and saw Billy looking up at him, and the two men shared a look of scornful respect. Caldwell was amazed that the kid still had some fight left in him after the beating and the chokehold he had just administered. Most people would have given up easily after the first one or two whacks to the head, he thought. As much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, Caldwell could not help but be impressed by the kid's tenacity, regardless of his crazed behavior. He suspected that the young man might be under the influence of mescaline or PCP or some other hallucinogen. Either that, Caldwell thought, or the guy was certifiably insane.
Allison had watched in shocked disbelief from the back seat of Caldwell's patrol car as the entire drama had unfolded around her. "Goddamn him!" she said aloud, as her carefully scripted protest had disintegrated before her eyes. "He's ruining it! He's ruining everything!" she screamed. Her despair grew deeper with each passing moment as events deviated further and further from her charted course. Frustration and bitterness rang out in her words as she sat helplessly behind the locked doors of the police car, her arms still enchained securely behind her back as per her original plan, her hands no longer able to direct the cast of players that swarmed riotously around her, her voice unheard behind the tempered glass and steel of her chosen enclosure.
Sally Wheelan, as well, watched the scene from the window of her fourth floor office as the conflict played itself out on the grounds below. A shudder of foreboding, born of experience and of a sad, perceptive understanding of human nature, moved through her. She felt the odd sensation which comes over people on those occasions when they chance to observe their brethren not as fellow human beings, but as creatures to be studied in some surreal, ontological social experiment. As she watched the various factions tussle about against each other, she was perturbed and saddened by two thoughts which crossed her mind simultaneously. The first thought concerned the ironic, almost comic significance of a small section of clotted and swollen rectal tissue, which, having been snipped away from its host for the sin of growing in a decidedly unwelcome and unacceptably painful manner, was, at least for the time being, the single most tangible manifestation of the disagreement over which the opposing parties battled. If it were only for the true nature of the objects in play at that moment, Wheelan thought, and not for the symbolic significance of the things which they represented, she might be doubled over with laughter at the absurdity of it all. But her other thought stifled all hope of mirth. And that second thought concerned the unhappy portent of these events for a certain young girl, an innocent nonallegiant, whose stricken circumstances might very well lead her to be treated like so many other vessels of flesh of disputed import, caught up in the maelstrom of conflicting passions and prejudices which swept across the landscape below her doctor's worried eye.