“Which one of you guys put in the alarm?” he asked.
“He did,” the sexton said, pointing at the giant.
The cop looked at the giant and decided to call the fire captain. “We got the man who put in the alarm, sir.”
The fire captain called back, “Ask him where the fire is?”
“Fire?” the giant said as though he didn’t know what it was.
“Fire!” the sexton echoed in outrage. “There isn’t any fire! That’s what I been trying to tell you.”
The two cops looked at one another. All these fire engines and no fire, they thought. Suddenly one was reminded of that song by Louis Armstrong, “All that meat and no potatoes.…”
But the fire captain purpled with rage. He moved toward the giant with balled fists.
“Did you put in the alarm?” he asked dangerously, his chin jutting forward.
The giant released his grip on the dwarf and said, “You tell him, Jake.”
The dwarf tried to run but one of the cops caught him by the neck of his coat collar.
“I saw him when he did it,” the sexton said.
The captain wheeled on him. “Why didn’t you stop him? Do you know what it costs the city to put all these engines into operation?”
“Hell, look at him,” the sexton replied. “Would you have stopped him?”
They all looked at him. They understood what the sexton meant. One of the cops flashed his light into the giant’s face to see him better. He saw the white face with the Negroid features and white hair. He had never seen an albino Negro. He was astonished.
“What the hell are you?” he asked.
“I’m his friend,” the giant said, pointing at the dwarf struggling in the other cop’s grip.
The captain’s eyes stretched. “By God, he’s a nigger!” he exclaimed.
“Well, kiss my foot!” the first cop said. “I thought there was something damn funny about him to be a white man.”
The dwarf took advantage of the distraction and broke from the other cop’s grip. He ran around the rear of the fire captain’s car and started across the street.
Brakes squealed and a fast-moving car slewed sidewise to keep from running him down.
Two big loose-jointed colored men wearing dark battered felt hats and wrinkled black alpaca suits emerged in unison from opposite sides of the front seat and hit the pavement in identical flat-footed lopes.
They came around the front of their little black sedan and converged on the running dwarf. Coffin Ed reached out a hand and caught hold of a thin, bony arm. It felt as though it might break off in his hand. He spun the hunchback around.
“It’s Jake,” Grave Digger said.
“Look at his face,” Coffin Ed said.
“He’s been eating it,” Grave Digger observed.
“But he ain’t digested it yet,” Coffin Ed concluded, gripping the dwarf from behind by both arms.
Grave Digger hit the dwarf in the stomach.
The dwarf doubled over and began to vomit.
Grave Digger took out a handkerchief and spread it on the ground so that the dwarf vomited into it.
Half-chewed packets of paper came out with bits of boiled tongue and dill pickle.
Suddenly the dwarf fainted. Coffin Ed carried him over to the edge of the street and laid him on the grass border.
Grave Digger carefully folded the vomit-filled handkerchief and inserted it into a heavy manila envelope which he stuck into his leather-lined side coat pocket.
They left the dwarf lying on the ground and moved over to see what the commotion was about.
The giant was saying to the fire captain, “Jake can tell you, boss. He’s my friend.”
“Jake ain’t talking,” Grave Digger said.
The giant looked stunned.
“He’s a halfwit,” one of the white cops said.
By now the giant was encircled by several cops and a number of firemen.
“Halfwit or not, he’s going to answer my question,” the captain said, pinning his bloodshot gaze onto the giant’s pink eyes. “Why did you ring the fire alarm, boy?”
Sweat flowed down the giant’s cheeks like tears.
“Boss, I didn’t go to start all this,” he whined. “All I wanted was for somebody to come and stop ’em from robbing and murdering my pa.”
Grave Digger and Coffin Ed tensed.
“Where at?” Grave Digger asked.
“He works for the janitor of the apartment house three doors up the street,” the sexton volunteered.
“He’s my pa,” the giant said.
“Shut up, all of you, and let me ask the questions,” the fire captain grated. He leaned toward the giant. He was over six feet tall but he only came up to the level of the giant’s flat nose. “I want to know why you came here and rang the special fire alarm for Riverside Church?” he insisted. “You’re not such an idiot that you don’t know there is a special fire alarm just for this famous church.”
“He told you,” Coffin Ed said.
The fire captain ignored him. His teeth clenched so fiercely the muscles knotted in his purple-tinted jaws. “Why didn’t you phone the police? Why didn’t you put in a police alarm? Why didn’t you ring some other fire alarm? Why didn’t you just yell for help?”
The giant looked bewildered. His flat white face began twitching. He licked a pink tongue across colorless lips.
“It was the closest,” he said.
“Closest to what?” the fire captain rasped.
“Closest to where he lives, obviously,” Grave Digger said.
“This is my business!” the fire captain shouted. “You keep out.”
“If it’s murder or robbery it’s our business,” Grave Digger replied.
“Do you believe this idiot?” a white cop asked scornfully.
“It won’t take long to find out,” Coffin Ed said.
“I’m going to find out first why he rang this alarm and got all these engines out here,” the fire captain said.
He reached forward with his left hand to clutch the giant in a vise, but he didn’t find any place to take hold. The giant’s T-shirt was too flimsy and his sweaty white skin was too slippery. So the fire captain just held out his hand with the palm forward as though to push the giant in the chest.
“Who’s trying to rob your pa?” Grave Digger asked quickly.
“There’s an African and my stepma; they is teaming up on him,” the giant whined.
The fire captain rapped him on the chest. “But you knew there wasn’t any fire.”
The giant looked about for help. There wasn’t any.
“Nawauh, boss, I didn’t exactly know there wasn’t any fire,” he denied. He glanced at the captain’s face and admitted, “But I didn’t seen any.”
The fire captain blew his top. He hit the giant in the stomach with all his might. His fist bounced back as though he had hit the tire of a truck.
The giant looked surprised.
“There ain’t no need of that,” Coffin Ed said. “He’s willing to talk.”
The fire captain ignored him. “Let’s take him, boys,” he said.
A fireman took hold of the giant’s right arm while the fire captain looped a left into his hard rubber stomach.
The giant grunted. He reached out his left hand and took the captain by the throat.
“Easy does it!” Grave Digger shouted. “Don’t make graves.”
“Keep out of this,” a white cop warned him, drawing his police revolver.
The captain’s eyes bulged and his purpling tongue popped out.
