The Blue Knight Read Free Page B

‘Oh
thank
you, Officer,’ she says.”
    Seymour hooted again and Ruthie laughed, but things quieted down when my food came, and I loosened my Sam Browne for the joy of eating. It annoyed me though when my belly pressed against the edge of the yellow Formica counter.
    Seymour had a flurry of orders to go which he took care of and nobody bothered me for ten minutes or so except for Ruthie who wanted to make sure I had enough to eat, and that my eggs were fluffy enough, and also to rub a hip or something up against me so that I had trouble thinking about the third bagel.
    The other counter customer finished his second cup of coffee and Seymour shuffled over.
    “More coffee, Mister Parker?”
    “No, I’ve had plenty.”
    I’d never seen this man before but I admired his clothes. He was stouter than me, soft fat, but his suit, not bought off the rack, hid most of it.
    “You ever met Officer Bumper Morgan, Mister Parker?” asked Seymour.
    We smiled, both too bloated and lazy to stand up and shake hands across two stools.
    “I’ve heard of you, Officer,” said Parker. “I recently opened a suite in the Roxman Building. Fine watches. Stop around anytime for a special discount.” He put his card on the counter and pushed it halfway toward me. Seymour shoved it the rest of the way.
    “Everyone around here’s heard of Bumper,” Seymour said proudly.
    “I thought you’d be a bigger man, Officer,” said Parker. “About six foot seven and three hundred pounds, from some of the stories I’ve heard.”
    “You just about got the weight right,” said Seymour.
    I was used to people saying I’m not as tall as they expected, or as I first appeared to be. A beat cop has to be big or he’ll be fighting all the time. Sometimes a tough, feisty little cop resents it because he can’t walk a foot beat, but the fact is that most people don’t fear a little guy and a little guy’d just have to prove himself all the time, and sooner or later somebody’d take that nightstick off him and shove it up his ass. Of course I was in a radio car now, but as I said before, I was still a beat cop, more or less.
    The problem with my size was that my frame was made for a guy six feet five or six instead of a guy barely six feet. My bones are big and heavy, especially my hands and feet. If I’d just have grown as tall as I was meant to, I wouldn’t have the goddamn weight problem. My appetite was meant for a giant, and I finally convinced those police doctors who used to send “fat man letters” to my captain ordering me to cut down to two hundred and twenty pounds.
    “Bumper’s a one-man gang,” said Seymour. “I tell you he’s fought wars out there.” Seymour waved at the street to indicate the “out there.”
    “Come on, Seymour,” I said, but it was no use. This kind of talk shriveled my balls, but it did please me that a newcomer like Parker had heard of me. I wondered how special the “special discount” would be. My old watch was about finished.
    “How long ago did you get this beat, Bumper?” asked Seymour, but didn’t allow me to answer. “Well, it was almost twenty years. I know that, because when Bumper was a rookie, I was a young fella myself, working for my father right here. It was real bad then. We had B-girls and zoot-suiters and lots of crooks. In those days there was plenty of guys that would try the cop on the beat.”
    I looked over at Ruthie, who was smiling.
    “Years ago, when Ruthie worked here the first time, Bumper saved her life when some guy jumped her at the bus stop on Second Street. He saved you, didn’t he, Ruthie?”
    “He sure did. He’s my hero,” she said, pouring me a cup of coffee.
    “Bumpers always worked right here,” Seymour continued. “On foot beats and now in a patrol car since he can’t walk too good no more. His twenty-year anniversary is coming up, but we won’t let him retire. What would it be like around here without the champ?”
    Ruthie actually looked scared for