"Very well," Mr. Culpepper said. "I'll go."
"No. We'll all have to go," Marc said. "We can't risk staying here. The
cleaning ladies will be around this way soon. If they saw this ..." he
indicated the babies and Toffee, "... there would be a scandal that
would make Hollywood furious with envy."
Leaving the building, the Pillsworth party was one to startle
and confound, a woman in a revealing evening gown carrying two
velvet-swathed babies and accompanied by two extremely uneasy looking
gentlemen, was a sight to give pause to even the most careless-minded
citizen. Indeed, several citizens not only paused but stopped cold in
their tracks as they saw the strange group moving toward them. With
grave dignity, though, glancing neither to the right nor to the left,
the ill-matched fivesome proceeded to the end of the block, waited in
heavy silence for a change of traffic signals, crossed the street and
disappeared through the doors of a retail liquor store. There they were
greeted by a large, befuddled looking merchant.
The merchant surveyed his approaching customers with silent disbelief.
Then he seemed to shake himself from an absorbing dream.
"This is a liquor store," he said dully.
"Yes, we know," Toffee said politely. "That's why we've come."
"I just thought I'd mention it," the merchant said unhappily, clearing
his throat. He glanced out the window and closed his eyes a minute.
Then he turned back to the group before the counter and seemed to be
surprised all over again.
"Since you're really here," he said, "what can I do for you?"
"We'd like a bottle of strong whiskey," Toffee said. She turned
questioningly to Mr. Culpepper who nodded back to her approvingly. "The
strongest you have."
"Two bottles!" a tiny voice suddenly piped from the depths of one of
the velvet bundles. Chadwick's small head bobbed into sight. "Make it
two! And make it snappy!"
Agatha's head was only a moment behind Chadwick's in making its
appearance, "Sot!" she accused. "Greedy little pig!"
"You be still," Chadwick rejoined. "What if I do get a little drunk
tonight? Who ever had a better reason? Just being married to you would
be enough, I should think! I've got it coming to me."
"You've got a lot coming to you," Agatha shrilled. "And someday you're
going to get it. If it hadn't been for you starting that fight up
there...."
"Please," the infant Chadwick said, looking pained. "Try to restrain
your shrewish tendencies just this once, won't you?" He turned to
the liquor merchant with a bland smile. "Two bottles, if you please,
friend."
"Yes," Toffee put in quickly, by way of ending the discussion. "Two
bottles, if you please."
"Perhaps it's just as well," Agatha drawled. "I wouldn't drink from the
same bottle with that little lush, anyway."
* * * * *
The merchant made a brief, strangling noise as he tore his eyes away
from Agatha and Chadwick and backed into a shelf, upsetting several
bottles onto the floor. "I shouldn't of nipped the stock in the back
room," he muttered to himself. "Me old lady warned me this would
happen. She said it would start just this way." He turned his back on
Toffee and the infants, grasped the edge of the shelf and rested his
head on the backs of his hands. A deep shudder ran the full length of
his body. It was some time before he began to recover even a little bit.
Finally, without turning around, he managed to say, "What kind of
whiskey did you want, lady?"
Toffee looked at Agatha and Chadwick questioningly.
"What kind have you got?" Agatha called out.
The merchant shuddered again. "I don't know," he whimpered. "I don't
know nuthin' right now. Maybe this is all Chanel number 5 up here on
these shelves. It wouldn't surprise me none. Why don't you just look
around and take what you want? I won't look. You just take it and go
away. Just tip-toe out and don't slam the door. That's all I ask. The
liquor is on the house."
After the selection of two large, rather vaporish-looking bottles,
the little company returned to the sidewalk. The babies, however,
were becoming increasingly troublesome in their eagerness to be at
the liquor, which was in Marc's custody for the time being. Their
ill-tempered cries, however, were almost entirely directed at Toffee.
People began to stop in the streets to watch and to listen. If they
could believe their ears, they were overhearing two new-born infants
calling their mother names that even an adult hadn't any right to
know. Shocking invective gushed from the sweet mouths of the babes in
a fountainous stream. Toffee, probably for the first time in her life,
was embarrassed.
"Can't we do something?" she asked her companion. "Can't we go
somewhere? If this sort of thing goes on much longer I'll be picked up
by a home for wayward mothers or something."
Marc glanced down the street. Then he pointed. "Over there," he said.
His finger indicated a public library. "There should be quiet and
privacy in there." He turned to the babies. "Now listen here, you two,
either you be quiet and behave yourselves or you won't get a drop.
Understand?"
Agatha and Chadwick were instantly subdued.
The library was a large, high-ceilinged place of passages and
corridors. Just inside the main entrance was a large foyer-like room
out of the center of which, like a giant mushroom, jutted a circular
checking counter. Toffee moved quickly to the counter and rested the
babies on it. An aged woman whose spinsterish face belied her gay dress
turned and smiled, revealing a mouth full of charred fags.
"Yes?" she asked.
"Where are the books?" Toffee asked.
"What books?"
Toffee looked puzzled for a moment. "Big books," she said. "In stacks.
I was told there were veritable walls of books in here."
"And there are," the woman said defensively. "Which books are you
interested in?"
"How should I know?" Toffee asked helplessly. "I haven't read them yet."
The woman sighed. Then her eyes fell to Agatha and Chadwick lying on
the counter and they lighted with the fanatical gleam of frustrated
motherhood. She reached out and pulled back the velvet folds.
"My, what beaut...!" The lie died in her throat. To suggest that Agatha
and Chadwick were anything but downright ugly was too great a falsehood
for even this child-starved soul. "You must be ... uh ... proud," she
said tonelessly. However, she was game; once she'd started she wasn't
going to give up. She reached out a hand and waggled a finger over
Agatha's protruding tummy.
"Kitchy-kitchy," she said unhappily.
Anger flashed in the infant's eyes. "Get your horny talons off me, you
withered old wraith," she snapped. And having given warning, she parted
her bubbling lips and bit the woman's finger.
* * * * *
The woman didn't cry out in surprise; she didn't make any sound at
all. She simply stared hard at Toffee for a long moment, then silently
pointed to a distant corridor.
"The books on abnormal child psychology are in there," she whispered.
"And if I were you, honey, I'd hurry."
Toffee gathered up Agatha and Chadwick and joined Marc and Mr.
Culpepper, who had been watching from a distance.
"That was fine," she scolded Agatha. "That was a splendid display."
"What did you expect?" Agatha replied haughtily. "The old hag was
thumbing me like a ripe watermelon."
"I wish she'd throttled you," Toffee said annoyedly. "Lord knows you
deserve it. Your mothers must have been women of great forbearance. How
they kept their hands off your little throats is more than I can tell."
The little party made its way through the nearest passage and found
itself in a forest of books. Shelves lined on either side stretched out
toward them like great, reaching fingers. Here and there a solitary
"browser" was picking his way painfully along the long rows, title by
title, but on the whole the great, book-jammed room was reasonably
deserted. Toffee moved along the ends of the rows, found a browserless
section and disappeared inside. Marc and Mr. Culpepper followed.
Together, they all retreated to the end of the section and formed a
sort of huddle. Marc produced the bottles from beneath his coat.
"How are we going to measure it?" Toffee asked. "We have to give them
ten jiggers exactly."
"Do I have to think of everything?" Agatha inquired scornfully. Her
small hand emerged from her velvet wrappings, clutching a jigger glass.
"It was lying around loose on the counter," she explained.
"As in womanhood," Toffee said philosophically, "so, too, in infancy is
she a crook."
As though in solemn ritual, the bottles were silently opened and the
initial portion poured.
Agatha stretched out her miniature hand. "Gimme," she said. "It's my
glass. And, boy, do I need a slug!"
"Tell me, dear," Toffee said quietly, tilting the glass to Agatha's
eager mouth, "whatever became of that lovely accent of yours?"
Agatha polished off the whiskey and burped. "None of your damned
business," she said with truly childish simplicity.
By alternating between the two babes, a certain amount of decorum was
maintained. Marc took charge of the stoking of Chadwick while Toffee
continued in behalf of Agatha. Mr. Culpepper shoved a few volumes aside
on one of the lower shelves and seated himself, watching with interest
as the glass moved from hand to hand to bottle to baby. He looked like
a spectator at a tennis game being played on a checker board. The glass
shuttled from pouted lip to pouted lip until the inner infant, on both
scores, had been fortified five times over. From this point on, as
the whiskey poured down the tiny throats, a corresponding amount of
exuberance arose via the same channel. Agatha, made congenial by the
liquor, began to while away the time between drinks by lifting her
childish voice in song.
"Becky lived in a Turkish harem," she chortled. "She had towels but she
wouldn't wear 'em."
"Stop that caterwauling," Toffee commanded.
Agatha perversely increased her volume. "Becky looked like Theda
Barer," she shrieked. "Theda was bare but Becky was barer!"
* * * * *
Suddenly a sharp, gasping sound echoed around the little group, seeming
to come from no place in particular; the bookshelves themselves
appeared to be making little twittering sounds of surprise. The
Pillsworth party froze as it was. Eyes moved furtively in unturning
heads. It was Toffee who discovered the cause of the interruption.
Several books had been removed from one of the upper shelves, leaving a
sort of peep hole into the next section. In this opening had appeared
the forbidding face of the spinsterish librarian. It bore the dismayed
expression of a maiden lady who had inadvertently stumbled into a YMCA
swimming pool.
"Heavens!" the woman gasped. "Giving liquor to _babies_! No wonder
they're retarded!"
Toffee, recognizing the situation for what it was, displayed what she
believed was great presence of mind in grabbing the tell-tale bottle
from the shelf and lifting it to her own lips. She drank deeply of the
contents, and just to lend conviction to her performance as a ravening
drunkard, staggered against the bookshelves, rolling her eyes loosely
in their sockets.
"Oh, dear," Mr. Culpepper put in from the perch on the shelf. "If I
were you, I don't think I'd...."
A little moan issued from the colorless face in the bookshelf. "Oooo,
what depravity!" it exclaimed. "And teaching the babies to drink, too!"
"Nonsense," Toffee said, addressing the face openly. "We're drinking
this ourselves. We're just a bunch of roaring sots. We're too stingy to
give any to the babies."
"I saw you," the face insisted. "You were forcing the filthy stuff on
those infants. You ought to be reported."
Toffee turned to Marc. "We weren't either, were we?" she asked. "We
never give these babies any liquor, do we?"
"Certainly not," Marc said indignantly. "We were only fighting them
off, trying to keep them from taking it away from us. We love the stuff
too much to waste it on them."
In demonstration, he grabbed the bottle that had been Chadwick's and
pressed it eagerly to his mouth, a fanatical gleam in his eye.
"Oh, really," Mr. Culpepper cried. "I really don't think...."
"You see," Toffee said to the face. "Can't leave the stuff alone. Those
babies haven't got a look-in as far as liquor is concerned. We wouldn't
give them a drop if they were dying of thirst."
Doubt came into the face as Marc withdrew the bottle from his lips with
a loud smacking noise and grandly wiped his mouth with the back of
his hand. The librarian was beginning to look more or less convinced.
Slowly, the face started to move away.
"Becky's boy friend came and found her," Agatha suddenly shrilled in a
voice that was definitely dewy. "But her towels were not...."
The voice suddenly became softly muffled, as though by velvet.
The face darted back into the opening between the books. "What was
that?" it asked.
"Me," Toffee said. "I like music with my liquor."
The face was some reassured. "Well, you'll have to stop it," it
snapped. "You'll have to stop almost everything you're doing, in fact,
if you expect to remain here. Drinking is not allowed...."
A loud, rumbling burp issued from the velvet bundle in Toffee's arms.
"Oh!" the face exclaimed, and suddenly disappeared. There was the sound
of quick tapping footsteps on the other side of the shelf.
* * * * *
When the footsteps had died away Toffee and Marc, with renewed vigor,
returned to their labors with the bottles and the babies.
"We'll have to hurry," Marc said. "That old hag had a look about her
that definitely meant trouble if you ask me."
"I agree," Toffee said. She glanced down at Agatha. "And you didn't
help matters any. You displayed your customary perverseness, I noticed."
The baby cocked an insolent eye at her. "You acted with rare
intelligence, yourself," she said. "In my opinion you handled the
situation like a jerk. I only shudder that all these strangers are
laboring under the degrading notion that you are my mother."
The liquor flowed with increasing velocity. The eighth jigger had been
administered when the footsteps sounded in the doorway beyond the book
shelves. They entered the room and hurried forward as though they knew
just where they were going.
"In there!" came the voice of the aging librarian. "They're in section
five, throwing a regular wild party! They're drinking liquor and
singing dirty songs and ... and ... contributing to the delinquency of
babies! They're carrying on 'till you wouldn't believe it!"
"My!" a voice said, not untinged with pleased expectancy. "Sounds like
the time we raided that house over on the other side...."
"Shut up," another voice said. "No matter what's goin' on behind them
books, this is different. And don't you forget it!"
The footsteps drew closer and swiftly rounded the end of the section.
The members of the Pillsworth party looked up in unison and saw two
large, blue-clad policemen running toward them.
Toffee fairly threw Agatha into the arms of Mr. Culpepper. "Here!" she
said. "I'll hold them off. You see that she gets the other two shots!"
She sounded like the little Dutch boy about to cram his pinky into that
dyke over in Holland. Agatha landed in Mr. Culpepper's lap with a thud
and a burp.
Thus relieved of her besotted burden Toffee raced quickly to a movable
ladder stretched up against the long shelves. Reaching it, she started
upward, two rungs at a time.
The ladder was the sort that rested on rollers at either end and could
easily be shuttled from one location to another with a good deal of
facility. Once aloft Toffee lost no time in using the contrivance to
its utmost capacity. Rollers whirred and Toffee and the ladder sped
forward to the attack, toward a section that was notable for the number
of truly weighty volumes it housed. Toffee seized up the first of these
volumes and paused momentarily to read its title.
"War and Peace," she read. "That ought to put them to sleep."
Never was literature so forced upon anyone as it was on the hapless
policemen in the awful moments that followed. "War and Peace," true to
Toffee's expectations did indeed leave the first of the cops looking
extremely drowsy as it clipped him on the chin and sent him staggering
backwards against his companion. In a matter of seconds two of the
city's finest were groveling pitifully on the floor, trying vainly to
ward off a hail storm of books. Toffee, in selecting a lettered diet
for these two besieged gentlemen showed a marked preference for the
heavier works. Her victims were most impressed, in a very physical sort
of way, with the works of the ancient Greeks.
The cops, apparently unwilling to perish under this literary avalanche,
turned tail, and started crawling toward the outer protection of the
shelves. Seeing that victory ... at least momentary victory ... was at
hand, Toffee turned back to see what progress was being made with the
howling Harpers. Everything at the end of the section was oddly serene.
* * * * *
Agatha had been set aside on one of the shelves and apparently the last
of the ten libations was being given to Chadwick. While Toffee was
watching this picture of rather distorted domestic contentment, one of
the cops timidly extended his head around the lower corner of one of
the shelves.
"Lord," he commented to his companion, "they're choking whiskey down
them young'uns like it was a matter of life and death. What do you
suppose they wanna do that for?"
"Maybe they get a kick out of drunk babies," the other returned
morosely. "Maybe hooched-up babies are a barrel of fun. How should I
know?"
"Looks more like they're tryin' to kill 'em," said the peeping cop.
"Infanticide is a serious charge. Attempted infanticide is just as bad.
It's goin' to go hard on 'em when we get 'em outa there."
"_If_ we get 'em outa there," his companion corrected. "Me, I feel
almost like just crawlin' outa here and lettin' 'em do as they please."
"Shame on you, Murphy," the first cop said. "It's our duty to protect
them babies, even if they don't look very human."
"What'll we do?"
The cop surveyed the situation; Toffee was now facing away from them,
watching as Chadwick was being shelved beside Agatha.
"Now's our chance," he said. "Let's rush 'em."
"I wouldn't mind rushin' that redhead," Murphy said stoutly, "if I
could just get out of the readin' room. She flings a mean book."
"Let's go," the first cop whispered. "No time to jaw."
Together, the policemen rushed once more onto the scene of their recent
defeat. Somehow confused, they both ran headlong for Toffee and the
ladder. Apparently neither remembered the swift mobility of the ladder
for, simultaneously, they lunged at it, throwing their full weight
against it.
Instantly the ladder shot into motion, fully burdened with the two
startled cops and a thoroughly unbalanced Toffee. At the outset Toffee
toppled from her perch, hurtled downward, and caught one of the cops
around the neck just in time to prevent a crashing arrival at the
floor. From there on, it was just one grand, piggy-back ride for the
redhead. For the cop it was a matter of an extra burden and hanging on
for dear life. Books, row upon row of them, flashed by in a screaming
blur. They were heading for a dead end with the speed of a bullet.
"Get off me!" Toffee's protector yelled ungallantly. "Beat it, lady! No
riders!"
"Not on your life!" Toffee hollered back through clenched teeth. "For
the rest of this trip you and I are sweethearts!"
At this moment the librarian appeared at the end of the book littered
aisle and gazed on the scene within with open amazement. "Just look at
those cops!" she exclaimed. "Carrying on just as bad as the others!
You'd think this was a fun house. You boys stop that this instant!" she
yelled. "I'm going to call the commissioner!"
"When you do, lady," one of the policemen hollered back, "tell him for
me what he can do with his lousy job! I got a wife and kids to think
of!"
Just then, the ladder, like a transcontinental express, arrived at the
end of the line and discharged its protesting passengers like three jet
propelled missiles. The two policemen shot out into the air, headed
directly for Marc and Mr. Culpepper who had been watching the little
excursion in a state of rigid immobility. Toffee, through some hitherto
undiscovered law of physics, left the back of her stalwart carrier in a
sweeping upward arc that landed her ungently atop the book shelves.
* * * * *
The law literally swept down on Marc and Mr. Culpepper, upending them
posthaste and hurling them to the floor. From the top of the bookcase,
Toffee collected her breath and gazed blandly on the scene of confusion
below. She might have hurled a book or two in Marc's behalf, except
that in the tangle of arms and legs, it was impossible to tell which
were the property of Marc. Besides, she had just become happily aware
of a window at her side, one that was easily accessible from the top of
the book shelves. She threw the catch and it slid open.
Turning her attention back to the confusion on the floor, she was
delighted to see that Marc and Mr. Culpepper had emerged from the
"flail" and were dazedly looking about for some new, less hazardous
enterprise.
"Up here!" Toffee yelled, pointing to the window. "Up the ladder!"
They reacted mechanically. They gazed dully at Toffee and the window,
then started obediently toward the ladder. They were nearly to the top
of the shelves when the two cops, finally weary of struggling with
each other on the floor, got to their feet and observed these recent
developments with considerable malice.
"Oh, no you don't!" one of them grated viciously. He lunged at the
ladder and shoved it with all his might. As it shot away from his hand
he let out a hysterical laugh. "There!" he yelled. "Now it's your turn
to look silly!"
The ladder streaked away toward the open end of the section like a
shrieking, avenging thing. Marc and Mr. Culpepper twined themselves to
it and each other in a seizure of iron-bound desperation.
"Heh, heh, heh!" the cop cackled wildly, watching their terror.
"That'll teach 'em to make light of the law!" He turned his attention
to Toffee. "Come down off there, you little witch," he demanded.
"Come and get me, lardhead," Toffee hissed. "I'm holding out for
squatter's rights."
[Illustration: Toffee smiled enticingly from her perch on top of the
bookcase as the cop gestured wildly....]
The cop accepted her invitation. Or at least he tried. Clutching the
edge of a high shelf he attempted to swing himself upward. From there
on, the natural laws of gravity took matters into their own hands.
The entire bookcase teetered drunkenly for a moment, swayed forward,
paused, then clattered downward. Toffee's pursuer went down under a
flood of literature, while Toffee sailed lightly outward and landed
with ease in the outstretched arms of the other policeman. All three
of the participants in this rather singular incident were starkly
surprised at its outcome.
At the same moment a howling duet of horror announced the arrival of
Marc and Mr. Culpepper at their dreaded destination. There was a thud
and a crash as the ladder hit the end of its track and hurled its
helpless cargo into the wall. A clatter, a moan and a groan marked the
end of the operation.
"Now look what you've done!" Toffee howled as the cop lowered her to
the floor. "You've probably killed them!"
A howl of outrage issued from the mountain of books at her side. A few
slid from the top of the pile and the head of the deluged policeman
jutted into view, eyes ablaze. "You haven't increased my insurance
value either, sister," he said bitterly. He burrowed his way to freedom
and gained his feet, staring evilly at the diminutive cause of his
downfall. "I--hate--you," he said with heavy emphasis.
* * * * *
By the time Toffee and the cops arrived at the end of the section,
Marc and Mr. Culpepper were just beginning to stir. Apparently their
nervous systems had suffered the bulk of the damage, for they were not
noticeably marked. The cops took them into hand.
"Fun's over boys!" the more unruffled of them said. "You won't go
sky-larking again for a long, long time."
In the meantime, Toffee was staring back into the aisle, searching out
the shelf on which she had last seen the infant Harpers. She made a
little cry of surprise. The shelf was empty.
"They're gone!" she said. "They've gotten away. And after all the
trouble we've gone through to bring those two crooks to justice!" A
look of speculation crept into her eyes, and she turned to the nearest
cop. She grabbed his arm with an urgent hand. "My babies!" she wailed
dramatically. "My babies! They're gone. You've got to find them! You've
got to! I'll kill myself!"
"What's that?" the cop asked mildly.
"I'll kill myself, Dumbo," Toffee said sourly. "Go get my babies.
They've run away."
"I don't blame 'em. Where did they go?"
"How should I know?"
"Kill yourself, lady," the cop said tiredly. "I'm too worn out."
"Why you...!" Toffee started.
A sudden shriek from the foyer interrupted her. It was a scream with
a purpose in life, it was ambitious, it was soul searing and nerve
shattering.
In a body, the cops and the apprehended fugitives ran to the doorway.
Then they stopped, completely stunned by the spectacle before them.
Two lank and very mature figures, clothed only to the essential degree
in brief scraps of black velvet, were crawling serenely across the
foyer floor. The ancient librarian, holding onto her counter to keep
from slipping to the floor, was screaming her dreadful head off. The
Harpers, apparently in the midst of escape, had suddenly and quite
unbeknownst to themselves been restored to adulthood. At each movement
the velvet wrappings were slipping a bit further afield. A number of
people, some with books in their hands, were standing about the room in
attitudes of fascinated bewilderment.
Beyond the apparent chronological transformation, even stranger changes
had been wrought in the Harpers. Their faces were no longer the works
of art that they had previously been. Agatha was definitely moon faced,
in a wall-eyed, colorless sort of way, and Chadwick's handsome features
appeared suddenly to have been run over by a steam roller.
"Holy gee!" one of the cops breathed, recovering from the first shock
of surprise. "It's the homicidal Harpers!"
"What a catch!" his companion exclaimed excitedly. "We'll both get
promoted, sure. Agnes and Chester Harper! They're wanted for things
that ain't even got a name yet ... in five continents!"
In light of this sensational development, the ambitious policemen
hastily abandoned their captives and started in pursuit of the Harpers.
Agatha and Chadwick, at the sound of running footsteps, glanced up,
caught glimpses of each other and became instantly animated. Springing
quickly to their feet, they frantically clutched their brief coverings
to them where they would do the most good, and started to run, their
bare feet slapping dully against the tiled floor. They raced through
the entrance and out onto the sidewalk, the policemen in hot pursuit.
At the other end of the room Toffee plucked urgently at the sleeves of
Marc and Mr. Culpepper.
"Why hang around?" she asked, motioning them back toward the
bookshelves. "Follow me, men."
* * * * *
The three of them raced back to the aisle from which they had been so
rudely ejected only a few moments before. They shoved the ladder to the
far wall and hastily climbed toward the window. The window wasn't so
accessible as it had been before the pillaging of the end bookcase, but
they managed to reach it without too much difficulty.
Outside, the trio found themselves in a dead-end alley which was
pleasantly bathed in bright moonlight. They did not tarry, however, to
enjoy the scenery. Immediately upon hitting the pavement, Mr. Culpepper
streaked out toward the sidewalk, and Marc and Toffee started out
after him at a dead run.
Then something happened.
Ahead, they could see Mr. Culpepper skittering swiftly around the
corner. Accordingly, it was only logical that they should be in the
close vicinity of the little man's flashing heels. But they were not.
Their own progress, unlike Mr. Culpepper's, suddenly lacked something
in get-up-and-go.
Their steps definitely lagged, and their breath came to them in rasping
gasps. As they ran, they turned questioningly to each other. Toffee
screamed and stopped dead in her tracks. Marc came to a halt only a few
steps distant. They gazed at each other in horror.
All at once, they had become nothing more than a couple of doddering
old wrecks. Toffee, no longer a voluptuous young redhead, was now
a withered, greyheaded hag. And Marc's transformation was no less
startling, his clothes were hanging loosely over a shriveled frame that
was noticeably hunched in the back. Both their faces were networked
with wrinkles, and their eyes were dull with age. All of a sudden they
had become old ... very old.
They stared at each other in silent bewilderment, too stunned to speak.
In this dramatic moment, footsteps thundered in the mouth of the alley,
and the two policemen appeared, running toward them. The first to reach
them, grabbed Toffee roughly by the arm.
"So!" he cried triumphantly. "Got yuh! Thought you'd pull a sneak, eh?"
"Hey!" the other cop yelled, arriving on the scene. "That ain't them!"
Toffee glanced quickly at Marc, then back at the cops. "Take your hands
off me, young man," she cried indignantly. "Have you no respect for old
age?"
"Gee, sorry, mother," the policeman said apologetically. "We thought
you was someone else. Did you see a young couple with some babies
runnin' down here?"
Marc shook his head. "Not a soul," he said.
The cops backed away, looking thoughtful.
"Say," one of them said, a note of suspicion in his voice. "What are
you two doin' down here at this time of night?"