Then Dave Berne arrived.
His eyes were the same faithful blue, but unnaturally vivid. He patted
my back and shook hands with Black, whom he knew. He stood in the room
a moment, peeling off a light-weight jacket and looking at the yellow
roses. Then he went over and leaned out the window.
"Hi, Paul!"
"Et tu?" Paul called back.
Dave chuckled. "You've got quite a crowd down there. Had trouble
pushing through!" He pulled his head back and said to us, "What gives?"
We told him such plans as existed.
Dave listened and smelled the flowers and moved his eyes to whoever was
talking. Finally we'd finished and he grinned. "Well," he said, sighing
a little, "let's go and get the damned fool in."
He went and I went after him and the others stayed, peering into the
fading light.
Dave whispered to me to hang back a little and I did and he moved on
along the parapet till he came to a point just out of range. Paul was
watching him with a wary, scornful expression. Dave leaned over the
parapet and looked down--and Paul took a look, too.
"Funny," Dave said. "All those yokels. I suppose most of 'em will go
along home pretty soon. Suppertime. And soon be too dark to see the
fun, anyhow. But some of 'em would hang around all night--even though
the street is a God-damned stove-top. Waiting. Waiting and hoping.
Hoping. Imagine it! Hoping to see a human being come sixteen stories in
slow somersaults. Hoping to see him hit and spatter. Hoping his feet
will burst and his shoes will fly off--the way they do, sometimes.
Hoping they'll be a Christ-to-be-Jesus big puddle of blood to tell the
family about--and blood spattered up to the second story. And a dent
in the sidewalk. What the hell is wrong with a bunch of yahoos that'll
stand around for hours on account of a hope like that?"
"Very graphic," Paul said.
Dave took a long look, then, at the surrounding roofs--the vertical
rows of windows, some now electrically lighted, and some flared with
the last copper rays of a sun that was going down in Jersey behind
the Orange Mountains where I used to make field maps when I was a Boy
Scout. He took still another look at the blue-powder sky, drew one deep
breath, and hopped lightly up astride the parapet.
Paul was startled.
So was I.