"I don't mean passengers," Ordway said. "The ones I'm talking about may cause us more trouble."
He told Mel about the Meadowood mass meeting to protest airport noise; now the meeting had adjourned and most of its members were on their way to the airport. Lieutenant Ordway had learned about the meeting, and its intended follow-up, from a TV news crew which had requested permission to set up cameras inside the terminal. After talking with the TV people, Ordway telephoned a friend on the Tribune city desk downtown, who read him the gist of a news story which a reporter at the original meeting had just phoned in.
"Hell!" Mel grumbled. "Of all the nights to choose! As if we don't have enough trouble already."
"I guess that's the idea; they'll get noticed more that way. But I thought you'd better be warned because they'll probably want to see you, and maybe someone from the FAA."
Mel said sourly, "The FAA goes underground when they hear of something like this. They never come out until the all clear's sounded."
"How about you?" The policeman grinned. "You plan to start tunneling?"
"No. You can tell them I'll meet a delegation of half a dozen, though even that's a waste of time tonight. There's nothing I can do."
"You realize," Ordway said, "that providing they don't create a disturbance or damage property, there's nothing I can do legally to keep the rest of them out."
"Yes, I realize it, but I'm not going to talk to a mob, though just the same, let's not look for trouble. Even if we get pushed around a little, make sure we don't do any pushing ourselves unless we have to. Remember that the press will be here, and I don't want to create any martyrs."
"I already warned my men. They'll make with the jokes and save the jujitsu."
"Good!"
Mel had confidence in Ned Ordway. The policing of Lincoln International was handled by a self-administering detachment of the city force, and Lieutenant Ordway represented the best type of career policeman. He had been in charge of the airport police detail a year, and would probably move on to a more important assignment downtown soon. Mel would be sorry to see him go.
"Apart from this Meadowood thing," Mel inquired, "how's everything else been?" He was aware that Ordway's force of a hundred policemen, like most others at the airport, had done extra hours of duty since the storm began.
"Mostly routine. More drunks than usual, and a couple of fist fights. But that figures because of all the flight delays and your busy bars."
Mel grinned. "Don't knock the bars. The airport takes a percentage from every drink, and we need the revenue."
"So do airlines, I guess. At least judging by the passengers they try to sober up, so they can put them aboard. I have my usual beef about that."
"Coffee?"
"Right. The moment a passenger in his cups shows up at an airline check-in counter, somebody from passenger relations gets assigned to pour coffee into him. Airlines never seem to learn that when the coffee's in, all you have is a wide-awake drunk. Mostly, that's when they call us."
"You can handle it."
Ordway's men, Mel was aware, were expert at dealing with airport drunks, who were rarely charged unless they became obstreperous. Mostly they were salesmen and businessmen from out of town, sometimes exhausted after a grueling, competitive week, whom a few drinks on the way home hit hard. If flight crews wouldn't allow them aboard---and captains, who had the last word on such matters, were usually adamant about it---the drunks were escorted to the police detention building and left to sober up. Later, they were allowed to go---usually sheepishly.
"Oh, there is one thing," the police chief said. "The parking lot people think we have several more dumped cars. In this weather it's hard to be sure, but we'll check it out as soon as we can."
Mel grimaced. Worthless cars abandoned on parking lots were currently a plague at every big city airport. Nowadays, when an old jalopy became useless, it was surprisingly hard to get rid of it. Scrap and salvage dealers were jammed to the limits of their yards and wanted no more---unless car owners paid. So an owner was faced with the alternatives of paying for disposal, renting storage, or finding a place to abandon his vehicle where it could not be traced back to him. Airports had become obvious dumping grounds.
The old cars were driven into airport parking lots, then license