Stop This Man! - By Peter Rabe Page 0,2

The patient had radiation sickness.

Cal and Tom hadn’t known each other for more than a few hours but they had been stepping fast. They’d been stepping so fast that by midnight it seemed they’d been buddies all their lives. That’s why Cal had been buying the drinks for Tom and then Tom had been buying the drinks for Cal. So it was a sad moment when the two buddies sat down at the curb and discovered that their friendship was wearing thin.

“Stop rubbing them stubbles,” said Cal. “You trying to drive me crazy with them stubble noises?”

Tom kept rubbing his stubbles and said, “Bah.”

They sat for a while staring at the dark street and then they looked at the empty pint in the gutter. That brought up the next point.

“Cheapskate,” said Cal. “Just lookit this empty pint.”

“Cheapskate!” Tom jumped up from the curb. He stood straight and steady after a while and yelled, “Cheapskate! You’re talking to the man what bought that pint, ya bum!”

“It’s empty, ain’t it?”

“So it’s your turn, ya bum! It’s your turn for the next one.”

Cal got up from the curb and held himself by Tom’s sleeve. “Listen, cheapskate,” he said. He stuck his face close to Tom’s. Tom tried to lean back and out of the way. “I got the pint afore this one and I barely recall buying that pint and it’s empty. Then I barely recall this pint coming along and it’s empty. Unnerstand?”

Tom didn’t. He tried to lean his face out of the way and they both started to sway.

“So it’s your turn,” Cal said, and it sounded like a conclusion.

They swayed for a while, staring at each other from close range, but Tom didn’t know what to say next.

“I knew it,” said Cal. “You’re a cheapskate. You stink!”

Tom jerked his head back and wiped his eye. “Don’t say ‘stink’ like that. A bum what can’t talk polite never gets nowheres.”

He took a few steps and leaned against a dark store window. It made a dangerous sound. Then Cal came over and leaned against the glass. They looked inside as best they could.

“More cheapskates,” said Cal. “The whole store full of bulbs and wires and no light anywhere.”

“That’s because he sells ‘em,” Tom said.

They looked at the display of fixtures, bulbs, and fluorescent tubes. There was a display of fluorescent tubes like sun rays coming out from a face in the middle. The cardboard face was smiling.

“What’s he got to smile about I can’t figure,” said Cal.

“He’s thinking of that drink he’s gonna have. He believes in miracles and he’s just smiling away there, thinking—”

Tom didn’t get any further because Cal had burst out crying, loud and hard, sobbing that he’d always believed in miracles, but not anymore.

“Cal boy! Cal buddy! You’re busting my heart, honest, Cal boy.” Then he patted his buddy on the back and gradually his face got stern. “Cal!”

“Yes, Tommy?”

“We got to have a miracle.”

“There ain’t—”

“First guy comes along we ask for a miracle, Cal buddy.”

Cal had stopped crying. He felt like himself again. “Maybe an angel’s gonna come down the street? Carrying a pint?”

“Shut up. Here he comes!” and they both listened to the footsteps that came down the dark street. They were coming at a fast clip.

“Or maybe Jesus Christ Himself.”

“Shut up already and get over here!” Tom dragged his buddy to the entrance to the house next to the electrical store. “Here comes the miracle. Watch me make a touch.”

“Oh, surely. Maybe Jesus Christ—” He stopped when they saw the figure come through the dark.

Tom stepped into the street, all energy and smiles. “How do you do, sir? I do believe—” He got no further. The man was at the window now when a sudden glow of eerie white suffused the dark. The display of fluorescent bulbs glowed brilliantly, and against the sudden brightness the dark figure of the man appeared surrounded by a halo.

“Jesus Christ!” Cal said, and fell down on his face.

Tom hadn’t moved a muscle. By the time he managed to breathe again, the lights were off and the middle-aged man in the blue overcoat had gripped his yellow leather case and run into the night.

Tony Catell hurried up the stairs of the railroad station and pushed his way through the crowd without looking right or left. Once inside, he went to the far end of the large hall, where the ornamental columns made shadowed recesses along the wall. He stood there watching the ticket windows. When one of them was empty,