Taking It on the Lam by Edward Drobinski - HTML preview

Page 61

climbed out of the wreckage and bit the linoleum in an exchange of gunfire with the police. Ellen arrived at the scene, and found Joe seriously but not mortally injured. She embraced him before the police loaded him into the long meat wagon.

The book ended there, but I would have found it more interesting if the writer had not chosen so abrupt an ending. I guess that rather than intending a feature, Malcom St. Claire wanted to do a “B” book. I know that Victor Backett, the corrupt, politically and mob contacted attorney would never be caught; and that framed wealthy broker/patsy Emil Lorrison would continue to be blackmailed. But, I’d have liked to know what happened to Joe and Ellen. I put the book back on the shelf and double-checked.

It was the only one in the room, so I returned to my window view of the side street.

The pedestrians walked toward a disturbed and scruffy man who appeared to be attracting them like a magnet by holding a camera to his puss and pointing it at them like a revealing roscoe.

Taking It on the Lam Page 62

Everyone wanted to be a star, with no conception of what being one entailed. The crowded sidewalk of the neglected side street included many young dinge boys dressed in rags they, judged by their propensities to uniformly strut like chickens about to be beheaded, apparently thought to be the height of fashion. Well-dressed women into slumming sat in rickshaws, while very poor thin women walked alongside. All looked uncomfortably into what they thought was a camera, the un-counted composing kisser contortions which were designed to show that they didn’t care, while subliminally advertising that they did. My vertical pan showed poorer women swathed in rags, some having just been physically ejected from the dime-a-dance Avalon Ballroom. A gray bearded old man carrying a bundle passed the camera and smiled at it, finding something unmentioned to be funny. The song-like sound of an unseen distant tram car bearing a large Star of David rang through the busy street. The woman lying on the sidewalk was ignored by the pedestrians passing by. Shot through and through, the street vendor of warmed pretzels and his cart gathered steam and kept moving on.

Being further down the side street from my new favorite take-out joint, “Benny’s Eats,” it wasn’t duck soup to see well, but it looked like there was a flurry of activity in front of

“Rochester’s Magnificent Shoe Shine and Repair Emporium.”

Taking It on the Lam