Jeremy said, "We have Dorothy and the Cowardly Lion and the Scarecrow, but we don't have the Tin Woodman."
"No, we don't have the Tin Woodman." A chill ran down my spine. I said, "I'm feeling better now. How about you? Time to go on?"
"Sure, Aunt Cat."
6
CURSES! SOMEBODY ALWAYS HELPS THAT GIRL
The three of us walked steadily on, taking a right at another place where the tunnel diverged. At this point, I really had no idea whether we were going north, south, east, or west, but if we ever had to find our way back, I needed to keep alternating choices in a regular manner.
Where were we now? We could be under Grant Park or under Michigan Avenue. Unfortunately, if we kept going long enough, we could be almost anyplace under the central city. Several years ago, a company driving pilings in the Chicago River broke through the roof of an abandoned freight tunnel that ran under the river. They flooded half of downtown. Millions upon millions of dollars of damage resulted. Why hadn't they known the tunnel was there? Because they didn't have good maps. Why hadn't the city inspectors checked the site before permitting the piles to be driven in? Well, the inspector who was supposed to inspect didn't get there when he should have because
he couldn't
fi
nd a parking space!
You gotta love Chicago.
Anyway, that was the first time many Chicagoans, myself included, realized how extensive the tunnel system under the city really was. If you had a decent subterranean map, you could go almost anyplace anywhere in the downtown area without ever coming up where the daylight shines.
Unfortunately, there was no map down here with me and my buddy.
We hit another split, where we took a left, and I could feel my stomach muscles tightening from fear, a little more all the time. The tension in my neck was painful. Responsibility for this lovely, brave little child was almost freezing my ability to think. Did he want to ask me,
Aunt Cat, do you know where you're going?
Probably he did, and was just too nice.
Thank God for the occasional functioning lightbulb.
"Jeremy, what's that?"
"That noise?"
"Yes. That rumble."
"It sounds like cars. Up there." He pointed at the stained cement roof.
"I think so, too."
We were under a street. That was good. People are on streets. Help was maybe just a few feet away.
Above us. Through solid concrete.
"Let's think, Jeremy. If we're under a street, sooner or later, there's got to be a manhole."
Hope I'm right. Very much happier, I walked forward. The best thing was that as we walked, the automobile rumblings continued, which meant that we weren't walking away from the street into some deserted backwater, but along under a major throughway.
The tunnel went on and on and on. And in this section there were very few working lightbulbs. We could hardly see the bulb behind us now, and none had appeared ahead yet. The dark was wetly oppressive, the damp like being in a wet paper bag.
"Aunt Cat!"
I jumped inches.
"Aunt Cat. Look up there!"
In the almost total darkness, his sharp young eyes had seen thick, staple-shaped wire metal brackets, set into the wall to form a ladder. And where there's a ladder, there ought to be someplace it goes. "Great, Jeremy!" I climbed up.
What I saw was exciting and daunting at the same time. A round iron manhole cover was visible in the low light, primarily because it was a dark red-rust color against the gray cement. From the circular collar area around it depended stalactites of yuck. The yuck was probably a mixture of road salt and street cruddies. From the crisp, crusty look of the stuff, it could have been accumulating there for a decade, sealing the opening.
I pushed the round iron lid.
The manhole cover wouldn't budge. I pushed and pushed at it, but I was standing seven steps above the tunnel floor with my feet wedged uncomfortably onto a metal bracket. If I pushed up with all my might, the bracket cut painfully into the bottom of my arches. I tried standing sideways to the ladder, placing my feet along the bracket instead of across it, but that put one foot ahead of the other. I pushed up hard, but the awkwardness of the position reduced my leverage.
It was so frustrating I almost cried. Here we were within earshot of safety. I whispered a few choice words under my breath, and that took some of the frustration away.
Standing with my feet crosswise on the bracket again, I took a deep breath, held it, and gave a mighty heave. The iron lid moved, ever so slightly. Then a rumble passed above and it slid back in place.
Damn! Damndamndamn! Still, I had broken the seal that rust and street goo had put on it. The second time had to be easier.
Somewhere I had read that manhole covers were made round so that they couldn't fall into the hole, as square ones could. Thank heaven. Picturing this thing that felt like a hundred pounds of cast iron falling down on me and Jeremy would have been enough to make me give up.
"Are you okay, Aunt Cat?"
"Reasonably okay. Here I go again."
One more
huge
heave. I felt the muscles scream in my back. There— the lid was off! A thin crescent moon of light showed between the lid and the cement. Warier now about it slipping back, I pushed it more sideways than straight up, and the stupid thing moved much more easily, sliding rather than being held up by my sheer force.
Air! The glow of streetlights!
Jeremy said, "Yay!"
"Damn right! Yay!"
With another big push, the cover slid farther off. Suddenly, there was a crash and a rattle as a truck tire the size of a Zamboni rolled over it. I lurched back and lost my grip. I tumbled down the bracket ladder and stupidly tried to catch myself with my left hand. The hand got hold of a bracket and the weight of my body pulled my elbow and shoulder joint so hard I screamed.
I slid the rest of the way down to the wet cement floor.
"Aunt Cat! Aunt Cat! Don't be dead!"
Jeremy shrieked and wept and patted my face. My shoulder felt dislocated. "I'm not dead," I said, although frankly I wondered. Of course, it wouldn't hurt this much if I were.
Slowly, lying in the muck, I made myself sit up. Years ago, my third brother had dislocated his shoulder falling off a playground jungle gym. I remembered the doctor had said if it was dislocated, my brother would be unable to raise his arm above shoulder level. I tried raising my arm above shoulder level. It hurt a lot. Whimpering in pain, I nevertheless was able to raise it. Not dislocated. It needed ice. Cat Marsala, instant orthopedist. But my first job was to get us out of here. Ice could come later.
Above our heads the manhole cover was tipping and rattling back and forth in the traffic vibrations. It had better not fall back into place.
"Jeremy, we can get out. But that's a busy street up there, so we'd better do this really, really carefully. You follow behind me up the ladder."
Right. Up the ladder. One-handed, maybe?
I was afraid that I would edge my head up into the open space only to have it clipped by a truck tire. I wished I had a periscope or even a mirror. It was so exciting to be within inches of safety that I could hardly restrain myself enough. However, I waited at the top of the ladder, with Jeremy just below me, while cars and trucks rumbled and thundered above. Then came a pause. That ought to mean a red light down the street.
I peeked up. Yes, there was a streetlight half a block away. The traffic had stopped, but the light was changing again.
"Okay, Jeremy. Get ready. We're going out in about two minutes. When I think it's safe I'll jump out. Then you come just to the top of the ladder. But be ready to duck back down
fast
if I say so."
* * *
In the event, it happened more easily than that. The light changed. Traffic was thin, and we climbed out fast and walked from the street to the sidewalk. We should have pushed the manhole cover back, but I was just too drained. I found a cop instead.
I showed him the manhole cover problem. He called it in to Traffic Control. I asked him to page my friend, Chief Harold McCoo. "About the shooting at the Oz Festival. Tell him I'm Cat Marsala." The cop looked at me kind of funny, seeing an unprepossessing, bedraggled, smelly, damp woman wincing in pain and holding the hand of a bedraggled, smelly, damp child. But he paged.
Jeremy and I sat in a squad car, listening to the police radio and trying to feel warm. McCoo was on his way. As I tried to relax I suddenly thought, What about the cat? I looked over at Jeremy.
He was just taking the cat out from under his shirt.
I smiled.
This was all fine, and thank God we were alive. But an even harder problem lay ahead.
What should I do about Barry?
7
WE'VE COME SUCH A LONG WAY ALREADY
"It can't be only ten after ten!" I was utterly amazed. Apparently Jeremy and I had been down in the tunnels only a little over an hour. It had seemed like four or five hours.
We were in the District Commander's office in the brand-new First District police station. My friend Harold McCoo had come in and declared that, even though the detectives would prefer to take us to the Area, which is where detectives ordinarily hang out, the new First District would be better for Jeremy. We were here already, for one thing, and McCoo believed it would upset him more to move him. Also, the new station was clean and bright and had quite a dazzling selection of food and drink machines. And milk, which somebody had poured into a plastic plate for the cat.
One of the detectives was bringing Barry to the First District from the festival, where he had been questioned. Remarkably, McCoo himself was taking a statement from Jeremy. A chief of detectives
never
does this kind of thing. They don't go out on cases. Commanders of districts, who are below McCoo in the hierarchy, don't go out on cases either. Nor, despite what you see on television, do the lieutenants who rank still further down. But McCoo loved children and he realized that Jeremy was fragile.
Harold McCoo was a very good man.
* * *
"My name is Harold," he said, holding out his hand. Jeremy shook it soberly. Jeremy was veering back and forth in emotions, between excitement and the teary residue of fear.
"I'm Jeremy Marsala," he said.
"That was very brave of you, going down into the tunnels."
"Yeah, I guess. But we had to. The bad guy was chasing us."
McCoo is a middle-aged black man of medium height and stately motions. He doesn't rush; he's never flustered. His main problem in life, seemingly, is a constant fight with his weight. He loves food. Now he must have decided Jeremy needed a little distraction.
"You want to get something to eat from the machines? I've got plenty of coins."
"Sure!" Jeremy went out with McCoo. I stayed in my chair, on the theory that bonding between McCoo and Jeremy would be good for both of them. Besides, my shoulder was shrieking in pain and the less I moved the happier I was. In a couple of minutes they came back.
"McCoo!" I said, when I saw Jeremy return carrying Twinkies, a Hershey bar, a can of Coke, and a bag of hard candy. There had to be a pound of pure sugar in the collection. His parents would freak. Under my breath I muttered, "That's right. Bribe a child."
"What?"
"Uh, nothing."
McCoo said, "All the adrenaline you two've been pumping probably sucked up his blood glucose. Glycogen. Whatever. I'm just trying to replenish it."
"Yeah, yeah. I know a cop with a marshmallow heart when I see one."
"Very funny. Now, Jeremy, tell me how the bad guy started to go after you. What happened right at first, before the chase?"
"You mean when the man ran to Daddy?"
"Yes."
"Well, me and Aunt Cat were talking with Je-Jennifer. And then I looked around and this guy was sort of grabbing my dad. And then the guy fell down. And, no, wait, we started walking over to Dad and
then
the guy fell down, I think. And Aunt Cat and Jennifer went over to look at the guy who fell down but Dad said, Get Jeremy away, because you know how grown-ups always think things with blood are gonna be bad for kids."
"Yes, I know. Grown-ups are like that."
"And so we went to the monkey merry-go-round. And Jennifer went back to see. She could tell you about that part."
"Um. Yes. She did tell one of the officers about it."
"Okay."
So Jeremy didn't know that Jennifer was dead. I had felt fairly sure that he didn't. He could find that out later, if he had to. There had been enough emotional stress for him for one night.
