Raga Six (A Doctor Orient Occult Novel) (4 page)

A moment later the music and noise was split by the sounds of sirens, whistles, and tires screeching against asphalt, as the park was surrounded by wailing squadrons of police cars and trucks. Helmeted police leaped out of the cars and covered the exits.

The music stopped. For a long time everything was still except for the dying whine of the sirens. No one moved. The rotating emergency lights on the cars flashed in the lowering darkness like electronic heartbeats.
 

A policeman with a bullhorn awkwardly mounted the roof of a squad car. His voice came to Orient as a disembodied echoing rasp. "This is an illegal assembly. Please move out of the center area NOW!"
 

No one moved. "Everyone will MOVE OUT of the park NOW!" the voice repeated without emotion for all of its emphasis.
 

Orient felt the tension in the crowd stretching tight. He began to perspire as a stifling blanket of claustrophobia wrapped itself around him.
 

The crowd began inching forward. For an instant it seemed to be heading straight for him. Then the tension snapped, unleashing a rush of fury that literally staggered him with the force of its rage.
 

Everyone was yelling and shoving. The young people shrieked obscenities and incomprehensible phrases of hate, partially drowning out the repetition of orders from the bullhorn. The police advanced quickly, shouting directions to each other as they moved.
 

Everything was a jerky m61ange of movement. He was whirled around in stumbling circles, his arms and legs twitching like a puppet dangling in a high wind. The young people converged and pressed forward. Orient was pulled along with them, trapped in the surging crush.
 

"Off the PIGS!... Motherin’ Pigs... MOTHERS!"
 

"Get 12 working... Unit 12 over THERE... DAMMIT, MOVE!"
 

"RAMSHACKLE THOSE PIGS... Gimme somethin’—gimme SOMETHIN’!"
 

Girls and boys began ripping concrete chunks from the sidewalks and hurling them at the police; bending and rifting frantically as they clawed at the ground for some weapon. Bottles made heavy arcs in the air, shattering at the feet of the police. A policeman went down and was quickly surrounded by three others who shielded him with their bodies as they helped him back toward the squad cars. The rest of the police split into groups of four or five and began charging toward the crowd. A series of flat POPS exploded dully and clouds of dank, stinging gas erupted from the ground near Orient, searing his eyes and sending him reeling backward.
 

He was stunned by a sudden blow against the side of his face. He tried to move forward but he couldn’t. He was on the ground, his face pressed against the dirt. He realized that he hadn’t been hit but had fallen down. His leg was lying on top of something soft and writhing and wailing to get loose. He rolled over. Julian was lying next to him.
 

Tears had cut brown furrows through the dirt caking the boy’s face and he’d lost his hat, but now that Orient’s leg was no longer pinning his body he was quite calm. He crawled up to Orient’s chest and looked into his face. When he saw that Orient’s eyes were open, he leaned over, "Let’s get out of here," he whispered.
 

Orient sat up, pulling Julian close to him. He saw two policemen chasing a boy who had an American flag draped around himself. The boy stopped short, spun around and changed direction. One policeman staggered off balance but managed to grab an edge of the banner. The boy jumped away, shedding the flag and leaving the policeman holding an empty piece of cloth. But then the other policeman rushed up to the boy from behind and swung his nightstick against his neck, knocking him down. He dug his fingers into the boy’s long hair and began dragging him toward the exit. Two girls leaped on the policeman’s back. He continued to drag the boy by the hair, jabbing his free elbow back into the body of one of the girls who was pulling on his arm.
 

The other policeman, the flag still clutched in his hand, whacked the girl’s bare legs methodically with his club, each blow raising long red welts on her shins and thighs. Three more policemen ran up to help and carried the still struggling young people away.
 

As the area cleared, Orient saw a small building about twenty yards in front of him. He got to his feet and went toward it, moving in a half-crouch, holding Julian against his chest with both arms. The boy started kicking.
 

"Mommy. Wait for Mommy," Julian cried out. He pointed back to the area they had just left.
 

Orient turned and saw Sun Girl peering through the dust and fumes, squinting through inflamed, tearing eyes. Her hands were stretched out in front of her as she moved haltingly through the melee. She was half blind and yelling hysterically for Julian, her voice raw as she called his name again and again.
 

Still crouching, Orient went back and tugged at her arm. She pulled away. "I want my boy—my boy—DON’T TOUCH ME," she screamed, her face contorted with desperation.
 

"He’s here," Orient yelled, pulling her toward him.
 

"I’m okay, Mommy," Julian called out.
 

Orient grabbed Sun Girl’s hand and began moving toward the building. A whirling crowd of people moved across the grass threatening to cut them off from shelter. Sun Girl fell heavily toward the ground as Orient began to run. He let go of her hand and sprinted the last few yards to the building. He deposited the protesting boy against the wall and ran back to the grass. Then he pushed his way through the scuffling throng, pulled Sun Girl to her feet and guided her to the side of the building where Julian was waiting.
 

Sun Girl held Julian close as the boy gently touched his mother’s eyes with his tiny fingers. "Are you all right, Mommy?" he asked over and over.
 

Orient saw a door. He pushed against it and it opened. He came back and led Sun Girl and Julian inside, closing the door behind them.
 

Silence.
 

Orient blinked hard, trying to focus through the stinging blur of his sight.
 

They were in a public lavatory.
 

Sun Girl sighed and sat down on the floor, leaning her back against the wall. Julian sat next to her and put his head in her lap. He tried to rub his eyes, but she held his hands firmly. "If you rub it, it gets worse," she said softly.
 

Julian nodded and closed his eyes.
 

Sun Girl looked at Orient, screwing up her face as she tried to see clearly. "It’s you," she said, "the one with the funny name."
 

"That’s right." Orient looked around for the washbasin. He washed his hands, then put his head under the faucet and let the water run over his eyes. "Come over here," he said to Sun Girl, "and bring Julian.”

Sun Girl tore a strip from the sleeve of her blouse and held it under the water. She took the wet cloth and carefully washed Julian’s face. Orient started to speak but a familiar tug at the base of his brain interrupted him. The gentle probe of telepathic communication.
 

The picture formed.
 

A confusing streak of movement. Orient felt a quick snap of anxiety. The picture faded, then formed again. A policeman. The picture drained away. Orient looked at the door. Someone was trying to contact him.
 

Automatically he went receptive and felt another alien pang of anxiety. It was someone nearby. He headed for the door. "Policeman, policeman," Julian was saying. "Help! Help!"

CHAPTER 3

When Orient opened the door, he was assailed by the screams and stinging fumes. Using all his concentration, he emptied his mind and went receptive, reaching out for the strange sense of anxiety, using the presence to guide himself through the tumult.
 

As he crossed the grass, a policeman charged toward him, his gas mask and upraised club giving him the unearthly look of a giant insect waving some deadly antenna. Orient dodged and began to run.
 

The policeman sprinted after him but was bowled over by the body of a girl who fell kicking directly under his feet.
 

Orient looked around wildly. His nose was starting to run and his eyes were overflowing with burning tears. He blinked hard as his mind tried to hold firm to the fluctuating anxiety signal. He felt close to the source of the call.
 

Then he saw the cowboy. The potential. He was lying face down next to a tree. Nearby two policemen were trying to subdue a girl who was shrieking curses and a boy whose face was streaming blood.
 

Orient ran to the other side of the tree and, keeping his body low, pulled the cowboy next to him against the trunk, unnoticed by the policemen who were still struggling with the couple.
 

Orient made a fast check for broken bones. There were none. The cowboy must have involuntarily called out when he was injured. A series of short metallic explosions unloosed fresh billows of gas over the field.
 

Orient grabbed the cowboy under the shoulders and began dragging him toward the building. Halfway there his path was blocked by a trio of youths who were heaving stones at a group of police. The police charged them, heading straight for Orient. He dropped to the ground, protecting the unconscious cowboy with his own body.
 

Something heavy cracked against Orient’s wrist, numbing his arm to the shoulder. A foot came down on his kidneys, sending an excruciating jolt of pain through his midsection. A surge of nausea came up bitter in his throat and his knees jackknifed against his chest as he tightened his body against another kick.
 

It never came.
 

Orient opened his eyes and saw that the police had converged on the rock throwers and were driving them back toward the exit. He slowly got to his feet, the pain in his lower back preventing him from straightening up completely. He looked down at the cowboy. The man’s eyelids fluttered. He was conscious.
 

"Get up," Orient yelled, pulling the cowboy to a sitting position. The cowboy shook his head and tried to see through the hair hanging in front of his face. He brushed the hair away from his red, swollen eyes, revealing a shallow gash on his forehead. When he saw Orient, he tried to grin.
 

"Well, goddamn," he drawled. "You again, huh?"
 

"Come on." Orient helped the cowboy to his feet and headed for the building, his body still bent from the pain in his side.
 

When they reached the lavatory, Orient dropped to the floor and lay very still until the agonizing knot binding his back and stomach diminished to an uncomfortable throb. He flexed the fingers of his injured hand, sending a fresh shock of hurt through his bruised wrist.
 

"That’s gonna hurt for a while, man," the cowboy said from the washbasin. "You better stick it under this cool water here."
 

As Orient painfully and slowly got to his feet, Sun Girl came over to help him.
 

"Well, well, well, you meet the damndest citizens in ladies’ johns these days," the cowboy chuckled. "Sun Girl, what are you doing in here with trash like my buddy and me?"
 

"Only trash around here is some loudmouth dude," Sun Girl smiled. Then she saw the gash on his forehead and the smile faded.
 

The sound of loud voices pulled everyone’s eyes to the door. The voices rose and there were the shuffling sounds of a struggle outside.
 

The cowboy went to the door but Sun Girl’s voice stopped his hand on the knob. "Not yet, Julian’s here."
 

The cowboy looked over and saw the little boy, asleep next to the wall, wrapped in his mother’s green suede jacket. He took his hand off the knob. The sounds faded.
 

"You’d better let me take a look at that cut on your forehead," Orient said. The cowboy ambled over to the basin, and stood impatiently, shifting his weight from foot to foot as Orient washed away the coagulated blood matted with hair and dirt from his forehead.
 

When the wound was clean, Orient examined it closely, checking for signs of a fracture.
 

"You got a real touch there, man," the cowboy congratulated.
 

"You should have been a sawbones or somethin’."
 

"I am a doctor," Orient muttered, "and you should probably get your skull x-rayed for a possibly hairline fracture."
 

"Ain’t no billy club hard enough to crack this bean," the cowboy snorted. He extended his hand. "I’m Joker, Doc," he said, "and this female here is..."
 

"I’ve already introduced myself, thanks," Sun Girl snapped.
 

Joker released Orient’s hand and lifted his arms in surrender. "Damned if I don’t apologize to you, ma’am," he said with exaggerated courtesy. He winked at Orient. "Women’s Lib, you understan’, Doc." Then his blue eyes narrowed. "Now you wouldn’t be some kind of nark or something, would you, Doc?" he said, his voice light and bantering. "You been doggin’ my trail all day now."
 

"A what?"
 

"You know man, a cop’s stool." Joker leaned casually against the wall but Orient could sense the cowboy tensing with suspicion. Then he remembered.
 

"My bag," Orient said.
 

"Right, man." Joker touched his forehead gingerly and winced. "What’s your bag is all I’m asking."
 

Orient turned to Sun Girl. "I left my suitcase out there."
 

"Anything important?"
 

"Some clothes, but mainly my passport and other identification."