Black
The man said: “McCary.”
“No.” I shook my head and started to push past him, and he said: “McCary,” again thickly, and then he crumpled into a heap on the wet sidewalk.
It was dark there, there wasn’t anyone on the street — I could have walked away. I started to walk away and then the sucker instinct got the best of me and I went back and bent over him.
I shook him and said: “Come on, chump — get up out of the puddle.”
A cab came around the corner and its headlights shone on me — and there I was, stooping over a drunk whom I’d never seen before, who thought my name was McCary. Any big-town driver would have pegged it for a stick-up, would have shoved off or sat still. That wasn’t a big town — the cab slid alongside the curb and a fresh-faced kid stuck his face into the light from the meter and said: “Where to?”
I said: “No place.” I ducked my head at the man on the sidewalk. “Maybe this one’ll ride — he’s paralyzed.”
The kid clucked: “Tch, tch.”
He opened the door and I stooped over and took hold of the drunk under his armpits and jerked him up and across the sidewalk and into the cab. He was heavy in a funny limp way. There was a hard bulge on his left side, under the arm.
I had an idea. I asked the kid: “Who’s McCary?”