You grab the nearest person. It's a woman but you shake her anyway. Someone has got to listen.
"Let go of me, you masher," the woman screams. "Help, somebody, help!"
The crowd closes in on you. A sailor grabs you from behind and a man in working clothes hits you with a lunch bucket. You let go of the woman and hit back at him.
"Help! Help!" the woman is still yelping.
"Call the cops—a man's trying to rape a girl!"
Someone hits you with an umbrella, and you know it's the same dear little old lady. A guy grabs you by the neck and tries to throw you to the ground but you kick him in the groin and trade punches with two others. Then they're all over you. The old lady trips you and you go down. She starts beating you with the umbrella as a man's foot smashes against your head. You see a woman's nylon-clad leg as she raises her spiked heel and brings it ripping down across your cheek. Other feet crash into you.
"Let me help you," you're still yelling, but they keep on kicking. Some of the shoes have blood on them, you notice through the haze, but they still keep on kicking.
Then it's getting dark and you lie there and think how Henny Penny—or was it Chicken Little?—must have felt. You want to tell someone about it but you don't. You just lie there and wait for the screaming sirens to come and take you away.