Circling the Square

For four years the Harvard man may neglect Soldiers Field or University Hall, but he cannot do without the Square. If he has a car, half his time will be spent searching for parking space. If he walks, half his money will be devoted to the ties at Leopold Morse or the pipes at Leavitt and Peirce. The commuter will pursue his bus; the shopper will nibble mints at Woolworth's and the theatergoer will dash for the subway stairs. The Square is the beginning and end of all life: it is the road to class and the cup for that last drop of midnight coffee.

But to Police Officer Daniel Sughrue the Square is a headache. From his police box he looks out daily upon four hundred and fifty minutes of human nature at its worst. He brings order out of confusion and safety to traffic lanes that were laid out by the hooves of cattle. No job could be more exasperating, none so important to Harvard, and none so little recognized.

Sughrue, however, has never thought of himself as a humanitarian. "I'm just a mechanical man," he tells you. Such a state of mind is the result of half a year's duty in the Square. Six hundred questions are thrown at him daily. They have taught him not to take life seriously. Most of them come from women, and they are on subjects on which Sughrue is least prepared. Although happily unmarried, his manner is one which invites confidence in all shopping crises. He is looked upon as an expert on silk underwear particularly, and hats and gloves less often. Few questions are asked about food, but Sughrue admits that he is singled out continuously for directions to the best bar. Road advice can be aggravating, but he loses his temper only rarely at out-and-out stupidity.

On one football Saturday, a young couple, who put no faith in the thousands of rooters streaming down Boylston Street, asked the way to Soldiers Field. Sughrue sent them hurrying down Massachusetts Avenue towards M. I. T.

But life is not all a question mark to Officer Sughrue. His police-box in the Square has endowed him with philosophic calm. The busses and street-cars are passing phantoms, but the bits of human nature that Sughrue observes are real and lasting. He likes to watch for each new crop of Radcliffe Freshmen and takes pride in his ability to spot the "belles dames" of the Fall Season. Progress is slow at first. The Freshmen stroll through the Square, alone and un-eyed. In a week or two Sughrue is quick to note the presence of an occasional escort. Sughrue swears that he has no personal interest in all these goings-on, but when the same couple begins to appear day after day, he enjoys a certain tingling of satisfaction.

Before he ruled the Square with hand and whistle, Sughrue was in the motorcycle division. He liked that far better. Here he has to be in his box from 8 a.m. until 6 p.m., but he gets an hour off in the morning and afternoon. During the rest of the time he lives on Sparks Street, but is always a little cautious about going indoors, because the change of air puts him right to sleep. His job, however, is easier than it might have been years ago. Harvard men, he thinks, are getting better behaved all the time. Sughrue has never thought what he would do in case of a riot. He's so used to his traffic box that he might become helpless outside. It is more than home to him.

Despite the wind, life is really quite logical and complete for Officer Sughrue. For the Square has its well defined limits, and within them he is master.