A Cambridge Night

I WAS COMING HOME to South House from the Square around midnight. On my way through the Common I noticed a group of people talking and smoking by the path, so I hugged the shadows and slipped by quietly. They say the Common is a dangerous place at night.

As I came out of the Common I saw the lights of police cars and tow trucks at a corner ahead and hurried to join the onlookers. There was a flattened Dodge Dart sitting in the middle of the road. A tow truck was trying to pull it apart from a shiny, twisted Volkswagen Beetle resting against the curb. One of those flashy low sports cars sat on the other curb, its fiberglass body shattered in pieces on the tar. A fourth car had already been hauled off--only a broken headlamp remained. The passing traffic beat an empty rhythm on the metal and glass rubbish left in the street.

The people at the scene were too familiar: a driver wandered in a daze around the bent cars, a crowd of people stood and stared; a woman sat on the ground with her head in her hands; a policeman tried to keep things moving. The tow truck creaked as it dragged the two cars out of each other's steel embrace, but the people made no sound. An insistent flash from the policeman's cruiser froze the image in blue once every second.

My fascination for the grotesque had almost been satisfied when someone ran up to the intersection and stopped a Cambridge police cruiser driving through. I recognized him--he had been in my Bio section last year. It seems he had just been held up and robbed in the Common. He was trying to explain that to the cop in the cruiser when another officer shouted at him for blocking traffic. The cop in the cruiser pulled over grouchily to talk to the kid, who was scared and breathing hard. The cop took a description of the robber, filled out a four-by-five robbery card, and called his partner over.

A man had pulled a gun and said "Drop your wallet," the student told the two policemen. They at least went through the motions of paying careful attention. The robber was black, about six feet tall, and wore a light brown jacket, the student said. I remember that clearly because only a few minutes earlier I had walked past a man meeting that description in the darkest part of the Common.

After talking a while, fiddling with his radio, and wasting enough time to let any half-wise robber disappear, the first policeman told his partner and the student to get in the car, and they moved out. The cruiser raced back to catch the criminal with its high beams on and blue lights flashing. Even a sleeping wino would have fled the area. The cruiser drove right onto the Common as if it expected to find someone waiting there, but the Common, of course, was empty.

I continued on my way, telling myself it was a good time to stop walking through the dark places in Cambridge late at night (I haven't stopped, though), and a good time to stop flirting with danger when I cross streets around the Square (I haven't stopped that, either). As I walked, the tow truck passed me, dragging the battered Volkswagen. There was wet blood on the wheel.

I came back to my room, tucked away at the Quad, and bolted the door behind me. I put on a new album and turned the stereo up loud, opened a book on love by Plato, and pretended to read. Through my open window, I thought I heard a scream come from way off beyond the dorms, but I'm sure it was just my imagination.