"So you saw the man go into the door?” I was asked.
"Yes," I replied. "He was at least 6 feet tall. He had a bag strapped to his shoulder.”
The door was the first descent on the 3 line in upper west side of New York City. I was an innocent bystander, some say wrong place wrong time, yet many others say quite the opposite, right place right time. I imagine you will have to be your own judge which camp you place me.
My thoughts rumbled, reminding me of a question I had asked my father one day as a teenager, while we drove through the city.
“Dad, are most people good at heart, or are most people bad people?"
In his young forties age wisdom he glanced over while stopped at a traffic light,
"Andrew, your going to have to answer that yourself.”
I am still trying to address that question. Just like you now, may be judging me, at this specific time and spot, that I was wrong or was right.
The Authorities continued to ask a series of pointed interrogations.
'Why was I standing there, where I stood on the platform?';
'Did I notice others?';
‘When was it I was there?’;
'How long was I present in the station?’;
Given the circumstance I was asking myself all the same questions. It really was just a stopping point on my walk as I took time to unpack a cigarette, light it and smoke it. Innocent enough, right in January 1966?
It is the bystander part that has peeked your curiosity, yes?
All three of us, you, and I and love want the same ... answers. If I may be honest, and I will be, I was not scared. I was conscious of the moment and what I witnessed, yet perhaps more fearful of the repercussions of my vivid recollections of unplanned observations.
New York City had in the mayor's office a very recent replacement to the office, Mayor Lindsay, the Big Apple’s 103rd Mayor. First running in the Republican persuasion and then converting to a Democrat in his second term, but that is way ahead of this tale. In the newbie world his activities were of the tall kind. The tallest was the strike of the transit workers. The president of the union would not see the end of the 12 day walkout, the foremost negotiator, Mike Quinn. His life ended on a hospital bed before the strike’s end.
Turns out, someone has to see something and then most crucially has to say something. That someone was me.
I generally walked the sidewalks but this particular hour I headed for the IRT 3 train on the 7th Avenue Express. Often I would duck in the subway on a cold winter’s day, ride through for a few stations and resume my walk. This day my mood was reversed. I chose to ride the IRT 3 train to 86th street, pop up out of the stairway and continue on to 91st Street. Just like any graffiti artist who frequented the now abandon 91st station, I knew the means to access the platform area of the 91st.
Away from the wind and people above ground I meandered my way to the stairs. Arriving at the platform I took a quick look about. Enough light filtered various points so I could see if others were about. Often the place was also abandoned of people. Everyone seems to had forgotten the station in a few short half dozen or so years since its closure.
True too, no ads were posted above ground suggesting a quiet sanctuary existed below. Quiet much of the time, the trains still passed through here many times a day, but the passengers rarely if ever noticed the station. Only the passing trains brought wind through the tunnel while subway cars passed to and fro.
For me, this vaulted space was one large monastic cell, and for a time mostly mine.
Alone, warm, secluded, most of the city noise abated, seemingly secure, I entered to smoke a cigarette peaceably without interference from mother nature or my own species. This was not an everyday occurrence but an occasional respite from the normalcy of the day to day wheel of life.
Life in which that same normalcy demanded concession, sometimes resistance, once in a while, even revolt. Not being an anarchist or a revolutionary, I settled for sheltered puffs of cigarette smoke in a concealed municipal organ placed on some sort of urban morphine drip.
1966 was a pre “911” era by a year or two. I speak here about the national emergency call system. The fact remains, phone or no phone, this platform had no active line of communication to the metropolis above me, as much as at one specific moment presented itself, to me, did.
As I lit up three matches struck on the matchbox I carried, a magnified reflection bounced across the tracks from the south bound platform off the glazed tiles, illuminating a shadowy human figure, in a large trench coat, stooped over something or other. Just what the coat hid had been put out of my sight lines, and I could not say. Although startled, I was not afraid for I did not jump or scream or really move at all.
The person across the way did not jump out of their skin either, but I sensed assuredly the mortal was surprised, to the point of exiting the platform, for certainly my sudden appearance did not put the man to ease. The only perceived difference from when I had seen the same man earlier from the sidewalk above, was the bag that had been strapped to his shoulder was then left behind, in a small alcove along the platform wall.
I could not attribute any physical marks of the exiting six foot male, for dimness, distance and time did not allow a closer inspection of the hand or facial features. The mysterious character removed himself abruptly from the lower portion of the station.
My thought reminisced strangely in that moment on the proverbial ‘care will kill a cat’. I said to myself,
“I am no cat”.
In the event this human, me, was killed, I added the mental retort, ‘but satisfaction brought it back’, then freely and without any second guessing I headed to the stair crossing the four tracks to the other side.
I carried a flashlight when I knew my destination may be dark. On arrival to the other side, at the bag placed on the floor, I turned on the beam of white light and directed its stream to the bulky bag. The content did not reveal itself, nor, did it give any sign it would do so of its own accord. I gently kicked the pouch. A sound emanated from within.
I listened.
With the precision of a metronome the interior contraption produced an audible tick, with a constant interval that led me to think of a few possibilities, and one unspeakable thought was the worse. This enclosure might contain a timed detonation device. I may not have believed I was a cat, but I surely acted as if curiosity had overtaken my behavior. I kneeled on both knees, turning the right ear toward the sound. I confirmed the tick tock was indeed coming from inside.
Now would have been the time to say a quick prayer and leave with Godspeed.
For better or worse I unloosed a leather strap, then a second. Slowly lifting the flap with straps, up, pulling back the flap far enough to gaze into what was making the sound, I careened. An alarm clock with wires emerging from the rear were present. So too were four tube like, black taped cylinders. Buried a little further in the bag was another fitment, connected it seemed to the wires of the clock, and small lights blinked alternately red, and yellow, and green.
Blink, tick, blink, tock, blink, blink tick, blink, tock, blink continued the sequence. Then some internal warning in my mind sprang with urgency, launching me to an upright orientation with bearings signaling a prompt exit.
Upward and out, I ran.
With pause, once seeing the sky, I considered my next action. All the experiences of the past minutes made mental acuity necessary. Flashing simultaneously through the opinion patterns were the newspaper stories regarding the mass transit workers strike and strife.
Had I stumbled on disruption?
Was this a message waiting to be sent, via a pending explosion?
Why 91st Street?
The only recourse that seemed appropriate was to contact some symbol of authority and share my experience. I did act. Questions from the Authorities ensued.
Was I in the wrong place at the wrong time, or conversely, was I in the right place at the right time? What say ye?
The transit strike ended a few days later. I never heard any details from the Authorities of the investigation regarding the bag, contents, or the 91st Street station platform.
I have always imagined this unexpected find in a shuttered subway station, had in some way brought resolution to a strike that may have continued much longer and violently than it did for those 12 days in January of 1966. It ended, peace prevailed, violence was avoided. Had that bag exploded, if indeed it was designed to do so, no good would have come from it. Perhaps by an act of observation, evil was stilted that day, or not.
People and time come and go, good and evil have a character trait of omnipresence.
The End
© 2017
This story was submitted in March of 2017 for the WNYC historical fiction challenge.
This is a quick fun interactive weekend read.
What do you think happened in January 1966?
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