"Shit," West said when they rolled up on the scene.

"Fuck."

She parked on the side of the narrow, dark street.

"You see that tall man right there getting out of the car, the one in the suit? You know who that is?"

Brazil reached for the door handle, then thought better of it.

"I know exactly who it is," he said.

"Huge Bedsore."

West shot him a surprised look. It was true the cops had a pet name for their city councilman, but she wasn't clear on how Brazil knew about it.

"Not one peep out of you," West warned as she opened her door.

"Stay out of the way." She got out.

"And don't touch anything."

The ambulance was rumbling, and parked in the middle of the street with the tailgate open wide, light spilling out as red and blue flashed and strobed from cop cars. The men had convened near a rear tire to come up with a plan. West followed around to the back to assess the problem for herself, Brazil right behind her and dying to get in front. Swan was inside, as far back as he could get, wielding a pair of surgical scissors, his eyes bloody egg yolks filled with fury when the woman cop in the white shirt filled his vision.

He had knots on his head and was bleeding from the fight he had gotten into at the nip joint where he had been gambling and drinking Night Train Express fortified wine. When he was put in the ambulance, it was one of those times when he decided he really didn't feel like going anywhere just that second. Whenever this happened. Swan seized the environment. In this case, he grabbed the closest dangerous object he could, and yelled to the paramedics that he had AIDS and was going to cut every one of them. They jumped out and got the cops, all of them men, except for that one with the big tits peering in at him like she might do some thing.

West saw the problem plainly. The subject was holding down the lock to a side door that led out to the street, and the only way to get to him was for someone to climb inside the ambulance. This didn't require much of a plan. West went around to confer with the committee of officers still gathered by the same tire.

"I'm going to divert him," she said as Bledsoe stared at her as if he'd never seen a woman in uniform.

"The minute he takes his hand off the door, you guys grab him," she made sure they understood.

She got closer to the open back of the ambulance and made a face, waving a hand before her eyes.

"Who used pepper spray?" she called out.

"Even that didn't stop him," one of the cops let her know.

Next thing Brazil knew, West had climbed inside the ambulance and picked up an aluminum stretcher to use as a shield. She did this easily, and her lips moved. Swan didn't like whatever it was she was communicating to him. His eyes were on hers, arteries bulging in his neck as he twitched and challenged her with looks and utterances. She was halfway inside when he lunged. Swan was sucked out as if he opened the door of an airplane. Brazil went around to check and found him facedown on the street being cuffed by all those men with a plan. City Councilman Bledsoe watched, hands in his pockets. His eyes followed West as she walked back to her car. Then he stared at Brazil.

"Come here," Bledsoe said to him.

Brazil cast a furtive glance in West's direction, certain he might get left alone out on this dark, unfriendly road.

He was mindful that West had ordered him not to talk to anyone.

"You're the ride-along," Bledsoe stated as he got closer.

"I don't know if I'm the ride-along," Brazil answered. He was just trying to be modest, but the councilman took it the wrong way. He thought the kid was being a smartass.

"Guess Superwoman there just gave you a good story, huh?" The councilman nodded his head toward West, who was getting back into her car.

Brazil was beginning to panic.

"I've got to go," he said. Bledsoe had a goatee and liked gloss gel. He was the minister of the Baptist church on Jeremiah Avenue. Strobing police lights flashed in his glasses as he stared at Brazil and mopped his neck with a handkerchief.

"Let me just tell you one thing," he went on, getting unctuous.

"The city of Charlotte doesn't need people coming out here and being insensitive to humanity and poverty and crime. Even this man here is not to be ridiculed or laughed at."

Swan was being led away, dazed. He had been minding his own business in the nip joint one minute and was sucked up by aliens the next.

Bledsoe swept a hand over the lighted skyline in the distance, rising and sparkling like a kingdom.

"Why don't you write about that?" the councilman said it as if he wanted Brazil to start taking notes, so he did.

"Look at all the good, the accomplishments. Look at how we've grown. Voted the most attractive city to live in nationwide, third largest banking center in the country, with an appreciation of the arts. People are in line to move here. But no. Oh no." He tapped Brazil's shoulder.

"I'll wake up in the morning to another depressing story. An ambulance hijacked by a man with a knife. News intended to strike fear in the hearts of citizens."

West started pulling out and Brazil broke into a run, as if he were about to miss the school bus. Bledsoe looked surprised and annoyed for he hadn't finished talking, and West knew it was no accident that the councilman just happened to be out tonight while Andy Brazil, the experiment in community policing, was riding. Bledsoe would find his way into a story and impress his constituents this reelection year with how diligent and caring he was. CITY COUNCILMAN TAKES TIME TO RIDE WITH POLICE. She could see the headline now. Opening the glove box, she rummaged for a roll of Turns.

She stopped the car so Brazil could climb in. He wasn't even breathing hard and had just sprinted a good fifty yards. Reminders like that made West want to smoke.

"I told you not to talk to anyone," she said, lighting up.

"What was I supposed to do?" He was indignant.

"You walked off without me and he got in my face."

They passed more impoverished houses, most of them boarded up and not lived in anymore. Brazil was staring at West, thinking about Bledsoe calling her Superwoman.

"They made a mistake promoting you," Brazil said.

"That was really something, what you did back there."

West had been good at this once. Taking the sergeant's exam had been the first step toward paperwork and political correctness. If Hammer hadn't come to town, West was fairly certain she would have looked for some thing else.

"So tell me," Brazil was saying.

"Tell you what?" West asked, blowing out a stream of smoke.

"What did you say to him?" Brazil wanted to know.

"Say to who?"

"You know, the guy in the ambulance."

"Can't tell you."

"Come on. You said something that really pissed him off," Brazil insisted.

"Nope." West flicked an ash out the window.

"Oh, come on. What?"

"I didn't say anything."

"Yes you did."

"I called him a pussy," she finally confessed.

"And you can't print that."

"You're right," Brazil told her.