Taste of Tenderloin by Gene O'Neill

helpful. Kind, even. No, he chastised
himself, you can’t think like that. They had all three been volunteers, helping
counteract the Law of Catastrophic Isostasy.
    Sometime shortly after the
last shot, Declan’s thinking and perception had sped back up to
real time. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, took a deep
breath, and washed his face with cool water. As he straightened up
from the sink, the ringing in his ears began to subside.
    Declan pushed the swinging
door back into the store, about the same time a neighborhood bag
lady shuffled in the front door and looked around, frowning
angrily. “Say, boy, where’s that ole Gung Ho or one of ‘em
young’ns? I needs a coffee, bad.”
    Declan shrugged, turning
his face down and away as he pushed by the impatient old woman on
the way to the street, mumbling, “Dunno.”
    He crossed O’Farrell,
looked anxiously back over his shoulder once, and realized no one
was following. He hurried down the block back to his building, the
street still relatively empty of pedestrians and traffic.
Everything had gone real smooth, according to plan. Yes,
indeed.
     
    Inside his studio
apartment, Declan glanced around
cautiously. The tiny room, sparsely furnished, appeared
undisturbed. He stepped over to the chipped desk his social worker
had given him and re-aligned the three pencils parallel with the
edge of his writing pad. Yes, everything was neat and simple, just
like his room had been at the VA hospital in Martinez. Except there
he’d had to go into the dayroom to see TV. Here in his apartment,
Declan sat down on his one folding chair and stared at the portable
black and white set with its rabbit ears. But he didn’t turn on the
TV, just stared intently at the blank grey screen and waited
patiently, a skill he’d developed over the years during his stays
at Martinez.
    After a few minutes, a
figure materialized on the screen: a woman, looking just like the
blindfolded statue down at the Hall of Justice. Only the scales
held by the TV Lady Justice were balanced evenly.
    Declan sighed deeply with
relief.
    At that moment, a feminine
voice in his head announced: You did very
well, Declan Mulcahy. Very well indeed, considering it was your
first assignment. I am quite impressed by your effective and timely
performance. But, to validate to yourself that we have indeed
counteracted the Law of Catastrophic Isostasy, please peruse the
San Francisco Chronicle tomorrow morning, noting the complete
absence of any reported disasters .
    Declan nodded and smiled as
Lady Justice faded from the blank screen. Yes, he promised himself, I will definitely check the newspaper
tomorrow .
     
    Early the next morning,
Declan walked up O’Farrell, glancing
nervously across the street as he passed the Korean’s grocery. SFPD
yellow crime scene tape roped it off, and quite a few cops were
still on the scene, talking to pedestrians up and down both sides
of the street. A TV van from Channel 7 was set up nearby, too. It
looked like that Melendez lady talking into the camera. None of the
policemen seemed the least bit interested in stopping Declan or
asking him questions. Apparently they hadn’t interviewed the bag
lady, or maybe she hadn’t been able to ID him. Either way, he
breathed more easily and walked quickly past the cops.
    Declan continued two blocks
up to the corner of Jones and crossed over to Homeboy’s liquor
store to buy a Chronicle.
    Back out on the street,
Declan anxiously thumbed through the newspaper. No Oklahoma City
bombings, no hurricanes, no earthquakes, no tornados, no floods,
not even a thunderstorm reported in the Midwest. His held breath
trickled out across his dry lips. The voice in his head, the Lady
Justice, had been right. The intervention had definitely worked;
they had managed to keep the scales balanced.
    Jacked up by the results of
the successful covert operation, Declan turned to head back home,
grinning at the dude in the Army cams who was apparently coming in
to