"Garp?" said the policeman interviewing Garp. "I know who you are!" he cried suddenly. Garp felt very anxious. "You're the one who got that molester in that park!"
"Yes!" said Garp. "That was me. But it wasn't here, and it was years ago."
"I remember it as if it were yesterday," the policeman said.
"What's this?" the other policeman asked.
"You're too young," the cop told him. "This is the man named Garp who grabbed that molester in that park--where was it? That child molester, that's who it was. And what was it you did?" he asked Garp, curiously. "I mean, there was something funny, wasn't there?"
"Funny?" said Garp.
"For a living," the policeman said. "What did you do for a living?"
"I'm a writer," Garp said.
"Oh, yeah," the policeman remembered. "Are you still a writer?"
"Yes," Garp confessed. He knew, at least, that he wasn't a marriage counselor.
"Well, I'll be," the policeman said, but something was still bothering him; Garp could tell something was wrong.
"I had a beard then," Garp offered.
"That's it!" the policeman cried. "And you've shaved it off?"
"Right," said Garp.
The policemen had a conference in the red glow of the taillights of the squad car. They decided to give Garp and Duncan a ride home, but they said Garp would still have to show them some information regarding his identity.
"I just don't recognize you--from the pictures--without the beard," the older policeman said.
"Well, it was years ago," Garp said, sadly, "and in another town."
Garp felt uneasy that the young man in the caftan would get to see the house the Garps lived in. Garp imagined the young man would show up one day, asking for something.
"You remember me?" the kid asked Duncan.
"I don't think so," Duncan said, politely.
"Well, you were almost asleep," the boy admitted. To Garp he said, "You're too uptight about children, man. Children make it just fine. This your only child?"
"No, I have another one," Garp said.
"Man, you ought to have a dozen other ones," the boy said. "Then maybe you wouldn't get so uptight about just one, you know?" This sounded to Garp like what his mother called the Percy Theory of Children.
"Take your next left," Garp told the policeman who was driving, "then a right, and it's on the corner." The other policeman handed Duncan a lollipop.
"Thank you," Duncan said.
"What about me?" the kid in the caftan asked. "I like lollipops." The policeman glared; when he turned his back, Duncan gave the kid his lollipop. Duncan was no fan of lollipops, he never had been.
"Thank you," the boy whispered. "You see, man?" he said to Garp. "Kids are just beautiful."
So is Helen, Garp thought--in the doorway with the light behind her. Her blue, floor-length robe had a high, roll-up collar; Helen had the collar turned up as if she were cold. She also had her glasses on, so that Garp knew she'd been watching for them.
"Man," whispered the kid in the caftan, elbowing Garp as he got out of the car. "What's that lovely lady like when she gets her glasses off?"
"Mom! We got arrested," Duncan called to Helen. The squad car waited at the curb for Garp to get his identification.