wizard-of-the-pigeons

cheeks. He felt suddenly and intensely sick.
“Get out of here, kid. Go!”
Wizard stood up, but the boy was gone even before he stepped back. He
stared after his vanishing prey.
“Please. Please help me.”
The gray sheaf of hair that was supposed to be combed to cover the old man’s
bald spot had draggled down one side of his head. His old brown sweater was
muddied at the elbow and one knee of his gray pants was torn. Wizard raised
him gently, smelling the unmistakable odor of fried chicken and fish clinging to
him. “Are you hurt?”
“No. God be thanked, I’m not hurt. Boys today. Only a boy that was, did you
see? I told them I didn’t have any money. But they said they had watched me
carrying a bag home every night, and they wanted the deposit. Deposit! Leftover
chicken and fish from the restaurant for my cat. For that they put a knife to my
throat.”
“So why did you tell me to let him go?” Wizard spoke softly, his voice a
deeper nimble than the traffic overhead.
“So maybe it’s not that different, if he kills me over leftover chicken, or you
kill him. Or maybe it’s the delicate ecological balance I was worrying about.” A
quavery laugh shook the old man’s voice. “Look at it this way. I’ve just had the
rare opportunity of seeing a fullgrown Mugger in its natural surroundings as it
taught its young to stalk and attack its natural prey. Think of what might have
happened if you had killed it. Why, there might be a mother Mugger, and a
whole line of little baby Muggers at home in the den, waiting for those two to
bring home their kill. Oh, God!”
The old man started shaking suddenly. Wizard helped him to the dumpster
and he leaned against it until the belated adrenalin shudders had passed. He tried
for another laugh, but it failed. “Or think what it could have done to you, if you
had killed him. Or to me.”
“Would it be worse than what’s been done to you?” Wizard asked. He didn’t
want to be speaking to him like this, especially not in this chilly soulless voice,
but the words were swelling out of him like blood from a wound.
“I’m not hurt. Well, not much. It would be nothing to a man your age. Oh,
I’ve bruises that won’t heal for a week, and a scrape that’s going to keep me
awake all night. But if it hadn’t been for you. I might be headed for the hospital.