新视野大学英语 读写教程第三册 unit1-c

　　Section (C)For the Want of a Telephone Call

      For more than half an hour 38 respectable 1 Brooklyn, New York citizens watched a man attack and stab (刺杀) a womanthree separate times. Twice their talk and the sudden glow of their bedroom lights frightened him off. Each time he returnedand stabbed her again. Not one person telephoned the police during the attack; one person called after the woman was dead.

That was two weeks ago.

Still shocked is Assistant Police Chief Keith Williams, in charge of the Brooklyn detectives (侦探). He can tell you the facts ofmany murders. But this killing 2 leaves him confused—not because it is a murder, but because “good people” failed to call thepolice.

“As we understand it,” he said, “the man had three chances to kill this woman during a 35-minute period. He returnedtwice to complete the job. If we had been called when he first attacked, the woman might not be dead now.”

This is what the police say happened beginning at 3:20 AM in the proper, tree-lined neighborhood:

Twenty-eight-year-old Marissa Parry was returning home from her job as manager of a bar (酒吧). She parked her car in alot next to the local railroad station, locked the door, and started to walk the 100 feet to the entrance of her apartment. Theentrance to the apartment is at the rear 3 of the building because the front of the building contains small stores. Theneighborhood was covered in a sleeping darkness.

Miss Parry noticed a man at the far end of the lot, near a seven-story apartment house. She halted. Then, nervously 4, sheheaded up the street, where there is a police call box. She got as far as a street light in front of a bookstore (书店) before the mangrabbed her. She screamed. Lights went on in the ten-story apartment house across the street. Windows were opened andvoices spoke 5 in the early-morning stillness.

Miss Parry screamed: “Oh, my God, he stabbed me! Please help me! Please help me!”

From one of the upper windows in the apartment house, a man called down: “Let that girl alone!”

The man looked up at him, shrugged 6 (耸肩) and walked down the street toward a white car parked a short distance away.

Miss Parry struggled to her feet.

Lights went out. The man returned to Miss Parry, now trying to make her way around the side of the building by theparking lot to get to her apartment. The man stabbed her again.

“I'm dying!” she called out. “I'm dying!”

Windows were opened again, and lights went on in many apartments. The man got into his car and drove away. Miss Parrystaggered to her feet. A city bus passed. It was 3:35 AM.

The man returned. By then, Miss Parry had crawled (爬行) to the back of the building, where doors to the apartment househeld out hope for safety. The killer 7 tried the first door; she wasn't there. At the second door, he saw her lying on the floor at thefoot of the stairs. He stabbed her a third time — killing her.

It was 3:50 by the time the police received their first call, from a man who was a neighbor of Miss Parry. In two minutesthey were at the scene. The neighbor, a 70-year-old woman, and another woman were the only persons on the street. Nobodyelse came forward.

The man explained that he had called the police after much thought. He had phoned a friend for advice and then he hadgone to the apartment of the elderly woman to get her to make the call.

“I didn't want to get involved,” he told the police.

Six days later, the police arrested Vincent Ellis, a 29-year-old business-machine operator, and charged him with murder.

Ellis had no previous police record. He is married, has two children and owns a home. On Wednesday, a court committed himto a hospital for observation (观察) of his mental condition. When questioned by the police, Ellis said that he had killed twoother women.

The police stressed how simple it would have been to have gotten in touch with them. “A phone call,” said one of thepolicemen, “would have done it.”

Today people from the neighborhood, which is made up mostly of expensive one-family homes with the exception of the twoapartment houses near the railroad station, find it difficult to explain why they didn't call the police.

A housewife said, “We thought it was a quarrel between two lovers.” A husband and wife both said, “Frankly, we wereafraid.”

Another couple, now willing to talk about that night, said they heard the first screams. “We went to the window to see whatwas happening,” the husband said, “but the light from our bedroom made it difficult to see the street.” The wife, still uneasy,added: “I put out the light and we were able to see better.” When asked why they hadn't called the police, she shrugged andreplied: “I don't know.”

A man looked out from his apartment and gave a description of the killer's second attack. Why hadn't he called the police atthe time? “I was tired,” he said without emotion. “I went back to bed.”

It was 4:25 AM when the ambulance arrived to take the body of Miss Parry. It drove off. “Then,” a policeman said, “thepeople came out.”