Off and on for months, a bulldozer has been scratching around on the grassy lot down near the end of my block, rattling me out of bed before 7 A.M. I would resent it less if I knew why. Dirt has moved from one pile to another, with no discernible program.

The very fact that excavators have arrived in my remote neck of the East Village is testament to the fate of J.R. He was the block's shady patriarch, our enigmatic alpha-neighbor. Until he went "away," as we've learned to say here euphemistically, he protected us from noisy progress.

For two decades, J.R headed up a vibrant heroin bazaar on the stoop next to a dingy midblock Laundromat. Appropriately, he and his colleagues dubbed themselves "the Laundromat Crew," and stamped their heroin "Laundromat" too. It was so enduringly popular among college kids that it has been mythologized in literature and music.

The Crew members lived among us -- or we among them -- in a bemused coalition: Puerto Ricans and yuppies, poets and punks. But the teeming sidewalks always belonged to the Crew. The rest of us were greeted vociferously when we passed. But pass we must. If I stopped to tie a shoelace, a firm voice would goose me along: Keep walking, keep walking, guy. I put up with the second-class relegation for 15 years. We all did. As long as J.R. was in charge, we knew, his would be the only crimes here. That was our dirty compromise.

J.R.'s career was a fixation of mine nonetheless. He was the first person who greeted me on the hot afternoon in 1981 when I landed here. He was 26 then and had spent time in the military, his only experience off the block. At 22, I had just arrived from Kalamazoo , Mich. Here we were, both ebullient, with little money and enormous ambition, I thought.

He was less generous. "Great," J.R. spat as I tramped past him in the lobby that day, "another white fag on the block." Over the years, as J.R. went gray and I went bald, his tolerance for me blossomed. I doubt he ever learned my name. But he never threw brickbats again.

Meanwhile, his customers lined up 15 deep outside the Laundromat to crease tiny envelopes into their palms. Rooftop spotters transmitted warnings to the sellers down below using cries of Spanish code words like Feo and Bajando. On some nights, their canopy of cries could seem as mysterious and beautiful as a jungle aviary.

They were purportedly doing $50,000 a week in business, though I often wondered where the money went. J.R. cultivated a Spartan life. He didn't even own a car. I have since learned that he helped many people with rent or veterinary bills they couldn't otherwise afford. But such token charity can't consume $2.6 million a year.

The denouement, when it came two years ago, was a scene out of a dime-store novel. In seeming slow motion, an army of officers arrived just before 11 P.M. A helicopter whirred overhead, projecting a cone of light over the dingy coin-op, where Crew members were handcuffed in clumsy succession. Well after midnight, J.R., then 41, made a Billy Jack-like appearance. The cops cuffed him with a flourish, I'm told by witnesses. His doting mother, who swings an unbending leg when she walks, gripped his shirt sleeve and unleashed a surreal and memorable cry.

I was curious to read that J.R., whom the tabloids would dub "Little John Gotti," didn't spring for a fancy attorney, and instead of fighting the charges, had his lawyer negotiate a plea. He was sentenced last fall to a dozen years, his first-ever trip to jail. The rest of the Crew got stiff sentences, too.

News of their disposition fluttered down upon the block like black organza. And the earth-moving equipment followed. All winter long the speculation was wild about what the new construction might bring. A police station. AIDS housing. N.Y.U. dorms. Last month, the construction crew posted a permit for 85 apartments over six floors, but one of the foremen undermined the sign's authority. "It's 125 luxury units on seven floors," he was telling people.

As I stood over the muddy hole the other day, I marveled at how one gaping mystery has supplanted another. And then a tempting idea entered my mind: What if there's no building at all? What if, somewhere in that turbid crevice, J.R. has stashed his treasure? Could this wheezing and pounding be directed by him, to remove or replace or replenish the hoard?

Then another thought struck: Keep walking, keep walking, guy.