the chair beside him.
“Hi, kid. I shoulda known something would happen. You’re like your old man, always action when he was around. A good fight, maybe, plenty of singing, lots of action.”
I took the beer the girl brought me and let it sit there. The suds wouldn’t go right on top of breakfast. “Don’t look at me, Tod. Whatever’s going on isn’t my bit.”
“Pig’s ass. Maybe you just stirred the soup.”
“What’s happening?”
Under the sweater the bony shoulders tha: used to be weighed with solid muscle gave a small shrug. “Barrin’s got new contracts, that’s what. They’re hiring again.”
“The labor pool looks a little sad,” I said.
“Good guys, but old-timers. Half of ’em have been on welfare for years. The fuckin’ union’s flipping. They can’t get anybody down here since McMillan’s paying higher than union wages and these old coots’ll do anything to get back on the job again. You know what this meeting is all about?”
“I just got here.”
“Barrin wants to go under union minimums and the labor leaders are screaming. This bunch is about to tell the unions to go frig themselves and cut out. All they want is work and they’re not going to let them city boys tell them they can’t.”
“What’s going to happen, Tod?”
“You ought to know, kid. They’ll picket, run goons up here and try to stop the contracts. Those city boys know all the cute tricks. Right now they’re meeting with some of the Washington boys and putting on the big squeeze.”
I wiped the sweat off the cold beer with my fingers and let out a laugh. “You got it wrong, Tod.”
“Come on, bucko.”
“Labor’s running scared on this one if you’re telling it right.”
“Oh hell!”
“Take a good look,” I said, “a dying town, impoverished workers who want off public welfare and an opportunity to get back on their feet, blocked by fat, rich, politically oriented organizations howling for dues money.”
“So what?”
“A newspaper’s dream story and a labor lobby nightmare.”
Tod watched me for a moment, then shut the radio off impatiently. He took a long pull of his beer and put the stein back down. “I’ll be a son of a bitch,” he said. “You know, you may be right.”
“They won’t picket and they won’t run in any goons,” I said. “They’re a little too smart. They’ll let it go ahead. If it falls, then it falls. If it works, then they’ll wait until they have the power back again, then move in for a reorganization. By then all those old boys who are voting now will be smothered by the newer ones. The game never changes, Tod.”
“You said...
“Something looks pretty damn spooky to me.”
“Maybe you ought to know, kid.” His tone didn’t sound friendly anymore.
“I’m sure going to find out, Tod. There’s always a winner in every game.”
“Who wins in this one?”
“Right now there’s a couple leading the field.”
“Old Alfred and Dennison Barrin?”
“How can they lose?”
“That’s what I figured. The rich get richer.”
“Not in this case,” I said. “I think they’re trying to hold on to what they’d like to have.”
Tod finished his beer, got a refill and looked at me with a direct, earnest glance. “Tell me somethin’, kid. Are any of those old guys gonna get busted?”
Something funny crawled up my back and I had to take the top off my drink so he didn’t see what I was thinking. I put the glass down and looked back up at him. “Not if I can help it.”
“Will they get hurt?”
Now I could see him back the way he was behind the bar in the old days, ready to pick somebody up by his neck with one big, beefy hand and toss him into the wall. He was watching my face and whatever he saw put the assurance back into his expression, and when I said, “No,” Tod nodded slowly.
“Just like your old man,” he said.
“Thanks.”
“Too bad you never met him.”
“I can look in the mirror, Tod.”
“Ah, that you can, that you can. You might even see your grandfather, the old bastard.”
“That’s
“It means something different the way I’m saying it. You know, he woulda liked it right now.”
“Hell, that’s the way he started.”
He put down the rest of his beer in a single big gulp. “And you’re going to finish it.”
I grinned at him.
“You haven’t changed either,” he said.
“Don’t fool yourself.”
“The only thing’s missing’s the pretty lady.”
“She’s working,” I told him. “Too much of me is no good.”
“Sheee-it.” One corner of his mouth turned up in a smile. “The little lady is all yours, Kelly.” He ran the back of his arm across his mouth and let his eyes dance across the table. “I got to asking questions after you left.”
“So what’s new?”
“Fuck you, Kelly. Find out for yourself.”
“You’re a big help.”
“Sure I am.”
“Where’s your pay phone?”
“Outside in the hall.” He sat back and folded his hands across his stomach. “You gonna raise some more hell?”
“Just a little,” I said.
“Damn,” he told me, “you kids have all the fun.”
Nothing could perturb the butler. He was too coldly professional, too remote. In his own way he was a contract man too, ready to protect his own as long as the pay was right, but not quite ready to go beyond the bounds of his limitations when it came to Big Casino time. I said, “Hello, Harvey,” and Big Casino time was there and Harvey smiled with a facial expression that didn’t mean anything at all except to me and opened the door.
“Miss Pam and Miss Veda are inside, sir.”
“Where’s Lucella?”
“Drunk, sir. May I be so bold?”
“You may be so bold, Harvey. And my male cousins?”
“At a meeting, sir.”
“Great. I have arrived at the opportune time.”
“I would say so, sir.”
“And why would you say so, Harvey?”
There was no smile, no raising of the eyebrows, just the simple, unspoken acknowledgment of small dog to top dot and he said, “Because you have been the subject of countless discussions since your last visit, sir.”
“I hope they didn’t say anything good about me.”
“You can be sure of that, sir.”
“They’re afraid the plans of mice and men may get screwed up, I guess.”
Harvey almost smiled, but didn’t quite make it. “A rather awkward misquote, sir, but the inference is correct.”
