A Rage in Harlem by Chester Himes

it was funny but they all laughed.
    “Not you, Boss, not a man of your position,” the ex-pug keptclowning for laughs. “Anybody here will tell you I ain’t had no real money in my pockets for weeks.” Suddenly he recalled that he’d just accused Jackson of picking his pocket, and added, “Maybe it was that man at the bar what robbed you, boss. he’s sportin’ a big roll he got from somewheres.”
    The man looked at Jackson for the first time.
    “Listen, don’t get me into that,” Jackson said. “I hit the numbers for my money. I can prove it.”
    The man went over and stood beside Jackson at the bar and ordered a drink.
    “Don’t worry, friend, I know it wasn’t you,” he said in a friendly voice. “It was some big ragged mugger like that bastard there. But I’ll find him.”
    “How much did you lose?”
    “Seven hundred dollars,” the man said, turning the shot glass between his fingers. “If that had happened to me a week ago, I’d have tracked the bastard to hell. But now it don’t make too much difference. I’ve lucked up on a good thing since then, something that’s solid gold. Eight or nine months from now I’ll be able to give a bastard that much money just to keep from having to kill him.”
    At the word
gold
, Jackson looked up quickly at the reflection of the man in the mirror behind the bar. He ordered another drink, pulled out his roll and peeled off a bill to pay for it.
    The man eyed Jackson’s roll.
    “Friend, if I was you I wouldn’t flash my money in this joint. That’s just asking for trouble.”
    “I don’t usually come in here,” Jackson said. “But my woman’s not at home right now.”
    The man gave Jackson a poker-faced look. He’d gotten a tip from one of the cheap hustlers he employed as lookouts that a square loaded with a big roll was in the joint. But Jackson looked too much like a square to be a real square. The man wondered if Jackson was trying to rook him with a confidence game of his own. He decided to go slow.
    “I figured that,” he said noncommittally.
    The whores began closing in on Jackson again and the man beckoned to the bartender.
    “Give these whores what they’re drinking and get them off my back.”
    The bartender took a bottle of gin and a tray of shot glasses toone of the booths. The whores melted away from the bar, looking hostile but as though they couldn’t be so much bothered as to be offended.
    “You shouldn’t talk that way to women,” Jackson protested.
    The man looked at Jackson queerly. “What can you call a two-bit whore but a whore, friend?”
    “They were good enough for Jesus to save,” Jackson said.
    The man grinned with relief. Jackson was his boy.
    “You’re right, friend. I’m upset a little, don’t usually talk like that. My name’s Gus Parsons.” He stuck out his hand. “I’m in the real-estate business.”
    Jackson shook hands, also relieved.
    “Glad to meet you, Gus. They call me Jackson.”
    “What business are you in, Jackson?”
    “I’m in the undertaking business.”
    Gus laughed. “Business must be good, considering that roll you’re carrying around. How much are you carrying there, anyway?”
    “It didn’t come from my business. I just work for an undertaker. I hit the numbers.”
    “That’s right. You did say you’d had a hit.”
    “Had twenty dollars on four eleven. I drew down ten thousand dollars.”
    Gus whistled softly and looked suddenly serious.
    “You take my advice, Jackson, keep that roll in your pocket and go straight home. The streets of Harlem are not safe for a man with that kind of money. You’d better let me go along with you until you see a policeman.”
    He turned and called to the bartender. “How much do I owe?”
    “Let me buy you a drink before we leave,” Jackson said.
    “You can buy me a drink somewhere else if you want, Jackson,” Gus said, paying for his drink and the bottle of gin. “Some place that’s clean and where a man can feel safe. Let’s get