On the Waterfront by Budd Schulberg Page B

sure of gettin’ a day, and they’re good for a dollar every time we pass the cigar box for the welfare fund, and we got the numbers and the horses going, and some other stuff—well, you figure it out. We got a couple of the fattest piers in the fattest harbor in the world. Everything that moves in and out, we take our cut.”
    “We had to work hard for it,” Charley said. “And there’s plenty of headaches and responsibilities. Believe me, whatever we make, we’re entitled to it.”
    Terry was between them now and wishing he was on his roof, waving his long exercise pole at his pigeons. But Johnny was on top of him, talking close into his face.
    “So now look, kid, you don’t think we could afford to be boxed out of a deal like this—a deal I sweated and bled for—on account of one lousy little cheese-eater, that Doyle bum, who goes around agitatin’ and squealin’ to that friggin’ Crime Commission. Do you?”
    Terry was on the floor. He was crawling on his hands and knees and the referee was counting and what the hell was wrong with him so he couldn’t get up. Like the breath was knocked out of him …
    “… Well?”
    Terry frowned and said, “Sure, Johnny, sure. I know he had his nerve givin’ you all that trouble. I just figured if I was gonna be in it I shoulda been told what was goin’ t’ …” He faltered, feeling Johnny’s eyes on him, and Charley trying to signal him off. “I … just …” His voice trailed off. Why bother? They knew what he meant.
    Charley was watching Johnny anxiously, but the boss was still in a soft mood where Terry was concerned. The kid had done his piece of it well and Specs and Sonny had taken care of the rest and everything was okay. Right now it was a hundred to one the coroner was handling it as a routine accident. The police would close it out ditto in a couple of days. There wouldn’t even be the bother of a few minor arrests. Sam Millinder, who was now riding a seventy-five-thousand-a-year retainer, wouldn’t even have a chance to show off his legal figure-skating. It was the kind of smooth operation that’s only possible when you’ve got everybody with you. Johnny reached into his pocket, drew out a fifty and tucked it into the neck of the sweater Terry was wearing for a shirt.
    “Here, kid, here’s half a bill. Go get your load on.”
    Dully, darkly, as in an overclouded dream, a bleary snapshot torn out of the frayed album of beer-sodden sleep, Terry remembered the fresh young face of the Doyle kid leaning out over the sill. The money would only remind him. “Naw, thanks, Johnny.” He tried to hold it off. “I don’ need it, I …”
    Johnny didn’t like to be refused in anything, even handouts. He pushed the bill deeper into the neck of Terry’s sweater, with a laugh that was hard and generous. “Go on. A little present from your Uncle Johnny.”
    He turned around to Big Mac, who was waiting docilely for his split so he could spread money on the bar in a dozen traps and be a big man among cronies and freeloaders.
    “Hey, Mac,” Johnny commanded, “tomorra morning when you shape the men put Terry in the loft. Number one. Every day.”
    Big Mac nodded, sucking in his puffy cheeks, a sign of reluctant obedience.
    “Okay, Matooze?” Johnny told Terry. “An easy ride. Check in and goof off on the coffee bags.”
    That was ninety bucks a week for reading See, She, Pic, Quick, Tempo, Stare, Dare and the Police Gazette.
    “Thanks, Johnny,” Terry said. He couldn’t shake the mood of he-didn’t-know-what. He stuffed his hands into the pocket of his jeans and went walking out with the fifty hot on his chest like a mustard plaster.
    Charley had been watching his brother with shrewd, seasoned sympathy. “You got a real friend here, and don’t you forget it,” he felt the need to call after the kid.
    Terry didn’t turn around. He walked slowly toward the door, just as a beaten fighter, his head down, makes his way up the aisle through the