“I can hear you, all right,”Al said from the kitchen. He had propped open the slit that dishes passed through into the kitchen with a catsup bottle. “Listen, bright boy,”he said from the kitchen to George. “Stand a little further along the bar. You move a little to the left, Max.”He was like a photographer arranging for a group picture.
“Talk to me, bright boy,”Max said. “What do you think’s going to happen？”
George did not say anything.
“I’ll tell you,”Max said. “We’re going to kill a Swede. Do you know a big Swede named Ole Andreson？”
“Yes.”
“He comes here to eat every night, don’t he？”
“Sometimes he comes here.”
“He comes here at six o’clock, don’t he？”
“If he comes.”
“We know all that, bright boy,”Max said. “Talk about something else. Ever go to the movies？”
“Once in a while.”
“You ought to go to the movies more. The movies are fine for a bright boy like you.”
“What are you going to kill Ole Andreson for？ What did he ever do to you？”
“He never had a chance to do anything to us. He never even seen us.”
“And he’s only going to see us once,”Al said from the kitchen.
“What are you going to kill him for, then？”George asked.
“We’re killing him for a friend. Just to oblige a friend, bright boy.”
“Shut up,”said Al from the kitchen. “You talk too goddamn much.”
“Well, I got to keep bright boy amused. Don’t I, bright boy？”
“You talk too damn much,”Al said. “The nigger and my bright boy are amused by themselves. I got them tied up like a couple of girl friends in a convent.”
“I suppose you were in a convent.”
“You never know.”
“You were in a kosher convent. That’s where you were.”
George looked up at the clock.
“If anyone comes in you tell them the cook is off, and if they keep after it, you tell them you’ll go back and cook yourself. Do you get that, bright boy？”
“All right,”George said. “What you going to do with us afterward？”
“That’ll depend,”Max said. “That’s one of those things you never know at the time.”
George looked up at the clock. It was a quarter past six. The door from the street opened. A street-car motorman came in.
“Hello, George,”he said. “Can I get supper？”
“Sam’s gone out,”George said. “He’ll be back in about half an hour.”
“I’d better go up the street,”the motorman said. George looked at the clock. It was twenty minutes past six.
“That was nice, bright boy,”Max said. “You’re a regular little gentleman.”
“He knew I’d blow his head off,”Al said from the kitchen.
“No,”said Max. “It ain’t that. Bright boy is nice. He’s a nice boy. I like him.”
At six-fifty-five George said, “He’s not coming.”
Two other people had been in the lunchroom. Once George had gone out to the kitchen and made a ham-and-egg sandwich “to go”that a man wanted to take with him. Inside the kitchen he saw Al, his derby hat tipped back, sitting on a stool beside the wicket with the muzzle of a sawed-off shotgun resting on the ledge. Nick and the cook were back to back in the corner, a towel tied in each of their mouths. George had cooked the sandwich, wrapped it up in oiled paper, put it in a bag, brought it in, and the man had paid for it and gone out.
“Bright boy can do everything,”Max said. “He can cook and everything. You’d make some girl a nice wife, bright boy.”
“Yes？”George said. “Your friend, Ole Andreson, isn’t going to come.”
“We’ll give him ten minutes,” Max said.
Max watched the mirror and the clock. The hands of the clock marked seven o’clock, and then five minutes past seven.
“Come on, Al,” said Max. “We better go. He’s not coming.”
“Better give him five minutes,”Al said from the kitchen.
In the five minutes a man came in, and George explained that the cook was sick.
“Why the hell don’t you get another cook？”the man asked. “Aren’t you running a lunch counter？”He went out.
“Come on, Al,”Max said.
“What about the two bright boys and the nigger？”
“They’re all right.”
“You think so？”
“Sure. We’re through with it.”
“I don’t like it,”said Al. “It’s sloppy. You talk too much,”
“Oh, what the hell,”said Max. “We got to keep amused, haven’t we？”
“You talk too much, all the same,”Al said. He came out from the kitchen. The cut-off barrels of the shotgun made a slight bulge under the waist of his too tight-fitting overcoat. He straightened his coat with his gloved hands.
“So long, bright boy,”he said to George. “You got a lot of luck.”
“That’s the truth,”Max said. “You ought to play the races, bright boy.”
The two of them went out the door. George watched them, through the window, pass under the arc light and cross the street. In their tight overcoats and derby hats they looked like a vaudeville team. George went back through the swinging door into the kitchen and untied Nick and the cook.
“I don’t want any more of that,”said Sam, the cook. “I don’t want any more of that.”
Nick stood up. He had never had a towel in his mouth before.
“Say,”he said. “What the hell？”He was trying to swagger it off.
“They were going to kill Ole Andreson,”George said. “They were going to shoot him when he came in to eat.”
“Ole Andreson？”
“Sure.”
The cook felt the corners of his mouth with his thumbs.
“They all gone？”he asked.
“Yeah,”said George. “They’re gone now.”
“I don’t like it,”said the cook. “I don’t like any of it at all.”
“Listen,”George said to Nick. “You better go see Ole Andreson.”
“All right.”
“You better not have anything to do with it at all,”Sam, the cook, said. “You better stay way out of it.”
“Don’t go if you don’t want to,”George said.
“Mixing up in this ain’t going to get you anywhere,”the cook said. “You stay outof it.”
“I’ll go see him,”Nick said to George. “Where does he live？”
The cook turned away.
“Little boys always know what they want to do,”he said.