John Sayles - A Moment in the Sun

“It must have been at least four minutes.”

“Full power?”

“Oh, he yanked the lever all the way down, all right.”

“Just to be certain. It was ‘Molly, ye’ve burnt the roast’ in there.”

“The whole body stiffens,” says Gratz, tensing his muscles and arching his head and shoulders backward, “and if it wasn’t for the straps fastened tight it would fly clear across the room.”

“And the smoke—”

“That’s your resistance,” says Dortmunder. “I’ve discussed it at length with the electrician fella—”

“Davis.”

“Him. And he explained to me that different bodies present different resistance to the electrical current. For instance, electricity will pass through copper wire—”

“Like shit through a tin horn.”

“So to speak—”

“What I don’t understand,” says Flanagan, squeezing his brow into a frown, “is why a tin horn would have shit in it in the first place?”

“We’re getting off the subject here, gentlemen.” Dortmunder heaves a thick leg over the bench and pulls himself to his feet. “The greater the resistance the electricity has to pass through, the greater the heat generated. So if a great deal of electrical current— vol tage is the word for it — attempts to pass through a body of great resistance — an ax-murderer, let us say — you can imagine the heat that might result.”

“So a stouter man—”

“—will burn hotter than a little wisp like this Goulash fella, should it come to that. It’s scientific fact.”

“Is McKinley on his way out?”

They all turn then and look at Shoe.

“And to what do we owe your presence here, Shoemaker?”

Shoe straightens slightly. “Sergeant Kelso requests that I bring him the newspaper, sir.”

Dortmunder jerks his head toward the jumble of early edition lying on the end of the bench. “And when did Kelso learn to read?”

Shoe steps forward to gather up the entire pile. “Thank you, sir.”

“Now, green corn through a goose, I understand,” says Flanagan, brow still knitted. “It paints a lively picture. But shit in a horn, or any other musical instrument for that matter—”

Dortmunder rolls his eyes to Shoe and jerks his head toward Flanagan. “And you cons complain about the Rule of Silence.”

In the anteroom Shoe nicks a stub of a pencil, slipping it through the string dangling by the roster sheet on the wall. He stops on the stairway landing halfway down, out of sight but able to hear any movement from the bulls, and makes his kites, scribbling on scraps torn from the newspaper and folding them a dozen ways before slipping them into his jacket pocket. He sees that there is both the Auburn paper and the Buffalo News and quickly separates the local rag and stuffs it under his shirt.

He drops one of the kites, without breaking stride, only inches from Lester Gorcey’s grass snippers as he passes.

“I sent you for the newspaper,” Kelso complains when Shoe steps back into the shop, “not for an Easter egg hunt.”

“Your brothers in blue were shooting the breeze.” He hands Kelso the News . “It took a while to get their attention.”

“Like a bunch of old hens.” The keeper disappears behind the unfolded sporting pages. “It’s a wonder the lot of yez don’t scarper over the wall some day while they’re up in the bullpen floggin their gums.”

DiNucci is finished with his work, putting his equipment away. He raises his chin to Shoe, who flicks a kite into the Dago’s box. Nose will be cutting at the broom shop next and can whisper the news to the boys there. Shoe takes a quick peek at the News headlines about the assassination attempt.

“Jeffries versus Ruhlin,” muses Sergeant Kelso from behind his wall of paper. “What d’ye make of it, Shoe?”

First Work ends and Shoe heads up Kelso’s company, full-stepping to the shithouse to retrieve their cleaned buckets and full-stepping back to the north wing to be counted and single file up the iron stairs to the tier and waiting, counted again, till they step into their cells and are locked down. There is a half-hour before dinner and Shoe carefully works the stub of pencil into the lining of his cap just behind the bill where it won’t show and reads through the Auburn paper he’s smuggled. He’ll need to lay that off during Second Work. They search the cells while you’re out, picking one or two at random and going over them with a jeweler’s loupe, even his own. There is no trust in trustee anymore, not enough confidence left in the world to work a paying dodge.

The bulls on the outside, in the old days, understood the game. Oh, they’d give you a whack on the noggin if they caught you below the Dead-line south of Fulton without a pass from the Chief, or if you were late with your contribution, but they understood that if the marks were on the square there was no way to beat them. Green goods, the glimmer drop, gold bricks — if they got no larceny in their hearts they’ll walk straight away from you. And if you trimmed the wrong bird, somebody connected, the word came down and an envelope appeared on the desk of the local Tammany chief, every cent accounted for, the offended party reimbursed, minus handling, and then it was back to business. Byrnes ran the detectives then, and was as square as you could ask for, insisting on solid evidence before he beat a confession out of you. But once the Lexow Report come out and they put that little four-eyes Roosevelt in charge it was every man for himself. No order left in the game, no sense of proportion. Like the play that bought him this bit.

The high hat from Philly and his midget sidekick are practically begging to be taken, three rows ahead in the swells’ box and piping Shoe and Al’s conversation, till finally the high hat turns and hoists an eyebrow at them. “I gather that you gentlemen are searching for an investor?”

Al Garvin playing sore and thumping Shoe on the chest. “I told you to keep your voice down, you mutt.”

And Shoe, feigning sly and stupid at the same time. “Look, Mister, it’d be better if you didn’t hear nothin, see?”

The high-rollers all gathered for the Stakes at Saratoga and every dip and swindler on the East Coast gathered to take a swipe at them. Fred Taral was favored riding Archduke but the suckers were leaning toward Willie Sims up on Ben Brush — the little goat could fly on a dry track — and him and Al discussing a proposition about buying the race, just loud enough to be overheard by Mr. Silk Drawers and the one who keeps braying that he’s the Gold King of the Yukon.

“What he said, Mister,” echoes Al. “Forget you heard it.”

“I didn’t hear an amount mentioned,” says the sidekick.

You set the hook right and they practically choke trying to swallow it.

He and Al trade another look, like now that they been caught at it there’s no use lying.

“Too rich for our blood,” says Al.

“Perhaps we could be of service,” the high hat says, winking to show it’s only a lark, a trick that naughty boys might play. “But of course we’d need to be assured of the outcome.”

“We can’t guarantee you Ben Brush wins,” Shoe cuts in. “Only that Arch-duke don’t.”

“It’s four grand,” says Al. They have moved up a couple rows and lean on the divider behind the swells now. “But we only got three-fifty, maybe four hundred between us.”

If you can get them adding and subtracting, working percentages, you’re more than halfway home.

“And if we were to make up the deficit—?”

“Then the Archduke gets assassinated in the backstretch.”

The tall one and the runt trade a look.

“We’ll need to witness the transaction,” says the swell.