Free The Winter of Our Discontent by John Steinbeck Page B

“Everybody!” And he went rapidly out the door and closed it quietly after him.
    In the darkened silence Ethan could hear the low hum of the transformer for the neon light in the cold counter. He turned slowly to the piled and tiered audience on the shelves.
    “I thought you were my friends! You didn’t raise a hand for me. Fair-weather oysters, fair-weather pickles, fair-weather cake-mix. No more unimus for you. Wonder what Saint Francis would say if a dog bit him, or a bird crapped on him. Would he say, ‘Thank you, Mr. Dog, grazie tanto , Signora Bird’?” He turned his head toward a rattling and a knocking and a pounding on the alley door, went quickly through the storeroom, muttering, “More customers than if we were open.”
    Joey Morphy staggered in, clutching his throat. “For God’s sake,” he groaned. “Succor—or at least Pepsi-Cola, for I dieth of dryth. Why is it so dark in here? Are mine eyes failething too?”
    “Shades pulled down. Trying to discourage thirsty bankers.”
    He led the way to the cold counter and dug out a frosted bottle, uncapped it, and reached for another. “Guess I’ll have one too.”
    Joey-boy leaned against the lighted glass and poured down half the bottle before he lowered it. “Hey!” he said. “Somebody’s lost Fort Knox.” He picked up the billfold.
    “That’s a little gift from the B. B. D. and D. drummer. He’s trying to hustle some of our business.”
    “Well, he ain’t hustling peanuts. This here’s quality, son. Got your initials on it, too, in gold.”
    “It has?”
    “You mean you don’t know?”
    “He just left a minute ago.”
    Joey flipped open the folded leather and rustled the clear plastic identification envelopes. “You better start joining something,” he said. He opened the back. “Now here’s what I call real thoughtful.” Between first and second fingers he extracted a new twenty-dollar bill. “I knew they were moving in but didn’t know with tanks. That’s a remembrance worth remembering.”
    “Was that in there?”
    “You think I planted it?”
    “Joey, I want to talk to you. The guy offered me five per cent of any business I threw their way.”
    “Well, bully-bully! Prosperity at last. And it wasn’t no idle promise. You should set up the Cokes. This is your day.”
    “You don’t mean I should take it—”
    “Why not, if they don’t add it on the cost? Who loses?”
    “He said I shouldn’t tell Marullo or he’d think I was getting more.”
    “He would. What’s the matter with you, Hawley? You nuts? I guess it’s that light. You look green. Do I look green? You weren’t thinking of turning it down?”
    “I had trouble enough not kicking him in the ass.”
    “Oh! It’s like that—you and the dinosaurs.”
    “He said everybody does it.”
    “Not everybody can get it. You’re just one of the lucky ones.”
    “It’s not honest.”
    “How not? Who gets hurt? Is it against the law?”
    “You mean you’d take it?”
    “Take it—I’d sit up and beg for it. In my business they got all the loopholes closed. Practically everything you can do in a bank is against the law—unless you’re president. I don’t get you. What are you hoggle-boggling about? If you were taking it away from Alfio lad, I’d say it wasn’t quite straight—but you’re not. You do them a favor, they do you a favor—a nice crisp green favor. Don’t be crazy. You’ve got a wife and kids to think of. Raising kids ain’t going to get any cheaper.”
    “I wish you’d go away now.”
    Joey Morphy put his unemptied bottle down hard on the counter. “Mr. Hawley—no, Mr. Ethan Allen Hawley,” he said coldly, “if you think I would do anything dishonest or suggest that you do—why you can go and screw yourself.”
    Joey stalked toward the storeroom.
    “I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean it. Honest to God I didn’t, Joey. I just had a couple of shocks today and besides—this is a dreadful holiday—dreadful.”
    Morphy