Snopes: The Hamlet, The Town, The Mansion

“No no,” the other said. “I mean the rest of the folks in the neighborhood he aint converted yet, aint going to put up with nsuch as this. The rest of the folks that already had to put up with that damn war for four-five years now and want to forget about it. That’ve already gone to all that five years of trouble and expense to get shut of it, only just when they are about to get settled back down again, be damned if here aint a passel of free-loading government-subsidised ex-drafted sons of bitches acting like whatever had caused the war not only actually happened but was still going on, and was going to keep on going on until somebody did something about it. A passel of mostly non-taxpaying folks that like as not would have voted for Norman Thomas even ahead of Roosevelt, let alone Truman, trying to bring Jesus Christ back alive in the middle of 1946. So it may be worth three dollars just to hear him in the free outside air. Because next time you might have to listen through a set of jail bars.” He yawned again, prodigiously, beginning to remove the battle jacket. “Well, we aint got a book to curl up with in here even if we wanted to. So all that leaves is to go to bed.”

Which they did. The light was off, he lay breathing quietly on his back, his hands folded on his breast. He thought Sholy it -will be three dollars. Sholy they will count today too thinking And Sunday will make three days lost because even if I got to Memphis Sunday after we are paid off the stores where I can buy one will still be closed until Monday morning thinking But I reckon I can wait three more days a little wryly now Likely because I cant figger out no way to help it and almost immediately was asleep, peacefully, sleeping well because it was daylight when he knew next, lying there peacefully for a little time yet before he realised he was alone. It seemed to him afterward that he still lay there peaceful and calm, his hand still playing idly with the safety pin it had found lying open on his chest, for the better part of a minute after he knew what had happened; then sitting, surging up, not even needing to see the open window and the dangling screen, his now frantic hand scrabbling from the bib pocket of the overalls the wad of newspaper beneath which the ten-dollar bill had been pinned, his voice making a puny whimpering instead of the cursing he was trying for, beating his fists on the locked door until it jerked open and Goodyhay stood in it, also taking one look at the ravished window.

“So the son of a bitch robbed you,” Goodyhay said.

“It was ten dollars,” Mink said. “I got to ketch him. Let me out.”

“Hold it,” Goodyhay said, still barring the doorway. “You cant catch him now.”

“I got to,” he said. “I got to have that ten dollars.”

“You mean you’ve got to have ten dollars to get home?”

“Yes!” he said, cursing again. “I cant do nothing without it. Let me out.”

“How long since you been home?” Goodyhay said.

“Thirty-eight years. Tell me which way you figger he went.”

“Hold it,” Goodyhay said, still not moving. “All right,” he said. “I’ll see you get your ten dollars back Sunday. Can you cook?”

“I can fry eggs and meat,” Mink said.

“All right. You cook breakfast and I’ll load the truck. Come on.” Goodyhay showed him how to light the stove and left him; he filled up last night’s coffee pot with water as his tradition was until the grounds had lost all flavor and color too, and sliced the fatback and dusted it with meal into the skillet in his tradition also, and got eggs out to fry, standing for a while with the door in his hand while he looked, mused, at the heavy holstered pistol beneath the helmet, thinking quietly If I jest had that for two days I wouldn’t need no ten dollars thinking I done been robbed in good faith without warning; why aint that enough to free me to rob in my turn. Not to mention my need being ten times, a hundred times, a thousand times more despaired than ara other mans need for jest ten dollars thinking quietly peacefully indeed now No. I aint never stole. I aint never come to that and I wont never.