“You were in Norfolk,” Frankie said.

“I was in Norfolk,” Amato said. “Sit there all day listening to some kid make a fuckin’ asshole outa my goddamned lawyer, all I can think about’s what Billy’s gonna do to that coon, I get back there, and then it turns out, I’m going to Norfolk. Only thing I see that night, there’s this nun in a gray thing, there, wants to know, do I wanna learn the fuckin’ guitar.”

“I know her,” Russell said. “She’s all over the place. She was up to Concord once. I said to her, I said: ‘Sister, I wanted to play the guitar, I would’ve grabbed a fuckin’ guitar.’ After that she left me alone. Lot of the guys liked her, though.”

“That night the nigger was in the hospital,” Frankie said.

“Good,” Amato said. “I hope he fuckin’ died.”

“Nope,” Frankie said, “but I seen him. He was missing about three feet of skin off his fuckin’ head.”

“Hey,” Amato said.

“Him,” Frankie said, nodding his head toward Russell.

“No shit,” Amato said.

“Peeled him like a fuckin’ orange,” Frankie said.

“More like pulling bark off a fuckin’ tree,” Russell said. “Guy had skin like nothing I ever seen.”

“He came after you?” Amato said.

“Somebody sure did,” Russell said, “somebody looked to me like he hadda be the biggest chungo bunny inna world, come after me. I had this blade there, another guy I meet onna way over, he told me, I give him a hundred out of my thing there and he had this blade for me. Said I was probably gonna need it. I bet I wasn’t in there ten minutes and that nigger’s coming after me. Didn’t do it again, though.”

“That’s how come,” Frankie said. “He’s a prick but he’s got all the moves.”

“He clean?” Amato said. “Both you guys clean?”

“Frankie,” Russell said, “you been using something?”

“Shut the fuck up, all right, Russell?” Frankie said. “Yeah. I haven’t had anything but booze since I get out. Not that much booze, either. Mostly beer. I been waiting for payday, I start in on the VO and other stuff.”

“You’re on pills,” Amato said. “You’re in, you’re on pills. I seen you, don’t forget. You were beating the hell out of them yellowjackets.”

“John,” Frankie said, “the yellowjackets were there. I didn’t see nobody serving no beer. I took what there was. I haven’t had none of that stuff since I was out.”

“How about him?” Amato said.

“Gee, Squirrel,” Russell said, “I wouldn’t take nothing. I, ah, I probably had a couple quarts of Ripple and some grass, and I might’ve had one or two dime bags once or twice, but I just snort them, you know? It’s not like I was using something. I go to Cub Scouts, you know? And they pat you down, there, they start teaching you how to tie them knots and everything.”

“Smack,” Amato said to Frankie. Frankie shrugged. “I ask you to find a guy for me and I got this thing, and all I got to do is do it and we get some very nice money. All I got to do is find two guys that can do a fairly simple thing without fucking it up, and this is the best you can do for me. A fuckin’ junkie. And I’m supposed to just let you guys go in there and you’re gonna go in and once and for all you’re gonna fuck it up, a job that’s never gonna come around again in a million years. I don’t want to have a whole lot of fun with this thing, you know, because I hadda go out and get a guy that looked all right when I got him and then he goes in and he’s on the fuckin’ nod or something. I want the goddamned money. That’s what I need.”

“Squirrel,” Russell said, “when I was a little kid I used to take off on Cheracol. I didn’t have any trouble. When I was working for my Uncle, I used to have to go down in holes for him, you know? The carbon black on my face and go down in them holes with a forty-five in my hand and a knife in my fuckin’ teeth and I went into them tunnels. Every day I went in them tunnels. If there wasn’t anything in the tunnel, that was a good day. Not so good days, there’s probably only a big fuckin’ snake in there or something that wants to eat you. Kinda bad days, there’s some skinny dink in there with a gun, tryin’ to kill you. Bad days was when the dink did it, or there was a piece of wire in there and you didn’t happen, you weren’t paying attention or something and it’s rigged up to something that blows up pretty quick, or else there’s a punji stick in there with a whole lot of dink shit on it under your hand and you go into your basic blood poisoning extra quick.

“I didn’t have no bad days,” Russell said. “I was in them tunnels almost two years and I didn’t have no bad days. I wasn’t buying up Mustangs and teaching little dumb shits to drive, but I didn’t have no bad days, either.

“The thing of it is, Squirrel,” Russell said, “when I was having them days, I didn’t know for sure at the time that I wasn’t gonna have a bad one, you know? I started out, I thought it was all just a matter of balls. I don’t wanna hurt your feelings or anything, but I always had the balls, you know? And I thought, I felt pretty good, because I thought that’s all it was and I had them so I was all right. Then I see, I seen them cart out a couple guys that went in there and put them in the green bags, you know? And a couple of them, they didn’t have no balls when they come out, on account they didn’t have no luck, they went in that time, and no cocks either, and that carbon black, don’t do a thing for cuts and stuff. Fuckin’ booby traps go right through it, like it wasn’t even there.

“So that gets me to thinking,” Russell said. “I’m no good at thinking. But that gets me to thinking, and I see, well, I’m in the shit, is what I am, and I can’t personally do nothing about it. All I can do is, I can have the balls and the luck, but the only thing I know about is the balls. I just can’t have no bad days. Only, I don’t know no way to do that. So, I used to come out, and I know, tomorrow I go in again, and the only thing I can think about is, I used up another day. That’s all. So I smoke something. And it helped.

“Then I start looking at them other guys,” Russell said. “I see them, I was still thinking, and they’re all, most of them, at least’re smoking. And them guys that’re doing the grass, you know? Very heavy on it, and they slow down some. I was, I was keeping track of things. I could see it happening to me, it was happening to them, I got it a little bit and I begin to see, that’s what, them other guys, they started on it, it was probably just a little bit for them, too, when they start. You start forgetting things. All you want, you don’t care about things, you know? Very funny thing. And then, some of the guys that’re older, they drink a lot. And pretty soon they’re sick a lot. And that’s bad. Their hands shake. They’re not paying attention either. And you get in there, there’s the wire or the dink or something, well, you’re gonna have to have a lot of time to think about it or else you’re not gonna have no time at all. You can’t let yourself get slow.

“So I try the horse,” Russell said. “You got to have something. So I get some of that nice white shit, and what I did was, I used it after, right? After I come out again. I haven’t got to go back in tonight. First I snort it. Then, a couple times I did it the other way, but mostly I snort it. But I used it. And I liked it.

“Okay,” Russell said, “it don’t, it makes you feel great, but it don’t actually do nothing for you, you know that. When you’re in there, doesn’t protect you at all. But you been in, and you got out, and you got to go back in again and you don’t want to think about that, maybe you’re not gonna bring yourself out, you go in again, use up all your luck thinking. So then it’s very fuckin’ nice. Don’t slow you down. Just makes you feel good, and that’s what I was after.”

“Sure,” Amato said, “and that’s what you’re gonna be after when you’re getting ready to go in on this thing I got, and you’re gonna get it and you’re gonna be flying and you’re gonna go in stoned up to your ass and some poor bastard’s gonna start hollering or something and he’s gonna get shot, and a very good thing that a kid in his fuckin’ right mind couldn’t fuck up is gonna get fucked up. That’s exactly what I’m afraid of.”