Well, he'd go out in a while. Stretch his legs and buy the papers and give
them a reading. And then take a walk. Just walk around and take in the
streets and see if there was anybody he knew. No. Rube stuff, that. Better
stick where he was.

Lucky Tommy walked around in the room. The drawn window blind held his
eye. Wagons were passing. What for? Yes, and there was a noise. Like
people coming. Turn out the light, then. He'd take a look.

Tommy O'Connor peeled back the blind carefully. Dark. Lights in windows.
Some guys on the corner. Hunting him? Sure. And they were coming his way.
Straight down the street. They were looking up. What for? A gun crept out
of Tommy O'Connor's pocket. He pressed himself carefully against the wall.
He waited. The minutes grew long. But this was the hunt closing in. They
were coming. Black figures of men floating casually down the street. All
right--let them come.

Lucky Tommy O'Connor's eyes stared rigidly out of the smeared window at a
vague flurry of figures that seemed to be coming, coming his way.



MR. WINKELBERG


There was never a man as irritating as Winkelberg. He was an encyclopedia
of misfortune. Everything which can happen to a man had happened to him.
He had lost his family, his money and his health. He was, in short, a man
completely broken--tall, thin, with a cadaverous face, out of which shone