"What, she's a village pump?"

"Now ... O.K. You wanna call a spade a spade, yeah, that's what I heard. Now, you wanna have a good time, she's a good lay, whatever. Enjoy yourself, but don't ... fuckin'... get ... involved. The minute you split she probably takes on the janitor for the month's rent. A chick like that doesn't even need carfare. You remember once you said to me Cheri uses her cunt like spare change? Now that was a exaggeration, you know it too. O.K., maybe she played around with a guy or two, maybe not even that, but a girl like Annette, she really uses her cunt like a fuckin' Master Charge an' I seen guys get hung up on tramps like that too. It's heartbreaking to see these guys, an' I just don't want you to be one a them. Like I said, have all the fun you want, but if you think you had heartache with Cheri, God have mercy on your soul if you fall in love with this one."

All through Chubby's talk Stony was getting sick to his stomach; now the nausea was creeping into his face.

"Whassamatter?"

"Huh? Nothin'."

"You O.K.?"

"Yeah, yeah!" Stony forced a laugh. "You know. Chubby, you're talkin' like I'm plannin' to marry her."

"Not even in a joke, Stony."

"Yeah." Stony shrugged. "No sweat."

Chubby gripped Stony's wrist. "Stony, you know I love you like a son, I'd cut off my balls for you. I just don't want to see you hurt, do you dig what I'm tryin' to say to you?"

Stony felt something click off inside him. "Yeah, sure. She is a village pump, I know that."

Chubby slowly began to smile. As he stood up he placed his hand on the back of Stony's neck. "C'mon, let's go join that fast crowd out there, I don't want anybody thinkin' we're goin' queer on each other in here."

18

AFTER WORK on Monday as Stony approached Frank's Hosiery House he noticed three police cars converging on the corner at abrupt angles, lights flashing, doors flying open. Stony double-parked across the street, sprinted under the el, waded through the empty cop cars, radio squawk blaring from under the dashboards and raced inside. A half-dozen cops were milling around Butler's Uncle Frank, who sat in a torn vinyl chair in the middle of the store gasping for breath. Without his aviator glasses his face looked blanched and popeyed and old. The front of his red silk sport shirt was ripped and he held a bloody piece of gauze to the side of his neck. He looked scared. "Thirty years," he wheezed, "I been here thirty fuckin' years ... never..."

Butler emerged from behind the curtain separating the storeroom from the front. He was wild-eyed and livid. "I'll get those motherfuckers!" he screamed at the cops. "Fuck you guys! I'll get them. I know those nigger bastards!" Two cops tried to calm him down. Two others jotted notes from Frank; one examined the knocked-over cash register and one spoke over a walkie-talkie.