The buttermilk drinker glanced up and saw Corey. He grimaced wearily and said to Rafer, “Why do you bother me with these things?”

“I’m just checkin’ to get it straight,” Rafer said. “You want him bounced?”

“Leave him alone,” Walter Grogan said. He drank some buttermilk. “Let him stand there if he wants to.”

“Can I sit down?” Corey asked.

Walter Grogan didn’t answer.

“Can’t I get in the game?” Corey asked.

“No,” Grogan said.

“Why?” Corey asked. “Why, Walt?”

Grogan looked at him. That was all, just a look. It caused Corey to take a step backward, as though he was shoved in the face. So this is what it comes to, he thought. And it ain’t the treatment; it’s worse than the treatment. What it amounts to, is you’ve been listed minus zero, strictly useless, absolutely worthless. The tip off came when he didn’t even bother to have you thrown out. I guess that puts you right at the bottom, even lower than Carp and the other mischief-makers. At least they get some attention, they rate high enough to get bounced. All you’re getting is the look; the look that says in no uncertain terms that you’ve been junked.

Corey took another step backward. Then very slowly he backed across the room until he reached the wall. He leaned back against the wall and stared at the floor. His hand drifted toward his pocket and he fingered the money, the three dollars and forty cents. Let’s put it to work, he told himself. Let’s drink it up.

But he didn’t move. He went on staring at the floor, his head lowered. Then gradually he raised his head and his mouth tightened just a trifle. He focused on Walter Grogan.

Walter Grogan was the owner of the Hangout. He also owned a pawnshop, a poolroom, a dry-cleaning establishment and most of the real estate in the Swamp. All his business activities were centered in the Swamp and the same applied to his social life. He seldom was away from the Swamp. Although he had considerable cash—(estimates of his wealth ranging anywhere from one hundred thousand to more than a quarter of a million) it seemed that everything he wanted or needed was in this neighborhood of wooden shacks, tarpaper hovels and narrow alleys. His only recreation outside the Swamp was his membership in the Southeast Boat Club. It was a rather exclusive club and its list included some very important names. But Grogan hadn’t joined it for that reason. It was just that he liked to row on the river. He was better than the average rower. Took it very seriously; and he needed the facilities of a good boating club.