Nother suicide, the man says. Thoid this month on this block.
They see furniture stacked on curbs, nests of toys and clothes, the belongings of families who couldn’t make the rent, couldn’t hang on. It looks like the detritus that washes ashore hours after a ship sinks.
I’m almost on the street myself, Marcus says. I was doing okay till a few months ago. I was a proofreader at an ad agency. My boss was a rummy, the work was dull, but I loved that job, Willie. It was decent pay, honest work, and it was the only thing standing between me and the edge.
What happened?
Business fell by forty percent. It came down to me and another guy. The other guy had never been in the joint.
When Willie sees the basement apartment where Marcus lives, at Eighty-Third and Broadway, he thinks Marcus might be better off on the street. The front walk is covered with trash, the halls smell of urine. Old urine. Marcus’s one lightless room is a rabbit cage, its walls papered with newspapers. Old newspapers. Over Marcus’s hot plate are headlines about President Taft.
On the other side of the wall a woman or wild animal is wailing. The walls are so thin, the wailing so loud, she sounds as if she’s right there in the room with Willie and Marcus. She sounds like Big Ben.
Make yourself at home, Marcus says.
Willie looks around. Home? There’s no furniture, just a couch that looks like a park bench, an unmade Murphy bed, a card table bowing under the weight of an Underwood. Scattered around the Underwood are rejection letters from all the slicks. Willie unrolls the page in the typewriter. It’s covered with x’d sentences.
How’s the writing coming, Marcus?
I’m working on a story about a guy with no job who lives in a rathole. I need an ending.
Willie is about to say something sympathetic when the door bangs open and in walks a shockingly plain woman. No waist, no breasts, cheeks specked with so many dark moles that she looks splashed with mud. Her hair is set in a kind of finger wave, but the fingers that did the waving must have been arthritic. Willie’s heart goes out to her. She must be the wailing neighbor. Then he hears the neighbor send up a wail. Big Ben. Convicts on the loose. Confused, he watches Marcus rush to the woman’s side and plant a kiss on her mole-splashed cheek.
Willie, I want you to meet my bride. Dahlia, say hello to my old pal Willie Sutton.
This is where it happened, Sutton says, stepping away from the lion, gazing up at its broad nose, which always reminded him of his own. Talk about your crossroads, boys—I bumped into Marcus on these steps, with these lions watching, in the spring of 1930. How many times I’ve looked back on that moment and thought, What if? What if I hadn’t decided to sit in the shadow of this lion at the very same moment Marcus was returning a book? What if Marcus had decided to finish The Decline of the West? What if I’d stopped in the library men’s room, or spent a few extra minutes combing the wants, or said hello and goodbye and gave Marcus the air? The things I might have said. The things I shouldn’t have said. So much would be different.
Sutton glowers at the lion. You saw it happening, he says. Patience, or Fortitude, whatever the fuck your name is. How come you didn’t warn me? One little roar?
FOURTEEN
Willie sits on the steps of the library, waiting for it to open. In the last few months he’s managed to scrounge a few temporary things in the wants. A job mopping floors in an office building—then the boss had to cut back. A job cleaning toilets at the bus station—then the regular guy returned. He’s nearly out of money. He has no family, no friends, besides Marcus, who’s in even worse shape than Willie. He needs to find something permanent, right now, or else.
The library unlocks its doors. Willie runs upstairs to the reading room, grabs an armful of newspapers, settles into a chair. He goes through the wants slowly, hopefully, twice. Nothing. He rubs his eyes, massages his temples.
He turns briefly to the news pages. Four million out of work. Thirteen hundred banks belly-up—this year. Next year the number is expected to be two or three times higher. He crumples the newspaper, tosses it on the floor. The librarians give him a look. He storms out.
He feels the sidewalk poking through a new hole in his shoes. Before he can think about the hole and how he’s going to afford new shoes, his infected tooth starts to throb. He puts a hand to his jaw. He can bear it most days, but today it’s pulsing. He walks and walks, fighting his rage, his hunger, and eventually finds himself before a bank. He gazes at the marble columns, the gold and brass eagles around the front door. He watches customers come and go. He watches the security guard lock up.
Closing time—already? How many hours have passed? He must have fallen into a stupor.
He stumbles back to his flop. He’s paid up for one more week. Then what? He lies on the lumpy bed, pulls the sour-smelling coverlet to his chin. It smells of the previous occupant. And the previous, and the previous. He imagines them all lying here, worrying about the same thing. He nods off.
He wakes drenched with sweat, his neighbor banging the wall. Shaddap in there! Willie must have been screaming in his sleep again. The room is pitch dark. He doesn’t know what time it is. He pawned his clock. But he can tell from the number of lights in the buildings across the street—it’s late. He goes to the basin, wets his wash rag, presses it to his face and neck. He puts on his coat and hat, goes for a walk. He finds himself back at the bank. Across the street is a drugstore. Its front window casts a trapezoid of white-purple light on the sidewalk. Willie stands just outside the trapezoid. He looks at the windows of all the buildings around him. Each window is a story. Probably like his. He makes up the stories, tells them to himself, one after another, stories about people tired, sick, scared, broke. Then he looks at the bank. And looks. An hour passes. Three. The bank’s security guard appears. Willie sees him unlock the door. Creeping from the shadows Willie peeks through the bank’s front window, watches the security guard cut the alarms, make a pot of coffee. Willie sidles back across the street, waits for the first tellers to arrive, then the assistant manager, then the manager. Just before the bank opens for business a Western Union boy knocks. The security guard opens wide, jokes with the boy, signs for a telegram.
And then it happens. A feeling comes over Willie, something like the feeling when he first walked into the south yard of Sing Sing and saw Chapin’s explosion of roses. He runs all the way to Marcus’s apartment. While Dahlia sleeps Willie and Marcus sit at the card table and Willie lays it all out.
It’s so simple, Marcus. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before. I don’t know why no one else has thought of it. We stand outside the bank, see? Early. When that security guard comes, when he cuts the alarms, the bank is defenseless. A sitting duck. All we need to do is get in. So how do we get in? We trick our way in. No one’s ever done it that way. Dillinger, Floyd, Barrow, all those boys shoot up a bank, scare everybody out of their wits. Or else they break in, middle of the night, blow the safe—risky. A hundred things can go wrong. But it doesn’t have to be that tough, Marcus. It’s all so much easier.
What is?
A uniform. Any uniform. Western Union. Post Office. The guard will open sesame, abracadabra, because guards obey uniforms blindly, they don’t check, and once that guard opens that door, it’s over. We own that fuckin bank. I back the guard in, tie him up. Then you come in. As each employee arrives we tie them up. Then the manager comes. We make him open the safe. Then we tie him up and out we go. No torch, no nitro. No violence, no evidence. Clean. Cool.
Marcus strokes the sloping sides of his triangular face. His waterbug eyes are skittering. It’s a thing of beauty, Willie.
Say you’re in.
Oh I’m in, Willie. I’m in.
They agree, there’s only one problem. Guns and uniforms aren’t cheap. They’ll need seed money for this new venture. Not to mention rent, food, cigarettes. Also, they could do with a dress rehearsal. Besides murder one, no crime carries a stiffer penalty in 1930 than bank robbery. The bank
ers and their lobbyists have seen to that. If you’re going to rob a bank, you’d better be damn smooth about it.
If Eddie were here, Willie says, he’d recommend a jewelry store. I know just the one. Rosenthal and Sons. It’s on one of the busiest corners in midtown.
That seems like asking for trouble, Willie.
I’ll bet you a fin that busy corner makes them smug. They think they have nothing to worry about.
He’s also willing to bet there are no sons.
Why do you think bumping into Marcus Bassett was so fateful, Mr. Sutton?
We were both out of work, desperate—stupid. It was the fuse meeting the match.
Did you have any qualms about going down that road again? Getting back into a life of crime?
Qualms? Yeah kid. I had qualms.
I mean, did you think about ethics? Morals? Did it occur to you that taking something which doesn’t belong to you is, you know, immoral?
People took plenty from me.
I don’t mean to—I’m just trying to get a sense, Mr. Sutton, of your thinking at the time. Did you ever stop and think it was wrong?
I didn’t think it was wrong. I knew it was wrong. But it was also wrong that I was hungry. It was wrong that I was about to be on the street. It was wrong that half the country was in the same boat as Willie, that half the fuckin country was out of work. You know how they say character is destiny? That’s the bunk. Work is destiny. A man talks about the woman he loves, he might sound excited, but get him talking about his job, then check his eyes—that’s the real him. A man is his job, kid, and I had no job, so I was a bum. A loser. America’s a great place to be a winner, but it’s hell’s basement for losers.
Three Salvation Army workers appear outside the library. They set up their kettle, begin ringing bells, shaking tambourines.
Besides, Sutton says, I had it all worked out. I wasn’t going to hurt anyone. I went out of my way like no bank robber before me not to hurt anyone. Marcus and I robbed banks before they opened. When that wasn’t possible, we did everything we could to make sure there was no violence.
Reporter opens a file. According to this one clip, Mr. Sutton, you and Marcus had some kind of policy? If someone got sick during one of your robberies, if an old person or a pregnant woman got faint, if a baby was crying, you’d call off the job and walk out of the bank.
That’s true.
It seems such a contradiction, Reporter says.
I don’t really like people, kid, but I don’t want to hurt them either. Do unto others—I believe in that shit.
But you were hurting people, Reporter says. You were taking their money. And this was before people had deposit insurance.
Nah, Sutton says, banks back then insured themselves against robberies.
Photographer sighs. He doesn’t get it, Willie.
And you do kid?
Photographer turns to face Reporter: Around the time Willie and this Marcus cat went on their rampage, the Bank of United States collapsed. People today don’t remember—the government doesn’t want us to remember. The Bank of United States just vaporized—with $100 million of people’s life savings. It’s still the biggest bank failure in the history of the world. Thousands of people were wiped out. And did any of those bank managers responsible go to the Big House like Willie did? No they did not. They sat around their country clubs laughing it up. Banks gamed the system, fucked society, caused the crash of 1929, drove the world into the abyss and paved the way for the rise of fascism—Stalin, Hitler—and they got despicably, disgustingly rich in the process. Banks. Banks did all that. So Willie only wanted to hurt banks, not people, which is why he became a folk hero. Am I right, Willie?
Antihero, Sutton mutters.
Is he right? Reporter asks Sutton.
Well now, Sutton says, it seems to me the Bank of United States actually stole $200 million of everybody’s money.
No. I mean: Did you feel you were at war with banks? With society?
Which is it?
Either one. Pick.
Everybody’s at war with society kid. Everybody’s at war with everybody else. In every job you have to get over on someone, beat somebody out of something. Taking stuff that doesn’t belong to you—no other way to survive. That’s how the whole thing works, everybody robbing everybody else.
I don’t rob anybody, Reporter says.
You don’t, huh? You take people’s stories away from them. Half the time they don’t want to give up their stories, am I right? So you have to charm them, cajole them, con them. Or else make a deal with their lawyers.
Photographer laughs. What about me, Willie? You going to tell me I rob people?
Nah, you don’t rob anybody. You just shoot them.
Photographer burrows into his buckskin jacket. Willie, brother, you make it hard to be a fan.
You’re not the first to tell me that kid.
Reporter runs his finger along the map. So our next stop is Fiftieth and Broadway—did you rob a bank there, Mr. Sutton?
Nah. That’s where I pulled a big jewel heist. A warm-up for banks. Banks were the regular season, jewelry stores were spring training. Or so I thought. This jewel heist wound up being the most fateful job of my career.
Marcus and Willie walk down Broadway. Marcus wears a gray flannel suit, Willie wears an indigo blue mailman uniform. Tuesday, October 28, 1930. Early morning.
They stop at Fiftieth Street, stand on the corner, pretend to be talking about the weather. Marcus flips a quarter in the air, catches it. A Negro man in blue pants, a pale blue work shirt, comes up Broadway. He stops, unlocks the door to Rosenthal and Sons, enters.
Marcus looks up and down the street. That the porter?
Willie nods.
They give the porter five minutes to cut the alarms, start the coffeepot. Then Willie moves in.
He knocks. The door opens. Porter—fortyish, graying at the temples, freshly shaved. Willie smells his bay rum.
Yes?
Telegram.
Who for?
Mr. Rosenthal.
He’s not here.
You can sign.
They stare at each other. One one-thousand, two one-thousand.
Wait, Porter says.
He slams the door.
Willie looks up the block. He sees Marcus leaning against the streetlamp, flipping his quarter. He tells himself there’s still time to walk away.
The door opens. So where do I sign?
Willie hands him a short clipboard. Here.
As Porter takes the clipboard, as both his hands are occupied, Willie pulls a .22 from his breast pocket.
Back in, Willie says. Nice and easy.
Porter steps backs. Willie jumps inside, shuts the door. He and Porter are inches apart, Porter staring at Willie, not the gun. Willie waves the gun, gestures to an empty showcase. Over there—go.
Porter backs behind the showcase.
Marcus comes through the door, his face covered with a bandanna, which somehow accentuates its triangular shape. And magnifies his waterbug eyes. He walks up to Porter. Give me your leg, he says.
My what.
What’re you deaf.
I can’t hear you through your kerchief.
Marcus turns up a corner of the bandanna. Your leg.
Porter lifts his leg. From his breast pocket Marcus pulls a roll of picture wire. He ties one end to Porter’s ankle, holds the other end like a leash. All the while Porter is glaring at Willie.
What’s your name, Porter?
Charlie Lewis.
You ever been in a holdup before?
No.
You sure are cool about it.
No other way to be.
How many employees coming in today?
Three more.
When?
Soon.
Who has the combination to the safes in the back room?
Mr. Fox. Head salesman.
Willie gestures for Porter to stand at the door facing Broadway. The door has a shade i
n the window and Willie pulls the shade halfway down. Marcus stands to one side of the door, holding the wire attached to Porter, and Willie crouches on the other side, holding the gun.
A cop walks by.
Porter looks at Willie. What if a police officer tries the door?
Let him in, Willie says. We’ll take care of him.
Ten minutes pass. Sweat is pouring down Marcus’s forehead. His bandanna is sopping. Porter’s face, Willie notices, is dry.
Just before nine, a knock.
It’s Mr. Hayes, Porter says. One of our salesmen.
Open it.
A young man about Willie’s age saunters in, removes his hat, throws it on one of the showcases. Hiya Charlie, he says to Porter, how come the door’s still locked?
Willie sticks his gun in the man’s back. Good question. Be real quiet and do as you’re told.
He hands First Salesman off to Marcus, who wires his wrists to his ankles and sets him on the floor.
A minute later, another knock.
That’ll be Mr. Woods, Porter says. Salesman.
Porter opens the door. This time Sutton does the tying while Marcus holds the gun. Second Salesman makes a sound, a wince or a cry.
Don’t hurt him, Porter says, he’s an old man.
I’m not hurting anybody, Willie says, annoyed.
Another knock. That’s Mr. Fox, Porter says.
Willie pulls Third Salesman aside as he walks through the door, jams the gun in his ribs. Good morning. We’ve been waiting for you. Come with me, we’re going to open the safe.
Can I hang up my hat and coat first?
Drop them.
Willie marches Third Salesman to the back room and stands him before the safe. Open it, he says.
Third Salesman fumbles with the dial. I can’t remember the combination.
That’s a stall, Willie says. Come on, open it—or I’ll give you the works.
Are you really a letter carrier?
I’ll ask the questions.
Third Salesman turns back to the safe. He’s cursing, sighing, and he’s sweatier than Marcus. I can’t remember the combination, he says.
You’re lying.
I tell you I can’t remember. I’d open it if I could. Don’t you think my life means something to me?
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