“All right,” said the major. “Harvey is your name? It’s all right, Harvey. It’s just one of those misunderstandings. But no point getting worked up about it. He didn’t mean to insult you. He didn’t know you were around.”
“I get sick of you white smart-asses like him.” Harvey still trained his ivory eyes on Murphy. “Makin’ fun of us, like we were yellow. I wore a U.S. uniform. I was infantry like you. Fourteenth Infantry Regiment. You never heard about us retreatin’ ’thout orders.”
“Who the hell wuz talkin’ about you!”
“You wuz talkin’ about colored.”
“I wuz talkin’ about Senegalese.”
“That’s colored!”
“The hell with you!” said Murphy. “What d’ye want me to do? Kiss yer ass?”
“The hell with you!” Harvey retorted.
Both men had raised their voices. “See? What’d I tell you?” Mr. Klein rasped. “Sit balt sein du a malkhumah.”
The two angry men could be heard throughout the cellar. The youthful, tow-haired agent in the vault with Tommy came forward, with Tommy trailing him, and the short-necked man on the stairs came partway down.
“Let’s cut it out,” the major said curtly. His voice was restrained, and his forefinger moved like a dial between the two adversaries. “Both of you. We’ll all be in hot water in a minute. You better watch the noise. The store is still open.”
“I don’t want to get in no hot water, Major. I just came over to do what Mr. Stiles told me: clean out the broken bottles down in de pit.”
“All right, it’s all yours.” The major put one foot on the elevator platform, raised his face to call up into the late-afternoon sky: “Everything okay up there, Ordwin?”
“Yes, sir,” came the response from the street.
“When’s that Model-T driver due back?” the Major spoke to Mr. Klein.
“Shea? He should be beck already. It’s efter five.”
“What’s keeping the man?” The major stepped aside to allow Harvey to press one of the elevator buttons, and frowning, watched the ascending elevator platform block off all view of the outdoors.
“Gott sei dank, the trucks are upstairs in the street, not down here,” Mr. Klein said in a dry undertone.
“Down here? The trucks?” Ira repeated, sure of his wonder at the absurdity.
“Why do you think there’s a Prohibition man in beck of the door,” Mr. Klein demanded — and without waiting for an answer: “He protects a flenk. Sit a sakh helfin,” he added. “You know there’s bottle goods up there in the trucks cost twice what I get a week, one bottle?” With the orders in Shea’s hamper nearly all packed away, Mr. Klein allowed himself to relax. “Thet was before Prohibition. So what will it cost now?”
“You mean those dirty old bottles I used to see through that little window?” Ira hoped his ignorance would prolong the brief recess.
“Those dirty old bottles, yeh: chempagne. You know what is chempagne: Mouton and Lafite and Rothschild? Esk the alter kocker upstairs in the wing-collar. He’ll tell you.”
“So what?”
“Oy, gevald!” Mr. Klein arched backward in despair. “So what?”
“You mean somebody’ll try t’take ’em?” Ira demanded, miffed at being so uncharitably found mystified.
“You never heard from hijeckers? Shlemiel!”
“Lorring,” the major called toward the liquor vault. “I want all the rest stacked in front of the elevator ready to go. Get me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Would you two, and that young fellow in there, pull everything out here?” the major addressed Quinn and Murphy. “Set it right here, will you? Okay, Lorring,” he called again. “You know what to do.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where is that man?” Still frowning, the major turned to Mr. Klein.
“I don’t know. The Model T sometimes — he has trouble.”
“We should have been out of here by now.” The major glanced down at Harvey in the elevator sump shoveling glass and murky water into the bucket, pursed his lips in a silent, reflective whistle. “We’ve been in the neighborhood too damned long. If he has trouble, we could have a lot of it.” He strode over to the stairs, climbed up.
“Now there’s three up there.” Ira felt a not unpleasant vertigo of tension. “You don’t think anything is goin’ to happen?” He stopped to listen to the conversation.
“You know, Harv, I got nothin’ against you. You’re all right.” Murphy didn’t seem unsteady. He raised his arm and rested his hand against the wall, under the elevator switches. “But the trouble with some o’ you boys is — I don’t mean you — just because you had a little French pussy over there, you start struttin’ aroun’. Them French floosies just thought youz wuz Yanks wit’ a deep tan.”
“Yeah. You’re right, Murphy.” Harvey’s accommodating laugh belied the deeply sober eyes lifted up toward Murphy’s arm. “Yee-hee-hee! That’s right.”
“You’re damn right,” said Murphy. “You know I don’t git along good wit’ people sometimes because I don’t softsoap ’em. I don’t give a fuck what color they are. I coulda made sergeant three times over if I’da brown-nosed.”
“I know, Murphy. You don’t have to tell me. I know that the first time I saw you.” Placating in tone, Harvey kept his eyes rolled upward.
“Just because I’m short, some people think I’m a pushover. Shit, it wuz jist because I wuz a runt, everybody picked on me when I was a kid. I had to learn how to fight, you know what I mean?”
“Ain’t that the truth?” said Harvey.
“So if I sez dem Senegalese wuz yeller, dem sons o’ whores wuz yeller.” He slapped the wall. “Dey couldn’t fight der way into a crowded bar.”
“Man, you’re gettin’ too close to them switches.” Harvey no longer feigned negligence. The timbre of his voice became peculiarly rich — and vibrant. “You better get your hand away from that wall, and let me finish before I get outta here.”
“Yeah?” Murphy tapped the down button. The elevator jarred in preliminary movement. He tapped the up button. “I’ll tell ye somethin’ else: Some bright colonel put some you guys in them same monkey uniforms them Senegals had on, thinkin’ to give the Heinie a surprise. He attacked.” Murphy thumped the elevator button, reversed it. “Those guys scrambled outta the trenches so fast, you couldn’t see ’em fer the dust. Hell, they must be runnin’ yet.” He thumped the elevator buttons again.
The shovel left leaning against the ledge, Harvey clambered out to the cellar floor. He stood head and shoulders above Murphy. “I ain’t looking for no trouble, Murphy. I ain’t looking for no fight. But I tell you, man, I ain’t running away from it. I’m ready any time you is. Any place.”
“You better run upstairs,” Mr. Klein nudged Ira. “No! No! Get that shavetail. Tell him there’s trouble.”
But they could already hear the major’s voice on the stairs as he came hurrying down: “What the hell’s happening to that elevator?” He took in the situation at a glance. “You men at it again? I’m really surprised. I’d think, by God, you two men would know better. You were soldiers. But you’re acting like — like half-grown kids. Men who wore the same uniform. Who fought the same war. Who fought for the same cause, for the same ideals — and died for it, your own buddies: freedom and democracy. And remember we won it. We won it! You going to throw it all away down here in this damned cellar?”