From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [346]
“I still dont know how though,” Prew put in.
“That doesnt matter,” Jack Malloy said. “I dont know either. You still did them.”
“Okay, so maybe he can do them,” Angelo said hotly. “For him thats fine. For me thats from nothing. What a use for me keep on trying I cant do them?”
“None,” Jack Malloy said, in the same gently tender tone that his voice never seemed to get out of, even when he spoke loudly. “Thats why I told you to stop. But you could do it—if you only believed you could strong enough, so that you didnt knock yourself out trying so hard.”
“That tells me a lot,” Angelo said. “That tells me a hell of a lot. Maybe Prew can do it. Well, I told you he was your kind of a guy. But nobody else around here has ever been able to do them.”
“That doesnt mean they cant do them,” Jack Malloy said. “The same thing is in every man’s mind. My mind’s no different than your mind, citizen.”
It was a habit of his, Prew found out later, he never called anybody anything but citizen. Once, the story went, he had even called Major Thompson citizen a couple times. It had earned him four extra days in the Hole. Prew wondered why he did things like that, and then all the time told everybody else not to?
“Like hell it aint differnt,” Angelo grinned. “I had your mind, I wount never of been in this fucking place in the first place.”
“You had my mind,” Jack Malloy grinned ruefully, one of those rare flashing grins of his, always rueful, that were different from his smile which never quite reached clear up into the vague unlistening eyes, “you had my mind, citizen, you’d been in here a hell of lot sooner than you were.”
“I guess thats no lie,” Angelo grinned with a great pride in the big man.
“How about this big secret plot?” Prew asked them. “What the hell is this great plan anyway? I’ve been killing myself with curiosity for a week now, wondering about it.”
“Let him tell you,” Jack Malloy deferred gently.
Apparently Prew had addressed the question to Malloy instinctively, although he did not know why because it was Angelo’s idea.
“Its his plan,” Jack Malloy said. “It was his idea, he thought of it, and he deserves the telling of it.”
And Prew thought suddenly that he had never seen such tenderness, in man or woman, as was in Jack Malloy’s eyes looking at Angelo Maggio. It was worth it, he thought exultantly, it was more than worth it, it was worth ten days in the Hole, to be here with these men.
“Come on down here then,” Angelo said, his eyes gone cunning and miserly again. He got up and started down toward the other end where the two commodes were.
“You can tell it here, citizen,” Jack Malloy tried to dissuade him gently.
“Nosir,” Angelo grinned at them crafty-eyed. “Nosiree.”
“Maybe Prew dont feel like getting up,” Jack Malloy suggested gently.
“Then he’ll have to wait,” Angelo said emphatically, and started to come back. “I tell it at all, I tell it down there, where nobody is.”
“I feel okay,” Prew said, and got up and the two of them followed the little guy down. And it was sitting on the closed commodes, with Jack Malloy leaning against the iron sink, that Angelo Maggio unfolded his big secret plan, his great dream.
The rest of the barrack, led by Blues Berry, drifted unobtrusively down toward the far end with their conversations, like healthy people tactfully humoring an invalid. Prew looked at Malloy, then swung his eyes back to Maggio quickly.
“I’ve only told it to Berry and The Malloy,” Angelo explained insistently. “Nobody else knows about it, not a single soul.”
Prew looked at Malloy; Malloy’s face was closed.
“Aint that right, Jack?” Angelo said anxiously.
“Thats right, citizen,” Jack Malloy said gently.
“If they did,” Angelo said fiercely, “I’d kill the cocksuckers, see? Even in here see? Some of these guys find out about it, they liable as not to try it first. And half the chances of success depends on it bein the first guy who tries it. After the first time it wouldnt work. Father Thompson aint no fool. Neither’s Fatso. And