in and robbed it we could get away with the whole payroll. He asked me didn’t it beat knocking over candy stores and I told him it sure did. A guy like me never would have figured out something like that, but Charlie was sharp as a tack.

We pulled the job the next night. It was just a few blocks away from where we lived, and the place was all locked up. Charlie said there was a watchman on duty in the back, where the money was. Then he took a little hunk of metal and got the door open. I don’t know where he learned how to do that, I really don’t.

I started to walk right in but Charlie made me slow down. He whispered that the old guy could give an alarm unless we got him by surprise. We walked in on tiptoe, and we were practically on top of him before he looked up, and Charlie had the fake gun pointed right at him. I thought he’d have a heart attack then and there.

“Open the safe,” Charlie said.

The old guy just stared for a minute, and then he stuck out his chin. “You boys better go home,” he said. “I’ll give you ten seconds before I call the cops.”

Charlie knew how to put the screws on. He didn’t say a word, but just kept standing there with the gun pointing right at the guy’s head. It was so real that I almost started thinking it wasn’t a phony gun with blank bullets.

Then the guy jumped. He fell right down off the chair, and Charlie yelled, “Get him, you goddamn dope!”

I went for him then, but he hit the alarm button before I could get him and the bells started ringing like mad. I was boiling then. I yanked him up off the floor and belted him all the way across the room, and his head hit the wall like Ted Williams hits a baseball.

I started across the room after him, I was so mad. But Charlie stopped me and we ran out. There were people all around, but they didn’t know what was happening and we managed to get back to the room.

Charlie wouldn’t even talk to me. He sat on the bed listening to the radio, and when the news came that the guy had died of a broken skull he looked at me like I was the stupidest guy in the world. Let me tell you, I felt horrible. It was just like me to swing too hard.

I thought we could still get away, but Charlie straightened me out. He told me how they saw us and they’d get us sooner or later. And he figured out the only way we could get out of it.

We wiped off his gun and got my fingerprints on it, and then we went to the police station. I told them the story just like Charlie told me to, about how I was the older brother and I was bigger than Charlie and made him come along and commit crimes, and how I beat up the guy and killed him. And then at the trial some doctor told how I was a dope and hardly knew what I was doing, and they shouldn’t blame me for it. Charlie had to go to jail, but he got out in a year. Because I was such a dope they only gave me ten years for manslaughter.

It’s not bad here, either. There are lots of nice guys to talk to, and the food’s okay. And the best part of it is that Charlie’s out now, and he comes to visit me once a month. He sends me money for cigarettes and everything, which is damn nice of him.

I’m just a dope, but I’m lucky. Most guys wouldn’t pay any attention to me, especially if they were real smart. But Charlie comes every month, and he says, “Hi, Muscle,” and I say, “Hiya, Brain.”

We’re still buddies, even after what I did.

He’s a wonderful brother, let me tell you.

A FIRE AT NIGHT

HE GAZED SILENTLY INTO THE FLAME. The old tenement was burning, and the smoke was rising upward to merge against the blackness of the sky. There were neither stars nor moon in the sky, and the streetlights in the neighborhood were dim and spaced far apart. Nothing detracted from the brilliance of the fire. It stood out against the night like a diamond in a pot of bubbling tar. It was a beautiful