my knife, dropping the strips into the box over and around the clock until it was full and overflowing, dribbling dozens of matches through it as I went. I added the pine shavings and slivers, building it up. There would be no smell of oil or kerosene here when they started investigating. Of course there would be the clock, or what would be left of it, but there were already at least three or four of them in all this junk so it would probably never be noticed. The solder would melt in the intense heat and the wire cross-arm would drop off, leaving it looking just like any other discarded alarm clock except that the bell was gone. I pushed the pile of newspapers against it on one side and set some chairs on the other, then tore up more papers to pile on top of the box.
I wiped the sweat off my face and stood back to look at it in the narrow beam of the flashlight. It would do. Once those matches caught the whole rat’s nest would take off like gunpowder. Well, I thought, they like to go to fires. This’ll give ‘em one to talk about.
* * *
When I awoke the next morning it was a minute or so before I remembered. I began to tighten up then. When I looked at my watch I thought of that clock ticking away the seconds and the hands creeping slowly around and the fact that nothing could stop it now. It was eight o’clock, and the next four hours and a half were going to be rough. Once it was started and I got moving I should be able to shake the nervousness and keyed-up tension, but the waiting was going to be bad. I had to act naturally. I couldn’t be looking at my watch every three minutes. It started off all right. As soon as I had a cup of coffee and got over to the lot, Harshaw and I got in another beef about something. God knows that was routine and natural enough. I can’t even remember what this one was about. It never took much to start us off because we always reacted to each other like a couple of strange bears. And the funny part of it was that I had begun to have a sort of reluctant liking for him. He was as tough as boot-leather and he barked at everybody, but you were never in doubt as to how you stood with him. He told you. But the fact remained the more I had to admit he wasn’t a bad sort of joe, the more I’d go out of my way to start a row.
“You know, Madox,” he said, leaning back in his chair and sticking a match to the cold cigar. “I can’t figure you out. You sell cars, but I’ll be a dirty pimp if I know how you do it.”
He was right. I’d hit a lucky streak the past few days and unloaded several of his jalopies. “Well,” I said, “it’s sure as hell not the advertising. Why don’t you go ahead and build a fence around the place to keep people from finding out you’ve got cars in here? They keep sneaking in.”
“So you sell three cars, and now you’re going to tell me how to run the place?”
“I don’t care what you do with it,” I said, and walked out of the office. I had to relax. At this rate I’d blow my top before noon. A Negro boy came in and stood around with his hands in his pockets looking at the cars the way they always do. You get the impression they’re waiting for some thing, but you don’t know what—maybe for prices to come down or cotton to go up.
Suppose I lost my head? I thought.
I went over and gave him sales talk you’d use on an oil man looking for Cadillacs for three of his girl friends. Or at least I think it was all right. He seemed to like it. I didn’t hear a word I was saying.
You can take care of everything except chance. Chance can kill you.
“How much the down payment?” he asked. That was all they ever wanted to know. You could sell Fords for eight thousand dollars if you’d let them go for five dollars down.
Somehow ten o’clock came and went. I walked over to the restaurant and had a cup of coffee. It was hard