14 Stories by Stephen Dixon Page A

lighter than me and tries to move out from under my buttocks on his back but can’t.
    â€œOne of you call a cop,” I tell the salesman.
    â€œNo, the owner doesn’t like to make so much of it. Stick him in jail and he’ll be out tonight and tossing a brick through our window by the morning. Let’s just get back our shoes.”
    â€œFlunky,” the thief says to me.
    â€œListen,” I say. “I want shoes, I buy them, I don’t swipe them”
    â€œTimes are tough. And when I got a job I would have mailed you the money for the shoes.”
    â€œSure you would, sure.”
    Meanwhile the salesmen have taken off the new shoes and slipped on the man’s old loafers.
    â€œOkay,” a salesman says. “You can let him up.”
    â€œNo trouble,” I say to the thief, getting off him. “I have a club. I’ll use it and have.”
    â€œNo you won’t. You haven’t the guts. Your face tells me that, your voice, but there’s no need to try you out. What do they pay you for this?”
    â€œJust get out of here.”
    â€œGet out of here already,” a salesman says.
    â€œTwo C’s a week I bet for beating the brains in of your fellow poor people. A real winner, your job.”
    â€œWhat do you know?” I say. I poke him in the ribs with the club and edge him to the door.
    â€œThat a way,” a salesman says. “But I got a better way for this bigmouth.” Both salesmen grab the man by the arms, tell me to hold the door open, and throw him outside. He lands on his knees, gets up, looks at the hole in his pants he just got, shakes his fist at us and goes.
    â€œGood work,” the salesman says to me. “Good good work. If we didn’t have a guard they’d walk out of here twenty times a day with our shoes. I like the club in his side,” he tells the other salesman. “I know what it feels like. When I was in the navy the SP’s used to do it to me about once a month when I’d get smashed.”
    â€œCall my boss if you got a moment and tell him what I’ve done,” I say.
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause I don’t think he trusts I can do what I did.”
    â€œIf we speak to him, we’ll tell him.”
    There’s no further trouble that day, but the next day a man comes in and says to the cashier, who’s hanging some shoehorns on a rack next to the cash register, “Excuse me, you have the time?”
    She looks at her watch. He quickly punches a few register keys and the drawer opens. He grabs a stack of bills and runs to the door. She yells “Stop, thief, he got all our twenties.” I’m already in front of the door with my club raised.
    â€œPut the money down and you can go,” I say.
    â€œYou’ll have to take me, sucker,” and picks up a floor ashtray and swings it around his head, cigarette and cigar butts flying around the room. I jump him, one hand pressing the club against his neck and other on the hand holding the ashtray, and wrestle him to the floor. One of the salesmen holds him down with me while the other takes the money out of his hand and says “You walking out of here nicely or do we have to get the police?”
    â€œOh I’ll go, all right, after I bean the three of you and set fire to your cashier.”
    â€œThis one I think’s too sick to just give to the street,” the salesman says. “Because I’m sure not letting him up till the police come.”
    He calls the police, we hold him till they come, and they fill out a report on the incident and take the man away. One of the salesmen calls the owner in his other shoestore across town and then comes back and says “Mr. T. wants to know why you didn’t hit that nut with your club?”
    â€œTo tell you the truth, I tried to but couldn’t. I also thought I could disarm him manually, which I did, without cracking his skull and maybe getting