Brain Guy: A gang killer meets his match in a TNT blonde by Benjamin Appel Page A

hellward so swiftly. The incredible long day, begun at six, was gone. How nice it was early in the morning getting his breakfast, fresh and crisp in the bustle of life, the trucks shooting towards far-away destinations! The fourteen-hour day was over. Man, that was going some.
    “All gone,” said Joe to himself.
    Now this Ninth Avenue, so empty when they washed Metz’s window, was crowded with folk who’d already eaten their last supper meal. Families gazed into the gleaming winter windows, young couples were hotfooting it for the movies. Everybody had eaten and was full-bellied. He hadn’t. When he awoke, the world slept. When he ate, the world was sated. Bill’s life was more fun. Bill had a good time. Bill slept as late as he wanted. What good did he get out of it all? His job wasn’t worth a lousy twelve bucks. Boy, was he tired? It was getting on to nine, but it was twelve midnight, as far as he went. After he washed and got something to eat, it’d be time for bed if he was to rise at six.
    Dark lonely Greenwich sounded his footsteps. The businesses were shut down and lights were scattered. The river smelled of the night. The tugs sirened. He cut up into Leroy, into a city of the dead, the warehouse and printery lonely pyramids. The row of houses glimmered with lights remote as camp fires.
    “Hello, Spotty,” he said in the empty flat. Was that kiyoodle wild to see him! He sat down on the rug, the pup biting his hair. A fellow’s only friend, and that was no dumb crack either. Bill was out busy with his bookkeeping or whatever it really was. He’d be in bed when Bill came home. The only time he could see him would be at six, and sometimes Bill wasn’t even in then, sleeping out with the ledgers. Or he’d have the pleasure of his company on Sunday. He should’ve stayed in Easton.
    He washed up and knocked at Mrs. Gebhardt’s, entering into the snug warmth of the place as if into a brother’s heart. Hulky Mr. Gebhardt was reading a German newspaper, the kids doing their homework, Mrs. Gebhardt already glancing nervously at the gilt clock on the mantel. The dishes were dried, the red clean cloth spread on the table, the family sitting in the parlor like an illustration of domesticity, their cheeks shining, their eyes bright with industry, patience, and religion. They smiled at him with the patriotism of other workers, Gebhardt lifting his paper with bony red fingers, smiling with eyes small as a pig’s, blue with a stamina for the year-in year-out grind with only a few turnverein picnics and beer parties. “How’s vork today, Joe?” He understood the boy.
    “I made a million.”
    “In the market?” He continued with the sympathy of one banker quizzing another about a bond issue concerning them both.
    “We brought back enough cheese to feed every rat in the world.”
    “Hawhahhaw, you hear dot, mamma?” The kids laughed with him like dutiful white mice.
    “Metz does a whale of a business — ”
    “Where you go? You eat here. You ain’t here a long time. Mamma give him zu fressen. Dot means to eat.”
    “I was going out. Honest.”
    “A home meal harms nobody,” said Mrs. Gebhardt, rushing to the gas range. The three younger kids, Frederick, baby Carl, Gertrude, smiled at him, yellow-haired, almost formidable with their collective honesty. Joe winked at the three child faces, at the do re mi of kindergarten Carl, eight-year-old Freddie, twelve-year-old Gertrude, so young and yet so patient for the working lives waiting for them. He could shiver at their courage, the unconscious strength of children who will and must follow their parents’ way. Sleepy, listening to the comfortable newspaper rustling (he didn’t mind Gebhardt’s absorption, understood he must hit the hay soon and this was his only chance to read the world news), watching the wakeful kids peeking at him from the table, their yellow heads inexpressibly beautiful, their industry predicting that some day society would follow the