Cool Hand Luke by Donn Pearce

argued that fifty eggs would make about three quarts and weigh at least six pounds. In full voice he claimed that the eggs would swell up in Luke’s belly and kill him. Or Luke himself would swell up. He would drown, choke, give up or faint. Dragline was adamant, challenging and daring us all.
    And in the sheer ferocity of that challenge we cowered. We suspected that we were being conned somehow. Yet we couldn’t bring ourselves to believe in the impossible. So in the end we were bullied and cajoled into putting our money where our mouth was.
    For the rest of the week Luke went into training. Out on the road Dragline waited on him personally, heaping up his plate with beans and corn bread and watching him like a mother hawk.
    Eat them beans, bastard. Drink some more water too. And stay away from them candy bars tonight. We ain’t got but three more days. We gotta git that double-gut
o‘ yours stretched and strained. We gotta git you in fightin’ shape. Like a barrage balloon.
    Why, you toothless bastard. If I had a belly like yours we wouldn’t have nothin‘ to worry about.
    Like mine? Hell, ah don’t eat much.
    Maybe not. But just look at the size of that gut.
    Well, hell. Don’t you know how come that to be? That’s a sign ah got me an affectionate nature.
    Affectionate? Like an elephant you mean?
    Maybe. Maybe so. Why not? Ah read in a book once that when an elephant’s makin‘ love it takes him two days and two nights to git his gun off. But when he does make it—man, look out.
    That’s you, huh?
    Sho! Ah’m an affectionate son of a bitch. Ah jes cain’t help mahself.
    The week came to an end. Saturday we began our usual weekend activities. But instead of loafing around and playing poker, Cool Hand Luke and Dragline spent the morning out on the lawn sparring with the old, worn-out boxing gloves. At noon Luke ate very little. He did some calisthenics in the afternoon and walked up and down the Building, stopping every few minutes to cup his hands under the faucet for a drink.
    Then the impossible happened. Luke didn’t eat any supper. And later, after we checked in for the night, Luke had Carr ask the Wicker Man for a couple of Brown Bombers and a cup of Epsom Salts.
    Society Red began to protest. This was the same as
doping a race horse with a needle. But nothing had been mentioned in the contest rules about taking a physic. Nobody liked the idea but we had to admit that it was legal. So all evening and the next morning we glumly watched as Cool Hand made trip after trip to the john.
    It was Sunday. The big day. As we expected, Luke didn’t have any breakfast. Instead he drank water and did push-ups and boxed a couple of rounds with Dragline. It was nearly noon when the Trustee and the Yard Man got back from town with the Store Order.
    We didn’t waste any time. We knew that Cool Hand was getting hungrier and hungrier. About six of us formed an official cooking committee and ran around to the back of the Building where there is a huge cast-iron pot raised up on bricks which is used by the Laundry Boy to boil out our clothes. The pot was ready. We had already filled it halfway with the hose and built a fire under it out of fat pine kindling. By the time the Store Order arrived it was just beginning to boil.
    Carefully we took all the eggs out of the cardboard cartons and put them in a big paper bag. Cautiously, with tongues sticking out and with bated breath, we lifted up the bag and slowly lowered the whole thing into the pot, the paper dissolving almost instantly and the eggs settling gently to the bottom. Babalugats went over to the fence and asked Boss Shorty who was on the platform to time them for us. Then he came back to the rest of us standing and squatting around the pot, studiously watching it boil.
    When Boss Shorty yelled out that they were ready
we used the coffee can that the Laundry Boy measures soap with, bailing out the water and