All the King's Men - Robert Penn Warren [234]
That wasn’t exactly the look on the Boss’s face when he came in, but it gives some idea of what that look was. He wasn’t really pale, but he was paler than usual, and the flesh seemed to hang a little loose at the jawbone. There were a couple of razor nicks along the bone. Under his eyes were grey circles, as though the flesh had been bruised but was just about well now. But the eyes were clear.
He had come across the reception room without making any noise on the thick carpet, and for an instant he stood in the doorway of the office before anybody noticed his arrival. The chatter didn’t die; it was frozen in mid-syllable. Then there was a kind of noiseless scurry and fumble to adjust the funeral faces which had been laid aside. Then, with the faces in place and only a little askew, they crowded around the Boss and shook his hand. They told him they wanted to tell him how they felt. “You know how us boys all feel, Boss,” they said. He said, yes, he knew, very quietly. He said, yes, yes, and thank you.
Then he moved toward the desk, the boys falling away from him like water from the prow of a ship when it is first warped out from the pier and the screw makes the first revolutions. He stood before the desk, handling the telegrams, looking at them, letting them drop.
“Boss,” somebody said, “Boss–those telegrams–that shows you now–that shows you how folks feel about you.”
He said nothing.
Just then the girl came in with another batch of telegrams. She set the tray on the desk in front of him. He fixed her with his glance. Then he laid his hand on the pile of yellow paper and gave it a slight shove and said, in a quiet, matter-of-fact voice, “Get this muck out of here.”
The girl got that muck out of there.
The bloom had gone from the occasion. The boys began to drift out of the office and off to the swivel chairs which had not been warmed that morning. As Tiny was leaving, the Boss said, “Tiny, wait a minute. I want to talk to you.”
Tiny came back. I was heading out, too, but the Boss called me. “I want you to be in on this,” he said. So I sank into one of the chairs over by the wall. Tiny disposed himself in a big green leather chair to one side of the desk, crossed his knees, to the great strain of his hams and of the fabric which covered them, inserted a cigarette in his long holder, lighted it, and waited.
The Boss was in no hurry. He brooded a full minute before he lifted his eyes to Tiny Duffy. But then he came in fast. “There won’t be any contract with Larson,” he said.
When breath came back, Tiny managed, “Boss–Boss–you can’t, Boss.”
“Yes, I can,” the Boss said, without raising his voice.
“You can’t, Boss. It’s all fixed up, Boss.”
“It isn’t too late to unfix it,” the Boss said. “It isn’t too late.”
“Boss–Boss–” the word was almost a wail, and the cigarette ash was falling down the starched white front of the Duffy shirt, “you can’t break your word to old Larson. He’s a good guy and you can’t. You’re a square-shooter, Boss.”
“I can break my word to Larson,” the Boss said.
“You can’t–you can’t change your mind, Boss. Not now. You can’t change it now.”
The Boss rose very abruptly from his chair at the desk. He fixed his eyes on Tiny and said, “I can change a hell of a lot of things.”
In the ensuing silence, the Boss came round the desk. “That’s all,” he said, in a voice not much more than a husky whisper. “And you can tell Larson to do his damnedest.”
Tiny got to his feet. He opened his mouth several times, wet his lips, and seemed about to speak, but each time the now gray face closed back up over the expensive bridgework.
The Boss went up to him. “You tell Larson.” he said. “Larson is your pal, and you tell him.” He punched Tiny’s front with a stiff forefinger. “Yeah,” he said, “he is your pal, and when you tell him you can put your hand on his shoulder.” Then the Boss grinned. I had not expected a grin. But it was a wintry and uncomforting grin. It put the seal on everything that had been said.
Tiny made the door, and was gone. He didn’t bother to close it, but kept on going through without a pause, dwindling away over the long green carpet. The he had disappeared.