Roughneck by Jim Thompson Page A

establishment and charge very high prices for inferior merchandise. Collection expenses were high, of course, but still low enough, percentage-wise, to make the operation immensely profitable. And the losses on uncollectible accounts were not nearly so large as one might think. The chain was constantly on the lookout for good men—"aggressive, forceful men." Such men could earn very handsomely. There were minimum prices on all merchandise; anything a man could get above that price was split between him and the store. He also received a relatively high base salary, and a commission on collections.
           "I run better than a hundred dollars a lot of weeks," Durkin said. "That's about three times what I'd get in this town on the average collection job."
           "I'd say you earned it," I said. "Are all the customers like Pete?"
           "Well, none of 'em are easy to get money out of, but some are worse than others. We've got a real tough baby coming up."
           The "tough baby" lived in a place similar to Pete's, and like Pete, he did not appear to be at home. The front door was locked, also the back one. Durkin shaded his eyes with his hands and peered through several of the windows.
           "Can't see him," he frowned, "but I know damned well he's here. I'm sure I saw him out on the steps when we rounded the corner. I wonder if..."
           He broke off, staring speculatively at the back yard privy. With a significant wink at me, he headed for the edifice, pausing on the way to pick up two fist-sized brickbats.
           He pounded on the door of the privy. He kicked it. He stood there and hurled the brickbats at it with all his might. There was a yell from the inside, a furious curse-filled sputtering. Durkin took a pair of pliers from his pocket and hefted them thoughtfully.
           "Come on out, Johnnie," he called. "You'll have to do it sooner or later, so why not make it light on yourself?"
           "To hell with you!" yelled the man within. "Try and make me come out, you goddamned thieving junk-peddler!"
           "All right," said Durkin, reasonably, "don't come out, then. Just shove your money under the door."
           Johnnie replied with an unprintable suggestion. He was not shoving any money under the door and he was not coming out; and that, by God, was that.
           Durkin shrugged. He fitted the hasp over the staple in the door, and slid a handle of the pliers through it. Then, scooping up an armful of old papers from the yard, he walked around to the back of the privy.
           Two planks had been removed from its base, apparently to provide ventilation. Durkin touched a match to the papers, and shoved them through the aperture.
           Since they fell into the waste pit, there was no danger—or at least very little—of incinerating Johnnie. But the clouds of stinking smoke which welled up from the pit, soon had him on the point of strangulation. He yelled that he would murder Durkin—he would kill him if it was the last thing he ever did. The next moment he had ceased his threats and was beating wildly on the door, pleading hysterically for mercy.
           "Three dollars, Johnnie," said Durkin. "Shove it through the crack and I'll let you go."
           "Goddammit,"—'cough, cough—'"I can't. My wife's in the hospital. I've got to have—"
           "Three dollars," said Durkin.
           "But I—'all right!"—'a terrified scream. "There it is! Now for God's sake let me—"
           Durkin took the three crumpled bills, slipped the pliers from the hasp and stepped back. Coughing and strangling, bent double, Johnnie staggered out into the yard.
           He was no more than a boy, eighteen, perhaps nineteen years old. He was tall, six feet at least, yet he could not have weighed much more than a hundred pounds. His cheeks were colored with the rosy, telltale spots of tuberculosis. There was no fight