Nightwork by Irwin Shaw Read Free Book Online

sole person authorized to have access to the safety-deposit box?”
    That’s for sure, brother, I thought. But all I said was, “Yes.”
    “That will be twenty dollars for the year. Do you wish to pay by cash or by check?”
    “Cash.” I gave him a hundred-dollar bill. His expression did not change. Obviously, he thought that I looked like a man who might normally carry a hundred-dollar bill loose in his pocket. I took this as a good sign. The assistant manager smoothed the bill carefully, with a churchly gesture, went over to a teller’s window to break the bill down into smaller denominations. I sat relaxedly at the desk, touching one of the manila envelopes with the tips of my fingers. I hadn’t stuttered once all morning.
    The assistant manager came back and handed me my change and made out a receipt. I folded it neatly and put it into my wallet. Then I followed the man down to the vault. There was a hygienic, almost religious hush there that made you hesitate to speak above a whisper. Stained-glass windows would not have been out of place. The parable of the talents. The vault attendant gave me a key and led me down a silent aisle of money.
    With the three thick manila envelopes under my arm, I couldn’t help wondering how all the treasure lying in those locked boxes, the greenbacks, the stocks and bonds, the jewelry, had been accumulated, what sweat expended, what crimes enacted, through whose hands all those stones and all that luxuriously printed paper had passed before coming to rest in this sanctified, cold steel cave. I looked at the attendant’s face as he used the two keys, his and mine, and pulled out a box for me. He was an old man, pale from his underground existence. He didn’t look as though he had ever speculated about anything. Perhaps such people were chosen for their lack of curiosity. A curious man would go mad here. I followed the attendant back to a little curtained cubbyhole with a desk in it, and the attendant left me there with my box, respecting the privacy of wealth.
    I tore open the manila envelopes and laid the piles of bills in the box. I looked at the neatly stacked notes, trying without success to foresee what they finally would mean for me. It was like looking at a huge engine, quiet now, but capable of sudden, brutal force. I closed the box with a decisive little click. I tossed the envelopes into a wastepaper basket and went back along the row of safes with the attendant and watched him slide the box into my own slot. The attendant used both keys once more to lock the safe. I dropped my key into my pocket, said, “Thank you,” to the man. “Have a good day,” courteous as any policeman.
    “Hah,” the man said. He hadn’t had a good day since he was twelve.
    I went up the steps and out onto the sunny, cold avenue. Okay for today, I thought. Chemical Bank and Trust, with all my worldly goods I thee endow.
    I walked home briskly and packed. Beside the small bag I had carried the money in, I had a flight bag and everything I owned fitted in, with room to spare. I left the old parka hanging in the closet. Whoever moved in next would need it more than I. Then I wrote a note to the landlord saying that I was giving up the apartment. I had no lease and was on a month-to-month arrangement, so there wouldn’t be any difficulties there. I folded the note and stuck it in an envelope and dropped the key in with the note. Downstairs I put the envelope in the landlord’s mailbox. Carrying the two bags, I left the building without looking back. I wouldn’t ever again have to worry about keeping warm at that particular address.
    I hailed a cab and gave the driver the name of a hotel on Central Park West. It was a neighborhood I had never lived in and had only rarely visited. Even with my nighttime job and my reclusive habits, in my old neighborhood on the East Side there were bound to be people who had come to recognize me, my bookie, the bartender in the saloon around the corner I