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a case and sold it here for fifteen or twenty. You could load
a lot of ale into those big crates we had. We kept five or six
ears on the road all the time. We sold everybody in Barre and
Montpelier from the poolroom crowd to the town bigshots. We
was sitting pretty them days. A gang from Burlington tried to
chisel in but they didn't last long. We high -jacked three of
their cars one night and they was loaded, what I mean, loaded.
We gave them a damn good beating, we it a couple of 'em in the
hospital. They kept away from Barre after that, they didn't
bother us no more. We had a tough crew to fool round with, see?
We liked to fight too. Nobody messed round much with us. Our
gang was bad news. We could drive like hell and fight like
hell. We ran a lot of stuff cross that Line, I'm telling you.
"We knew the officers and they knew us. You know, the
same as you know football players on another team, something
like that. There was one French sonofabitch gave us plenty of
trouble. We lost a few loads but we never lost a man.
"For awhile we had Boston Billy's protection. He wan a
bigshot. He was too big for them forty -buck -a -week customs
punks to fool with, see? His outfit was big-time stuff. We
was just kids but Boston liked us. So he let us cross with his
outfit under his protection, until the officers told him he'd
got to drop us. We went through just the same, don't worry.
WA gave them Customs monkeys some wild ohases.
"I used to drive the pilot car a lot. I'd hang behind the
loaded cars. When the partrol started chasing us I'd hold 'em
up, block the road on 'am, to let the boys with the loads get
away. We had a smoke -screen on the pilot car. We'd come hell-
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roaring down over that Line and hit back roads all the way home,
We had hideouts in barns and garages along the way. SOMS of
the people we had to pay, some we just had to leave a case of
beer.
"There was one Customs officer that went to high school
with us. I guess in school we'd all licked the poor punk.
One day Tony and I saw him parked beside the road up there.
Tony got out and knocked his dap off, cuffed him, threw him
down, took his badge off, and laughed at him. Tony said, "You
sure look nice in that uniform." The poor bastard was begging
and crying, said he'd lose his job and everything. Tony gave
him back his badge when we left.
"We had all kinds of money and women, we lived high, the
good old days. I ain't had so much fun since. One night Timmy
got drunk up there and started down with a load, lie didn't make
a turn in North Troy. He crashed right through a plateglass
window into a store. Be was singing in there when the cops got
him. Timmy did time for that one, on top of losing the car and
the load. But he never paid for the window. He still gets
bills from that storekeeper. He just laughs at tem.
"Now things ain't so hot here. After Repeal we tried runn-
ing alcohol into Canada but it wasn't so good, and if you get
caught up there you never get out of the can. One winter we
vent to Florida and we had a sweet spot there. We cleaned up
big. I come back with a roll that was a roll. I spent it all
on the gang around here. Used to take them to Montreal, New
York, Boston, Albany, pay all the bills. It went pretty fast.
Then I had some slot machines out but they got knocked off.
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I lost Ism all, and don't think for a minute them slots don't
cost.
"Right now all I do is run a poker game and sell a little
beer. No money in beer but the gem* pays me pretty good. I
get a drag on every pot, sure, and I win plenty of pots myself.
I played poker long enough.
a.
got a nice place here, and a
blonde to keep house for me. I've settled down some but I ain't
married. Only suckers get married.
"oat of the gang's settled down now. Some different than
the old days* Frank's got a farm; Mario runs a restaurant;
Tony's got a poolroom; Timmy is just loafing and doing odd jobs.
I don't know where Red is. He went in the ring for *Wine. I
heard he got killed in a shooting jam in Chicago, but I don't
know. I know this town has gone to hell.
"I'm doing all right though. I got a new Ford sedan and
it's paid for. If I want to take a run to Montreal or New York
I can do it. I make enough to got by on, but it don't come so
easy no more,
"The only time I got jugc4d was over a girl. I been in
plenty of lama but I never did time before. I was playing her,
I admit, but so was plenty other guys. Half of Norwich, I guess.
She got knocked up and tried to hook me. If she'd been decent
I'd probably married her, but I knew what she was, so I wouldn't
even give her five hundred bucks. I went to jail. 1411 of a
thing to co to jail for, aftor all the things I done that should*
put me in the can, But I'd go again before I'd let a slut like
that get the hooks in me.
"My old man's been dead a lone time. he was a stonecutter,
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a good carver. Fie came over here from the Old Country. ry
mother died three-four years ago. She was sick of living any-
way, I think. We owned a house but it burned after she died.
They tried to claim we burned it to collect the insurance.
Just because we got tough reputations they tried to pull a fast
one.
mUe got a bad name in this town but it don't make no diff-
erence., We're getting by all right. We don't ask help from
nobody. We never did. I been flat, I been down-and-out, but
I always came back. Nobody helped me neither* I came back my-
self. And I'll always come back like that.
mI got a nice place to live here, good clothes, a new car,
money in my pockets, a good I still say only suckers
work for a living."