Part One-1

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    Iown there were two mutes, and they were always together. Early every m they would e out from the house where they lived and walk arm in arm dowreet to work. The two friends were very different. The one who always steered the way was an obese and dreamy Greek. In the summer he would e out wearing a yellreen polo shirt stuffed sloppily into his trousers in front and hanging loose behind. When it was colder he wore over this a shapeless gray sweater.

    His face was round and oily, with half-closed eyelids and lips that curved in a geupid smile. The other mute was tall. His eyes had a quick, intelligent expression. He was always immaculate and very soberly dressed.

    Every m the two <kbd>99lib?</kbd>friends walked silently together until they reached the main street of the town. Thehey came to a certain fruit and dy store they paused for a moment on the sidewalk outside. The Greek, Spiros Antonapoulos, worked for his cousin, who owhis fruit store. His job was to make dies and sweets, uncrate the fruits, and to keep the place . The thin mute, John Singer, nearly alut his hand on his friends arm and looked for a sed into his face before leaving him. Then after this good-bye Singer crossed the street and walked on aloo the jewelry store where he worked as a silverware engraver.

    Ie afternoon the friends would meet again. Singer came back to the fruit store and waited until Antonapoulos was ready to go home. The Greek would be lazily unpag a case of peaches or melons, or perhaps looking at the funny paper i behind the store where he cooked. Before their departure Antonapoulos always opened a paper sack he kept hidden during the day on one of the kit shelves. Inside were stored various bits of food he had collected—a piece of fruit, samples of dy, or the butt-end of a liverwurst. Usually before leaving Antonapoulos waddled gently to the glassed case in the front of the store where some meats and cheeses were kept. He glided open the

    back of the case and his fat hand groped lovingly for some particular dainty inside which he had wanted. Sometimes his cousin who owhe place did not see him. But if he noticed he stared at his cousin with a warning in his tight, pale face.

    Sadly Antonapoulos would shuffle the morsel from one er of the case to the other. During these times Siood very straight with his hands in his pockets and looked in another dire. He did not like to watch this little se betweewo Greeks. For, excepting drinking and a certain solitary secret pleasure, Antonapoulos loved to eat more than anything else in the world.

    In the dusk the two mutes walked slowly home together. At home Singer was always talking to Antonapoulos. His hands shaped the<u></u> words in a swift series of designs. His face was eager and his gray-green eyes sparkled brightly. With his thin, strong hands he told Antonapoulos all that had happened during the day.

    Antonapoulos sat back lazily and looked at Singer. It was seldom that he ever moved his hands to speak at all— and then it was to say that he wao eat or to sleep or to drink.

    These three things he always said with the same vague, fumbling signs. At night, if he were not too drunk, he would kneel down before his bed and pray awhile. Then his plump hands shaped the words Holy Jesus, od, or Darling Mary. These were the only words Antonapoulos ever said.

    Singer never knew just how much his friend uood of all the things he told him. But it did not matter.

    They shared the upstairs of a small house he business se of the town. There were two rooms. On the oil stove i Antonapoulos cooked all of their meals. There were straight, plain kit chairs for Singer and auffed sofa for Antonapoulos. The bedroom was furnished mainly with a large double bed covered with an eiderdown forter for the big Greek and a narrow iron cot for Singer.

    Dinner always took a long time, because Antonapoulos loved food and he was very slow. After they had eaten, the big Greek would lie ba his sofa and slowly lick over eae of his teeth with his tongue, either from a certain delicacy

    or because he did not wish to lose the savor of the meal—while Singer washed the dishes.

    Sometimes in the evening the mutes would play chess. Singer had always greatly ehis game, and years before he had tried to teach it to Ant<dfn>99lib.</dfn>onapoulos. At first his friend could not be ied in the reasons for moving the various pieces about on the board. Then Singer began to keep a bottle of something good uhe table to be taken out after each lesson. The Greek never got on to the erratients of the knights and the sweeping mobility of the queens, but he learo make a few set, opening moves. He preferred the white pieces and would not play if the black men were given him. After the first moves Singer worked out the game by himself while his friend looked on drowsily. If Singer made brilliant attacks on his own men so that in the end the black king was killed, Antonapoulos was always very proud and pleased.

    The two mutes had no other friends, and except when they worked they were aloogether. Each day was very much like any other day, because they were alone so much that nothing ever disturbed them. Once a week they w<details>９9ｌib?</details>ould go to the library for Sio withdraw a mystery book and on Friday night they attended a movie. Then on payday they always went to the te photograph shop above the Army and Navy Store so that Antonapoulos could have his picture taken. These were the only places where they made ary visits. There were many parts iown that they had never even seen.

    The town was in the middle of the deep South. The summers were long and the months of winter cold were very few.

    Nearly always the sky was a glassy, brilliant azure and the sun burned down riotously bright. Then the light, chill rains of November would e, and perhaps later there would be frost and some short months of cold. The winters were geable, but the summers always were burning hot. The town was a fairly large one. On the main street there were several blocks of two- and three-story shops and business offices. But the largest buildings iowhe factories, which employed a large pertage of the population. These ills were big and flourishing

    and most of the workers iown were very poor. Often in the faces along the streets there was the desperate look of hunger and of loneliness.

    But the two mutes were not lonely at all. At home they were tent to eat and drink, and Singer would talk with bis hands eagerly to his friend about all that was in his mind. So the years passed in this quiet way until Singer reached the age of thirty-two and had been iown with Antonapoulos for ten years.

    Then one day the Greek became ill. He sat up in bed with his hands on his fat stomad big, oily tears rolled down his cheeks. Singer went to see his friends cousin who owhe fruit store, and also he arranged for leave from his own work.

    The doade out a diet for Antonapoulos and said that he could drink no more wine. Singer rigidly enforced the doctors orders. All day he sat by his friends bed and did what he could to make the time pass quickly, but Antonapoulos only looked at him angrily from the ers of his eyes and would not be amused.

    The Greek was very fretful, a finding fault with the fruit drinks and food that Singer prepared for him. stantly he made his friend help him out of bed so that he could pray.

    His huge butt<bdo>99lib.</bdo>ocks would sag down over his plump little feet when he kneeled. He fumbled with his hands to say Darling Mary and theo the small brass cross tied to his neck with a dirty string. His big eyes would wall up to the ceiling with a look of fear in them, and afterward he was very sulky and would not let his friend speak to him.

    Singer atient and did all that he could. He drew little pictures, and once he made a sketch of his friend to amuse him. This picture hurt the big Greeks feelings, and he refused to be reciled until Singer had made his face very young and handsome and colored his hair bright yellow and his eyes a blue. And theried not to show his pleasure.

    Singer nursed his friend so carefully that after a week Antonapoulos was able to return to his work. But from that time on there was a differen their way of life. Trouble came to the two friends.

    Antonapoulos was not ill any more, but a ge had e in

    him. He was irritable and no longer tent to spend the evenings quietly in their home. When he would wish to go out Singer followed along close behind him. Antonapoulos would go into a restaurant, and while they sat at the table he slyly put lumps of sugar, or a pepper-shaker, or pieces of silverware in bis pocket. Singer alaid for what he took and there was no disturba home he scolded Antonapoulos, but the big Greek only looked at him with a bland smile.

    The months went on and these habits of Antonapoulos grew worse. One day at noon he walked calmly out of the fruit store of his cousin and urinated in public against the wall of the First National Bank Building across the street. At times he would meet people on the sidewalk whose faces did not please him, and he would bump into these persons and push at them with his elbows and stomach. He walked into a store one day and hauled out a floor lamp without paying for it, and aime he tried to take aric train he had seen in a showcase.

    For Sihis was a time of great distress. He was tinually marg Antonapoulos down to the courthouse during lunch hour to settle these infris of the law.

    Singer became very familiar with the procedure of the courts and he was in a stant state of agitation. The money he had saved in the bank ent for bail and fines. All of his efforts and money were used to keep his friend out of jail because of such charges as theft, itting publidecies, and assault and battery.

    The Greek cousin for whom Antonapoulos worked did er into these troubles at all. Charles Parker (for that was the his cousin had take Antonapoulos stay on at the store, but he watched him always with his pale, tight fad he made no effort to help him. Singer had a strange feeling about Charles Parker. He began to dislike him.

    Singer lived in tinual turmoil and worry. But Antonapoulos was always bland, and no matter what happehe gentle, flaccid smile was still on his face. In all the years before it had seemed to Sihat there was something very subtle and wise in this smile of his friend. He had never known just how mutonapoulos uood and what he was thinking. Now in the big Greeks expression

    Sihought that he could deteething sly and joking.

    He would shake his friend by the shoulders until he was very tired and explain things over and over with his hands. But nothing did any good.

    All of Singers money was gone and he had to borrow from the jeweler for whom he worked. On one occasion he was uo pay bail for bis friend and Antonapoulos spent the night in jail. When Singer came to get him out the  day he was very sulky. He did not want to leave. He had enjoyed his dinner of sowbelly and bread with syrup poured over it.

    And the new sleeping arras and his cellmates pleased him.

    They had lived so much alohat Singer had no oo help him in his distress. Antonapoulos let nothing disturb him or cure him of his habits. At home he sometimes cooked the new dish he had eaten in the jail, and oreets there was never any knowing just what he would do.

    And then the final trouble came to Singer.

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