Little Eddy was a hustler—the kind of guy who’d borrow ten bucks and five minutes later have you convinced you owed him the money. When I met him, he’d just come out of the hospital after a beating by three guys with no place else to put their anger besides Eddie’s mouth. They broke his jaw twice, and the docs had wired him up so he talked like a bad ventriloquist. “I just need two bucks,” he said through gritted teeth. “For some baby food.” Everything he ate had to be creamed, so baby food was easiest. A few week later, after the wires came out, he was back on the hustle. A truck full of trousers had crashed on the expressway, and two hours later Eddie was on the corner with a shopping cart full of them. “I got all sizes, all styles,” he said. And he did: solids, plaids, cotton, poly, twill, double-knit. Some were a little run-over or had smears of motor oil. But he sold most of them, then got good and drunk. I heard shortly after that the cops grabbed him for B&E at a drug store. Gave him fifteen years. But I’m sure he’ll talk them down to five.
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