"我忘了告诉你，"门卫喘着气说。"今天是冰块搬运工发薪水的日子。"

最早到的员工是两个年轻的女孩，身着夏装非常可爱。当她们走进来看到我站在门卫后面，其中一个打趣地说，"嘿，看那个英俊的警官。"她给我一个调情般的微笑。"你最近关押了什么强盗吗？"

"我不会去关押强盗，"我说。"我只会关押银行员工。"
"好哇，"她说。"你得等我们先抢银行才行。"
"没问题，我会等的。甚至我还会帮你抢银行。"

她们还不知道我在说什么，直到我带领她们绕过威尔逊站立的玻璃隔板，告诉她们，我们正在打劫这家银行，并且我的搭档会告诉她们应该怎么做。

人们在压力下的行为很有趣。那个女孩（心里）受到严重伤害，每次我过去和她交谈，她都有意转过去将后背对着我。"你这么生气是为什么？"在等待经理的时候，我问她。"你不应该相信我，这不是我的错。"

"嗯，"她说。"你没有必要愚弄我，你知道的。"

"哦，算了吧，想想你今天晚上可以给你男朋友讲的精彩故事。"被她苍白的微笑鼓舞，我问那两个女孩是否会一起约会，随后关于她们爱情生活的讨论变得非常有趣，直到威尔逊不得不叫我出去，因为银行经理要进来了。

和其他银行一样，经理和经理助手各有一半钥匙，我将他们两个带下去到保险库处，我将里面所有的钱都抢走了，然后，就和罗森塔尔抢劫案（Rosenthal ）一样，当我们走出去的时候，门上的警笛响了。记得吧，我还穿着警察制服，警察从拐角处走过来。他所能做的事情就是叫我一起帮忙，如果如果那样的话就很有趣了。

但是他径直做他的事情，我走下去地铁楼梯，搭了一辆地铁回到华盛顿高地，在那里我们留了一辆小车。抢到的钱不到三万美元，远低于我的期望值。从另一方面说，这是我最喜欢的抢劫案之一。你不可能拥有一切（好处）。

警察当然知道是我干的。他们总是知道是我干的。每次我做完一单案子，就像留下了我的名片。不过没有关系，我直接回到费城了。

在我小时候我就听说了很多关于费城的事情，没有一件是好事。每当纽约周围有罢工的时候，公司就会到费城找代替的工人。第一次我听到那个城市的名字时，我的叔叔约翰（John）把它叫做工贼镇，对我来说，它就一直是这样。我还听到很多关于费城这个城市，人们在天黑后走在人行道的笑话。我（现在）发现了不同，奥尔加（Olga）和我在（ Chestnut and Forty-second）挑选了一个时髦的公寓。有总机，门卫，女主人和其他的一切。女主人的名字叫玛丽安·桑德斯（Marian Saunders），通过她和她的丈夫，埃迪（Eddie），我们发现那有个非常活跃的业余社区，由私人俱乐部和（非法）酒吧组成，斗殴者，赌徒和诈骗者在那里聚集。那些夜猫子， Boo Boo Hoff, Blinky Palermo, Frankie Carbo，还有Waxey Gordon偶尔也会出现。当Waxey穷到去纽约东部（贫民区）澡堂偷肥皂的时候，我就知道了他。作为第一个知道“禁令”意味着什么的骗子，他在新泽西开了几家自己的啤酒厂（注：那个年代美国禁酒），生意兴隆。一年后，我认识了他。当时，梅耶·兰斯基（Meyer Lansky）只是一个年轻的汽车修理工，他正在租给抢劫犯和走私犯用夸张的汽车。Waxey也因为逃避所得税而受到起诉，但他会坐在最好的桌子旁，是他所调查的国王（这一段不是太清楚，原文：but he’d be sitting there at the best table, the monarch of all he surveyed.）。他的结局和我一直想的一样，他坐渡船去了阿尔卡特拉斯（ Alcatraz），身无分文，名誉扫地，在向政府提供了证据，告发了所有人，引起了黑社会的怒火后逃跑了。至少，荷兰人（Dutch Schultz）怒不可遏，比往常更疯狂，他雇佣了汤姆·杜威（Tom Dewey），于是黑手党和组织松散的犹太暴徒——简言之，他们联合起来——雇凶要杀他。

我们在费城安顿下来不久，威尔逊Wilson和他的新女友雷纳尔多（Rita Reynaldo）过来了，她是一个时髦的模特，一个肤色黝黑，苗条的美女，聪明机智。威尔逊（也叫Eddie）的太太在他（在监狱？）时跟他离婚了，而他对女人的品味一如既往的完美。基于丽塔（Rita）和奥尔加（Olga）的不同，他们成了很亲密的朋友。

原文：
153-154页

“What was that envelope?” I wanted to know.

“I forgot to tell you,” the porter gulped. “Today is the day the iceman gets paid.”

Among the first of the employees to arrive were two young girls, as cute as they could be in their summer dresses. As they came in and saw me standing behind the porter, one of them said jokingly, “Hey, look at the handsome policeman.” She gave me a flirtatious little smile. “Have you locked up any robbers lately?”

“I don’t lock up robbers,” I said. “I only lock up bank employees.”

“Well,” she said. “You’ll have to wait until we rob the bank.”

“Okay, I’ll wait. I’ll even help you rob it.”

They still didn’t know what I was talking about until I led them around the glass partition where Wilson was standing and told them the bank was being robbed—by us—and that my partner would tell them what was expected of them.

It’s funny how people act under stress. This girl was so hurt that whenever I’d come into view she would deliberately turn her back to me. “What are you so sore about?” I asked her, while we were waiting for the manager. “It’s not my fault that you wouldn’t believe me.”

“Well,” she said. “You didn’t have to make a fool out of me, you know.”

“Aw, come on, think of the exciting story you’ll be able to tell your boyfriend tonight.” Encouraged by her wan smile, I asked the girls whether they double-dated, and the ensuing discussion about their love life got to be so interesting that Wilson had to call out to me that the bank manager was arriving.

This was another of those banks where the manager and the assistant manager each had half of the combination. I took them both down to the vault and grabbed all the money in sight, and then, just as in the Rosenthal robbery, the siren over the door started going as we stepped out. I was still in the policeman’s uniform, remember, and the policeman was coming down from the corner. All he had to do was call to me for help and it would have been a very interesting situation. But he went his way, and I went down the subway stairs and grabbed a train back to Washington Heights where we had left the car. The take came to something under thirty thousand dollars, which was far less than I had expected. On the other hand, it was one of the robberies I most enjoyed. You can’t have everything.

The police knew it was me, of course. They always knew when it was me. Every time I did a job, it was like leaving my calling card. It didn’t matter, because I went right back to Philadelphia.

I had heard many things about Philadelphia when I was a kid, none of them good. Whenever there was a strike around New York, the companies went to Philadelphia for their strikebreakers. The first time I ever heard the name, my uncle John was calling it a scab town, and to me that’s what it always was. I had also heard a lot of jokes about Philadelphia being a city where they took the sidewalks in after dark. I found out different. Olga and I picked out one of those fashionable apartment houses on Chestnut and Forty-second. Switchboard, doorman, hostess, and everything. The hostess was named Marian Saunders and through her and her husband, Eddie, we discovered that there was a very lively afterhours community consisting of private clubs and speakeasies where the fight promoters, the gamblers, and the racketeers met. The night people. Boo Boo Hoff, Blinky Palermo, Frankie Carbo. And, every once in a while, Waxey Gordon. I had known Waxey when he was so poor that he’d go to the East Side Baths and steal a bar of soap. I had known him a year later when, as the first of the racket guys who had realized what Prohibition was going to mean, he opened up a couple of his own breweries in New Jersey and was riding high. And this was at a time when Meyer Lansky was just a hot young automobile mechanic who was renting hyped-up cars to the hijackers and bootleggers. Waxey was under indictment for income-tax evasion too, but he’d be sitting there at the best table, the monarch of all he surveyed. He ended just the way I always figured he would, riding the ferryboat to Alcatraz, penniless, discredited, and fleeing the wrath of the underworld after he had turned state’s evidence and ratted on everybody. At least, Dutch Schultz went out in a blaze. The Dutchman went crazier than usual and put out a contract on Tom Dewey, whereupon the combined forces of the Mafia and the more loosely knit Jewish mobs—in short, the Syndicate—put out a contract on him.

Shortly after we got settled in Philadelphia, Wilson arrived with his new girl, Rita Reynaldo. A fashion model. A dark, willowy beauty, bright and witty. Eddie’s wife had divorced him while he was in the can, and as always his taste in women was faultless. As different as Rita was from Olga, they became very close friends.