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warden told him, would be 'counter-productive'. That's another of those phrases you have
to master before you can go to work in the prisons and corrections field.
Patiently, Andy renewed his request And renewed it And renewed it He had changed, had
Andy Dufresne. Suddenly, as that spring of 1963 bloomed around us, there were lines in
his face and sprigs of grey showing in his hair. He had lost that little trace of a smile that
always seemed to linger around his mouth. His eyes stared out into space more often, and
you get to know that when a man stares that way, he is counting up the years served, the
months, the weeks, the days.
He renewed his request and renewed it He was patient He had nothing but time. It got to
be summer. In Washington, President Kennedy was promising a fresh assault on poverty
and on civil rights inequalities, not knowing he had only half a year to live. In Liverpool,
a musical group called The Beatles was emerging as a force to be reckoned with in
British music, but I guess that no one Stateside had yet heard of them. The Boston Red
Sox, still four years away from what New England folks call The Miracle of '67, were
languishing in the cellar of the American League. All of those things were going on out
in a larger world where people walked free.
Norton saw him near the end of June, and this conversation I heard about from Andy
himself some seven years later.
'If it's the money, you don't have to worry,' Andy told Norton in a low voice. 'Do you
think I'd talk that up? I'd be cutting my own throat I'd be just as indictable as -'
That's enough,' Norton interrupted. His face was as long and cold as a slate gravestone.
He leaned back in his office chair until the back of his head almost touched the sampler
reading HIS JUDGMENT COMETH AND THAT RIGHT EARLY.
'But-'
'Don't you ever mention money to me again,' Norton said. 'Not in this office, not
anywhere. Not unless you want to see that library turned back into a storage room and
paint-locker again. Do you understand?'
'I was trying to set your mind at ease, that's all.'
'Well now, when I need a sorry son of a bitch like you to set my mind at ease, I'll retire. I
agreed to this appointment because I got tired of being pestered, Dufresne. I want it to
stop. If you want to buy this particular Brooklyn Bridge, that's your affair. Don't make it
mine. I could hear crazy stories like yours twice a week if I wanted to lay myself open to
them. Every sinner in this place would be using me for a crying towel. I had more respect
for you. But this is the end. The end. Have we got an understanding?'
'Yes,' Andy said. 'But I'll be hiring a lawyer, you know.'
'What in God's name for?'
'I think we can put it together,' Andy said. 'With Tommy Williams and with my testimony
and corroborative testimony from records and employees at the country club, I think we
can put it together.'
'Tommy Williams is no longer an inmate of this facility.'
'What?'
'He's been transferred.'
'Transferred where?'