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that it was for some men. He got along with himself.
The sisters was something he adjusted himself to - and then, in 1950, it stopped almost
completely. That is a part of my story that 111 get to in due time.
In the fall of 1948, Andy met me one morning in the exercise yard and asked me if I
could get him half a dozen rock-blankets.
'What the hell are those?' I asked.
He told me that was just what rockhounds called them; they were polishing cloths about
the size of dishtowels. They were heavily padded, with a smooth side and a rough side -
the smooth side like fine-grained sandpaper, the rough side almost as abrasive as
industrial steel wool (Andy also kept a box of that in his cell, although he didn't get it
from me - I imagine he kited it from the prison laundry).
I told him I thought we could do business on those, and I ended up getting them from the
very same rock-and-gem shop where I'd arranged to get the rock-hammer. This time I
charged Andy my usual ten per cent and not a penny more. I didn't see anything lethal or
even dangerous in a dozen 7" x 7" squares of padded cloth. Rock-blankets, indeed.
It was about five months later that Andy asked if I could get him Rita Hayworth. That
conversation took place in the auditorium, during a movie-show. Nowadays we get the
movie-shows once or twice a week, but back then the shows were a monthly event
Usually the movies we got had a morally uplifting message to them, and this one, The
Lost Weekend, was no different. The moral was that it's dangerous to drink. It was a
moral we could take some comfort in.
Andy manoeuvred to get next to me, and about halfway through the show he leaned a
little closer and asked if I could get him Rita Hayworth. I'll tell you the truth, it kind of
tickled me. He was usually cool, calm, and collected, but that night he was jumpy as hell,
almost embarrassed, as if he was asking me to get him a load of Trojans or one of those
sheepskin-lined gadgets that are supposed to 'enhance your solitary pleasure,' as the
magazines put it. He seemed overcharged, a man on the verge of blowing his radiator.
'I can get her,' I said. 'No sweat, calm down. You want the big one or the little one?' At
that time Rita was my best girl (a few years before it had been Betty Grable) and she
came in two sizes. For a buck you could get the little Rita. For two-fifty you could have
the big Rita, four feet high and all woman.
'The big one,' he said, not looking at me. I tell you, he was a hot sketch that night He was
blushing just like a kid trying to get into a kootch show with his big brother's draft-card.
'Can you do it?'
'Take it easy, sure I can. Does a bear shit in the woods?' The audience was applauding
and catcalling as the bugs came out of the walls to get Ray Milland, who was having a
bad case of the DT's.
'How soon?'
'A week. Maybe less.'
'Okay.' But he sounded disappointed, as if he had been hoping I had one stuffed down my
pants right then. 'How much?"
I quoted him the wholesale price. I could afford to give him this one at cost; he'd been a
good customer, what with his rock-hammer and his rock-blankets. Furthermore, he'd