When the Sacred Ginmill Closes

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The windows at Morrissey's were painted black. Theblast was loud enough and close enough to rattle them. It chopped off conversation inmidsyllable, froze a waiter inmidstride, making of him a statue with a tray of drinks on his shoulder and one foot in the air. The great round noise died out like dust settling, and for a long moment afterward the room remained hushed, as if with respect.

Someone said, "Jesus Christ," and a lot of people let out the breath they'd been holding. At our table, BobbyRuslander reached for a cigarette and said, "Sounded like a bomb."

SkipDevoe said, "Cherry bomb."

"Is that all?"

"It's enough," Skip said."Cherry bomb's major ordnance. Same charge had a metal casing instead of a paperwrapper, you'd have a weapon instead of a toy. You light one of those little mothers and forget to let go of it, you'regonna have to learn to do a lot of basic things left-handed."

"Sounded like more than a firecracker," Bobby insisted. "Like dynamite or a grenade or something. Sounded like fucking World War Three, if you want to know."

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