Well, anyway, when Repeal came and mailmen had to use Mack trucks to haul the applications for licenses over to the City Hall, Slade got a license. He got a license immediately, and he got a swell location, and he got the jack to put in leather chairs kind to the femurs, and a circular bar; and Slade, who never had a dime in his life after he paid rent and protection, not stands in the shadows under the murals of undressed dames in the midst of the glitter of chromium and tinted mirrors, wearing a double-breasted blue suit, with what’s left of his hair plastered over his skull, and keeps on eye on the black boys in white jackets who tote the poison and the other on the blonde at the cash register who knows that her duties are not concluded when the lights are turn off at 2:00 A.M., and the strains of a three-piece string ensemble soothe the nerves of the customers.

—From Robert Penn Warren, All the King’s Men.