"I know I didn't," Hilliard said. "And you know why that is, you fresh prick? I don't know the answer myself, why I work my ass off and get nowhere. I did I'd give it to you. Why the hell not?
Dillinger's right, I've sure got nothing to lose. According to him, my second campaign isn't stirring up any more excitement than my first one, when I lost. That'll help me a lot. Even though this time I'm more mature, so people don't see me anymore as an upstart college kid trying to replace Roy Carnes, I'm still not getting anywhere. What if he's right? What the hell can I do?"
"You left out the part about how even though almost everybody now seems to think the guy who beat you the last time's turned out to be a real asshole," Merrion said.
"Thank you very much," Hilliard said. "I'm really glad I decided to bring my car in today, so when I came to get it you'd be here to cheer me up. Instead of on some other day when you're up in Amherst there, taking Sandbox Two and Finger-painting One-oh-one, and old AL. would've been here. No imagination, AL. Never reads the papers."
Merrion was laughing.
"Sure, go ahead, laugh your ass off," Hilliard said. "I now see I was wrong, I said you're as bad as your father, but your father had compassion. Now I not only get the pleasure of reading Dillinger's abuse myself; I get to enjoy it again when you quote it back to me. Not bad enough Fred says I'm already a loser; now I'm a pathetic loser; you're asking me how I like it."
"You aren't yet, are you?" Merrion said. "We haven't had this election. Nobody's beaten you yet."
Hilliard stared at him. "Yeah," he said, 'that's right, they haven't.
I'm just being groomed to lose. You got some idea, I might win?"
"I dunno," Merrion said. "I got this problem. My mind sometimes wanders. I don't always think about things that concern me. I think about whole bunches of other things, none of my business at all. Today I'm reading Dillinger and since I know you and I also know you're comm' in, don't have much on my mind…
"Well: two things. You're obviously getting' nowhere kickin' the shit out of Gilson. As you've mainly been doin'."
"It's like beatin' a pillow," Hilliard said. "You don't hurt your hands but you don't accomplish anything either. People don't even listen to me. It doesn't bother them that he's a dummy.
They're resigned to it. Maybe what this really is is a matter of equal representation: Gilson's the dummies' alderman."
"So what I would do then," Merrion said, 'is quit alienatin' the jerks.
Stop even tryin' to talk to them. He's theirs and they're satisfied with him. Tell 'em you hope they'll be very happy. Leave them have him and go somewhere else."
"Like where, maybe Hadley?" Hilliard said. "This's where I live.
Gilson's got the at-large seat that I'm running for."
"But why is that?" Merrion said. "Why does he have what you want?
He's got that seat because two years ago young Roy Carnes decided he didn't want to be an alderman any more. He wanted to be a state rep, like his uncle Arthur used to be, before he moved up. There wasn't any new Carnes ready to step into his place. Open field. So you stood up and said you want the job, and the voters said: "No, you're too young."
They voted for Gilson instead.
"We now know why they did it. It was not because he's smart. Anyone who voted for him thinking that now has to know he's not. He's proven that he's stupid. So Dillinger's got that part right. They thought you were too young, and he was the alternative and he was older."
"Okay, but how does that help me?" Hilliard said. "He still is, he's still older than I am, and now he's the incumbent."
"He's still older'n you are," Merrion said. "But you are no longer so young. What are you now, twenty-six? Four years out of the Cross, 'stead of only two? You're an experienced teacher. You're familiar with the problems that face our public schools, 'stead of what you were back then: still feeling your way along, only your second year on the job. Not exactly elderly, but still more mature. Dillinger also said that.
"What you don't like's what he put with it, that you're not impressing the voters with it. Not convincing them you're not too young for the job anymore, so they don't need Gilson anymore to keep the seat warm.
Now you're ready. Kick him out."
"I start saying that," Hilliard said, 'how do I avoid pissing off every voter over thirty? That'll make 'em elect him again."
"Well, if I were you," Merrion said, 'the first thing I'd do would be call up old Roy Carnes or Arthur and ask if you could come up to their office and discuss the next city election. Tell 'em young Roy can sit in too."
"Why would the Carneses talk to me?" Hilliard said. "I haven't got anything they want. They're through with the alderman seat, gone on to bigger and better things. I've got nothing to offer them."
