Characters and Plots in the Novels of Horace Mccoy

By Robert L. Gale

Tennessee-born Horace McCoy joined the American Air Service in WWI, was wounded flying over France, became a reporter-actor in Dallas. In Hollywood, he was popular as a handsome actor, then toiled as a prolific movie-script writer. McCoy burst into fame with his first novel, They Shoot Horses, Dont They?, about Depression-era marathon dancers. His No Pockets in a Shroud features a social climber bribed to have his marriage annulled by the brides rich father, then establishing a radical magazine. I Should Have Stayed Home exposes Hollywood moguls and rich old women exploiting would-be actors and actresses. Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye features warfare between a professional criminal and corrupt law-enforcement agents. When made into a movie it starred Jimmy Cagney. Additional films were based on McCoys fiction. McCoy visited England and France where translations of his works were admired by existentialists. Scalpel, his best-seller, features Tom Owen, a successful WWII military surgeon at odds with his superiors, including General Patton. Owen returns to his Western Pennsylvania roots to investigate his brothers death, is drawn into high-society--temporarily? Well-educated Owen perhaps resembles what McCoy aspired to be. But love of cars, wine, travel, and the high life clipped his wings. He left Corruption City, a sixth novel, in fragmentary form--completed by a ghost writer and blasting yet another set of unclean cops and thieving politicians. McCoys popularity in Europe may be better than in America, a land he loved and wished were cleaner. This book begins with a chronology of major events in the life of Horace McCoy (1897-1955), and then in one alphabetized sequence synopsizes the plots of his six novels and identifies each of their 494 characters--often with critical comments by publishing scholars, including Gale. It concludes with a select bibliography showing the range of scholarship on McCoy, then an index.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jan 21, 2013
• ISBN: 9781477259719

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© 2013 . All rights reserved.

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Published by AuthorHouse 1/18/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4772-5973-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4772-5972-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4772-5971-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012915081

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Contents

Preface

Chronology

Characters and Plots A-Z

Bibliography

About the Author

To My Family,

Near and Far

Preface

Horace Stanley McCoy (1897-1955) has suffered the fate of being an unjustly neglected author. This situation is being remedied, however. It is worth noting that more than a third of the items in the bibliography of this reference book have been published since the year 2000. This fact alone hints at McCoy’s overdue comeback. In addition, I hope that this book will have a hand in bringing renewed recognition of his enduring literary value.

McCoy could have been more successful if he had concentrated his considerable talents on novels more steadily than he did. Instead, he spent decades in Hollywood as what he called a studio slave writer, constantly vowing to escape and return to more virtuous literary endeavors. As it was, he led such a complicated, even thrilling life that exploiting it more assiduously could have led to thrice his novelistic output. Even so, his five novels and a sixth, completed by a talented ghost writer assigned by his publisher, are sparkling, varied, and critically challenging.

McCoy was born in humble circumstances in rural Tennessee, was encouraged by his mother to read widely, but as a teenager had to quit school and start supporting himself. He did so, starting in Dallas, Texas. World War I gave him an opportunity for adventure. He volunteered, soon was flying combat missions with the American Air Service in France, and got himself wounded in action. After the war, he found a job as a Dallas reporter, at first by fibbing about his reportorial background in New York, of all places. Soon he made himself an assiduous reporter, and at the same time a competent athlete and a handsome local actor. By this time, however, he had become fond of spending more money than he could spare, and enjoying a fancy life, a habit he never shook. His first marriage, to Loline Scherer, produced a son Stanley but also a divorce, which was followed by a brief second marriage, soon annulled, with the whilom wife’s name not publicly available to this day. Meanwhile, he had begun to publish short stories in Black Mask, featuring adventure yarns. He was soon lumped with so-called hardboiled writers, a designation he always deplored.

Next, Hollywood lured McCoy. At first he was a so-so actor but soon became a well-paid scriptwriter, especially admired for fast-paced dialogue. McCoy married for a final time, to Helen Vinmont, daughter of a disapproving oil man. He and Helen had a daughter Amanda and a son Peter. McCoy published They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?, in which the dance and derbies that exploited marathon contestants in California became a sombre metaphor for life. Critics claimed that his novel was influenced by James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice--wrongly, because he wrote it before Cain’s work appeared. Again, McCoy deplored being categorized as hardboiled. If They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? had been filmed during McCoy’s lifetime, his career would have been different. But Hollywood’s censors delayed production, and he died long before the noir movie based on it appeared, starring Jane Fonda. It is now a cult classic.

These adversities deepened McCoy’s already bleak view of life. He was, however, invigorated when he learned that the French existentialists were adopting him as one of their own. Fibber that he continued to be, he let it be known that he had founded the movement. Regardless, his popularity abroad resulted in his getting his second novel, No Pockets in a Shroud, published in London before its tardy appearance in America. It is the bitter story of a risk-taking journalist fighting political corruption and racism in a Southern city, and is replete with autobiographical touches. His third novel, I Should Have Stayed Home, finds his cast of characters back in California. It tells the neo-naturalistic story of unemployed movie extras during the Great Depression and counterpoints Tinseltown’s high-living haves and disconsolate have-nots.

Lucrative but unsatisfying film work and a ruinously lavish lifestyle combined to delay McCoy’s fourth novel for years. But when it came, it was thoroughly first-rate: Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye, a gory thriller, traces the complex actions of an amoral killer whose troubled psyche prevents success either with his gun moll or with a high-society debutante. Some critics have called it his best novel. Furthermore, it was adapted as a gritty movie, of the same name and starring James Cagney. Scalpel, McCoy’s fifth novel, rises at times to the level of Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye. Its hero, an army colonel turned successful surgeon, is much like what McCoy wanted to be: military hero, professional success, social idol, and domineering male. Scalpel was the last McCoy novel to be made into a movie, which was called Bad for Each Other and starred Charlton Heston.

Ill health was finally the ruinous consequence of McCoy’s self-indulging life style. Overweight and a weakening heart kept him from finishing his sixth novel. Corruption City was completed by another and published four years after his early death, ironically, in Beverly Hills--in California, that state from which he had longed to escape. Sadly, his widow Helen had to sell his books and jazz records for ready cash. It is interesting that their son Peter McCoy married Kathleen (Kacey) Doheny, also from an oil-rich family; he became Nancy Reagan’s chief of staff during part of her husband Ronald Reagan’s presidency (see Kitty Kelley, 318, 339, 342, 363; Frances Spatz Leighton, 161, 215, 276; Pierre-Marie Loizeau, 82).

My Characters and Plots in the Novels of Horace McCoy includes a Chronology, in which interested readers can find many details of McCoy’s fascinating life. The main A-Z section, which follows, contains in one alphabetized sequence a synopsis of each of the six novels, and an identification and brief discussion of each of their 494 characters, often including critical commentary usually linked to items in the bibliography. Plot summaries are divided not only by chapters but in accordance with McCoy’s use of white space as separations within chapters.

It is my hope that this work will encourage readers to turn to, or return to, McCoy’s exciting fiction. In addition, students of American literature, and teachers and scholars as well, may be helped to place McCoy in the tradition of terse, realistic, objective American fiction--whether to compare and contrast him to practitioners of the hardboiled school or to see how he differs. They will learn that McCoy can hold his own with the likes of James M. Cain, Erle Stanley Gardiner, Dashiell Hammett, Raoul Whitfield, and certainly Mickey Spillane.

Characters and Plots in the Fiction of Horace McCoy would have been impossible to make as complete as it is without my extensive use of John Thomas Stuark’s unpublished 1966 Ph.D. dissertation entitled The Life and Writings of Horace McCoy, 1897-1955, University of California at Los Angeles, where McCoy’s few extant papers are now archived. Dr. Sturak was practically my co-author. I have read many dissertations, but none is better than his outstanding 590-page work. In addition, Mark Royden Winchell’s monograph on McCoy is critically astute, as are numerous learned-journal articles, all cited.

Since quotations and excerpted material found in this work lie within the fair-use concept as applied to academic and scholarly books, acknowledgment of permission to quote is omitted here.

Finally, I express my thanks to several colleagues and friends who have helped and encouraged me during my many pleasant months with McCoy. They include H. David Brumble III, Patricia Duff, Robert Alan Hallead, Frank N. Kremm, Susan Neuman, Eugene M. Sawa, and Thomas M. Twiss, all of the University of Pittsburgh; Carmen DiCiccio, teacher and scholar; and Sylvia Wilson, of the Carnegie Public Library, in Pittsburgh. And my love to John, Jim, and Christine, and to Lisette, Viviana, and Bill, and to Diana, Caroline, Stephanie, and Dilan Roberto, and our beloved Maureen.

Chronology

1896 James Harris McCoy (born in Alabama, 1873) marries Irish-American Nannie Holt.

1897 Horace Stanley McCoy born April 14, 1897, in cabin near Pegram (or Pegram Station), Tennessee (oldest of five children). He was called Stanley and Stan as a child and youth. His father, James McCoy, was a country school teacher, then a conductor on Nashville, Chattanooga, and St. Louis railroad. His mother Nancie (later spelled Nancye) Holt McCoy, was beautiful, feisty, and well-read.

1899 Father gets freight-house job in Nashville, Tennessee; moves there with family, is described as book rich and money poor.

1903 Young McCoy sells newspapers for spare cash.

1912 Graduates from grade school, enters high school.

1913 Quits high school, works as auto mechanic, traveling salesman (to 1915).

1915 Moves with family to Dallas, Texas, drives taxi; attends South Dallas Christian Church with family.

1917 Enlists as private in Troop G, First Cavalry, Texas National Guard (May 30); trains in Dallas and at Camp Bowie, Texas (August-December).

1918 Trains in Signal Corps, at Camp Hancock, Georgia, and Camp Greene, North Carolina (January-June); sails for France as member of American Air Service; is stationed at French base near Romorantin, 90 miles south of Paris; equips aircraft with radio devices there and then near Chateau-Thierry (July); flies on multiple missions in de Haviland bombers as bombardier and as belly down reconnaissance photographer (July-August); is wounded by enemy machinegun fire over Barricourt, lands plane when pilot is killed (August 5); flies on additional missions during Meuse-Argonne offensive (September-November); was wounded again (October), receives French Croix de Guerre, with palm; qualifies as pilot (November 5); by Armistice (November 11), had flown 400 hours over enemy lines.

1918-19 Attached with his company to Motor Transport Corps, at Romorantin (December-June 1919); briefly co-edits Romo Exhaust, his military unit’s weekly paper (April); in letter home (April), reports he has written several short stories (none extant); works with military Romo Follies of 1919 road show (May-June); arrives in U.S. (July); receives discharge as corporal at Camp Pike, Arkansas (August 19); visits parents in Dallas; becomes auto mechanic and chauffeur.

1919 Hired by Dallas Morning News, fired two days later for lying about non-existent newspaper work in New York.

1919-29 Becomes reporter for Dallas Dispatch (October-May 1920) and immediately thereafter for Dallas Journal, with increasing flamboyance and ability, especially when covering sports; excels in baseball, golf, handball, tennis; fancies flashy clothes and big cars (May 1919-1929).

1920-21 Joins Arts Club (spring 1920), associates with Bohemian guys and gals.

1920 Black Mask founded by H. L. Mencken and George Jean Nathan.

1921 Marries journalist Loline Scherer (July 9).

1924 Son Stanley McCoy born.

l924-31 Performs in 10 plays in the splendid Dallas Little Theatre, often superbly and accorded fine reviews.

1927 Publishes Brass Buttons (Holland’s Magazine [Dallas], March, paying $35), The Man Who Wanted to Win (Holland’s, July--indexed in The Best Short Stories of 1927), and The Devil Man (Black Mask, December), his first three short stories to see print. Publishes 16 more stories in Black Mask (to October 1934).

1928 The Devil Man republished in Best Short Stories from the Southwest, his first story in hard cover.

1929 Is divorced from Loline; elopes with Dallas socialite; marriage quickly annulled at her parents’ demand. Begins to share bohemian life with five other men, in Pearl Dive on Pearl Street (from September).

1929-30 Writes for the New Yorker-like Dallasite (September--April 1930). His Dirty Work (Black Mask, September 1929) and The Little Black Book (Black Mask, January 1930) named in O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1930.

1929-31 Supports himself minimally by publishing adventure stories about airplane pilots, detectives, and cowboys, in Battle Aces, Detective Action Stories, Western Trails, etc.

1930 Edits Dallasite as muckraking magazine (February-April), exposes Dallas police department corruption; publishes The Sky-Horse (Southwest Review, Spring); unsuccessfully seeks publication of stories in Saturday Evening Post (August-September). Elopes with unnamed Dallas debutante, but marriage is annulled soon.

1931 Hires August Lenniger of New York as his literary agent. Encouraged by MGM talent scout, moves to Hollywood, which becomes his permanent residence. Fails initial screen test. Sometimes destitute, finds menial jobs, including fruit picker, soda jerk, bodyguard. Meets Helen Vinmont (Fall), daughter of oil magnate.

1931-32 Has bit parts, then more important roles, in several action movies.

1931-34 His 15 Black Mask stories feature Captain Jerry Frost, Texas Ranger leading Air Border Patrol pilots known as Hell’s Stepsons.

1932 Becomes RKO-Radio Pictures contract writer at $50 a week (by falsely claiming he was a Vanderbilt University alumnus); sells The Luxury Girl, original screenplay. Starts writing short story he expands into They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?

1933 Writes dialogue for Columbia Pictures (at $50 per week), appears in several minor movies, is script assistant (uncredited) for movie King Kong; completes draft of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? Marries Helen Vinmont (November 4), against her parents’ wishes.

1934 Somebody Must Die (his final Black Mask story, October). Completes draft of Marathon Dancers, basis of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?

1935 Hires Harold Matson as literary agent. Publishes They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (New York: Simon & Schuster), publishes The Grandstand Complex (Esquire, December). Starts writing Looks Like They’ll Never Learn, retitled The Madman Beats a Drum, then Death Cannot Spoil the Spring, then No Angels in Heaven; it will expand into No Pockets in a Shroud.

1936 Is assigned by Republic to write B-grade pictures. Meets and influences fellow screenwriter William Faulkner. Jamen, Man Skyder Da Heste? (Danish translation of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?).

1936-55 Is intermittent author or co-author of at least 30 screenplays, including 16 for Paramount and also Gentleman Jim (1942, Warner Bros., starring Errol Flynn).

1937 Publishes No Pockets in a Shroud (London: Arthur Barker). (It sells 8,000 copies in England in four years.) O Pão Da Mentira (Portuguese translation of No Pockets in a Shroud). De Skyter Jo Hester, Ikke Sant? (Norwegian translation of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? Maranthondans (Dutch transaltion of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?).

1938 Publishes I Should Have Stayed Home (New York: Knopf; London: Barker). Though beginning to be paid up to $1,000 per week, establishes irrationally ruinous lifestyle. Marathondansen (Swedish translation of They Shoot Horse, Don’t They?). Un suaire n’a pas de poches (French translation of No Pockets in a Shroud).

1939 Jeg Skulde Vaere Blevet Hjemme (Danish translation of I Should Have Stayed Home).

1940 Daughter Amanda McCoy born. Reporter Gö Uppror (Swedish translation of No Pockets in a Shroud).

1942 Tries unsuccessfully to seek an appointment in army intelligence.

1943 Sells novella Flight for Freedom to Woman’s Home Companion (January) for $2,000. RKO-Radio movie with same title based on story released (April). Both based on disappearance of American aviator Amelia Earhart (1898-1937).

1944 On achève bien les chevaux (French Resistance translation and publication of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). Tapahtui Hollywoodissa (Finnish translation of I Should Have Stayed Home).

1945 Son Peter McCoy born. The Girl in the Grave published in Half-a-Hundred: Tales by Great American Writers, ed. Charles Grayson. Story is based on an episode from I Should Have Stayed Home.

1946 On achève bien les chevaux (Paris: Gallimard, translation of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?) increases McCoy’s popularity in Europe.

1947 Is encouraged by Allene Talmey’s note in Vogue (January 15) reporting that French existentialists are comparing him to William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway. Bennett Cerf of Random House approches McCoy. Mas Não Se Mata Cavalo? (Portuguese translation of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?).

1948 Publishes Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye (Random House). It quickly sells 7,500 copies. Paperback edition of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? sells 300,000 copies; revised American edition of No Pockets in a Shroud sells 200,000 copies. Publishes Hollywood, Hometown (Esquire, September). Suffers flu attack and heart attack. J’aurais du rester chez nous (French translation of I Should Have Stayed Home).

1949 Adieu la vie, adieu l’amour ... (French translation of Kiss Tomorrow Good-bye.).

1950 Writes This Is Dynamite, screen story for Columbia which becomes movie The Turning Point.

1951 Movie Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye released, starring James Cagney. Sells screen rights to Scalpel, original story idea, for reputed $100,000 to Hal B. Wallis Productions; vacations in France with family, seeks to meet several French intellectuals, including Jean-Paul Sartre, whom he may have met.

1951-52 Is offered $3,000 by Appleton-Century-Crofts to convert Scalpel plot into novel; does so (March-January 1952).

1952 Co-authors movie scripts for The Lusty Men, box-office hit starring Susan Hayward, Arthur Kennedy, and Robert Mitchum, and for The Turning Point, starring Anne Bancroft, Shirley MacLaine, and Tom Skerritt; publishes Scalpel (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts; London: Arthur Barker). Scalpel on New York Times best-seller list (July-September).

1953 Suffers severe heart attack. Pertes e Fracas (French translation of This Is Dynamite). Il Sudario Mon Ha Tasche (Italian translation of No Pockets in a Shroud). Det Sorte Guld (Danish translation of Scalpel). Skapell (German translation of Scalpel). Un Bacio e Addio (Italian translation of Kiss Tomorrow Good-bye).

1954 Bad for Each Other (movie based on Scalpel and starring Charlton Heston and Lizabeth Scott) released.

1955 Continues to enjoy hobbies of photography and oil painting. Plans to script and direct Night Cry, movie about professional wrestling. Dies of heart ailment, in Beverly Hills, California (December 15), leaving 46-page fragment of novel-to-be called The Hard Rock Man. Widow sells his considerable library and his fabulous collection of jazz records for $750, to satisfy numerous debts. Le Scalpel (French translation of Scalpel). Le Stelle Negli Occhi (Italian translation of Scalpel). Ums Nackte Leben (German translation of They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). (After McCoy’s death, more translations of his novels have appeared.)

1959 Pertes et Fracas augmented in English as Corruption City (New York: Dell; London: World Distributors, 1961).

1969 Movie They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? (starring Bonnie Bedelia, Jane Fonda, Susannah York, and Gig Young) released.

1997 They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? published as part of Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1930s and 40s (Library of America).

Characters and Plots A-Z

A

Abby (Scalpel). He is the owner of the Hill District joint in Pittsburgh that Crowley damages when drunk.

Ackerman, Roy (Corruption City). He is a city police officer, now an investigator, and a ruthless thug secretly employed by Nemo Crespi. With fellow-crook Verne Trickett’s help, Ackerman arranges the murder of Michael Conroy and a homosexual gunman named Kenneth Gladiola. Ackerman later tortures Sergeant Tom Tomberlake for information Tom doesn’t have, then shoots him through the head.

Ackerman is the most violent character in McCoy’s entire cast.

Adams, Mrs. (Scalpel). She is one of Dr. Benjamin Eustace’s wealthy patients. She needs surgery for a ventral hernia.

Adamson, Timothy (No Pockets in a Shroud). He is a Little Theatre actor. He was Dolan’s understudy in the play called Meteor until Dolan quits. Then Timothy is passed over when director Major Cookson assigns the part of Burke in Anna Christie to Wycoff. Timothy asks Dolan to intercede for him.

Alford, Coolie (Scalpel). He is an unpleasant-looking friend, about 40, of Helen Curtis’s. Tom Owen dislikes him.

Allen, Jess (No Pockets in a Shroud). He is a young man who is with Lita at the Hot Spot when Dolan and April Coughlin also drive there for refreshments.

Anderson, Miss (Scalpel). She is a secretary working for the Reasonover Coal Company. She is described as ugly.

Ansel, Max (Corruption City). He is an honest city police officer. He works loyally for John Conroy.

Apperson, The Rev. Stephen C. (Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye). He is supposedly Cotter’s brother in New York, to whom Cotter says he has sent the record incriminating Inspector Weber and other crooked policemen.

Arbiloff, Harry (Corruption City). He is one of 10 policemen who by strong-arming fruit and vegetable farmers kept them from complaining when Nemo Crispi’s goons in the early 1930s vandalized their stalls for refusing to join Crespi’s corrupt company. Stefan Manizates was one of the farmers, but though frightened refused to be intimidated. The nine other crooked cops were Donald Beecher, Jelmo Bossard, Jack Coleman, C. M. Conner, S. Lumpkin, Joseph Maury, Edward Sibley, Herman Veider, and Elmer Walters. Investigator John Conroy can find only Arbiloff, Bossard, Coleman, Lumpkin, Maury, and Sibley for Manizates’ widow Maria to try to identify. She identifies only Bossard and Sibley.

Arlene (No Pockets in a Shroud). She works at the Little Theatre. David leaves a check made out to Dolan with her for Dolan to pick up.

Arstruther, Mrs. (I Should Have Stayed Home). She is the manager of the bungalow court where Ralph, Mona, Dorothy, and Tommy Mosher rent accommodations.

Aston, Mack (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). He is one of the marathon dancers. He and Bess Cartwright are Couple No. 5.

Atherton (Scalpel). He is Johnny’s father. He and his wife care for Dick Owen when he travels with Johnny.

Atherton, Johnny (Scalpel). He is Dick Owen’s roommate when Dick returns to school.

Atherton, Mrs. (Scalpel). She is Johnny’s mother and Dick Owen’s adult friend.

Augie (Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye). He is a one-armed vender at a cigar stand. Mandon treats him amiably.

Awalii (Scalpel). He is a competent laboratory technician who proves helpful to Tom Owen.

B

Bacon (Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye). He is a mailman who warns Holiday that the authorities intercepted her letter to Toko, her jailed brother.

Bacon, Lillian (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). She is one of the marathon dancers. She and her partner Pedro Ortego comprise No. 34. She aspires to be a movie actress. When Kid Kamm’s partner Mattie Barnes is disqualified, Lillian teams up with him, comprising Couple No. 18.

Bagby, Nate (I Should Have Stayed Home). Bagby, 35 and heavy, is a San Joaquin valley fruit farmer. He and Mona become acquainted by love letters and will get married.

Bagriola (No Pockets in a Shroud). He is an Italian-American barber of limited means. When gossip wrongly suggests that he sleeps with female family members in his small house, The Crusaders whip him. Bagriola appeals to Dolan for justice.

Balter, Jonathan (I Should Have Stayed Home). He is a talent scout for Excelsior. He saw Ralph at the Little Theatre in Georgia, paid him to take a screen test in Hollywood, and then ignored him for months. When Ralph confronts Mr. Balter, he is told he might have been needed as an actor with a Southern accent, but ultimately was not.

Barnes, Mattie (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). She is one of the marathon dancers. She is Kid Kamm’s partner, comprising Couple No. 18. She faints at one point during the competition and is released. Kamm says she can go back to the farm now.

Barnovsky, Myra (No Pockets in a Shroud). She is from New York, harbors radical political thoughts, comes to Colton to meet with Ed Bishop, and meets Mike Dolan by chance. Dolan hires her as his secretary. She quickly becomes his lover. She warns him repeatedly of the danger of his exposés in his Cosmopolite. Knowing they are both in danger, he speedily marries her and gives her money to get out of town.

John Thomas Sturak regards Myra as insufficiently presented to the reader: Never quite human, she appears and disappears like an illusion. In addition, Sturak feels that Dolan persist[s] in acting like a small-town petty cad toward Myra throughout the book and then at the last minute ... [marries] her for vague reasons which he himself can’t seem to explain. But isn’t it possible that perhaps this small-town guy wants to do the right thing by his gal and, knowing he’s on a path to death, also arrange her escape from town and elevation to the status of a crusading hero’s liberal widow? Mark Royden Winchell says that one might ... expect the Communist Myra Barnovsky to be a ... symbol of working-class idealism and integrity. Instead, Myra seems to be more interested ... in Dolan’s bed than in establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat. (Sturak, 331, 332; Winchell, 14)

Barriger (No Pockets in a Shroud). He is The Times-Gazette city editor. His boss Thomas assembles five men, including Barriger, and suggests that they bribe Dolan to leave town. The other men are Courier publisher Havetry, Star publisher Mastenbaum, secretary-treasurer Riddle, and Times-Gazette managing editor Sandrich. Dolan refuses and defies them all.

Bassett (No Pockets in a Shroud). He is a Times-Gazette copy reader. He sees Dolan by chance and tells him that Roy Menefee has just murdered his wife April Coughlin Menefee and her lover Emil Video.

Bates, James (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). He is one of the marathon dancers. He and his wife Ruby Bates are Couple No. 13. The two become off-and-on friends with Robert and Gloria. The Bateses are soon sponsored by the Pompadour Beauty Shop.

Bates, Ruby (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). She is one of the marathon dancers. She teams up with her husband James Bates, as Couple No. 13. Ruby’s being pregnant causes her to be disqualified after they have successfully competed for several days.

Baumgarten (No Pockets in a Shroud). He sells printing machinery. When asked, he tells Dolan that he recently sold such equipment to Grissom, whom Dolan promptly hires to print issues of his Cosmopolite.

Beatty, Gloria (They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?). She and Robert chance to meet. She gets him to enter the marathon. They become Couple No. 22. She soon turns melancholy and pessimistic, says she would like to die but lacks the guts to kill herself. Robert tries to lift her spirits. At one point, Gloria sneaks under the announcer’s platform