The Power and the Glory

by Graham Greene

He thought: that is when I shall be discovered – unless it’s earlier, for surely one of these people will betray me first. A long train of thought began, which led him to announce after a while, ‘They are offering a reward for me. Five hundred, six hundred pesos, I’m not sure.’ Then he was silent again. He couldn’t urge any man to inform against him – that would be tempting him to sin – but at the same time if there was an informer here, there was no reason why the wretched creature should be bilked of his reward. To commit so ugly a sin – it must count as murder – and to have no compensation in this world . . . He thought: it wouldn’t be fair. ‘Nobody here,’ a voice said, ‘wants their blood money.’ Again he was touched by an extraordinary affection. He was just one criminal among a herd of criminals . . . He had a sense of companionship which he had never experienced in the old days when pious people came kissing his black cotton glove.