The Postman Always Rings Twice

After Sackett leaves, the cop who was guarding Frank comes back, and he realizes that Sackett got to Frank. He offers to introduce Frank to a lawyer named Katz, whom he claims is the only “guy in this town has got it on [Sackett]” (59). Frank agrees to meet Katz. Katz tells Frank that he’ll “handle it,” but he refuses to answer any questions from Frank or to tell him anything. He notes, “I may not be able to appear for you both, but I’ll be handling it” (60).

During the arraignment for Frank and Cora, an insurance offer comes to the stand and insists that the case is basically open and shut: “I may say that I have never seen a clearer case in all my years’ work for this and other companies” (63). Katz then pleads guilty for Cora, surprising everyone in the courtroom. Cora now believes that Frank has double-crossed her. She decides to make a statement, saying of Frank, “Well, he was in this as much as I was, and he’s not going to get away with it” (65). A cop comes and takes Cora’s statement, in which she tells the entire truth of the story.

Frank spends the next day in the hospital guarded by the same cop who recorded Cora’s statement. Eventually, he is released from the hospital, put into a limo with the same cop, and taken to Katz’s office. There, Katz says that Cora is “out, free. Free as a bird” (68). Katz then explains how he was able to work things in Frank and Cora’s favor during the arraignment. He says that Frank “did me a favor all right when you called me in on this. I’ll never get another one like it” (69). According to Katz, Sackett used the little information he had to scare Frank into giving up. Katz explains that the cop who took Cora’s statement was one of his associates, Pat Kennedy, and he reveals that he pitted multiple insurance companies against each other so that they would cave and pay. During Cora’s trial, Katz had control of the insurance, so he withdrew Cora’s guilty plea and managed to get her “six months, suspended sentence” (74).

After Katz finishes his explanation, Pat Kennedy brings Cora into the room. Katz says, “One minute, one minute, you two. Not so fast. There’s one other little thing. That ten thousand dollars you get for knocking off the Greek” (74). He notes that he usually takes all of the money in a case like this, but he decides to only take half this time. Then Katz changes his mind, deciding that the only reward he needs is the $100 he won in a bet with Sackett over which of them would win Frank and Cora’s case.

Frank and Cora leave Katz’s office, deposit their check for $10,000, and go to Nick’s funeral. At first, the funeral attendees act coldly toward Cora. However, after a newspaper declaring her innocence is passed around, everyone changes their behavior. Frank is overwhelmed by emotion during the funeral, “blubbering while they were letting him down” (76). After the funeral, Frank and Cora rent a car and return to the diner.

Cora accuses Frank of turning on her, but she says that this was Katz and Sackett’s fault. She believes that if they had not gotten involved, she and Frank “would have had our love” (77) and that would have been enough to get them through jail. Frank placates Cora with alcohol and makes a physical advance toward her. Cora replies, “Rip me like you did that night” (79). They once again have violent sex.