In the Best Families

“Yeah, I just told you. I got irritated. “Say I tell you he's in Egypt, where he owns a house. I don't, but say I do. Then what? You send a punk to Cairo to drill him? Why? Why can't you let him alone? I know he had his faults-God knows how I stood them as long as I did-but he taught me a lot, and wherever he is he's my favourite fatty. Just because he happened to queer your deal with

Rackham, you want to track him down. What will that get you, now that he's faded out?5

“I don't wish or intend to track him down.

“No? Then what made me so interesting? Your Max Christy and your bearded wonder offering me schoolboy jobs at triple pay. Get me sucked in, get me branded, and when the time comes use me to get at Wolfe so you can pay him. No. I shook my head. “I draw the line somewhere, and all of you together won't get me across that one.

I'm not up enough on fish to know whether sharks blink, but Zeck was showing me.

He blinked perhaps one-tenth his share. He asked, “Why did you take the job?

“Because it was Rackham. I'm interested in him. I was glad to know someone else was. I would like to have a hand in his future.

No blink. “You think you know, I suppose, the nature of my own interests and activities.

“I know what is said around. I know that a New York police inspector told me that you're out of reach.

“Name him.

“Cramer. Manhattan Homicide.

“Oh, him. Zeck made his first gesture: a forefinger straightened and curved again. “What was the occasion?

“He wouldn't believe me when I said I didn't know where Wolfe was. He thought

Wolfe and I were fixing to try to bring you down, and he was just telling me. I told him that maybe he would like to pull us off because he was personally interested, but that since Wolfe had scooted he was wasting it.

“That was injudicious, wasn't it?

“All of that. I was in a bad humour.

Zeck blinked; I saw him. “I wanted to meet you, Goodwin. I've allowed some time for this because I want to look at you and hear you talk. Your idea of my interests and activities probably has some relation to the facts, and if so you may know that my chief problem is men. I could use ten times as many good men as