"The question is, where do we go from here? How do we get that two and a half million dollars from your bank account into my organization's bank account without my walking out the side door of Judge Feeney's courtroom a year from today with his Honor's dentures locked on my neck? What we need is a will. Kid, I think you should look into that. Find a will. As I see it, that's your next move."

"What about a letter?"

"A letter?"

"Say Jack wrote a letter before he died, turning the money over to me for a specific purpose which he described. Would that do it?"

"Does such a letter exist?"

"It might."

"This is the first time you have talked about such a letter."

"There was no need previously to have mentioned it."

A sad shake of the head. "No forgeries," he said. "I believe you have in mind an act of forgery, and that, Mr. Strachey, it strictly no-go."

I saw it all falling away. I said, "Do you want the money, or don't you? Do you want to clean the crooks and phonies out of city hall, or don't you?

Which is it, Sim? Whose side are you on, anyway?"

"Yours," he said. "I think I am. Except, I was told that you are a rational man. One of the few in this town. But now I am beginning to wonder."

"Rational? What is rational? It seems to me rational is people running their own lives without extortionist goons reaching into their wallets twice a year. Rational is-"

He waved a hairy finger. "Whoa-wait a minute. Wait one minute. Let me tell you about rational. Rational is getting what you want without offering your own head on a platter in return for it. Suicide will get you some ugly sympathy, but it is not rational. Martyrdom will get your name in the papers, but it is not rational. Irrationality has its uses in public life, that I concede, but a price must be paid, and I, for one, am not prepared to pay it.

If you think about it, I doubt that you will want to pay the price either. You know, I think you've gone a little cuckoo on me since I saw you last week.

That two and a half million has softened your brain, is that it? Relax a little, and let's think this thing through. Maybe there's a way."

I felt myself redden. I said, "I'll see Creighton Prell. He'll deal."

"No, he won't. Republicans hate going to jail. They think the jails are full of Democrats who'll laugh at them mopping up the lavatories. No, Republicans are proud. They only go to jail at the national level, and Creighton is not that ambitious. You can try Creighton, of course, that's up to you. But it will be a waste of your valuable time, believe me."

I slugged down some Beck's. "Larry Dooley will be interested," I said, and then had to laugh.

Kempelman smiled. "Sure. That's Larry's style. Play now, pay later. He might even get away with it. He has friends in the courts. But I think that is not what you want, kiddo. In fact, that is the very opposite of what you want."

He had me and he knew it, and I wanted to throttle him because I knew that everything he told me was the bare, unadorned, rock-bottom truth. Fucking liberals.

I said, "Has Ned Bowman been in touch? Maybe you'll go to prison anyway, for the murder of Jack Lenihan. Of course, you wouldn't have used a tire iron. You'd have lectured him to death. Or jumped on him from your high moral plain."

"Oh, I'm clean enough, but I hear Larry Dooley's in a bit of a pickle. The word is, Larry spent Tuesday night with the young missus of a certain up-and-coming young council member who was off in Rochester on a business trip. All Larry will tell Bowman is, he was attending to personal business at the time of Jack Lenihan's death, but he says he can't go into detail and then he winks, but Bowman keeps missing the point. Bowman is leaning on Larry real hard and is threatening him with the DA. What Larry and Bowman both don't know is that two-I said two-assistant DAs have been dipping their wicks in the misguided doxy as well- simultaneously, according to one possibly misinformed distant observer. So you see how complicated life can become for those caught in the grip of irrational impulses."

I said, "Maybe in the interest of fairness the Times Union will run a smug, finger-pointing editorial on the health risks of heterosexual promiscuity, but I doubt it. Is Bowman back in town? I heard he was away for a few days."

"I wouldn't know. But I did hear that you were out of town for a couple of days. I was planning on mentioning this earlier, but we got sidetracked."

"Where did you hear that?"

"At Jack Lenihan's funeral yesterday."

"I missed it. I feel bad about that, but it was unavoidable and he would have understood. Who told you I was out of town?"

"Pug Lenihan."

At last, here it came. I didn't need this, didn't want it. I said, "Not old Pug, no. What does he know about all this? About me?"

"Beats me. I was wondering about that myself. On account of the snow and cold weather, they didn't take him out to the cemetery, but they carried him into the funeral home and propped him on a lounge chair for half an hour, and I noticed he was watching me, and after a while he sent Corrine over to relay the message that he would like a few words."

"What were you doing there in the first place? The Lenihans didn't even know you'd had a connection with Jack. Your presence wouldn't have made any sense to them."

Kempelman took a sip of wine and smacked his lips. "This is quite an adequate chablis. Of course, that is the extent of my sophistication as a wine connoisseur. For me, there are two grades of wine, adequate and inadequate. Nearly all of them I find adequate."

"You can tip the sommelier on the way out. Why did you attend Lenihans funeral?"

"I was invited."

"By whom?"

"Corrine McConkey. She phoned me Sunday morning and told me that her grandfather-Dad Lenihan, she called him-wanted me to be present. She said it would mean a lot to him, and I respectfully went along. She did not elaborate."

"This is just terribly, terribly interesting. So you went, and then Pug called you over. Do you two know each other?"

"I had never set eyes on the man. It was all very strange and discombobulating for me. I have to tell you, Mr. Strachey, that I was just a little bit frightened. Pug Lenihan is not a powerful man anymore, but I presume that he remains influential in some circles. Additionally, it entered my mind that somehow he'd gotten wind of my conversations with his late grandson and about Jack's project."

"Right. That could make you jittery. So he called you over."

"He beckoned for me to bend down-no mean feat for a man with a herniated-disk operation behind him-and I painfully obliged. He said-Pug Lenihan said to me- 'You're in on this, aren't you, Kempelman?' I said, 'In on what, Mr. Lenihan?' 'Oh, don't you bullshit me!' this doddering ninety-six-year-old croaked in my ear. 'I know you'd be the one,' he said. 'Now I don't know this Strachey from a peck of potatoes, but you tell him I want to talk to him. You hear what I'm saying to you?' I stood there for a few seconds looking at the hardest, iciest set of blue eyes I'd ever seen in my life, and then do you know what I said?"

"You said, 'Yes, sir.'"

"'Yes, sir.' You got it, kid. I said, 'Mr. Lenihan, yes, sir."'

"So he told you he wants to talk to me. Well, hell. Did he say what about?"

"Nope. He said he heard you were out of town, and when you got back to give Corrine a call and she would take you over to his house. So. I have now carried out my instructions. Sim the message-delivery boy."