The League of Frightened Men

"Good for her. God bless her." He laughed. "It is an incontrovertible fact that five thousand dollars is a hell of a lot more money than a nickel. How do you account for that? I want a cigarette."

I got a packet out and lit us both up.

His fingers weren't steady at all, and I began to feel sorry for him. So I said,

"Just figure it out. Hibbard's home is up at University Heights. If you drove downtown somewhere – say around the Perry Street neighborhood, I don't know Just where – and from there to One Hundred Sixteenth Street, ordinarily what (Would you get for it? Let's see – two, eight miles – that'd be around a dollar and a half. But if going uptown you happened to have your old classmate Andrew Hibbard with you – or just his corpse, maybe even only a piece of it, say his head and a couple of arms – instead of a dollar-fifty you'd get five grand. As | you see, it all depends on your cargo."

So as not to take my eyes off him, I blew cigarette smoke out of the corner of my mouth. Of course, riding a guy who | needed a drink bad and wouldn't take it was like knocking a cripple's crutch from under him, but I didn't need to remind myself that all's fair in love and business.

Basic truths like that are either born right in a man or they're not.

At that he had enough grip on himself to keep his mouth shut. He looked at his _ fingers trembling holding the cigarette, so J long that I finally looked at them too.

Finally he let his hand fall to his knee, and looked at me and began to laugh. He demanded, "Didn't I say you were going to be funny?" His voice went harsh again.

"Listen, you. Beat it. Come on, now, beat it. Go back in the house or you'll catch cold."

I said, "All right, how about that drink?"

But he was through. I prodded at him a little, but he had gone completely dumb and unfriendly. I thought of bringing out some rye and letting him smell it, but decided that would just screw him down tighter. I said to myself, anon, and passed him up.

Before going in the house I went around back of the taxi and got the license number.

I went to the kitchen. Wolfe was still there, in the wooden chair with arms where he always sat to direct Fritz and to eat when he was on a relapse.

I said, "Pitney Scott's out front. The taxi-driver. He brought her. He paid me a nickel for his share, and he says that's all it's worth. He knows something about Andrew Hibbard."

"What?"