savagely attacked the accumulated paper work. There was usually some release and satisfaction in that, because I liked the place. I’d built it up to what it was. The first time I’d ever seen it, one afternoon a little over two years ago when I’d dropped in for some item of tackle I needed on a fishing trip, I had recognized its potentialities and it had interested me. She’d come in about that time to say something to the inept and lethargic old gaffer who was running it for her, and she had interested me even more. Well-to-do widows with sex appeal are rare enough to be collector’s items in this vale of tears, and here was a real jewel. I gave her a good sales talk about what I could do with the place, quit the public relations outfit I was working for in Sanport at the moment, and moved in. Both phases of the project were wide open for an operator with any talent at all; inside of sixty days the business was in the black and I was in her bed. Four months later we were married. Not that she was particularly a patsy; but we did hit it off well in the hay, and she was in the market for a romantic and suggestively tragic figure who never talked much about his past. It’s stock, but easy.

It was ten p.m. when I ground out the last of the letters and finished checking the receipts and making up the bank deposit. I slammed the door of the safe and stood for a moment looking around the dim interior of the showroom. Mrs. Jessica Roberts McCarran Godwin, I give it to you. Cherish it, and guard it well in that old classic repository of the fervent resignation and the disenchanted farewell. From now on I’m just going through the motions here while I look after Godwin’s future. And no motions at all at home. Put it away, dear Mrs. Godwin; you had your little revenge and I’ll admit it was a nice piece of strategy, but it works only once in this league.

The drug store was still open. The copy of that digest magazine Cliffords had in his trunk was the current issue, and I found it on the stand. I drank a coke while I read the article about Haig. It could be, I reflected thoughtfully; it was a million-to-one shot, but it was probably the only thing they’d never thought of. I got in the station wagon and drove out to the cemetery just north of town. The night was dark and there were no houses within a half-mile; I had it all to myself. I took a flashlight from the car and went through the gate.

Grayson? No-o. Greggson. . . . That was it. It took about ten minutes to find the double headstone. I splashed the light against it and felt a surge of excitement as I read the date.

I could quit worrying about that part of it. I knew now how Cliffords had got that money.

* * *

I left the house before she got up, and had some breakfast in town. Otis was parking his car at the side of the store when I arrived.

“How was the fishing, boss,” he asked.

“Poor,” I said. I opened the front door and we went in. “Those jokers probably got their bass somewhere else. Never believe a fisherman.”

“Who does?” he said. He leaned against the showcase and lit a cigarette. “Say, where’d you stay up there?”

Dan Cahoon’s fishing camp was the obvious answer, since it was the only good one, but that warning bell went off in my mind just in time. “Oh,” I said. “Some little place on the west side. Why?”

“Man came in yesterday and made us an offer on those two reconditioned fifteen-horse jobs. Said he’d take both of ‘em if we’d cut the price fifty dollars. I tried to get hold of you at Cahoon’s, but they said you wasn’t there.”

That was too close for comfort. “I started there, but decided to try a new one. In this business, the more camp operators you know, the better.”

Careful. Don’t explain too much. Never, never do that. “Did he say he’d be back?” I went on.

Otis nodded. “Today or tomorrow. And, by the way, that F.B.I, man—what’s his name? Ramsey. . .?”

“I think it was Ramsey,” I said casually. I reached inside the showcase and straightened a display card of brass spinners. For Christ’s sake,