“Well, we’d — then we’d finish our contract.”
“And where would that leave Roberta Fenn?”
“To hell with Roberta Fenn. I’m thinking about us.”
“Think some more about us then.”
“What do you mean?”
I said, “We’re given a deck of marked cards. We’re supposed to put them into the game-very innocently. All right, we put them into the game, collect our stipend, and that’s all. But suppose we take the marked deck of cards, slip them into our pocket, forget to put them into the game, and a big jackpot is coming up? Then what?”
She gloated over me rapturously. “And I thought you were dumb about money matters!” For a moment I thought she was going to kiss me.
I got up and moved over toward the door.
“What do you want?” she asked.
I said, “I want you to sit in your office and not know where I am. If Hale telephones, I’ve disappeared, too.”