The thin smile slashed again across the wrinkled harshness of Jake's face.
"I'll be paid," he chuckled drily.
The District Attorney brought up the same question when Jake sat in his office two hours later. They had been studying each other across the desk, thinking of all the years that were gone, the good years dying with the new quarter of the century.
How many times had he sat here just like this, Jake wondered. How often had he come into this office to bargain and to deal, to cajole and plead—and always hovering like a hawk to pounce on any bit of information that could fit his case.
Now the D.A. was old, too. Older than Jake, if you measured a man's life by the inverse proportion of his distance from the grave. Even the limitless possibilities of medical science had about reached their limit with the D.A. He was heavier than Jake, and his skin was smoother, yet somehow it looked much older.
"I don't get it," he wheezed, with the shortness of breath that the latest bronchial replacement had not substantially relieved. "I just can't see Jake Emspak taking a case without a fee! Why, in the old days, you wouldn't defend your mother without a cashier's check in advance!"
Jake accepted the taunt without blinking.
"I'm touched by this solicitude for my fees," he retorted.
"Tony Corfino's guilty," said the D.A., moving up another pawn in the never-ending chess game between them. "He's a punk, and he's guilty. You know that, don't you, Jake?"
"Do I?"