The room was small and dark. It had a single desk in it, and three chairs, and a hatrack. There wasn't any coat or hat on the hatrack, and there was nobody in the chairs. In a fourth chair, behind the desk, a huskily-built man sat. He had steel-gray hair, a hard jaw and, Malone noticed with surprise, a faint twinkle in his eye.
"Lieutenant Lynch?" Malone said.
"Right," Lynch said. "What's the trouble?"
"I'm Kenneth J. Malone," Malone said. "FBI." He reached for his wallet and found it. He flipped it open for Lynch, who stared at it for what seemed a long, long time and then burst into laughter.
"What's so funny?" Malone asked.
Lynch laughed some more.
"Oh, come on," Malone said bitterly. "After all, there's no reason to treat an FBI agent like some kind of a—"
"FBI agent?" Lynch said. "Listen, buster, this is the funniest gag I've seen since I came on the Force. Who told you to pull it? Jablonski downstairs? Or one of the boys on the beat? I know those beat patrolmen, always on the lookout for a new joke. But this tops 'em all. This is the—"
"You're a disgrace to the Irish," Malone said tartly.