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right?”
    â€œRight,” Murfin said. “He was looking for somebody who could organize this thing and then run it and that’s what Quane and I are good at.”
    They were indeed good at that, plus a few other things, so I nodded my agreement. “What do all those people out there with the colored desks do?” I said.
    â€œThat’s the stuff, or most of it, except for the comptroller and his people, the computer types, the legal counsel, Vullo, me and Quane here. We got some of the ones you saw out there from the Post and the Star. We stole maybe three or four from Nader. A couple are from The Wall Street Journal. About a half dozen are lawyers and another two or three used to be cops. Detectives. We even got one guy from the FBI.”
    â€œAnd they’re going to sniff out conspiracy?” I said.
    â€œWherever it exists,” Quane said. “Or existed.”
    â€œWhen you come up with something, what’ll you do with it?”
    â€œWell, we’re gonna be sort of a clearing house and we’re also gonna put out a monthly magazine,” Murfin said. “That’s what they’re doing out there now, putting together a dummy issue. When everything’s all set it’ll sell for twenty or twenty-five bucks a year and for that you also become a member of the Foundation. And the twenty or twenty-five bucks or whatever will be deductible.”
    â€œWe stole that from the National Geographic, ” Quane said.
    â€œWhat’re you going to call yours?” I said. “The Paranoia Review ?”
    â€œNah,” Murfin said. “I came up with the title, as a matter of fact. We’re gonna call it The Vullo Report. ”
    â€œThat’s catchy.”
    â€œVullo likes it,” Quane said.
    â€œI bet.”
    There was a pause and then Murfin cleared his throat and said, “Harvey.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œVullo thinks Quane here and me are pretty hot shit.”
    â€œSo do I.”
    â€œI mean he doesn’t know—well, every last detail about us.”
    I smiled politely and said nothing.
    â€œWhat I’m saying,” Murfin went on, “is that this is a pretty nice deal and we don’t want it fucked up.”
    â€œYou should know by now that I won’t dump on you.”
    Murfin smiled his blackguard’s smile again. “Well, hell, we know that. I just thought I’d mention it.”
    â€œHow much does Vullo know about me?”
    This time Murfin frowned and it made him look serious and grave and almost guileless. But not quite. “Well, you know, we had to tell him quite a bit.”
    â€œWhat’s quite a bit,” I said, “everything?”
    â€œDamn near,” Quane said.
    â€œAnd what did Vullo say?”
    Murfin quit frowning and started smiling. I almost wished that he had gone on frowning. “He said he thought you sounded fascinating.”
    â€œWell, what the hell,” I said. “I am.”

CHAPTER THREE
    R OGER VULLO BIT his fingernails. He bit them so often and so thoroughly that the quicks had moved down at least a quarter of an inch from the tips of his fingers. In fact, he had very little nail left and I concluded he must have been biting them all his life.
    I probably had read somewhere why people bite their fingernails, but I couldn’t recall it so I resolved to look it up. I also decided that while I was at it I would see whether I could find out something about another bad habit, which was the one that Mary Jane Wynne had had in the fourth grade, although hers may have been unique.
    Mary Jane picked her nose and saved the treasures in a penny matchbox. She took them home after school, put sugar on them, and ate them. It should have been a secret vice, but Mary Jane bragged about it, and all of us in the fourth grade were very much in awe of her.
    I was noticing Vullo’s fingernails and thinking about Mary Jane so I didn’t pay much attention