Out of the corner of her mouth she replied to my unspoken question: “It
helps to keep grippers like you at mind’s length.”

Then she left me alone with my littered card table and the eight
thousand buck final pot–_and_ the unhappy recollection that Barcelona
had gotten upset at something Harold Grimmer had done, and he’d gone
into Grimmer’s place and busted Grimmer flat by starting with one lousy
buck and letting it ride through eighteen straight passes. This feat of
skill was performed under the mental noses of about eight operators
trained to exert their extrasensory talents toward the defeat of
sharpshooters who tried to add paraphysics to the laws of chance.

* * * * *

Lieutenant Delancey of the Chicago police came in an hour later. He
refused my offer of a drink, and a smoke, and then because I didn’t wave
him to a chair he crossed my living room briskly and eased himself into
my favorite chair. I think I could have won the waiting game but the
prize wasn’t good enough to interest me in playing. So I said, “O.K.,
lieutenant, what am I supposed to be guilty of?”

His smile was veiled. “You’re not guilty of anything, so far as I know.”

“You’re not here to pass the time of day.”

“No, I’m not. I want information.”

“What kind of information?”

“One hears things,” he said vaguely.

“Lieutenant,” I said, “you’ve been watching one of those halluscene
whodunit dramas where everybody stands around making witty sayings
composed of disconnected phrases. You’ll next be saying ‘Evil Lurks In
The Minds Of Men,’ in a sepulchral intonation. Let’s skip it, huh? What
kind of things does one hear and from whom?”

“It starts with Gimpy Gordon.”

“Whose mind meanders.”

He shrugged. “Gimpy Gordon’s meandering mind is well understood for what
it is,” he said. “But when it ceases to meander long enough to follow a
single train of thought from beginning to logical end, then something is
up.”

“Such as what, for instance.”

The lieutenant leaned back in my easy-chair and stared at the ceiling.
“Wally,” he said, “I was relaxing in the car with Sergeant Holliday
driving. We passed a certain area on Michigan near Randolph and I caught
the strong mental impression of someone who–in this day and age, mind
you–had had the temerity to pickpocket a wallet containing twenty-seven
dollars. The sum of twenty-seven dollars was connected with the fact
that the rewards made the risk worth taking; there were distinct
impressions of playing that twenty-seven bucks across the board on three
very especial nags at the Derby. The impression of the twenty-seven
bucks changed into a mental vision of a hand holding a sack of peanuts.
There was indecision. Should he take more risk and run up his available
cash to make a larger killing, or would one Joseph Barcelona take a
stand-offish attitude if some outsider were to lower the track odds by
betting a bundle on Flying Heels, Moonbeam, and Lady Grace.”

I said, “Lieutenant, you’ve a pickpocket to jug. Horse betting is
legal.”

“Since wagering on the speed of a horse has been redefined as ‘The
purchase of one corporate share to be valid for one transaction only and
redeemable at a par value to be established by the outcome of this
aforesaid single transaction,’ horse betting is legal. This makes you an
‘Investment Counselor, short-term transactions only,’ and removes from
you the odious nomenclature of ‘Bookie.’ However, permit me to point out
that the buying and selling of shares of horseflesh does not grant a
license to manipulate the outcome.”

“You sound as though you’re accusing me of contemplating a fix.”

“Oh no. Not that.”

“Then what?”

“Wally, Flying Heels, Moonbeam, and Lady Grace were refused by the
National Association Of Dog Food Canners because of their substandard
health. If I’m not mistaken, the Derby Association should have to run
the race early that Saturday afternoon.”

“Early?”

“Uh-huh. Early. Y’see, Wally, the blue laws of the blue grass state make
it illegal to run horseraces on Sunday, hence the start of the Derby
must be early enough to let our three platers complete the race before
midnight.”

“Lieutenant, there still stands a mathematical probability that–“

“That the rest of the field will catch the Martian Glanders as they lead
our three dogs past the clubhouse turn?”

“Lieutenant, you are wronging me.”

“I haven’t said a thing.”

“Then why have you come here to bedevil me, lieutenant? If Barcelona has
ideas of arranging a fix–“

“If Barcelona has such notions, Wally Wilson would know about it.”

“Everybody,” I said, “entertains notions of cleaning up a bundle by
having the hundred-to-one shot come in by a length. Even Barcelona must
have wild dreams now and then–“

“Come off it,” he snapped. “Something’s up and I want to know what’s
cooking.”

* * * * *

“Lieutenant, you’re now asking me to describe to you how someone might
rig the Kentucky Derby in a world full of expert telepaths and
perceptives and manipulators, a large number of which will be rather
well-paid to lend their extrasensory power to the process of keeping the
Derby pure.”

He eyed me sourly. “Remember, ‘Fireman’ O’Leary?”

“That’s an unfair allegation,” I replied. “The rumor that he started the
Chicago Fire is absolutely unfounded.”

“As I recall, ‘Fireman’ O’Leary came by his nickname about one hundred
years after the holocaust that started on DeKoven Street in 1871. It
seems that ‘Fireman’ O’Leary was most useful in helping the fillies home
at Washington Park by assaulting them in the region of the bangtail with
small bollops of pure incandescence. He was a pyrotic.”

“That is a false accusation–“

“It was never proved,” admitted the lieutenant, “because any one who
accused anybody of making use of extrasensory faculties in 1971 would
have been tossed into that establishment out on Narragansett Avenue
where the headshrinkers once plied their mystic trade.”

“Things are different now.”