"What?" he asked.

"Why don't you admit you got burned out" scoffed Zenger.

"You don't have a Sandler file anymore. What you don't know is that you're G.o.d-d.a.m.ned lucky you don't."

Thomas could feel his mouth dry and open in unconcealed amazement. He felt just as many witnesses in past years had felt before attorney Zenger. Totally befuddled, caught off base by the unexpected a.s.sertion, the unantic.i.p.ated declaration of the facts.

Thomas tried to recover.

"You know more than I do)' he said.

"Why don't you let me in on it."

Aah' scoffed Zenger, leaning back now and sipping coffee slyly "There's nothing to let you in on.".

"How did you know-?"

"About the fire? I read the papers, d.a.m.n it. And even though my G.o.d-d.a.m.ned flesh is giving out, I have not lost the capacity for thought. Victoria Sandler dies. Your offices are demolished by arson.

Your offices just happen to be where the files were on years and years of Sandler transactions. Well, what else am I to a.s.sume?"

"What was in the files? And who wanted it?"

Zenger shrugged.

"I couldn't begin to guess" he said.

"Come off it!" Thomas's voice was sharp, his patience thinning.

"I didn't come up here to play games. You may be having your cheap fun-' "Calm yourself, calm yourself," cautioned Zenger patiently, waving a frail hand across the table.

"You'll get your answers. In time."

"I want them now."

"You'll get them now."

Thomas gazed across the table in silence.

"I'm waiting," he said.

"Yes. I can see that." Zenger paused.

"Some people, young people mostly, don't know how lucky they are."

"What does that mean?"

"It means you're a very lucky young man. You have a great name to live up to. You have your youth. You have your freedom.

And you have no knowledge of the Sandler family."

. Thomas continued to stare at Zenger, having no idea at all where the old man was leading the conversation. Zenger continued.

"And you have a guardian angel. Before you could go to that file and involve yourself with it, someone burned you out. You owe the arsonist an eternal debt of grat.i.tude. Maybe someday you'll find out who he was."

"Make some sense, d.a.m.n it' Zenger looked at the young man in dismay.

"I suppose he said, "I was as naive and impetuous at your age as you are now. You want some sense made. All right. Here it is. The full knowledge of Sandler family transactions is enough to get you killed. I don't know everything and I don't want to know. The only person who'd want to live to be eighty-three is a man of eighty-two. I'm eighty two Have I made some sense?"

Thomas was thoughtful. He perceived a sincerity and almost a trace of fear in Zenger's eyes.

"Some," he said.

"But I'm not satisfied" "Jesus," snorted Zenger in disgust, as he slapped the arms of his chair.

"I want to know as much as you know."

"You never will." The old man's voice was firm.

"I won't tell you.

Hot pincers couldn't get it out of me" "Well," spoke Thomas Daniels in a controlled rage, p.r.o.nouncing each syllable.

"Then I'll find out myself" He stood quickly.

"Tell me something" said Zenger, raising his hand to hold the young visitor.

"Why is all this of such almighty interest to you?"

"In my position, wouldn't you be interested?"

Zenger pondered the hypothesis.

"No," he said finally.

"If a man with fifty years' experience in law told me that it could cost me my life to get involved with something, I'd take the hint. I'd lay off.

That's why I can't figure you. No one with ten cents' worth of brains risks getting killed just because he's curious."

Thomas looked at Zenger carefully.

"I have a client" Thomas said.

"What kind of a client?"

"A client " "Oh, come on."

"You're not answering my questions" Zenger thought for an instant.