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"I think," said Mario Gonzalo, "that I know Henry&039;s secret; how he gets the anse don&039;t" Gonzalo nodded in the direction of the waiter, as quietly serving the drinks that were prelude to the monthly banquet of the Black Widowers

Jaarette and said, "I&039;ve known it all along - he&039;s smarter than we are"

"Sure," said Gonzalo, flicking tobacco ash fro hi s dulowering through his thick - lensed glasses, "so what good will the secret do you, Mario?&039;

"Being really dumb," said Gonzalo coolly, "is to be afraid to listen for fear of learning so So I suppose you&039;re not interested, Manny"

"What, and h?" said Rubin "Go ahead, Mario"

Geoffrey Avalon, having accepted his drink froh about what?"

"About Mario&039;s idea as to how Henry es to come up with solutions," said Rubin "Henry, you can listen, too Mario has your secret"

Henry sentlemen of the Black Widowers analyze the problems carefully, remove all the useless adornments, and leave a plain picture for me to describe"

"Not at all," said Gonzalo, "not at all You just say that to throw us off The secret is - irrelevance!"

There was a short pause Then Rubin&039;s scanty beard bristled and he said in high - pitched disbelief, "Is that what I&039;?"

"Sure," said Gonzalo "We&039;re all of us reasoning men - even you, sometimes, Manny - and we try to solve any little puzzle presented to us by catching at all the relevant angles But if it were the relevant matters that mattered, so to speak, there&039;d be no puzzle Anyone would then see the answer It&039;s Henry&039;s trick of seeing the irrelevant that gives him the answer"

Drake said, "This is a contradiction in ter to do"

Gonzalo interposed patiently, "So that seems irrelevant but isn&039;t We see that it seems irrelevant; Henry sees that it really isn&039;t irrelevant Right, Henry?"

Henry&039;s face showed no expression beyond a general benevolence "It is certainly an interesting suggestion," he said

Avalon drew his forether "It is surely more than that, Mario Henry sees e do not, because he looks clearly at life while the rest of us do not have his direct and si so Even if you were to see what Henry does, you would not get the answer"

Gonzalo said, "I bet I can Five dollars says that if there&039;s a puzzle today, I&039;ll use Henry&039;s technique and get the answer before he does"

"You&039;re on," said Rubin at once

"Good," said Mario "Geoff, you hold the stakes But remember, no bet if there&039;s no problem"

Drake said, "Oh there&039;ll be a problem Personally, I think we&039;re each of us deliberately choosing our guests for their problematical content"

"And yet perhaps not this tiht&039;s host, either, unless the steps on the stairsNo, it&039;s Tom"

Thomas Trumbull&039;s white and crisply waved hair made its appearance, followed by the rest of his body as he mounted the stairs

He said, "If you&039;re worried about the host&039;s whereabouts, Geoff, Roger Halsted&039;s just arrived downstairs with a stranger who, I presu man who needs a dr - Ah thank you, Henry"

Gonzalo had taken his seat next to Halsted and, spreading out his napkin with a practiced flick, said, "We aluest, Roger What happened? Decided you couldn&039;t stand the expense?"

Halsted reddened and his mild stutter seemed a shade more pronounced "Not uest His phone rang just as I was picking hirew very upset I couldn&039;t very well press hi up For a while, in fact, I thought I&039;d have to leave without him"

"What was it about, do you know? The phone call, I uest "I don&039;t know So one of his students He&039;s a school principal, you know"

"Your school?"

"No, but why don&039;t you save your questions for the grilling?"

"Do youme start it?"

"Not at all" and Halsted turned his attention to the crabe man with dark hair as crisply waved as Trumbull&039;s and with a brief mustache of the kind Adolf Hitler had put out of fashion for at least a generation His jowled face bore a worried look and he tackled his roast duck with an enthusiasm dulled by absence of eneral conversation and seemed to listen only distantly as Rubin and Drake debated the respective values of nuclear fusion and solar power as the ultiy source

Burry seemed unprepared, therefore, for the suddenness hich the focus of attention suddenly shifted While Henry freshened the coffee and produced brandy, Gonzalo said, "Mr Burry, how do you justify your existence?"

Burry looked at Gonzalo hat seenation but then er warned me that there would be a question - and - answer period"

"Yes," said Gonzalo, "and in return for the dinner, you are expected to answer frankly and fully, under terms of strict confidentiality, of course So how do you justify your existence?"

Burry said, "I try to h school such that at least soain an education and a respect for learning That is justification enough, I think, whenever I succeed"

"Do you succeed often?"

"Not often"

Avalon cleared his throat &039;The education of the young of any species begins with discipline"

"&039;Those who believe so," said Burry, "all too frequently believe it ends with discipline, too, and confuse the purpose of a school with the purpose of a prison"

Gonzalo said, "I understand that just as you were leaving for dinner tonight, you received an unsettling phone call Did that involve school business?"

Burry cast a hard glance in Halsted&039;s direction Halsted reddened and slid, "I was explaining ere late, Dan"

Gonzalo said, "What was the phone call about?"

Burry shook his head "It is not so I should discuss It is an unfortunate matter that involves a minor"

"Athe word as a noun, Mr Gonzalo, not as an adjective It involves a hu who is only seventeen"

Gonzalo said, "We understand your reluctance to discuss the matter, but I assure you, the fact that a minor is involved is irrelevant" He paused and seemed to savor the word for a moment "The terer should have explained that to you"

"May I stress again," interrupted Avalon, "the confidentiality of our proceedings"

"Including the waiter," said Truanization"

Burry glanced briefly at Henry, who had now taken up his post at the sideboard with his usual look of quiet attention, and said, "I won&039;t deny, gentlemen, that I&039;d welcome a discussion of the matter, for I have been very frustrated over it Still, I cannot use the naanization if I refer to him only as John?"

Rubin said, "It&039;s our experience, Mr Burry, that that kind of subterfuge always fails You&039;ll slip and use his real name"

"John is his real naiven na his full name"

Halsted said, "I think we can allow that"

Burry said, "Letent His intelligence attracted the attention of his teachers at once and I, of course, as All students are, in theory, of equal iive theht ones are, of course, our special delight and, too often, our special heartbreak"

"Why heartbreak?" asked Gonzalo quickly

"Because very often a bright child is as much the victim of his social handcuffs as he would be if he had not a brain in his head It&039;s a ence alone can lift you out of theexaiven special circumstances; in most cases, it does not happen"

"I presuhetto - as was my father in his time"

Burry said in a deliberate and even tone, "John is a child of the ghetto, but not as your father was, Mr Rubin Your father and you can, if you are circue your name, be careful with your speech, abandon your idiosyncrasies, and youbadge on you John and others like hi before you can know thenize them as blacks"

Rubin looked uncomfortable "I meant no offense"

"None taken Soht say By the convention of our society a single black ancestor ht therefore be apparently white but socially black As myself I am black"

"That makes no difference to us, sir," said Avalon austerely

"Why should it?" said Burry "Nor does it seem to make a difference to soraffito in the fourth - floor toilet reads, &039;Burry is five fourths white&039; Just the same, my one ancestor does make a difference in ive a youngster like that the kind of chance hecrisis of our times, the human species cannot afford to waste brains, and this one s?" asked Trued "Pot, of course That&039;s a rite of passage with kids these days - like s a pipe was to Tom Sawyer, or to Mark Twain, for that e done by e done by tobacco, yet not only is tobacco sovernrowers"

"You start with pot and you go on to heroin," said Avalon dryly "Another rite of passage"

"Soal, so that the pot smoker fails to see o froerous as heroin and far more common, yet society does not for that reason conde

"In any case," Burry went on, "John is not deeply involved in pot and does not have the s of a heroin addict No, I&039;m afraid John&039;s temptations lie in another direction - crime"

Avalon said, "What kind of crily dra a purse snatcher, a shoplifter, a petty thief It was only a suspicion, until tonight Now, I&039;m afraid, it&039;s a certainty"

"Is that what the phone call was about?" asked Gonzalo

"It was about John," said Burry despondently "It was, indeed, from him He was in trouble and he turned to ed to obtain a lawyer for him and I promised to supply reasonable bail, it necessary It was that which delayed our arrival And yet I can take onlyof help now I suspect I failed hiin with"

"In ay?" asked Gonzalo

"If I had been ht have persuaded him to cooperate with the police"

"Not much chance of that, Dan," said Halsted "Anyone who&039;s a schoolteacher knows that in the bright lexicon of youth, there is no such word as &039;squeal&039; The guys who keep their o to jail, but they are heroes and are taken care of The squealers may stay out of jail but they&039;re ostracized and very likely beaten up"

"I know that, Roger," said Burry, "I need no education in the ht have done it if I were sht after thisby ten - thirty at the latest - and if he&039;ll co - operate, I&039;ll get hiencies ill help in this respect and I&039;ve used them before These people we&039;re after won&039;t mount an intercity hunt for hi about"

Avalon twiddled his e about, Mr Burry?"

"A burglary ring organized by h - school students as their field operatives The kids bring in their takings and receive a percentage It saves theoods themselves - but if they hold out for their own profit, and are caught at it, they are beaten up"

Truin operation"

"It&039;s exactly a Fagin operation," said Burry "You don&039;t suppose the practice died out with Oliver Twist, do you?"

"And you&039;re after Fagin himself, I take it," said Truood to pick up the kids They&039;re eventually let go and the gao, replaceoes on You&039;ve got to get the corrupters themselves And beyond that," he added sadly, "the quirks in our society that s possible"

"If you can cure those quirks," said Avalon, "you will have achieved a first for our ten thousand years of so - called civilization"

"Then at least the corrupters," said Burry "If I were so in with me "

Gonzalo interrupted "That&039;s twice now you&039;ve said you needed to be sh, I can see; eloquent enough; unscrupulous enough; threatening enough Why sh?"

Burry hesitated and rubbed his chin, as though wondering what to say

He decided, apparently, and said, "The police have been after the burglary ring and, a others, they have consulted me They had reason to think that some of the students at my school were involved and they wantedthe students To be truthful, I wasn&039;t anxious to do this"

"To squeal?" asked Drake, stony - faced

For a nation Then he relaxed "You&039;re right I don&039;t want to squeal, but that&039;s just a gut reaction There&039;s sters does not solve the problem, but it ster I suspected of being involved, what I would hope to do would be to obtain the necessary inforster, to the police"

Avalon said, "I don&039;t think you would get the necessary inforht have better arguments than you have"

Trumbull slapped the table with the palm of his hand "Geoff, that&039;s stupid Those kids are heroes to their peers if they resist the police, and if any police officer tried to beat anything out of theets inadmissible as evidence, but also the policees"

"I call that hobbling the police to the cost of the honest citizen," said Avalon

"I call it forcing the police to a single standard of conduct and having them treat the poor, the ill - educated, the unpopular as circumspectly as they would treat those with money and lawyers," said Trule standard by treating the well - to - do crihly as the poor ones, then?" demanded Avalon

Trumbull said, "Because they&039;re only suspected criminals The state of actual crihts and privileges of a free Auardians of the very law that says so Mr Burry, I think your attitude is a good one"

Burry said, "Thank you, but good or not, it didn&039;t work What the police need is evidence They have suspicions as to the identity of the ringleaders, the Fagins, but until they can find theoods, they aren&039;t likely to be able to prove it One of the difficulties appears to be that the crie their base of operation frequently, and are never in one place long enough to leave a clear trail Of course, if we knew in advance where they would be, ould have a chance And that is the kind of inforsters would have, for they have to knohere to bring the loot

"Without that - well, the poorer sections of New York are an incredible rabbit - warren that could s up an army of police searchers ould encounter frozen - faced inhabitants denying all knowledge of anything From the pattern of the robberies, the police suspect the scene of operations htieth Street and 125th Street, but that&039;s not much of a hint But I had my eye on John"

"Why him?" asked Drake