Speedily and guiltily, he swung his feet off the desk and snatched the cigar out of his mouth. He jammed it into a deep ashtray and put the ashtray back into his desk drawer. He locked the drawer, waved ineffectively at the clouds of smoke that surrounded him, and said in a resigned voice: "Come in." The door opened. A tall, solidly built man stood there, wearing a fringe of beard and a cheerful expression. The man had an enormous amount of muscle distributed more or less evenly over his chunky body, and a potbelly that looked as if he had swallowed a globe of the world. In addition, he was smoking a cigarette and letting out little puffs of smoke, rather like a toy locomotive. "Well, well," Malone said, brushing feebly at the smoke that still wreathed him faintly. "If it isn't Thomas Boyd, the FBI's answer to Nero Wolfe." "And if the physique holds true, you're Sherlock Holmes, I suppose," Boyd said. Malone shook his head, thinking sadly of his father and the cigar. "Not exactly," he said. "Not ex--" And then it came to him. It wasn't that he was ashamed of smoking cigars like his father, exactly--but cigars just weren't right for a fearless, dedicated FBI agent. And he had just thought of a way to keep Boyd from knowing what he'd been doing. "That's a hell of a cigarette you're smoking, by the way," he said. Boyd looked at it. "It is?" he said. "Sure is," Malone said, hoping he sounded sufficiently innocent. "Smells like a cigar or something." Boyd sniffed the air for a second, his face wrinkled. Then he looked down at his cigarette again. "You're right, Ken. It _does_ smell like a cigar." He came over to Malone's desk, looked around for an ashtray and didn't find one, and finally went to the window and tossed the cigarette out into the Washington breeze. "How are things, anyhow, Ken?" he said. "Things are confused," Malone said. "Aren't they always?" Boyd came back to the desk and sat down in a chair at one side of it. He put his elbow on the desk. "Sure they are," he said. "I'm confused myself, as a matter of fact. Only I think I know where I can get some help." "Really?" Malone said. Boyd nodded. "Burris told me I might be able to get some information from a certain famous and highly respected person," he said. "Well, well," Malone said. "Who?" "You," Boyd said. "Oh," Malone said, trying to look disappointed, flattered and modest all at the same time. "Well," he went on after a second, "anything I can do--" "Burris thought you might have some answers," Boyd said. "Burris is getting optimistic in his old age," Malone said. "I don't even have many questions." Boyd nodded. "Well," he said, "you know this California thing?" "Sure I do," Malone said. "You're looking into the resignation out there, aren't you?" "Senator Burley," Boyd said. "That's right. But Senator Burley's resignation isn't all of it, by any means." "It isn't?" Malone said, trying to sound interested.