“Where’d you get that idea?”

“There’s the card.”

“I got another that proves I’m a timber beast,” I said. “If you want me to be a miner I’ll get one for that tomorrow.”

“You won’t. I run ’em here.”

“Suppose you got a wire from Chi?” I asked.

“Hell with Chi! I run ’em here.” He nodded at a restaurant door and asked: “Drink?”

“Only when I can get it.”

We went through the restaurant, up a flight of steps, and into a narrow second-story room with a long bar and a row of tables. Bill Quint nodded and said, “Hullo!” to some of the boys and girls at tables and bar, and steered me into one of the green-curtained booths that lined the wall opposite the bar.