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chances.”
    â€œOnly he never told people what the risks were.”
    â€œCaveat emptor.” Let the buyer beware, which more often than not means let the buyer get fucked.
    â€œI saw a Cheating cartoon the other day,” I said. “He’s in jail, reaching his hand out through the bars, and a guard walks by, mumbling under his breath, ‘That goddamn Keating’s asking for the Grey Poupon again.’”
    Cindy laughed. Martha helped herself to a slice of cooked-to-death lamb. Whit said, “I don’t get it.”
    Either you have a sense of humor or you don’t. You can’t explain jokes to people like that. Whit didn’t give me a chance anyway. He went right on talking.
    â€œI was playing tennis today with Ed George from First Western Bank. Do you know him, Neil?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œIt went three sets. He had me down four love in the third, but I rallied and took him. Ed’s not a bad tennis player, but he has a weak backhand. It’s his grip, I think. I’ve been working on mine with Jim, the pro at the country club. He teaches skiing at Sandia in the winter. Have you ever skied there, Nel … Neil?”
    â€œNo,” I said again.
    â€œIt’s not every city that has its own ski area. It’s funny that the economy in Albuquerque never took off. I was asking Ed about it when we had dinner with him on Halloween, and he doesn’t understand it either. What was the name of that place we went to, Cyn?”
    â€œChez Henri.”
    â€œThat’s right. Great desserts, but the crepes were soggy and the service was terrible. Now Taos is an interesting area. Remember when we skied there, Cyn? Great runs, super powder, but there is absolutely nothing to do at night. It’s dead as Tucson in the summer. Give me Europe or Aspen any day. I don’t understand why Ernie Blake didn’t do more to develop Taos. First Western would have backed him, I know.”
    Whit talked, Cindy and Martha ate, I yawned. Who needed Halcion when you could spend the evening with Whit, the kind of guy who warms up his vocal cords in the morning by looking in the mirror and singing “Me, me, me”? He reminded me of the joke about the man who talks about himself all evening and then says, “Enough about me. Tell me about yourself. What do you think of me?” One of nature’s laws is that the more successful men are, the more they talk and the less they listen. It’s never been my idea of bliss to sit around and listen to men talk about themselves.
    â€œIt’s amazing how Santa Fe got through the eighties without experiencing any dip in property values at all. In fact the valuation of property in Santa Fe County increased six times. Did you know that?” Whit asked the table, but it did not answer. “The price of an average home there now is a hundred eighty thousand. It’s incredible. Most of the influx comes from second-home buyers, flex households with flex jobs. They’re the force that’s driving that economy. Here I think it’ll be high-tech. The salaries and cost of living are so much lower here than California. That’s got to make Albuquerque attractive to venture capital.” It also made us the equivalent of a third-world country. One of our fifty states was missing again.
    After the vanilla ice cream, Whit paused from his monologue to light a cigar, which was all the excuse I needed to get myself out of there. “Thanks for the dinner,” I said.
    â€œLet’s get together for lunch next week, Neil,” said Cindy. “How about Wednesday?”
    â€œOkay.”
    She gave me her number and made me promise to call.
    â€œYou’ll be calling me as soon as you hear anything from Saia?” asked Martha.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œYou ought to get to know Ed George, Neil,” said Whit. “I’ll be glad to get the two of you together sometime.”
    â€œRight,” I