"You are not an honorary Black Widower, Henry. You are a Black Widower. Decide!"

Rubin said, "Remember, Henry, you are the epitome of honest men. Where do you stand on cheating a girl?"

"No electioneering," said Trumbull. "Go ahead, Henry."

Henry's face wrinkled into a rare frown. "I have never laid claim to extraordinary honesty, but if I did, I might treat this as a special case. Juliet told Romeo, 'At lovers' perjuries/They say Jove laughs.' Might we stretch a point?"

"I'm surprised, Henry," said Rubin.

Henry said, ' 'I am perhaps swayed by the fact that I do not view this matter as lying between the young man and the young woman. Rather it lies between a bookish young man and an athlete. We are all bookish men; and, in our time, we may each have lost a young woman to an athlete. I am embarrassed to say that I have. Surely, then-"

Rubin said, "Well, I haven't. I've never lost a girl to-" He paused a moment in sudden thought, then said in an altered tone, "Well, it's irrelevant. All right, if I'm outvoted, I'm outvoted.-So what's the story, Peterborough?"

Peterborough's face was flushed and there was a trickle of perspiration at one temple. He said, "I won't tell you any of the story I've been planning except the barest essentials of the point I need help on. I don't want anything more than the minimum. I wouldn't want that, even, if this didn't mean- so much-" He ran down.

Rubin said, with surprising quietness, "Go on. Don't worry about it. We understand."

Peterborough said, "Thanks. I appreciate it. I've got two men, call them Murderer and Victim. I've worked out the way Murderer does it and how he gets caught and I won't say a word about that. Murderer and Victim are both eclipse buffs."

Avalon interrupted. "Are you an eclipse buff, Mr. Peterborough?"

"Yes, sir, I am. I have friends who go to every eclipse anywhere in the world even if it's only a five-percenter, but I can't afford that and don't have the time. I go to those I can reach. I've got a telescope and photographic equipment."