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thing about the trades—the clients were making money. “It’s complicated.”
    “What’s the hit?”
    “Actually, they’re up around ten percent. Two years running.”
    “Well, that’s intriguing.” His delivery was deadpan.
    Penny stocks did not produce steady returns. Each one was like a lottery ticket. And they paid off a lot less frequently.
    “I know,” I said, “it sounds like I’m chasing moonbeams.” I took outmy cell phone and opened the file of photos. “But take a look at this before you make any quick decisions.” I quickly scanned through the shots I had taken of the trucks, looking for one that might best sell my point. One dark, hurried, often blurred picture after another. Either the flash had not gone off, or when it had, the resulting image showed nothing but starbursts of reflected light. If you squinted and used your imagination, you could see that they were pictures of trucks. They could also have been outtakes from some moody noir movie filmed at night in downtown Detroit. “Never mind,” I finished lamely. I vowed to look up how long I had before I could get a cell phone upgrade.
    “Hand it over to Aimee.” It was an order, but he said it kindly.
    “Aye, aye.” Aimee Devane was head of compliance for Becker Financial. We did not always play well together. She tended to treat me like the pet cobra—I was convenient for getting rid of rats and mice, but she would have preferred a cat.
    “Now do I have your complete attention?” Virgil said it with a smile, but with just a bare hint of impatience.
    “I’m with you,” I said. “What do you need?”
    He checked his watch. “I have just a few minutes to bring you up to speed, then I have another meeting.”
    “Sorry. The holdup is my fault.”
    He waved a hand to change the subject. “You’ve no doubt heard the rumor going around that the firm is in play.”
    I had not heard it, but then I was not a welcome member of the rumor circuit. Conversations tended to stop midsentence as I approached. My nickname on the trading floor was Darth Vader.
    “Who’s the buyer?” I asked.
    “That’s why I need you. Whoever it is, they are being very careful not to reveal themselves. Large blocks of shares trade, but the buyer is always a cloaked account. Offshore, or in the name of a trust or a law firm.”
    There would be willing sellers out there, too. When the father’sfirm was broken up and Virgil took the reins of the remaining brokerage and investment banking businesses, many of the creditors and investors who had been scammed out of their savings by the father received shares in the new firm as partial compensation. Now that Virgil had turned the place around and made it a viable business, the stock price had recovered substantially. Those who had held on through the whole maelstrom were now being rewarded for their patience, having been made whole, or almost so, by the rebound. It was found money.
    “No one’s approached you?” I asked.
    “Not exactly. I had a rather clandestine meeting with a lawyer who claims to represent a consortium of buyers. I said I wasn’t interested in selling, but I’m always willing to listen. I suggested we have our bankers sit in on the next meeting.”
    “What’d he say?”
    “It spooked him. ‘No bankers,’ he said. ‘This is a private matter.’ It was the strangest pitch I’ve ever heard of. We were having dinner in a private room at the Waldorf, and he stood up and walked out between the salad and the entrée.”
    “How much does the family own?”
    Virgil’s family made the Borgias look normal. His older brother, James, known to his friends and enemies as Binks, had become a permanent resident in a rehab facility out in Sedona, Arizona, where it was easier to keep his heroin habit in check; their sister, Morgan, was serving time in a minimum-security facility in Rhode Island. The youngest brother, Wyatt, was an Aspy with limited interests. He lived with his mother on the family