“You’ve been doing this a long time,” Marion replied. “I would imagine your instincts are fairly good.”

“It’s not just that,” I said. “Really, anyone could do the same.”

“You’ve lost me,” said Judith.

“It’s the salaries,” I said. “The benefits. The decor, even.”

“The decor?”

“For instance, is the office fancier than it needs to be? Are the salaries too far above the norm? When the executives travel, are they staying in Holiday Inns or Ritz Carltons? When an employee needs to go to a training session, is she going to one in the next state—or one in Hawaii?”

“What’s wrong with staying at a Ritz Carlton?” Marion asked. “Those are lovely hotels.”

“But they’re very expensive,” I replied . “Nonprofit organizations should have a pervading mentality of saving money, of cutting corners. Of using their resources for the things that are important.”

“So if you work for a nonprofit, you should suffer?” Judith asked.

“No,” I replied. “But in a way you should be giving more than you’re getting. Most really good nonprofits all have one thing in common: They have a sort of ‘service’ mentality. The people work there because they want to make a difference in the world, not for personal gain. They work tirelessly and selflessly, even though it usually means few perks and lower-than-average incomes.”

“That doesn’t seem fair,” Judith said.

“Put it this way,” I continued. “People in the nonprofit sector work just as hard as people in the for-profit sector, but they do it with the understanding that they will never be compensated at the for-profit level. But because they derive so much personal satisfaction from the work itself, they’re usually okay with that.”

“I think I understand,” said Marion.

“I reviewed a company in California once,” I said, “a nonprofit health care organization. On paper, it looked very good. But something about the place bothered me.”

I took another bite of shrimp, thinking about all of the nonprofits I had examined, both good and bad.

“It took some digging,” I said, “but I finally found a few disgruntled former employees who were able to point me in the right direction. Turns out, the head of the organization liked to travel. Within five years he had gone to 12 international conferences in places like Zurich, Singapore, and Monte Carlo.”

“But if these conferences were necessary for doing his job—”

“They weren’t,” I replied. “They were all only marginally related to his work.”

“But legal?”

“Yes, legal. And it turned out that he brought along his wife, four children, and their nanny on each of the trips. They stayed in some of the nicest hotels in the world, dined in some of the fanciest restaurants, took in all of the sights—and the entire tab was always picked up by the agency.”

“Wow.”

“Needless to say, that man was getting more than he was giving. Classic case of financial abuse. They were denied the grant.”

“I should hope so,” Marion said.

Angelina came in and removed our shrimp dishes, replacing them with a small plate of Waldorf salad. I was glad when Judith turned the conversation to other matters, asking her mother about flowers for the funeral.