If anything, Todd and Chrissie were even less happy to see me than Vinnie had been. I let them squawk for a few minutes, but Mr. Contreras didn’t approve of some of Todd’s language and told him so. Todd’s jaw dropped—perhaps no one had ever chewed him out at such length before.

I took advantage of the momentary quiet. “I have a deal for you three high-flyers. Call it a plea bargain. Todd, I want you and Chrissie to resign your guardianship of Mrs. Frizell. She’s fully alert now, her hip is starting to mend, and she’ll be able to come home and manage on her own, with only a little help, in another month. She doesn’t need you. And I don’t think you can do her any good. So if you resign your guardianship, and if you buy back her three Diamond Head bonds—at face value—I will promise not to say a word to the U.S. attorney about your role in marketing those bonds around the neighborhood. Of course, if you start pushing them again the deal is off.”

They all started to speak again, in a chorus that included the fact that I should mind my own business, and anyway, they hadn’t been doing anything illegal.

“Maybe. Maybe. But you walked a mighty fine line, promising people that junk was just as good an investment as a federally insured CD. You could be disbarred, Todd, for taking part in something like that. U.S. Met might want to promote you, Vinnie, for your efforts, but they’d probably ditch you when the publicity heated up.”

The trouble was, none of them could admit they had done anything wrong. They had talked themselves into the idea that anything that got the results they wanted was by definition legal. I had to hammer repeatedly on the same key to get their attention: I had enough connections to the Chicago media to blow this story sky-high. And when that happened, their bosses would see them as sacrificial lambs.

“Remember Ollie North? You may think he was a hero, but his bosses didn’t have any compunction throwing him to the wolves when the spotlight shone their way. And you guys don’t have Marine uniforms to strut around in. You’ll be on the streets chasing the same jobs fifty thousand other kids are, and those mortgage payments come right on the fifth of the month.”