Not wanting to settle for any second bananas, I went straight to Larwin himself. “I’m Bonnie Lincoln,” I said when I called to make an appointment, “and I recently won the lottery.” I mentioned the amount I had won.

“How about next Tuesday,” Larwin’s secretary said. Her voice was cordial but otherwise expressionless at the figure I quoted; like a nurse or doctor, she had seen all shapes, all sizes. Her aloof attitude was how I knew I was getting the best.

Tuesday came, and I drove an hour and a half into the city. Everyone on the highway seemed to have a death wish they had resigned themselves to. Not used to driving in such traffic, I was terrified, certain I would die, my fortune and life snatched away. A tractor-trailer almost mowed me down while I merged onto the highway.

Larwin’s building was easy to find. It was one of the taller ones downtown, its glass front scattering the afternoon sun into a thousand golden coins. The elevator up to the seventh floor glided skyward with barely a whisper, and his office was cool and dark and brown the way everything old-rich is. Nothing like the gaudy dazzle of the building’s exterior. Ornate, titleless books sat between potted ferns on wood-paneled bookcases and lent the space an air of haughtiness, as if the room itself were resisting the passage of time. Even the secretary’s desk, which was unattended for the duration of my visit, was immaculate, not a fingerprint or paper clip in sight. A single ivory tusk mounted on brass, presumably a paperweight, was the only sign of personality.

I sucked in the circulated, chemical air quietly. So. This was real money.

“Come in, come in,” Mr. Larwin said, appearing at the doorway of an inner room, and I rose and went into his office. I was surprised to see that he was much older than I expected. His hair was thick and almost blue-white, with a beard to match, and his face was a mass of smoker wrinkles. He had to be at least seventy-five years old, though who could tell age with smokers. When he stood to shake my hand he looked like a small T.rex, with short arms and elegant, bird-like hands.

“I’ve seen your name all over the news and am so glad you came to us,” he began.

“Well, I came to you, specifically, Mr. Larwin. I don’t want to deal with anyone else.”

He told me a client of his had just died, so I had reached him at a good time. “Do you have anything in particular in mind?”

I handed him a piece of paper I had brought with me. On the paper I had written some ideas for investments. I had done some rudimentary research. My face burned as I watched him read my scrawl, realizing how childish I must have seemed. But, to his credit, Mr. Larwin only nodded his head, as blank as his invisible secretary had been on the phone, and made suggestions.