Dortmunder was sitting on the sofa with his feet up on the coffee table, a beer in his right hand and a luncheon-loaf sandwich on white with mayo in his left hand, his sleepy eyes more or less focused on Angels with Dirty Faces, being screened this afternoon on WNEW-TV, channel five, when the doorbell rang. Dortmunder blinked slowly, but otherwise didn't move, and a minute later May walked through the living room, trailing a thin wavy line of smoke from the cigarette in the corner of her mouth as she dried her sudsy hands on a dishtowel. She crossed the line of vision between Dortmunder and the television set – he blinked again, as slowly as before – and went on out to the foyer to open the door.

A loud and rather angry voice cut through the background music of Angels with Dirty Faces: "Where is he?"

Dortmunder sighed. He filled his mouth with bread and mayo and luncheon loaf, sat up a bit straighter on the sofa, and waited for the inevitable.

Out in the foyer, May was saying something soothing, which was apparently not doing its job. "Just let me at him," insisted the loud angry voice, and then there were heavy footsteps, and in came a wiry sharp-nosed fellow with a chip on his shoulder. "You!" he said, pointing at Dortmunder.

May, looking worried, followed the sharp-nosed fellow into the room, saying, in a ghastly attempt at cheeriness, "Look who's here, John. It's Andy Kelp."

Dortmunder swallowed white bread and luncheon loaf and mayo. "I see him," he said. "He's between me and the TV set."

"You got a job!" Kelp yelled, in tones of utter outrage.

Dortmunder gestured with his sandwich, as though shooing a fly. "Would you move over a little? I can't see the picture."

"I will not move over." Kelp folded his arms firmly over his chest and stamped his shoes down onto the carpet, legs slightly spread, to emphasize his immobility. Dortmunder could now see about a third of the screen, just under Kelp's crotch. He scrunched down in the sofa, trying to see more, but then his own feet on the coffee table got in the way.

And Kelp was repeating, "You got a job, Dortmunder. You got a job, and you didn't tell me."

"That's right," Dortmunder said. He sipped beer.

"I brought you a lotta jobs," Kelp said, aggrieved. "And now you got one, and you cut me out?"

Stung from his lethargy, Dortmunder sat up straighter, spilled beer on his thumb, and said, "Oh, yeah, that's right. You brought me jobs. A kid that kidnaps us."

"He never did."

"A bank," Dortmunder said, "and we lose it in the goddam Atlantic Ocean."

"We took over two thousand apiece out of that bank," Kelp pointed out.

Dortmunder gave him a look of disgusted contempt. "Two thousand apiece," he repeated. "Remind me, was that dollars or pesos?"

Kelp abruptly shifted gears. Switching from antagonism to conciliation, he spread his hands and said, "Aw, come on, Dortmunder. That isn't fair."

"I'm not trying to be fair," Dortmunder told him. "I'm not a referee. I'm a thief, and I'm trying to make a living."

"Dortmunder, don't be like that," Kelp said, pleading now. "We're such a terrific team."

"If we were any more terrific," Dortmunder said, "we'd starve to death." He looked at the sandwich in his left hand. "If it wasn't for May, I would starve to death." And he took a big bite of sandwich.

Kelp stared in frustration, watching Dortmunder chew. "Dortmunder," he said, but then he just helplessly moved his hands around, and finally turned to May, saying, "Talk to him, May. Was it my fault the bank fell in the ocean?"

"Yes," said Dortmunder.

Kelp was thunderstruck: "B-b-b-b-b- How?"

"I don't know how," Dortmunder said, "but it was your fault. And it was your fault we had to steal the same emerald six times. And it was your fault we kidnapped some child genius that boosted the ransom off us. And it was your fault–"

Kelp reeled back, stunned by the number and variety of charges. Hands spread wide, he lifted his head and appealed to Heaven, saying, "I can't believe what I'm hearing in this room."

"Then go to some other room."

Having had no help from Heaven, Kelp appealed again to May, saying, "May, can't you do something?"

She couldn't, and she must have known she couldn't, but she tried anyway, saying, "John, you and Andy have been together so long–"

Dortmunder gave her a look. "Yeah," he said. "We just been reminiscing."

Then he stared at the television set, which was now showing a commercial in which ballerinas in tutus danced on top of a giant can of deodorant spray, to the music of Prelude a l'après midi d'un faune.

May shook her head. "I'm sorry, Andy."

Kelp sighed. His manner now was stern and statesmanlike. He said, "Dortmunder, is this final?"

Dortmunder kept watching the ballerinas. "Yes," he said. Kelp drew his tattered dignity about himself like a feather boa. "Goodbye, May," he said, with great formality. "I'm sorry it ended like this."

"We'll still see you around, Andy," May said, frowning unhappily.

"I don't think so, May. Thanks for everything. Bye."

"Bye, Andy," May said.

Kelp exited, without looking again at Dortmunder, and a few seconds later they heard the front door slam. May turned to Dortmunder, and now her frown showed more annoyance than unhappiness. "That wasn't right, John," she said.

The ballerinas had at least been replaced by the angels with dirty faces. Dortmunder said, "I'm trying to watch this movie here."

"You don't like movies," May told him.

"I don't like new movies in movie houses," Dortmunder said. "I like old movies on television."

"You also like Andy Kelp."

"When I was a kid," Dortmunder said, "I liked gherkins. I ate three bottles of gherkins one day."

May said, "Andy Kelp isn't a gherkin."

Dortmunder didn't reply, but he did turn away from the television screen to give her a look. When they'd both contemplated May's remark for a little while, he returned his attention to the movie.

May sat down next to him on the sofa, staring intently at his profile. "John," she said, "you need Andy Kelp, and you know you do."

His lips tightened.

"You do," she insisted.

"I need Andy Kelp," Dortmunder said, "the way I need ten-to-twenty upstate."

"Wait a minute, John," she said, resting a hand on his wrist. "It's true the big jobs you've tried in the last few years didn't go well–"

"And Kelp brought me every one of them."

"But that's the point," May told him. "He didn't bring you this one. This is yours, you got it yourself. Even if he is a jinx in his own jobs – and you know you don't really believe in jinxes, any more than I do – but even if–"

Dortmunder frowned at her. "What do you mean, I don't believe in jinxes?"

"Well, rational people–"

"I do believe in jinxes," Dortmunder told her. "And rabbit foots. And not walking under ladders. And thirteen. And–"

"Feet," May said.

"–black cats crossing your – What?"

"Rabbits' feet," May said. "I think it's feet, not foots."

"I don't care if it's elbows," Dortmunder said. "I believe in it whatever it is, and even if there aren't any jinxes Kelp is still one, and he's done me enough."

"Maybe you're the jinx," May said, very softly.

Dortmunder gave her a look of affronted amazement. "Maybe what?"

"After all," she said, "those were Kelp's jobs, and he brought them to you, and you can't really blame any one person for all the things that went wrong, so maybe you're the one that jinxes his jobs."

Dortmunder had never been so basely attacked in his life. "I am not a jinx," he said, slowly and distinctly, and stared at May as though he'd never seen her before.

"I know that," she said. "And neither is Andy. And besides, this isn't you coming in on a job he found, it's him coming in on a job you found."