"Oh, that. I'll whip out a story on it in a couple of days."
"No hurry. Find out all you can about it. Give you something to do while
you're waiting around."
He put down the mike and faded from the screen.
* * * * *
So I promptly did my damnedest to forget all about Isaac Grogan and
telenosis. I spent the rest of the day at the beach, sprawled out on the
hot sand with the defense mech beside me and an army of people--humans
and aliens--surrounding me. Only once, at about four o'clock, did the
defense mech start going _click-click-click_. I timed it. It lasted
three minutes and then quit.
When I got back to the hotel, at about five, a man fell into step with
me as soon as I entered the lobby.
"Name's Maxwell," he told me. "C.I.D. I'm one of your bodyguards for a
while."
"How many others do I rate?" I asked.
He was a tall, heavily built young man in his middle twenties. He
carried a briefcase. We headed for the elevator.
"Only one," he replied, "but he'll stay pretty much out of sight. He'll
join us in your room after a while. We have to ask you a lot of
questions."
The other bodyguard, who slipped into my room without knocking twenty
minutes later, was shorter, thinner and older. He was bald except for a
gray fringe, and his name was Johnson.
The C.I.D. men spent a half-hour checking for hidden mikes and cameras
before they said much of anything. Then they plopped down on the edge of
the bed, and the young man opened his briefcase.
The older one said, "Have your dinner sent up here. We'll get started on
some of these questions right away."
The questions were both exhaustive and exhausting. The older man,
Johnson, fired the questions, and Maxwell wrote down the answers,
occasionally inserting an inquiry of his own. They wanted to know
everything--not only about my telenosis experiences and my knowledge of
and contacts with Isaac Grogan, but everything I had done, said or
thought during the past two weeks, everyone I had met and talked to, and
everything we had talked about.
At the end of three and a half hours, I felt completely pumped out, and
Maxwell had a sheaf of notes the size of a best-seller.
Johnson said, "Well, I guess that'll do for a starter. We'll have
another session tomorrow."
He took the notes from Maxwell and put them in Maxwell's briefcase. He
stood up. "I'll have these transcribed and maybe check around a little.
I'll meet you here at six-thirty tomorrow night."
"What about--" I started. He cut me off: "Maxwell will stay with you.
He's not to let you out of his sight. In case anyone asks, he's your
brother-in-law from Sacramento."
* * * * *
I couldn't help laughing--but it was an admiring laugh. "You fellows are
nothing if not thorough. Does my real brother-in-law, John Maxwell of
Sacramento, know about this?" I was curious.
It was Maxwell who answered. "Your brother-in-law received a
long-distance emergency call from you at noon today, telling him to join
you immediately. Vision-reception was fuzzy, but he recognized your
voice and took the first strato. I changed places with him in Denver,
where I happened to be stationed, and he was smuggled back home. He's
with his family, but he'll have to stay in for a few days."
I shook my head. "It's marvelous. Thoroughness personified. Say, I'll
bet you fellows even thought of getting defense mechanisms ... but where
are they?"
Johnson and Maxwell looked at each other, jaws hanging.
"Well, I'll be damned!" Johnson said bitterly. "Thoroughness
personified! Son of a...." He slapped his hat on his bald head and
dashed out the door without looking back.
Maxwell grimaced. He got up from the bed and walked to an easy chair and
sat down again. "Well, Irvin Johnson will take care of _that_ little
detail. But it's going to take time...."
"It would have taken time anyway--a day or so--even if you'd thought of
it first thing," I said. "Besides, there's no danger until they find
your wave-band, and that takes time, too."
But he remained disconsolate. Not because of the danger, but simply
because they'd overlooked an angle. Under a system in which the agents
are given maximum responsibility for details and planning, that would
count heavily against them on their records. I almost felt guilty for
reminding them.
I said, "John, look--if all else fails, there's one sure quick defense.
Alcohol. I would say that under the circumstances, since you're supposed
to be protecting _me_, we should keep _you_ as well defended as
possible."
"M'm?"
"You do drink, don't you?" I asked.
"Like a fish," Maxwell said, lunging to his feet.
* * * * *
When we were back in the room, Maxwell said: "Hell, I don't see that
telenoshis is such a damn menash to society, if all you have to do is
get drunk."
"You want a nation of alcoholics?" I said. I sat down on the bed and
untied my shoes. "Anyway, whasha difference? D. T. horrors or 'noshis
horrors? Whash worse?"
Maxwell grunted.
We both had to sleep in the same bed, and Maxwell was a restless
sleeper. I had finally crept into the lower depths of slumber, where it
was warm and snug, when he poked me sharply in the ribs.
"What's that?" he demanded. He was sitting up.
"What's what?"
"Listen!"