New York [AP], August 23. Judge James Lefkowitz
of the New York Supreme Court ruled today that
the International Truckers’ Brotherhood had no
grounds for their suit against the United Transport
Corp. and its officers. The action, a bitterly
fought contest, involved a complaint by the
Brotherhood that UTC had violated their contract
with the Brotherhood by hiring “unqualified drivers”
to work for the corporation.
In a statement made immediately after the ruling,
Judge Lefkowitz said: “It is obvious that a man with
a state-certified chauffeur’s license is not an
‘unqualified driver.’”
Effects of this ruling are thought to be
far-reaching. Comment from the international
Truckers’ Brotherhood....
There was more to it, a lot more, but Malone didn’t feel like reading
it. It sounded just as confused as he expected news to sound these
days, but it also sounded a little dull. He could feel Lou’s breathing
against his ear as he read, and he lost interest in the paper almost
at once.
“My, my,” she said. “And I expected a real exposé of a story, after
that headline.”
“This is an exposé,” Malone said. “But I’m not sure what of.”
“It sounds pretty confused,” Lou said.
“Everything seems to, these days,” Malone said. “Including any story
of what’s been happening during the last little while.”
“Agreed,” Lou said. “Without argument.”
“Listen,” Malone said suddenly. “Would it help if I went up and told
Sir Lewis that there’s no mark against your record?”
“Mark?” Lou said. “Against my record?”
“Well,” Malone said, “I mean—well, he isn’t the sort of man who’d
fire somebody, because of—because of something like this?”
“You mean because I know an FBI man?” Lou said.
“I—”
“Never mind,” she said. “I know what you mean. And he won’t. He’ll
understand.” She came round to face him, and patted his cheek.
“Thanks,” she said. “Thanks a lot, anyway.”
“If there’s anything I can do—”
“There won’t be,” Lou said. “You’ll call me, though, about tonight?”
“Sure I will,” Malone said. He hoped that the tentative date he’d made
with her for that evening wouldn’t be broken up because of a sudden
onslaught of work. “I’ll let you know before five, for sure.”
“Fine,” Lou said. “I’ll wait to hear from you.”
She turned to walk away.
“Hey,” Malone said. “Wait a minute.”
“What?” she said, turning again.
Malone looked judicious. “I think,” he said weightily, “that,
considering all the fun we’ve had, and all the adventuring and
everything else, the least you could do would be to kiss me goodbye.”
“On Fifth Avenue?”
“No,” Malone said. He tapped his lips. “Here.”
She laughed, bent closer and pecked him on the cheek. Then, before he
could say anything else, she was gone.
10
On the way to FBI Headquarters on 69th Street, he read the _Post_ a
little more carefully. The judge and his union suit weren’t the only
things that were fouled up, he saw. Things were getting pretty bad all
over.
One story dealt with the recent factional fights inside the American
Association for the Advancement of Medicine. A new group, the United
States Medical-Professional Society, appeared to be forming as a
competitor to the AAAM, and Malone wasn’t quite so sure, when he
thought about it, that this news was as bad as it appeared on the
surface. Fights between doctors, of course, were reasonably rare, at
least on the high hysterical level the story appeared to pinpoint. But
the AAAM had held a monopoly in the medical field for a long time;
maybe it was about time some competition showed itself. From what he
could find out in the story, the USMPS seemed like a group of fairly
sensible people.
But that was one of the few rays of light Malone could discern amid
the encircling bloom of the news. The gang wars had reached a new
high; the _Post_ was now publishing what it called a Daily Scoreboard,
which consisted in this particular paper of six deaths, two
disappearances and ten hospitalizations. The six deaths were evenly
scattered throughout the country: two in New York, one each in Chicago
and Detroit, and two more in San Francisco. The disappearances were in
Los Angeles and in Miami, and the hospitalizations were pretty much
all over.
The unions had been having trouble, too. Traditional forms of
controversy appeared to have gone out the window, in favor of
startling disclosures, beatings, wild cries of foul and great masses
of puzzling evidence. How, for instance, Malone wondered, had the
president of Local 7574 of the Fishermen’s Fraternal Brotherhood
managed to mislay a pile of secret records, showing exactly how the
membership was being bilked of dues, on a Boston subway train? But,
somehow, he had, and the records were now causing shakeups, denials
and trouble among the fishermen.
Of course, the news was not all bad. There were always the comic
strips. Pogo was busily staving off an approaching wedding between
Albert Alligator and a new character named Tranquil Portly, who
appeared to be a brown bear. He was running into some resistance,
though, from a wolflike character who planned to abscond with Albert’s
cigars while Albert was honeymooning. This character, Don Coyote by
name, looked like a trouble-maker, and Malone vowed to keep a careful
eye on him.
And then there were other headlines:
FUSION POWER SOON COMMERCIALLY
AVAILABLE SAYS AEC HEAD
Sees Drastic Cut in Power Rates
UN POLICE CONTINGENT OKAYED:
MILLION MEN TO FORM 1ST GROUP
Member Countries Pledge $20
Billion in Support Moneys
OFFICIAL STATES: “WE’RE AHEAD AFTER 17 YEARS!”
US Space Program Tops Russian Achievements
ARMED FORCES TO TOUGHEN TRAINING PROGRAM IN 1974
Gen. Foote: “Our aim is to train fighting men,
not to run a country club.”
GOVERNMENT TO SAVE $1 BILLION ANNUALLY?
Senator Hits Duplication of Effort in Government,
Vows Immediate Reform
Malone read that one a little more carefully, because it looked, at
first sight, like one of the bad-news items. There had been
government-spending reforms before, almost all of which had resulted
in confusion, panic, loss of essential services—and twice as many men
on the payroll, since the government now had to hire useless
efficiency experts, accountants and other such supernumerary workers.
But this time, the reform looked as if it might do some good. Of
course, he told himself sadly, it was still too early to tell.
The senator involved was Deeks, of Massachusetts, who was also in the
news because of a peculiar battle he had had with Senator Furbisher of
Vermont. Congress, Malone noted, was still acting up. Furbisher
claimed that the moneys appropriated for a new Vermont dam were really
being used for the dam. But Deeks had somehow come into possession of
several letters written by a cousin of Furbisher’s, detailing some of
the graft that was going on in the senator’s home state. Furbisher was
busily denying everything, but his cousin was just as busy confessing
all to anybody who would listen. It was building up into an extremely
interesting fracas, and, Malone thought, it would have been even
funnier than Pogo except that it was happening in the Congress of the
United States.
He heaved a sigh, folded up the paper and entered the building that
housed the New York contingent of the FBI.
Boyd was waiting in his office when he arrived.
“Well, there, Kenneth,” he said. “And how are all our little Slavic
brothers?”
“Unreasonable,” Malone said, “and highly unpleasant.”
“You refer, no doubt,” Boyd said, “to the _Meeneestyerstvoh
Vnootrenikh Dyehl_?”
“_Gesundheit_,” Malone said kindly.
“The MVD,” Boyd said. “I’ve been studying for days to pull it on you
when you got back.”
Malone nodded. “Very well, then,” he said in a stately, orotund tone.
“Say it again.”
“Damn it,” Boyd said, “I _can’t_ say it again.”
“Cheer up,” Malone said. “Maybe some day you’ll learn. Meantime,
Thomas, did you get the stuff we talked about?”
Boyd nodded. “I think I got enough of it,” he said. “Anyhow, there is
a definite trend developing. Come on into the private office, and I’ll
show you.”
There, on Boyd’s massive desk, were several neat piles of paper.
“It looks like enough,” Malone said. “As a matter of fact, it looks
like too much. Haven’t we been through all this before?”
“Not like this, we haven’t,” Boyd said. “Information from all over,
out of the everywhere, into the here.” He picked up a stack of papers
and handed them to Malone.
“What’s this?” Malone said.
“That,” Boyd said, “is a report on the Pacific Merchant Sailors’
Brotherhood.”
“Goody,” Malone said doubtfully.
Boyd came over, pulling at his beard thoughtfully, and took the top
few sheets out of Malone’s hands. “The report,” he said, looking down
at the sheets, “includes the checks we made on the office of the
president of the Brotherhood, as well as the Los Angeles local and the
San Francisco local.”
“Only two?” Malone said. “That seems as if you’ve been lying down on
the job.”
“They’re the top two in membership,” Boyd said. “But listen to this:
the president and three of his underlings resigned day before
yesterday, and not quite in time. The law—by which I mean us, and a
good many other people—is hot on their tails. It seems somebody
accidentally mixed up a couple of envelopes.”
“Sounds like a case for the Post Office,” Malone said brightly.
“Not these envelopes,” Boyd said. “There was a letter that was
supposed to go to the head of the San Francisco local, dealing with a
second set of books—not the ones used for tax purposes, but the real
McCoy. The letter didn’t get to the San Francisco man. Instead, it
went to the attorney general of the state of California.”
“Lovely,” Malone said. “Meanwhile, what was San Francisco doing?”
Boyd smiled. “San Francisco was getting confused,” he said. “Like
everybody else. The San Francisco man got a copy of an affidavit
dealing with merchant-ship tonnage. That was supposed to go to the
attorney general.”
“Good work,” Malone said. “So when the Frisco boys woke up to what was
happening—”
“They called the head man, and he put two and two together, resigned
and went into hiding. Right now, he’s probably living an undercover
life as a shoe salesman in Paris, Kentucky.”
“And, after all,” Malone added, “why not? It’s a peaceful life.”
“The attorney general, of course, impounded the second set of books,”
Boyd went on. “A grand jury is hearing charges now.”
“You know,” Malone said reflectively, “I almost feel sorry for the
man. Almost, but not quite.”
“I see what you mean,” Boyd said. “It is a hell of a thing to happen.”
“On the other hand—” Malone leafed through the papers in a hurry,
then put them back on Boyd’s desk with a sigh of relief. “I’ve got the
main details now,” he said. “I can go through the thing more
thoroughly later. Anything else?”
“Oh, lots,” Boyd said. “And all in the same pattern. The FPM, for
instance, literally dropped one in our laps.”
“Literally?” Malone said. “What was the Federation of Professional
Musicians doing in your lap?”
“Not mine,” Boyd said hastily. “Not mine. But it seems that some
secretary put a bunch of file folders on the windowsill of their
second-floor offices, and they fell off. At the same time, an agent
was passing underneath, slipped on a banana peel and sat down on the
sidewalk. Bingo, folders in lap.”
“Wonderful,” Malone said. “The hand of God.”
“The hand of something, for sure,” Boyd said. “Those folders contain
all the ammunition we’ve ever needed to get after the FPM. Kickbacks,
illegal arrangements with night-clubs, the whole works. We’re putting
it together now, but it looks like a long, long term ahead for our
friends from the FPM.”
And Boyd went to his desk, picked up a particularly large stack of
papers. “This,” he said, “is really hot stuff.”
“What do you call the others?” Malone said. “Crime on ice?”
“The new show at the Winter Garden,” Boyd said blithely. “Don’t miss
it if you can.”
“Sure,” Malone said. “So what’s so hot?”
Boyd smiled. “The police departments of seven major cities,” he said.
“They’re all under attack either by the local prosecuting attorney or
the state’s attorney general. It seems there’s a little graft and
corruption going on.”
“This,” Malone said, “is not news.”
“It is to the people concerned,” Boyd said. “Four police chiefs have
resigned, along with great handfuls of inspectors, captains and
lieutenants. It’s making a lovely wingding all over the country, Ken.”
“I’ll bet,” Malone said.
“And I checked back on every one,” Boyd went on. “Your hunch was
absolutely right, Ken. The prosecuting attorneys and the attorneys
general are all new men—all the ones involved in this stuff. Each one
replaced a previous incumbent in a recent election. In two cases, the
governor was new, too—elected last year.”
“That figures,” Malone said. “What about the rest?”
Boyd’s grandiose wave of a hand took in all the papers on the desk.
“It’s all the same,” he said. “They all follow a pattern, Ken, _the_
pattern. The one you were looking for.”
Malone blinked. “I’ll be damned,” he said. “I’ll be doubly damned.”
“And how about the Russians?” Boyd said.
“You mean the _Meeneestyerstvoh Vnootrenikh Dyehl_?” Malone said.
“Now,” Boyd said, “I’ll be damned. And after I practiced for days.”
“Ah,” Malone said. “But I was _there_. The Russians are about as mixed
up as a group of Transylvanian villagers with two vampires to track
down and not enough flambeaux for all. Here, for instance, is just one
example: the conflicting sets of orders that were given about me and
Her Majesty and L—Miss Garbitsch.”
Briefly, he outlined what had happened.
“Sounds like fun,” Boyd said.
“They were so busy arguing with each other,” Malone finished, “that I
have a feeling we hardly needed the teleportation to escape. It would
just have taken longer, that’s all.” He paused. “By the way, Tom,
about the stakeout—”
“Luba Garbitsch is being protected as if she were Fort Knox,” Boyd
said. “If any Soviet agent tries to approach her with a threat of any
kind, we’ll have him nabbed before he can say Ivan Robinovitch.”
“Or,” Malone suggested, “_Meeneestyerstvoh_—”
“If we waited for that one,” Boyd said, “we might have to wait all
day.” He paused. “But who’s doing it?” he went on. “That’s still the
question. Martians? Venerians? Or is that last one Venusians?”
“Aphrodisiacs,” Malone suggested diplomatically.
“Thank you, no,” Boyd said politely. “I never indulge while on duty.”
“Thomas,” Malone said, “you are a Rover Boy First-Class.”
“Good,” Boyd said. “But, meanwhile, who is doing all this? Would you
prefer Evil Beings from the Planet Ploor?”
“I would not,” Malone said firmly.
“But I have a strange feeling,” Boyd said, “that, in spite of all the
evidence to the contrary, you do not hold with the Interplanetary
Alien Theory.”
“Frankly,” Malone said, “I’m not sure of anything. Not really. But I
do want to know why, if it’s interplanetary aliens doing this stuff,
they’re picking such a strange way of going about it.”
“Strange?” Boyd said. “What’s strange about it? You wouldn’t expect
Things from Ploor to come right out and _tell_ us what they want,
would you? It’s against custom. It may even be against the law.”
“Well, maybe,” Malone said. “But it is pretty strange. The difference
between what’s happening in Russia and what’s happening here—”
“What difference?” Boyd said. “Everybody’s confused. Here, and over
there. It all looks the same to me.”
“Well, it isn’t,” Malone said. “Take a look at the paper, for
instance.” He tossed the _Post_ at Boyd, who caught it with a
spasmodic clutching motion and reassembled it slowly.
“Why throw things?” Boyd said. “You sore or something?”
“I guess I am,” Malone said. “But not at you. It’s—somebody or
something. Person or persons unknown.”
“Or Ploorians,” Boyd said.
“Whatever,” Malone said. “But take a look at the paper and see if you
see what I see.” He paused. “Does that mean anything?” he said.
“Probably,” Boyd said. “We’ll figure it out later.” He leafed through
the newspaper slowly, pulling thoughtfully at his beard from time to
time. Malone watched him in breathless silence.
“See it?” he said at last.
Boyd looked up and, very slowly, nodded. “You’re right, Ken,” he said
in a quiet voice. “You’re absolutely right. It’s as plain as the nose
on your face.”
“And that,” Malone said, “sounds like an insult. It’s much plainer
than that. Suppose you tell me.”
Boyd considered. “Over here,” he said at last, “there are a lot of
confused jerks and idiots. Right?”
“Correct,” Malone said.
“And in Russia,” Boyd went on, “there’s a lot of confusion. Right?”
“Sure,” Boyd said. “It’s perfectly clear. I wonder why I didn’t see it
before.”
“That’s it!” Malone cried. “That’s the difference!”
“Sure,” Boyd said. “It’s perfectly clear. I wonder why I didn’t see it
before.”
“Because you weren’t looking for it,” Malone said. “Because nobody
was. But there’s one more check I want to make. There’s one area I’m
not sure of, simply because I don’t have enough to go on.”
“What area is that?” Boyd said. “It seems to me we did a pretty good
job—”
“The Mafia,” Malone said. “We know they’re having trouble, but—”
“But we don’t know what kind of trouble,” Boyd finished. “Right you
are.”
Malone nodded. “I want to talk to Manelli,” he said. “Can we set it
up?”
“I don’t see why not,” Boyd said. “The A-in-C can give us the latest
on him. You want me with you?”
“No,” Malone said after some thought. “No. You go and see Mike Sand,
heading up the International Truckers’ Union. We know he’s tied up
with the Syndicate, and maybe you can get some information from him.
You know what to dig for?”
“I do now,” Boyd said. He reached for the intercom phone.
* * * * *
Cesare Antonio Manelli was a second-generation Prohibition mobster,
whose history can most easily be described by reference to the various
affairs of State which coincided with his development. Thus:
When Cesare was a small toddler of uncertain gait and chubby visage,
the Twenty-First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States
canceled out not only the Eighteenth Amendment, but the thriving
enterprises conducted by Manelli, Sr., and many of his friends.
When Cesare was a young schoolboy, poring over the multiplication
tables, his father and his father’s friends were busy dividing. They
were dividing, to put it more fully, husbands from families as a means
of requesting ransom, and money from banks as a means of getting the
same cash without use of the middleman, or victim. This was the period
of the Great Readjustment, and the frenzied search among gangland’s
higher echelons for a substitute for bootlegging.
And when Cesare was an innocent high-schooler, sporting a Paleolithic
switchblade knife and black leather jacket, his father and his
father’s friends had reached a new plateau. They consolidated into a
Syndicate, and began to concentrate on gambling and the whole,
complex, profitable network of unions.
And then World War II had come along, and it was time for Cesare to do
his part. Bidding a fond farewell to his father and such of his
father’s friends as had survived the disagreements of Prohibition, the
painful legal processes of the early Thirties and the even more
painful consolidations of the years immediately before the war, young
Cesare went off to foreign lands, where he distinguished himself by
creating and running the largest single black-market ring in all of
Southern Europe.
Cesare had followed in his father’s footsteps. And, before his sudden
death during a disagreement in Miami, Giacomo “Jack the Ripper”
Manelli was proud of his son.
“Geez,” he often said. “Whattakid, huh? Whattakid!”
At the war’s end, young Cesare, having proven himself a man, took unto
himself a nickname and a shotgun. He did not have to use the shotgun
very much, after the first few lessons; soon he was on his way to the
top.
There was nowhere for Cesare “Big Cheese” Antonio Manelli to go,
except up.
Straight up.
Now, in 1973, he occupied a modestly opulent office on Madison Avenue,
where he did his modest best to pretend to the world at large that he
was only a small cog—indeed, an almost invisible cog—in a large
advertising machine. His best was, for all practical purposes, good
enough.
Though it was common knowledge among the spoil-sport law enforcement
officers who cared to look into the matter that Manelli was the real
owner of the agency, there was no way to prove this. He didn’t even
have a phone under his own name. The only way to reach him was by
going through his front man in the agency, a blank-faced, truculent
Arab named Atif Abdullah Aoud.
According to the agent-in-charge of the New York office, Malone had
his choice of two separate methods of getting to Manelli. One, more
direct, was to walk in, announce that he was an agent of the FBI, and
insist on seeing Manelli. If he had a search warrant, the A-in-C told
him, he might even get in. But, even if he did, he would probably not
get anything out of Manelli.
The second and more diplomatic way was to call up Atif Abdullah Aoud
and arrange for an appointment.
Malone made his decision in a flash. He flipped on the phone and
punched for a PLaza exchange.
The face that appeared on the screen was that of a fairly pretty, if
somewhat vapid, brunette. “Rodger, Willcoe, O’Vurr and Aoud, good
afternoon,” she said.
Malone blinked.
“Who is calling, please?” the girl said. She snapped gum at the screen
and Malone winced and drew away.
“This is Kenneth J. Malone,” he said from what he considered a safe
distance. “I want to talk to Mr. Aoud.”
“Mr. Aoud?” she said in a high, unhelpful whine.
“That’s right,” Malone said patiently. “You can tell him that there
may be some government business coming his way.”
“Oh,” she said. “But Mr. Aoud isn’t in.”
Mr. Aoud wasn’t in. Mr. Aoud was out. Malone turned that over in his
mind a few times, and decided to try and forget it just as quickly as
possible. “Then,” he said, “let me talk to one of the other partners.”
“Partners?” the girl said. She popped her gum again. Malone moved back
another inch.
“You know,” he said. “The other people he works with. Rodger, or
Willcoe, or O’Vurr.”
“Oh,” the girl said. “Them.”
“That’s right,” Malone said patiently.
“How about Mr. Willcoe?” the girl said after a second of deep and
earnest thought. “Would he do?”
“Why not let’s try him and see?” Malone said.
“Okay,” the girl said brightly. “Let’s.” She flashed Malone a dazzling
smile, only slightly impeded by the gum, and flipped off. Malone
stared at the blank screen for a few seconds, and then the girl’s
voice said, invisibly: “Mr. Willcoe will speak to you now, Mr. Melon.
Thank you for waiting.”
“I’m not—” Malone started to say, and then the face of Frederick
Willcoe appeared on the screen.
Willcoe was a thin, wrinkle-faced man with very pale skin. He seemed
to be in his sixties, and he looked as if he had just lost an
all-night bout with Count Dracula. Malone looked interestedly for
puncture marks, but failed to find any.
“Ah,” Willcoe said, in a voice that sounded like crinkled paper. “Mr.
Melon. Good afternoon.”
“I’m not Mr. Melon,” Malone said testily.
Willcoe looked gently surprised, like a man who has discovered that
his evening sherry contains cholesterol. “Really?” he said. “Then I
must be on the wrong line. I beg your pardon.”
“You’re not on the wrong line,” Malone said. “I am Mr. Melon in a
way.” That didn’t sound very clear when he got it out, so he added:
“Your secretary got my name wrong. She thinks I’m Mr. Melon—Kenneth
J. Melon.”
“But you’re not,” Willcoe said.
Malone resisted an impulse to announce that he was really Lamont
Cranston. “I’m Kenneth J. Malone,” he said.
“Ah,” Willcoe said. “Quite amusing. Imagine my mistaking you for a Mr.
Melon, when you’re really Mr. Malone.” He paused, and his face got
even more wrinkled. “But I don’t know you under either name,” he said.
“What do you want?”
“I want to talk to Mr. Manelli,” Malone said.
“But Mr. Aoud—”
“Mr. Aoud,” Malone said, wondering if it sounded as silly to Willcoe
as it did to him, “isn’t in. So I thought you might be able to arrange
an appointment for this afternoon.”
Willcoe bit his lip. “Mr. Manelli isn’t in just now,” he said.
“Yes,” Malone said. “I didn’t think he would be. That’s why I want to
arrange an appointment for later, when he _will_ be in.”
“Does Mr. Manelli know you?” Willcoe said suspiciously, the wrinkles
deepening again.
“He knows my boss,” Malone said carefully. “You just tell him that
this is something that ought to be worth time and money to him. His
time, and his money.”
“Hmm,” Willcoe said. “I see. Would you wait a moment, Mr. Mel—Mr.
Malone?”
The screen blanked out immediately. The wait this time was slightly
longer.
And the next face that appeared on the screen was that of Cesare “Big
Cheese” Antonio Manelli, the nearly invisible cog.
For a cog, the face was not a bad one. It was strong and well-muscled,
and it had dark, wavy hair running along the top. At the sides of the
face, the hair was greying slightly, and behind the grey two large
ears stuck out. Manelli’s nose was a long, faintly aquiline affair and
his eyes were very pleasant and candid. They were light grey.
“Aha,” Manelli said. “You are Mr. Malone, right?” His voice was
guttural, but it was obvious that he was trying for control. “I regret
announcing that I was out, Mr. Malone,” he said. “But a man in my
position—I like privacy, Mr. Malone, and I try to keep privacy for
myself. Let me request you to answer a question, Mr. Malone: do I know
you, Mr. Malone?”
“Not personally,” Malone said. “I—”
“But I’m supposed to know your boss,” Manelli said. “I don’t know him,
either, so far.”
Malone shrugged. “I’m sure you do,” he said, and dropped the name
almost casually: “Andrew J. Burris.”
Manelli raised his eyebrows. “So that’s who you are,” he said. “I
ought to have known, Mr. Malone. And you want to talk to me a little
bit, right?”
“That’s right,” Malone said.
“But this is no way to act, Mr. Malone,” Manelli said reproachfully.
“After all, we understand each other, you and me. What you should do,
you should come in through channels, in the correct way, so everything
it would be open and above the board.”
“Through channels?” Malone said.
Manelli regarded him with a pitying glance. “You must be new on your
job, Mr. Malone,” he said. “Because there is an entire system built
up, and you don’t know about it. The way things work, we sit around
and we don’t see people. And then somebody comes and presents his
credentials, you might say—search warrants, for instance, or
subpoenas. And then we know where we are.”
Malone shook his head. “This isn’t that kind of call,” he said. “It’s
more a friendly type of call.”
“Mr. Malone,” Manelli said. The reproach was stronger in his voice.
“You must be very new at your job.”
“Nevertheless,” Malone said.
Manelli hesitated only a second. “Because I like you,” he said, “and
to teach you how things operate around here, I could do you a favor.”
“Good,” Malone said patiently.
“In an hour,” Manelli said. “My place. Here.”
The screen blanked out before Malone could even say goodbye.
Malone got up, went out to the corridor, and decided that, since he
had time to kill, he might as well walk on down to Manelli’s office.
That, he told himself, would give him time to decide what he wanted to
say.
He toyed at first with the idea of a nice bourbon and soda in a
Madison Avenue bar, but he discarded that idea in a hurry. It was
always possible for him to get into a tight spot and have to teleport
his way out, and he didn’t want to be fuzzy around the edges in case
that happened. _Trotkin’s_ had showed him that, under enough stress,
he could manage the job with quite a lot of vodka in him. But there
was absolutely no sense, he told himself sadly, in taking chances.
He started off downtown along Fifth. Soon he was standing in front of
the blue-and-crystal tower of the Ravell Building.
That made up his mind for him. He checked his watch, mentally flipped
a coin and then cheated a little to make the answer come out right. He
went inside and stepped into an elevator.
“Six,” he said with decision.
Lou was sitting at the Psychical Research Society desk, talking to the
tweedy Sir Lewis Carter. Malone waved at Carter, decided that
conversation with Lou was out, and started to walk away. Then he
realized that he couldn’t have Carter thinking he was crazy. He had to
figure out something to tell the man—and in a hurry, too.
Carter smiled and gestured to him. “Ah, Mr. Malone,” he said. “I’m
glad you brought our Lou home safely. I’ve heard a little about your—
ah—escapade. Astounding, really.”
“Not for the FBI,” Malone said modestly. “We’ve been through too
much.”
“But—”
“No, really,” Malone said. “We never call anything astounding any
more.”
“I can well imagine,” Carter said. “Is there anything I can do for
you?”
Malone thought fast. He had to have something, and he didn’t have much
time. “Why—uh—” he said, and then it came to him. “Yes, as a matter
of fact you can,” he said.
“Glad to be of service,” Carter said. “I’m sure we can do anything you
request.”
“Have you got any more data on telepathic projection?” Malone said.
Sir Lewis Carter frowned. “Telepathic projection?” he said.
“The stuff—the phenomenon Cartier Taylor mentioned,” Malone said, “in
_Minds and Morons_. I think it was page eighty-four.”
“Oh,” Carter said. “Oh, yes. Of course. Well, Mr. Malone, we’ll see
what we can do for you.”
Malone sighed. “Thanks,” he said mournfully. “I guess—I guess that’s
all, then.” He smiled at Lou, and turned the smile into a terrifying
scowl when his eye caught Carter’s. “Oh,” Malone said. “So long. So
long, everybody.”
“Ken—”
This was not, he told himself sadly, either the time or the place.
“Goodbye, Sir Lewis,” he said. “Goodbye, Lou.”
The elevator opened its doors and received him.
* * * * *
Exactly fifty-nine minutes after Cesare Manelli had hung up on him,
Malone showed up in the stately and sumptuous suite that belonged, for
a stiff fee every month, to the firm of Rodger, Willcoe, O’Vurr and
Aoud. The girl at the desk was his old Spearmint friend.
“Mr. Manelli,” Malone said. “I’ve got an appointment. My name is
Malone and his is Manelli. He works here.” That, he told himself, was
an understatement; but at least he had a chance of getting his point
across.
“Oh,” the girl said. Her gum popped. “Certainly. Right away, Mr.
Maloney.”
Malone opened his mouth, then shut it again. It just wasn’t worth the
trouble, he thought.
The girl did things with a switchboard, then turned to him again. “Mr.
Manelli’s office is right down there in back,” she said, pointing
vaguely. “Think you can find it, Mr. Maloney?”
“I’ll try,” Malone promised. He went down the long corridor and
stopped at an unmarked door. It was at least an even chance, he told
himself, and opened the door.
The room inside appeared to be mostly desk. The gigantic slab of wood
sat against the far wall of the room, in the right-hand corner and
spreading over toward the center. It appeared, in the soft half-light
of the room, to be waiting for somebody to walk into its lair. Malone
was sure, at first sight, that this desk ate people; it was just the
type: big and dark and glowering and massive.
There wasn’t anybody seated behind it, which reinforced his belief.
The desk had eaten its master. Now it was out of control and they
would have to have it shot. Malone took a deep breath and tried not to
veer.
Then he heard a voice.
“Sit down, Mr. Malone,” the voice said. “How about you having a drink
while we talk? If this is going to be so friendly.”
The voice didn’t belong to the desk. It belonged, unmistakably, to Big
Cheese himself. Malone turned and saw him, sitting in the left-hand
corner of the room behind a low table. There was another empty chair
facing Manelli, and Malone went over and sat in it.
“A drink?” he said. “Okay. Sure.”
“Bourbon and soda, isn’t it?” Manelli said. He stood up.
“Your research department gets fast answers,” Malone said. “Bourbon
and soda it is.”
“After all,” Manelli said, shrugging slightly, “a person in my
position, he has to make sure he knows what is what, and all the time.
It’s routine, what you call S. O. P. Standard Operating Procedure,
they call it.”
“I’m sure they do,” Malone murmured politely.
“And besides,” Manelli said, “you are a well-known type. I thought I
knew the name when old Fred mentioned it, or I would never talk to
you. You know how it is.”
Malone nodded. “Well,” he said, as Manelli went over to a small
portable bar at the back of the room and got busy, “we’re being frank,
anyway.”
“And why shouldn’t we be frank, Mr. Malone?” Manelli said. “It’s a
nice, friendly conversation, and what have we got on our minds?”
For the first time, as he turned, Malone got a glimpse of something
behind the structured and muscular face. There was panic there, just a
tiny seed under iron control, but it showed in the eyes and in the
muscles of the cheek.
“Just a nice, friendly conversation,” Malone said. Manelli brought the
drinks over and set them on the table.
“Take your pick,” he said. “That’s not what a good host should do, ask
the guest to pick one, like a game; but I got into the habit. People
get nervous about arsenic in the drinks. Which is silly.”
“Sure it is,” Malone agreed. He picked up the left-hand glass and
regarded it carefully. “If you wanted to kill me, you’d need a motive
and an opportunity, and you don’t have either at the moment. Besides,
you’d make sure to be far away when it happened.” He hoped he sounded
confident. He took a sip of the drink, but it tasted like bourbon and
soda.
“Mr. Malone,” Manelli said, “you say these things about me, and it
hurts. It hurts me, right here.” He pressed a hand over the checkbook
side of his jacket. “I’m a legitimate businessman, and no different
from any other legitimate businessman. You can’t prove anything else.”
“I know I can’t,” Malone said. “But I want to talk to you about your
real business.”
“This is my real business,” Manelli said. “The advertising agency. I
work here. Advertising is in my blood. And I don’t understand the
least little bit why you have to do things to me all the time.”
“Do things?” Malone said. “What did I do?”
“Now, Mr. Malone,” Manelli said. He took a swallow of his drink. “You
said let’s be frank, so I’m frank. Why not you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Malone said, telling part of
the truth.
Manelli took another swallow of his drink, fished in a jacket pocket
and brought out two cigars. “Smoke, Mr. Malone?” he said. “The very
best, from Havana, Cuba. Cost me a dollar and a half each.”
Malone looked with longing at the cigar. But it was okay for Manelli
to smoke cigars, he thought bitterly. Manelli was a gangster, and who
cared how he looked? Malone was an FBI man, and FBI men didn’t smoke
cigars. Particularly Havana cigars. That, he told himself with
regretful firmness, was that.
“No, thanks,” he said. “I never smoke on duty.”
Manelli shrugged and put one cigar away. He lit the other one and
dense clouds of smoke began to rise in the room. Malone breathed
deeply.
“I understand you’ve been having troubles,” he said.
Manelli nodded. “Now, you see, Mr. Malone?” he said. “You tell me you
don’t know what’s happening, but you know I got troubles. How come,
Mr. Malone? How come?”
“Because you have got troubles,” Malone said. “But I have nothing to
do with them.” He hesitated, thought of adding: “Yet,” and decided
against it.
“Now, Mr. Malone,” Manelli said. “You know better than that.”
“I do?” Malone said.
Manelli sighed, took another swallow of his drink and dragged deeply
on the cigar. “Let’s take a for-instance,” he said. “Now, you
understand my business is advertising, Mr. Malone?”
“It’s in your blood,” Malone said, involuntarily.
“Right,” Manelli said. “But I think about things. I like to figure
things out. In a sort of a theoretical way, like a for-instance.
Understand?”
“What sort of theoretical story are you going to tell me?” Malone
said.
Manelli leaned back in his chair. “Let’s take, for instance, some
numbers runners who had some trouble the other day, got beat up and
money taken from them. Maybe you read about it in the papers.”
“I haven’t been following the papers much,” Malone said.
“That’s all right,” Manelli said grandly. “Maybe it wasn’t _in_ the
papers. But anyhow, I figured out maybe that happened. I had nothing
to do with this, Mr. Malone; you understand that? But I figured out
how maybe it happened.”
“How?” Malone said.
Manelli took another puff on his cigar. “Maybe there was an error at a
racetrack—we could say Jamaica, for instance, just for laughs. And
maybe two different totals were published for the pari-mutuel numbers,
and both got given out. So the numbers runners got all fouled up, so
they got beat up and money taken from them.”
“It could have happened that way,” Malone said.
“I figure maybe the FBI had something to do with this,” Manelli said.
“We didn’t,” Malone said. “Frankly.”
“And that’s not all,” Manelli said. “Let’s say at Jamaica one day
there was a race.”
“All right,” Malone said agreeably. “That doesn’t require a whole lot
of imagination.”
“And let’s say,” Manelli went on, “that the bookies—if there are any
bookies in this town; who knows?—that they got the word about who
came in, win, place and show.”
“Sounds natural,” Malone said.
“Sure it does,” Manelli said. “But there was a foul-up someplace,
because the win animal was disqualified and nobody heard about it
until after a lot of payoffs were made. That costs money.” He stopped.
“I mean it would cost money, if it happened,” he finished.
“Sure,” Malone said. “Certainly would.”
“And you tell me it’s not the FBI?” Manelli said.
“That’s right,” Malone said. “As a matter of fact, we’re investigating
things like these confusions and inefficiencies all over.”
Manelli finished his drink in one long, amazed swallow. “Now, wait a
minute,” he said. “Let’s say for a joke, like, for laughs, that I am
some kind of a wheel in these things, in bookies and numbers boys and
like that.”
“Let’s call it a syndicate,” Malone said. “Just for laughs.”
“Okay, then,” Manelli said, with a suspicious gaze at Malone.
“Whatever you call it, a man like me today, he wouldn’t be some
two-bit chiseler without brains. He would be a businessman, a
smooth-operating smart businessman. Right?”
“Right,” Malone said. “And what I want to know is: how’s business?”
“You’re kidding?” Manelli said.
“I’m not kidding,” Malone said. “I mean it. The FBI’s investigating
mix-ups just like the ones you’re telling me about. We want to stop
them.”
Manelli blinked. “You know, Mr. Malone,” he said softly, “I heard
about government interference in private enterprise, but don’t you
think this is a little too far out?”
Malone shrugged. “That’s what I’m here for,” he said. “Take it or
leave it.”
“Just so it’s understood,” Manelli said, “that we’re talking about
imaginary things. Theoretical.”
“Sure,” Malone said. “Imagine away.”
“Well,” Manelli said slowly, “you heard about this wrecked night-club
in Florida? It happened maybe a month ago, in Miami?”
“I heard about it,” Malone said.
“This is just a for-instance, you know,” Manelli said. “But suppose
there was a roulette wheel in that club. Just a wheel.”
“Okay,” Malone said.
“And suppose the wheel was rigged a little bit,” Manelli said. “Not
seriously, just a little bit.”
“Fine,” Malone said. “This is going to explain a wrecked club?”
“Well, sure,” Manelli said. “Because something went wrong with the
machinery, or maybe the operator goofed up. And number seven came up
eight times in a row.”
“Good old lucky seven,” Malone said.
“So there was a riot,” Manelli said. “Because some people had money on
the number, and some people got suspicious, and like that. And there
was a riot.”
“And the club got wrecked,” Malone said. “That’s what I call bad
luck.”
“Luck?” Manelli said. “What does luck have to do with roulette?
Somebody goofed, that’s all.”
“Oh,” Malone said. “Sure.”
“And that’s the way it’s been going,” Manelli said. He puffed on his
cigar, put it in a nearby ashtray, and blew out a great Vesuvian spout
of smoke.
“Too bad,” Malone said sympathetically.
“It’s all over,” Manelli said. “Mistakes and people making the
mistakes, goofing up here and there and everyplace. There have been
guys killed because they made mistakes, and nobody can afford guys
being killed all the time.”
“It does run into expense,” Malone said.
“And time, and hiring guys to do the killing, and then they goof up,
too,” Manelli said. “It’s terrible. Some guys have even been killed
without they made any mistakes at all. Just by accident, sort of.”
“Well,” Malone said carefully, “you can depend on the government to do
everything in its power to straighten things out.”
Manelli frowned. “You mean that, Mr. Malone?”
“Of course I do,” Malone said honestly. He hadn’t, he reminded
himself, promised to help Manelli. He had only promised to straighten
things out. And he could figure out what that might mean later, when
he had the time.
“All I say is, it’s funny,” Manelli said. “It’s crazy.”
“That’s the way it is,” Malone said.
Manelli looked at him narrowly. “Mr. Malone,” he said at last, “maybe
you mean it at that. Maybe you do.”
“Sure I do,” Malone said. “After all, the government is supposed to
help its citizens.”
Manelli shook his head. “Mr. Malone,” he said, “you can call me
Cesare. Everybody does.”
“No, they don’t,” Malone said. “They call you Cheese. I’ve got a
research staff too.”
“So call me Cheese,” Manelli said. “I don’t mind.”
“There’s only one little trouble,” Malone said. “If I called you
Cheese, you’d call me Ken. And word would get around.”
“I see what you mean,” Manelli said.
“I don’t think either one of us wants his associates to think we’re
friends,” Malone said.
“I guess not,” Manelli said. “It would cause uneasiness.”
“And a certain lack of confidence,” Malone said. “So suppose I go on
calling you Mr. Manelli?”
“Fine,” Manelli said. “And I’ll call you Mr. Malone, like always.”
Malone smiled and stood up. “Well, then,” he said, “goodbye, Mr.
Manelli.”
Manelli rose, too. “Goodbye, Mr. Malone,” he said. “And good luck, if
you really mean what you said.”
“Oh, I do,” Malone said.
“Because things are terrible,” Manelli said. “And they’re getting
worse every day. You should only know.”
“Don’t worry,” Malone said. “Things will be straightened out pretty
soon.” He hoped, as he went out the door and down the corridor, that
he was telling the truth there, at least. He’d sounded fairly
confident, he thought, but he didn’t feel quite so confident. The
secretary was busy on the switchboard when he came out into the
anteroom, and he went by without a greeting, his mind busy, churning
and confused.
He felt as if his head were on just a little crooked. Or as if, maybe,
he had a small hole in it somewhere and facts were leaking out onto
the sidewalk.
If he only looked at the problem in the right way, he told himself, he
would see just what was going on.
But what was the right way?
“That,” Malone murmured as he hailed a cab for the ride back to 69th
Street, “is the big, sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. And how much
time do I have for an answer?”
11
“Boyd?” the agent-in-charge said. “He went out to talk to Mike Sand
down at the ITU a while ago, and he hasn’t come back yet.”
“Fine,” Malone said. “I’ll be in my office if he wants me.”
The agent-in-charge picked up a small package. “A messenger brought
this,” he said. “It’s from the Psychical Research Society, and if it’s
ghosts, they’re much smaller than last time.”
“Dehydrated,” Malone said. “Just add ectoplasm and out they come,
shouting _boo_ at everybody and dancing all over the world.”
“Sounds wonderful,” the agent-in-charge said. “Can I come to the
party?”
“First,” Malone said judiciously, “you’d have to be dead. Of course, I
can arrange that—”
“Thanks,” the agent-in-charge said, leaving in a hurry. Malone went on
down to his office and opened the package. It contained more
facsimiles from Sir Lewis Carter, all dealing with telepathic
projection. He spent a few minutes looking them over and trying to
make some connected sense out of them, and then he just sat and
thought for awhile.
Finally he picked up the phone. In a few minutes he was talking to Dr.
Thomas O’Connor, at Yucca Flats.
“Telepathic projection?” O’Connor said when Malone asked him the
question he’d thought of. “Well, now. I should say that—no. First,
Mr. Malone, tell me what evidence you have for this phenomenon.”
Malone felt almost happy, as if he had done all his homework before
the instructor called on him. “According to what I’ve been able to get
from the PRS,” he said, “ordinary people—people who aren’t
telepaths—occasionally receive some sort of messages from other
people.”
“I assume,” O’Connor said frostily, “that you are speaking of
telepathic messages?”
Malone nodded guiltily. “I didn’t mean the phone,” he said, “or
letters or things like that. Telepathic messages, or something very
like it.”
“Indeed,” O’Connor said. “Mr. Malone, I believe you will find that
such occurrences, when accurately reported, are confined to close
relatives or loved ones of the person projecting the message.”
Malone thought back. “That’s right,” he said.
“And, further,” O’Connor went on, “I think you’ll find that the—ah—
message so received is one indicating that the projector of such a
message is in dire peril. He has, for instance, been badly injured, or
is rapidly approaching death, or else he has narrowly escaped death.”
“True,” Malone said.
“Under such circumstances,” O’Connor said coldly, “it is possible that
the mind of the person projecting the communication might be capable
of generating immense psionic power, thereby forcing even a
non-telepath to recognize the content of the message.”
“Good,” Malone said. “That’s wonderful, Doctor, and I—”
“But,” O’Connor said sharply, “the amount of psionic energy necessary
for such a feat is tremendous. Usually, it is the final burst of
energy, the outpouring of all the remaining psionic force immediately
before death. And if death does not occur, the person is at the least
greatly weakened; his mind, if it ever does recover, needs time and
rest to do so.”
Malone let that sink in slowly. “Then a person couldn’t do it very
often,” he said.
“Hardly,” O’Connor said.
Malone nodded. “It’s like—like giving blood to a blood bank. Giving,
say, three quarts of blood. It might not kill you. But if it didn’t,
you’d be weak for a long time.”
“Exactly,” O’Connor said. “A good analogy, Mr. Malone.”
Malone hated himself for it, but he felt pleased when O’Connor praised
him. “Well,” he said, “that winds up Cartier Taylor’s theory pretty
thoroughly.”
“I should think so,” O’Connor said. “I am surprised, Mr. Malone, that
you would put any credence whatever in that man’s theories. His
factual data, I will admit, is fairly reliable. But his theories are—
well, they are hardly worth the time it takes to read them.”
“I see,” Malone said. “It did seem like a good answer, though.”
“It undoubtedly is a good one,” O’Connor said. “It is clever and has
the advantage of being simple. It is contradicted, Mr. Malone, only by
the facts.”
“Sure,” Malone said sadly. “But—hey. Wait a minute.”
“Yes?” O’Connor said.
“One person couldn’t do this alone, at least, not very often and not
without serious harm to himself. Right?”
“That is what I said,” O’Connor agreed. “Yes, Mr. Malone.”
“But how about several people?” Malone said. “I mean, well, let’s look
at that blood bank again. You need three quarts of blood. But one
person doesn’t have to give it. Suppose twelve people gave half a pint
each. Suppose twenty-four people gave a quarter of a pint each.
Suppose—”
“There is,” O’Connor said, “a point of diminishing returns. But I do
see your point, Mr. Malone.” He thought for a second. “It might just
be possible,” he said. “At least theoretically. But it would take a
great deal of mental co-ordination among the participants. They would
have to be telepathic themselves, for one thing.”
“Why?” Malone said, feeling stupid.
“Because they would have to mesh their thoughts closely enough to
direct them properly and at the correct time.” O’Connor nodded. “But,
given that, I imagine that it could be done.”
“Wonderful,” Malone said.
“However,” O’Connor said, apparently glad to throw even a little cold
water on the notion, “it could not be done for very long periods of
time, you realize.”
“Sure,” Malone said happily.
“By the way, Mr. Malone,” O’Connor said. “Does this have anything to
do with the hypothesis you presented to me some time ago? Mass
hypnotism, as I recall—”
“No,” Malone said. “I’ve given that idea up for good. I think this is
being done on an individual basis—working on one person at a time.”
Then another idea hit him. “You say these people would have to be
telepaths?”
“That’s right,” O’Connor said.
“Then wouldn’t Her Majesty know about them? If they’re telepaths? Or
is there some kind of a mind shield or something that a telepath could
work out?”
“Mind shield?” O’Connor said. “Ah, yes. Miss Thompson might be fooled
by such a shield. It would have to be an exceptional one, but such
things do seem to be possible. They belong to the realm of mental
disciplines, of course, rather than psionics.”
“Sure,” Malone said. “But there could be that kind of shield?”
“There could,” O’Connor said. “The mind which created the shield for
itself would have to be of tremendous power and a really high order of
control. A strong, sane mind might conceivably create such a block
that even Miss Thompson, let us say, might believe that she was
picking up a real mind, when she was only picking up surface thoughts,
with the real thought hidden behind the telepathic block.”
“Fine,” Malone said. “Thanks. Thanks a lot, Dr. O’Connor.”
“I am always happy to put my extensive knowledge of science at your
disposal, Mr. Malone,” O’Connor said.
Malone watched the image collapse without really seeing it. Instead,
he was busily talking to himself, or rather to his other self.
“Well, now, Sir Kenneth,” he said. “Let’s pull all the facts together
and see what happens.”
“Indeed, Mr. Malone,” said Sir Kenneth Malone, “it is time that we
did. Proceed, Sirrah. I shall attend.”
* * * * *
“Let’s start from the beginning,” Malone said. “We know there’s
confusion in all parts of the country, in all parts of the world, I
guess. And we know that confusion is being caused by carefully timed
accidents and errors. We also know that these errors appear to be
accompanied by violent bursts of psionic static—violent energy. And
we know, further, that on three specific occasions, these bursts of
energy were immediately followed by a reversal of policy in the mind
of the person on the receiving end.”
“You mean,” Sir Kenneth put in, “that they changed their minds.”
“Correct,” Malone said. “I refer, of course, to the firm of Brubitsch,
Borbitsch and Garbitsch, Spying Done Cheap.”
“Indeed,” Sir Kenneth said. “Then the operators of this force,
whatever it may be, have some interest in allowing these spies to
confess?”
“Maybe,” Malone said. “Let’s leave that for later. To get back to the
beginning of all this: it seems to me to follow that the accidents and
errors which have caused all the confusion through the United States
and Russia are caused by somebody’s mind being changed at exactly the
right moment. A man does something just a little differently than he
decided to—or else he forgets to do it at all.”
“Correct,” Sir Kenneth said. “And you feel, Mr. Malone, that a
telepathic command is the cause of this confusion?”
“A series of them,” Malone said. “But we also know, from Dr. O’Connor,
that it takes a great deal of psychic energy to perform this
particular trick—more than a person can normally afford to expend.”
“Marry, now,” Sir Kenneth exclaimed, “such a statement does not seem
to have reason in it. Changing the mind of a man seems a small thing
in comparison to teleportation, or psychokinesis, or levitation. And
yet it takes more power than any of these?”
Malone thought for a second. “Sure it does,” he said. “I’d say it was
a matter of resistance. Moving an inanimate object is pretty simple—
comparatively, anyhow—because inert matter has no mental resistance.”
“And moving yourself?” Sir Kenneth said.
“There is some resistance there, probably,” Malone said. “But you’ll
remember that part of the Fueyo training system for teleportation
involved overcoming your own mental resistance to the idea.”
“True,” Sir Kenneth said. “Quite true. Then let us say that it
requires enormous power to effect these changes. What is our next
step, Mr. Malone?”
“Next, Sir Kenneth,” Malone said, “We have to do a little supposing.
This project must be handled by a fairly large group, since no
individual can work it. This large group has to be telepathic, and not
only for the precise timing O’Connor specified.”
“There is another reason?” Sir Kenneth said.
“There is,” Malone said. “They’ve also got to know exactly when to
make their victim change his mind. Right?”
“Absolutely,” said Sir Kenneth. “Now, Sirrah, where does all this
leave us? We have had the orderly presentation of the case; where,
Sirrah, is your summation?”
“Coming up,” Malone said. “We’ve got to look for a widespread
organization of telepaths, with enough mental discipline to hold a
mental shield that Her Majesty can’t crack, and can’t even recognize
the existence of. We thought she’d found all the telepaths. She said
so, and she obviously thought so. But she didn’t. These are strong,
trained—and sane.”
“Aha,” said Sir Kenneth.
“Her Majesty,” Malone said, “found us only the crazy telepaths, the
weak ones, the nuts.”
“Fine,” said Sir Kenneth. “And this, Mr. Malone, leaves us with only
one question. Her Majesty—may God bless her—stated that she first
spotted these flashes of telepathic static by listening in on our
minds.”
“Our mind,” Malone said. “I hope.”
“Very well,” Sir Kenneth said. “This means that some force is being
directed in this way, toward us. And how do we know that all the
deduction, all the careful case-building we have done, hasn’t been
influenced by this group? That might mean, of course, that we are
miles, or even light-years, from the solution.”
Malone said: “Yeep.” The sound was echoed by Sir Kenneth, and the two
halves of the coruscating mind of Kenneth J. Malone were once more
one.
_Your Majesty_, the minds thought, _I’d like to talk to you._
Nothing happened. Evidently, Her Majesty was temporarily out of mental
contact with him.
“Hell,” Malone said. “Not to mention od’s blood.” He flipped on the
visiphone and dialed Yucca Flats.
The figure that appeared on the screen was that of a tall,
solidly-built man with a red face and the uniform of a Beefeater. This
Tower Warder had the British royal crest embroidered on his chest, and
the letters: “E. R.”
“Good evening, Sir Kenneth,” he said politely.
Malone had sometimes wondered what it would be like to be on the
Queen’s permanent, personal staff. Evidently, it soaked in so
thoroughly that one began to stay in character all the time. The
little old lady’s delusion was such a pleasant one that it was
painlessly infectious.
“I’d like to speak to Her Majesty, Colonel Fairfax,” Malone said.
“Her Majesty,” Colonel Fairfax said with regret, “is asleep, sir. I
understand that she has had rather a trying time, of late.”
“Then I must ask you to wake her,” Malone said. “I don’t want to
disturb her any more than you do, Colonel, but this is important.”
“Her Majesty’s rest,” Colonel Fairfax said gently, “is also important,
Sir Kenneth.”
“This is more important,” Malone said. “I know how you feel, but it’s
necessary to wake her.”
The screen blanked out.
Malone sighed and began to sing softly to himself while he waited:
“The soldiers of the Queen are linked in friendly tether—
And if she’s off her bean, we’ll all go nuts together....”
Her Majesty appeared at this point, dressed in a silken robe bearing
her crest and initials (E. R., rather than R. T., of course), and
wearing a silken Mother Hubbard cap on her head. “Oh, dear,” she said
instantly. “Are you still worried about them?”
“The flashes?” Malone said. “That’s right. You tuned in on my mind
right away, didn’t you?”
“As soon as I got your message,” she said. “I like your little song,
at least, I think I do.”
Malone blushed faintly. “Sorry,” he said.
“Oh, don’t be, Sir Kenneth,” Her Majesty said. “After all, I do allow
my subjects a good deal of liberty; it is theirs to make use of.” She
smiled at him. “Actually, I should have told you, Sir Kenneth. But it
seemed so natural that I—that I forgot it.”
_Oh, no_, Malone thought.
“I’m afraid so,” Her Majesty said. “When I told you about the
interference, your mind quite automatically began to build what I
think of as a—as a defense against it. A shield, so to speak.”
_Me?_ Malone thought.
“Most certainly,” Her Majesty said. “You know, Sir Kenneth, you have a
very strong mind.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Malone said aloud. “Sometimes I don’t feel so
bright.”
“I’m not talking about intelligence,” Her Majesty said. “The two
properties are interconnected, of course, but they are not identical.
After all ... well, never mind. But you have strength of will, Sir
Kenneth, and strength of purpose. As a matter of fact, you have been
building your strength in the last few days.”
“Really?” Malone said, surprised.
“It’s become more and more difficult,” Her Majesty said, “to see into
the depths of your mind, during the past few days. The surface of your
mind is as easy to read as ever, but it’s hard to see what’s going on
in the depths.”
“I’m not doing it deliberately,” Malone said.
“In any case,” Her Majesty said, “this process has been going on ever
since you knew that telepathy was possible, two years ago. But in the
past forty-eight hours matters have accelerated tremendously.”
“That sounds good,” Malone said. “Does it mean these mind-changers
I’ve been thinking about can’t get through to me?”
“What mind-changers?” the Queen said. “Oh. I see.” She paused. “Well,
I can’t be positive about this, Sir Kenneth; it’s all so new, you
know. All I can tell you is that there haven’t been any flashes of
telepathic energy in your mind in the last forty-eight hours.”
“Well,” Malone said doubtfully, “that’s something. And I am sorry I
had to wake you, Your Majesty.”
“Oh, that’s perfectly all right,” she said. “I know you’re working
hard to restore order to the realm, and it is the duty of any
Sovereign to give such aid as she can to her Royal subjects.”
Malone cleared his throat. “I trust,” he said, “Your Majesty will ever
find me a faithful servant.”
Her Majesty smiled. “I’m sure I shall,” she said. “Good night, Sir
Kenneth.”
“Good night,” he said, and flipped off. At once, the phone chimed
again.
He flipped the switch on. “Malone here,” he said.
Boyd’s face appeared on the screen. “Ken,” he said fervently, “I am
very glad you’re still in town.”
“Thanks,” Malone said politely. “But what about Mike Sand? Any
information?”
“Plenty,” Boyd said. “I damn near didn’t believe it.”
“What do you mean, you didn’t believe it?” Malone said. “Isn’t the
information any good?”
“It’s good, all right,” Boyd said. “It’s great. He practically talked
his head off to me. Gave me all his books, including secret sets. And
I’ve put him under arrest as a material witness—at his own request.”
“It sounds,” Malone said, “as if Mike Sand has had a sudden and
surprising change of heart.”
“Doesn’t it, though,” Boyd said. “We can crack the ITU wide open now,
and I mean really wide open.”
“Same pattern?” Malone said.
“Of course it is,” Boyd said. “What does it sound like? Same pattern.”
“Good,” Malone said. “Get on up here. I’ll talk to you later.”
He cut off in a hurry, leaned back in his chair and started to think.
At first, he thought of a cigar. Boyd, he figured, couldn’t be back in
the office for some time, and nobody else would come in. He locked the
door, drew out the cigar-laden box he kept in his desk in New York,
and lit up with great satisfaction.
When the cloud of smoke around his head was dense enough to cut with a
knife, he went back to more serious subjects. He didn’t have to worry
too much about his mind being spied on; if Her Majesty couldn’t read
his deepest thoughts, and the mind-changers weren’t throwing any bolts
of static in his direction, he was safe.
Now, then, he told himself—and sneezed.
He shook his head, cursed slightly, and went on.
Now, then....
There was an organization, spread all over the Western world, and with
secret branches, evidently, in the Soviet Union. The organization had
to be an old one, because it had to have trained telepaths of such a
high degree of efficiency that they could evade Her Majesty’s probing
without her even being aware of the evasion. And training took time.
There was something else to consider, too. In order to organize to
such a degree that they could wreak the efficient, complete havoc they
were wreaking, the organization couldn’t be completely secret; there
are always leaks, always suspicious events, and a secret society that
covered all of those up would have no time for anything else.
So the organization had to be a known one, a known group, masquerading
as something else.
So far, everything made sense. Malone took another deep, grateful puff
on the cigar, and frowned. Where, he wondered, did he go from here?
He reached for a pencil and a piece of paper. He headed the paper:
_Organization._ Then he started putting down what he knew about it,
and what he’d figured out.
1. Large
2. Old
3. Disguised
It sounded just a little like Frankenstein’s Monster, so far. But what
else did he know about it?
After a second’s thought, he murmured: “Nothing,” and took another
puff.
But that wasn’t quite true.
He knew one more thing about the organization. He knew they’d probably
be immune to the confusion everybody else was suffering from. The
organization would be—had to be—efficient. It would be composed of
intelligent, superbly cooperative people, who could work together as a
unit without in the least impairing their own individuality.
He reached for the list again, put down: