I said resentfully, "I guess I asked for that, Zorchi. Well, perhaps
what I said sounds funny. But, before God, Zorchi, that's the way the
Company is set up. Here--" I picked the Handbook from the end-table
beside me and tossed it to him--"read what Millen Carmody says. I won't
try to convince you. Just read it."
He caught it expertly and dropped it on the floor before him. "So much
for your Chief Assassin," he remarked pleasantly. "The words are no
doubt honied, Weels, but I am not at this moment interested to read
them."
I shrugged. It was peculiar how even a reasonable man--I have always
thought of myself as a reasonable man--could make a fool of himself. It
was no sin that habit had betrayed me into exalting the Company; but it
was, at the least, quite silly of me to take offense when my audience
disagreed with me.
I said, in what must have been a surly tone, "I don't suppose you
are--why should you? You hate the Company from the word go."
He shook his head mildly. "I? No, Weels. Believe me, I am the Company's
most devoted friend. Without it, how would I feed my five-times-a-day
appetite?"
I sneered at him. "If you're a friend to the Company, then my best
buddy is a tapeworm."
"Meaning that Zorchi is a parasite?" His eyes were furious. "Weels,
you impose on me too far! Be careful! Is it the act of a tapeworm that
I bleed and die, over and over? Is it something I chose, did I pray
to the saints, before my mother spawned me, that I should be born a
monster? No, Weels! We are alike, you gentlemen of the Company and
I--we live on blood money, it is true. But the blood I live on, man--it
is my own!"
I said mollifyingly, "Zorchi, I've had a hard day. I didn't mean to be
nasty. I apologize."
"Hah!"
"No, really."
* * * * *
He shrugged, abruptly quiet. "It is of no importance," he said. "If I
wished to bear you a grudge, Weels, I would have more than that to give
me cause." He sighed. "It all looked quite simple twenty-four hours
ago, Weels. True, I had worked my little profession in this area as far
as it might go--with your help, of course. But the world was before
me--I had arranged to fly next week to the Parisian Anarch, to change
my name and, perhaps within a month, with a new policy, suffer a severe
accident that would provide me with francs for my hobbies. Why is it
that you bring bad news always?"