rocketeers had bought a solid fuel formula from an Italian research outfit
for the star probe project. Paid them a big hunk of Uncle’s change for it.
So Self sued.”
Larry said, “You’re being _too_ brief. What d’ya mean, he sued? Why?”
“Because he claimed he’d submitted the same formula to the same agency a
full eighteen months earlier and they’d turned him down.”
“Had he?”
“Probably.”
Larry didn’t get it. “Then why’d they turn him down?”
Sam said, “Oh, the government boys had a good alibi. Crackpots turn up all
over the place and you have to brush them off. Every cellar scientist who
comes along and says he’s got a new super-fuel developed from old coffee
grounds can’t be given the welcome mat. Something was wrong with his math
or something and they didn’t pay much attention to him. Wouldn’t even let
him demonstrate it. But it was the same formula, all right.”
Larry Woolford was scowling. “Something wrong with his math? What kind of
a degree does he have?”
Sam grinned in memory. “I got a good quote on that. He doesn’t have any
degree. He said he’d learned to read by the time he’d reached high school
and since then he figured spending time in classrooms was a matter of
interfering with his education.”
“No wonder they turned him down. No degree at all. You can’t get anywhere
in science like that.”
Sam said, “The courts rejected his suit but he got a certain amount of
support here and there. Peter Voss, over at the university, claims he’s
one of the great intuitive scientists, whatever that is, of our
generation.”
“Who said that?”
“Professor Voss. Not that it makes any difference what he says. Another
crackpot.”
After Sam’s less than handsome face was gone from the phone, Larry walked
over to the bar with his empty glass and stared at the mixer for several
minutes. He began to make himself another flip, but cut it short in the
middle, put down the ingredients and went back to the phone to dial
_Records_ again.
He went through first the brief and then the full dossier on Professor
Peter Luther Voss. Aside from his academic accomplishments, particularly
in the fields of political economy and international law, and the dozen or
so books accredited to him, there wasn’t anything particularly noteworthy.
A bachelor in his fifties. No criminal record of any kind, of course, and
no military career. No known political affiliations. Evidently a strong
predilection for Thorstein Veblen’s theories. And he’d been a friend of
Henry Mencken back when that old nonconformist was tearing down
contemporary society seemingly largely for the fun involved in the
tearing.
On the face of it, the man was no radical, and the term “crackpot” which
Sam had applied was hardly called for.
Larry Woolford went back to the bar and resumed the job of mixing his own
version of a rum flip.
But his heart wasn’t in it. _The Professor_, Susan had said.
-------------------------------------
Before he’d gone to bed the night before, Larry Woolford had ordered a
seat on the shuttle jet for Jacksonville and a hover-cab there to take him
to Astor, on the St. Johns River. And he’d requested to be wakened in
ample time to get to the shuttleport.
But it wasn’t the saccharine pleasant face of the Personal Service
operator which confronted him when he grumpily answered the phone in the
morning. In fact, the screen remained blank.
Larry decided that sweet long drinks were fine, but that anyone who took
several of them in a row needed to be candied. He grumbled into the phone,
“All right, who is it?”
A Teutonic voice chuckled and said, “You’re going to have to decide
whether or not you’re on vacation, my friend. At this time of day, why
aren’t you at work?”
Larry Woolford was waking up. He said, “What can I do for you,
Distelmayer?” The German merchant-of-espionage wasn’t the type to make
personal calls.
“Have you forgotten so soon, my friend?” the other chuckled. “It was I who
was going to do you a favor.” He hesitated momentarily, before adding, “In
possible return for future—”
“Yeah, yeah,” Larry said. He was fully awake now.
The German said slowly, “You asked if any of your friends from, ah, abroad
were newly in the country. Frol Eivazov has recently appeared on the
scene.”
Eivazov! In various respects, Larry Woolford’s counterpart. Hatchetman for
the _Chrezvychainaya Komissiya_. Woolford had met him on occasion when
they’d both been present at international summit meetings, busily working
at counter-espionage for their respective superiors. Blandly shaking hands
with each other, blandly drinking toasts to peace and international
co-existence, blandly sizing each other up and wondering if it’d ever come
to the point where one would _blandly_ treat the other to a hole in the
head, possibly in some dark alley in Havana or Singapore, Leopoldville or
Saigon.
Larry said sharply, “Where is he? How’d he get in the country?”
“My friend, my friend,” the German grunted good-humoredly. “You know
better than to ask the first question. As for the second, Frol’s command
of American-English is at least as good as your own. Do you think his
_Komissiya_ less capable than your own department and unable to do him up
suitable papers so that he could be, perhaps, a ‘returning tourist’ from
Europe?”
Larry Woolford was impatient with himself for asking. He said now, “It’s
not important. If we want to locate Frol and pick him up, we’ll probably
not have too much trouble doing it.”
“I wouldn’t think so,” the other said humorously. “Since 1919, when they
were first organized, the so-called Communists in this country, from the
lowest to the highest echelons, have been so riddled with police agents
that a federal judge in New England once refused to prosecute a case
against them on the grounds that the party was a United States government
agency.”
Larry was in no frame of mind for the other’s heavy humor. “Look, Hans,”
he said, “what I want to know is what Frol is over here for.”
“Of course you do,” Hans Distelmayer said, unable evidently to keep note
of puzzlement from his voice. “Larry,” he said, “I assume your people know
of the new American underground.”
“_What_ underground?” Larry snapped.
The professional spy chief said, his voice strange, “The Soviets seem to
have picked up an idea somewhere, possibly through their membership in
this country, that something is abrewing in the States. That a change is
being engineered.”
Larry stared at the blank phone screen.
“What kind of a change?” he said finally. “You mean a change to the Soviet
system?” Surely not even the self-deluding Russkies could think it
possible to overthrow the American socio-economic system in favor of the
Soviet brand.
“No, no, no,” the German chuckled. “Of course not. It’s not of their
working at all.”
“Then what’s Frol Eivazov’s interest, if they aren’t engineering it?”
Distelmayer rumbled his characteristic chuckle with humor. “My dear
friend, don’t be naive. Anything that happens in America is of interest to
the Soviets. There is delicate peace between you now that they have
changed their direction and are occupying themselves largely with the
economic and agricultural development of Asia and such portions of the
world as have come under their hegemony, and while you put all efforts
into modernizing the more backward countries among your satellites.”
Larry said automatically, “Our allies aren’t satellites.”
The spy-master went on without contesting the statement. “There is
immediate peace but surely governmental officials on both sides keep
careful watch on the internal developments of the other. True, the current
heads of the Soviet Complex would like to see the governments of all the
Western powers changed—but only if they are changed in the direction of
communism. They are hardly interested in seeing changes made which would
strengthen the West in the, ah, Battle For Men’s Minds.”
Larry snorted his disgust. “What sort of change in government would
strengthen the United States in—”
The German interrupted smoothly, “Evidently, that’s what Frol seems to be
here for, Larry. To find out more about this movement and—”
“This _what_?” Larry blurted.
“The term seems to be _movement_.”
Larry Woolford held a long silence before saying, “And Frol is actually
here in this country to buck this ... this movement.”
“Not necessarily,” the other said impatiently. “He is here to find out
more about it. Evidently Peking and Moscow have heard just enough to make
them nervous.”
Larry said, “You have anything more, Hans?”
“I’m afraid that’s about it.”
“All right,” Larry said. He added absently, “Thanks, Hans.”
“Thank me some day with deeds, not with words,” the German chuckled.
-------------------------------------
Larry Woolford looked at his watch and grimaced. He was either going to
get going now or forget about doing any fishing in Florida this afternoon.
Grudgingly, he dialed the phone company’s Personal Service and said to the
impossibly cheerful blonde who answered, “Where can I find Professor Peter
Voss who teaches over at the University in Baltimore? I don’t want to talk
with him, just want to know where he’ll be an hour from now.”
While waiting for his information, he dressed, deciding inwardly that he
hated his job, the department in which he was employed, the Boss and
Greater Washington. On top of that, he hated himself. He’d already been
taken off this assignment, why couldn’t he leave it lay?
The blonde rang him back. Professor Peter Voss was at home. He had no
classes today. She gave him the address.
Larry Woolford raised his car from his auto-bungalow in the Brandywine
suburb and headed northwest at a high level for the old Baltimore section
of the city.
The Professor’s house, he noted, was of an earlier day and located on the
opposite side of Paterson Park from Elwood avenue, the street on which
Susan Self and her father had resided. That didn’t necessarily hold
significance, the park was a large one and the Professor’s section a
well-to-do neighborhood, while Self’s was just short of a slum these days.
He brought his car down to street level, and parked before the scholar’s
three-story, brick house. Baltimore-like, it was identical to every other
house in the block; Larry wondered vaguely how anybody ever managed to
find his own place when it was very dark out.
There was an old-fashioned bell at the side of the entrance and Larry
Woolford pushed it. There was no identification screen in the door,
evidently the inhabitants had to open up to see who was calling, a tiring
chore if you were on the far side of the house and the caller nothing more
than a salesman.
It was obviously the Professor himself who answered.
He was in shirtsleeves, tieless and with age-old slippers on his
stockingless feet. He evidently hadn’t bothered to shave this morning and
he held a dog-earred pamphlet in his right hand, his forefinger tucked in
it to mark his place. He wore thick-lensed, gold-rimmed glasses through
which he blinked at Larry Woolford questioningly, without speaking.
Professor Peter Voss was a man in his mid fifties, and, on the face of it,
couldn’t care less right now about his physical appearance.
A weird, Larry decided immediately. He wondered at the University, one of
the nation’s best, keeping on such a figure.
“Professor Voss?” he said. “Lawrence Woolford.” He brought forth his
identification.
The Professor blinked down at it. “I see,” he said. “Won’t you come in?”
The house was old, all right. From the outside, quite acceptable, but the
interior boasted few of the latest amenities which made all the difference
in modern existence. Larry was taken back by the fact that the phone which
he spotted in the _entrada_ hadn’t even a screen—an old model for speaking
only.
The Professor noticed his glance and said dryly, “The advantages of
combining television and telephone have never seemed valid to me. In my
own home, I feel free to relax, as you can observe. Had I a screen on my
phone, it would be necessary for me to maintain the same appearance as I
must on the streets or before my classes.”
Larry cleared his throat without saying anything. This was a weird one,
all right.
The living room was comfortable in a blatantly primitive way. Three or
four paintings on the walls which were probably originals, Larry decided,
and should have been in museums. Not an abstract among them. A Grant Wood,
a Marin, and that over there could only be a Grandma Moses. The sort of
things you might keep in your private den, but hardly to be seen as
culture symbols.
The chairs were large, of leather, and comfortable and probably belonged
to the period before the Second War. Peter Voss, evidently, was little
short of an exhibitionist.
The Professor took up a battered humidor. “Cigar?” he said. “Manila. Hard
to get these days.”
A cigar? Good grief, the man would be offering him a chaw of tobacco next.
“Thanks, no,” Larry said. “I smoke a pipe.”
“I see,” the Professor said, lighting his stogie. “Do you really like a
pipe? Personally, I’ve always thought the cigar by far the most
satisfactory method of taking tobacco.”
What can you say to a question like that? Larry ignored it, as though it
was rhetorical. Actually, he smoked cigarettes in the privacy of his den.
A habit which was on the proletarian side and not consistent with his
status level.
He said, to get things under way, “Professor Voss, what is an intuitive
scientist?”
The Professor exhaled blue smoke, shook out the old-time kitchen match
with which he’d lit it, and tossed the matchstick into an ashtray.
“Intuitive scientist?”
“You once called Ernest Self a great intuitive scientist.”
“Oh, Self. Yes, indeed. What is he doing these days?”
Larry said wryly, “That’s what I came to ask you about.”
The Professor was puzzled. “I’m afraid you came to the wrong place, Mr.
Woolford. I haven’t seen Ernest for quite a time. Why?”
“Some of his researches seem to have taken him rather far afield.
Actually, I know practically nothing about him. I wonder if you could fill
me in a bit.”
Peter Voss looked at the ash on the end of his cigar. “I really don’t know
the man that well. He lives across the park. Why don’t—”
“He’s disappeared,” Larry said.
The Professor blinked. “I see,” he said. “And in view of the fact that you
are a security officer, I assume under strange circumstances.” Larry
Woolford said nothing and the Professor sank back into his chair and
pursed his lips. “I can’t really tell you much. I became interested in
Self two or three years ago when gathering materials for a paper on the
inadequate manner in which our country rewards its inventors.”
Larry said, “I’ve heard about his suit against the government.”
The Professor became more animated. “Ha!” he snorted. “One example among
many. Self is not alone. Our culture is such that the genius is smothered.
The great contributors to our society are ignored, or worse.”
Larry Woolford was feeling his way. Now he said mildly, “I was under the
impression that American free enterprise gave the individual the best
opportunity to prove himself and that if he had it on the ball he’d get to
the top.”
“Were you really?” the Professor said snappishly. “And did you know that
Edison died a comparatively poor man with an estate somewhere in the
vicinity of a hundred thousand dollars? An amount that might sound like a
good deal to you or me, but, when you consider his contributions,
shockingly little. Did you know that Eli Whitney realized little, if
anything, from the cotton gin? Or that McCormick didn’t invent the reaper
but gained it in a dubious court victory? Or take Robert Goddard, one of
the best examples of modern times. He developed the basics of rocket
technology—gyroscopic stabilizers, fuel pumps, self-cooling motors,
landing devices. He died in 1945 leaving behind twenty-two volumes of
records that proved priceless. What did he get out of his researches?
Nothing. It was fifteen years later that his widow won her suit against
the government for patent infringements!”
[Illustration.]
Larry held up a hand. “Really,” he said. “My interest is in Ernest Self.”
The Professor relaxed. “Sorry. I’m afraid I get carried away. Self, to get
back to your original question, is a great intuitive scientist.
Unfortunately for him, society being what it is today, he fits into few
grooves. Our educational system was little more than an irritation to him
and consequently he holds no degrees. Needless to say, this interfered
with his gaining employment with the universities and the large
corporations which dominate our country’s research, not to mention
governmental agencies.
“Ernest Self holds none of the status labels that count. The fact that he
is a genius means nothing. He is supposedly qualified no more than to hold
a janitor’s position in laboratories where his inferiors conduct
experiments in fields where he is a dozenfold more capable than they. No
one is interested in his genius, they want to know what status labels are
pinned to him. Ernest has no respect for labels.”
-------------------------------------
Larry Woolford figured he was picking up background and didn’t force a
change of subject. “Just what do you mean by intuitive scientist?”
“It’s a term I have used loosely,” the Professor admitted. “Possibly a
scientist who makes a break-through in his field, destroying formerly held
positions—in Self’s case, without the math, without the accepted theories
to back him. He finds something that works, possibly without knowing why
or how and by using unorthodox analytical techniques. An intuitive
scientist, if I may use the term, is a thorn in the side of our
theoretical physicists laden down with their burden of a status label but
who are themselves short of the makings of a Leonardo, a Newton, a
Galileo, or even a Nicholas Christofilos.”
“I’m afraid that last name escapes me,” Larry said.
“Similar to Self’s case and Robert Goddard’s,” Voss said, his voice
bitter. “Although his story has a better ending. Christofilos invented the
strong-focusing principle that made possible the multi-billion-volt
particle accelerators currently so widely used in nuclear physics
experimentation. However, he was nothing but a Greek elevator electrical
system engineer and the supposed experts turned him down on the grounds
that his math was faulty. It seems that he submitted the idea in
straight-algebra terms instead of differential equations. He finally won
through after patenting the discovery and rubbing their noses in it.
Previously, none of the physics journals would publish his paper—he didn’t
have the right status labels to impress them.”
Larry said, almost with amusement, “You seem to have quite a phobia
against the status label, as you call it. However, I don’t see how as
complicated a world as ours could get along without it.”
The Professor snorted his contempt. “Tell me,” he said, “to which class do
you consider yourself to belong?”
Larry Woolford shrugged. “I suppose individuals in my bracket are usually
thought of as being middle-middle class.”
“And you have no feeling of revolt in having such a label hung on you?
Consider this system for a moment. You have lower-lower, middle-lower, and
upper-lower; then you have lower-middle, middle-middle, upper-middle; then
you have lower-upper, middle-upper, and finally we achieve to upper-upper
class. Now tell me, when we get to that rarified category, who do we find?
Do we find an Einstein, a Schweitzer, a Picasso; outstanding scientists,
humanitarians, the great writers, artists and musicians of our day?
Certainly not. We find ultra-wealthy playboys and girls, a former king and
his duchess who eke out their income by accepting fees to attend parties,
the international born set, bearers of meaningless feudalistic titles.
These are your upper-upper class!”
Larry laughed.
The Professor snapped, “You think it funny? Let me give you another
example of our status label culture. I have a friend whom I have known
since childhood. I would estimate that Charles has an I.Q. of
approximately 90, certainly no more. His family, however, took such
necessary steps as were needed to get Charles through public school. No
great matter these days, you’ll admit, although on occasion he needed a
bit of tutoring. On graduation, they recognized that the really better
schools might be a bit difficult for Charles so he was entered in a
university with a good name but without—shall we say?—the highest of
scholastic ratings. Charles plodded along, had some more tutoring,
probably had his thesis ghosted, and eventually graduated. At that point
an uncle died and left Charles an indefinite amount to be used in
furthering his education to any extent he wished to go. Charles, motivated
probably by the desire to avoid obtaining a job and competing with his
fellow man, managed to wrangle himself into a medical school and
eventually even graduated. Since funds were still available, he continued
his studies abroad, largely in Vienna.”
The Professor wound it up. “Eventually, he ran out of schools, or his
uncle’s estate ran out—I don’t know which came first. At any rate, my
friend Charles, laden down with status labels, is today practicing as a
psychiatrist in this fair city of ours.”
Larry stared at him blankly.
The Professor said snappishly, “So any time you feel you need to have your
brains unscrambled, you can go to his office and expend twenty-five
dollars an hour or so. His reputation is of the highest.” The Professor
grunted his contempt. “He doesn’t know the difference between an aspirin
tablet and a Rorschach test.”
Larry Woolford stirred in his chair. “We seem to have gotten far off the
subject. What has this got to do with Self?”
The Professor seemed angry. “I repeat, I’m afraid I get carried away on
this subject. I’m in revolt against a culture based on the status label.
It eliminates the need to judge a man on his merits. To judge a person by
the clothes he wears, the amount of money he possesses, the car he drives,
the neighborhood in which he lives, the society he keeps, or even his
ancestry, is out of the question in a vital, growing society. You wind up
with nonentities as the leaders of your nation. In these days, we can’t
afford it.”
He smiled suddenly, rather elfishly, at the security agent. “But
admittedly, this deals with Self only as one of many victims of a culture
based on status labels. Just what is it you wanted to know about Ernest?”
“When you knew him, evidently he was working on rocket fuels. Have you any
idea whether he later developed a method of producing perfect
counterfeit?”
The Professor said, “Ernest Self? Surely you are jesting.”
Larry said unhappily, “Then here’s another question. Have you ever heard
him mention belonging to a movement, or, I think, he might word it _The
Movement_.”
“Movement?” the Professor said emptily.
“Evidently a revolutionary group interested in the overthrow of the
government.”
“Good heavens,” the Professor said. “Just a moment, Mr. Woolford. You
interrupted me just as I was having my second cup of coffee. Do you mind
if I—”
“Certainly not,” Woolford shook his head.
“I simply can’t get along until after my third cup,” the Professor said.
“You just wait a moment and I’ll bring the pot in here.”
He left Larry to sit in the combined study and living room while he
shuffled off in his slippers to the kitchen. Larry Woolford decided that
in his school days he’d had some far out professors himself, but it would
really be something to study under this one. Not that the old boy didn’t
have some points, of course. Almost all nonconformists base their
particular peeves on some actuality, but in this case, what was the
percentage? How could you buck the system? Particularly when, largely, it
worked.
-------------------------------------
The Professor returned with an old-fashioned coffeepot, two cups, and
sugar and cream on a tray. He put them on a side table and said to Larry,
“You’ll join me? How do you take it?”
Larry still had the slightest of hang-overs from his solitary drinking of
the night before. “Thanks. Make it black,” he said.