evidently been room after room of it, stacked to the ceiling. Literally
billions of dollars. They’d moved out hurriedly, but they left kicking
around enough loose hundreds, fifties, twenties, tens and fives to give us
an idea. Look, Woolford, I thought you’d been pulled off this case and
that Walt Foster was handling it.”
Larry said sourly, “I’m beginning to think so, too. They’re evidently not
even bothering to let me know about developments like this. See you later,
Steve.”
The other’s face faded off.
Larry Woolford looked across the double desk at Irene Day. “Look,” he
said, “when you’re offered a promotion, take it. If you don’t, someone
else will and you’ll be out in the cold.”
Irene Day said brightly, “I’ve always know that, sir.”
He looked at her. The typical eager beaver. Sharp as a whip. Bright as a
button. “I’ll bet you have,” he muttered.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Woolford?”
The phone lit as LaVerne said, “The Boss wants to talk to you, Larry.” Her
face faded and Larry’s superior was scowling at him.
He snapped, “Did you get anything on this medical records thing,
Woolford?”
“Medical records?” Larry said blankly.
The Boss grunted in deprecation. “No, I suppose you haven’t. I wish you
would snap into it, Woolford. I don’t know what has happened to you of
late. I used to think that you were a good field man.” He flicked off
abruptly.
Larry dialed LaVerne Polk. “What in the world was the Boss just talking
about, LaVerne? About medical records?”
LaVerne said, frowning, “Didn’t you know? The Movement’s been at it again.
They’ve fouled up the records of the State Medical Licensing bureaus, at
the same time sabotaging the remaining records of most, if not all, of the
country’s medical schools. They struck simultaneously, throughout the
country.”
He looked at her, expressionlessly.
LaVerne said, “We’ve caught several hundred of those responsible. It’s the
same thing. Attack of the social-label. From now on, if a man tells you
he’s an Ear, Eye and Throat specialist, you’d better do some investigation
before letting him amputate your tongue. You’d better use your judgment
before letting _any_ doctor you don’t really know about, work on you. It’s
a madhouse, Larry.”
-------------------------------------
Larry Woolford, for long moments after LaVerne had broken the connection,
stared unseeingly at his secretary across from him until she stirred.
He brought his eyes back to the present. “Another preliminary move, not
the important thing, yet. Not the big explosion they’re figuring on. Where
have they taken that money, and why?”
Irene Day blinked at him. “I don’t know, I’m sure, sir.”
Larry said, “Get me Mr. Foster on the phone, Irene.”
When Walt Foster’s unhappy face faded in, Larry said, “Walt did you get
Frol Eivazov?”
“Eivazov?” the other said impatiently. “No. We haven’t spent much effort
on it. I think this hunch of yours is like the other ones you’ve been
having lately, Woolford. Frol Eivazov was last reported by our operatives
as being in North Korea.”
“It wasn’t a hunch,” Larry said tightly. “He’s in this country on an
assignment dealing with the Movement.”
“Well, that’s your opinion,” Foster said snappishly. “I’m busy, Woolford.
See here, at present you’re under my orders on this job. In the way of
something to do, instead of sitting around in that office, why don’t you
follow up this Eivazov thing yourself?” He considered it a moment. “That’s
an order, Woolford. Even if you don’t locate him, it’ll keep you out of
our hair.”
After the other was gone, Larry Woolford leaned back in his chair, his
face flushed as though the other had slapped it. In a way, he had.
Larry said slowly, “Miss Day, dial me Hans Distelmayer. His offices are
over in the Belmont Building.”
As always, the screen remained blank as the German spy master spoke.
Larry said, “Hans, I want to talk to Frol Eivazov.”
“Ah?”
“I want to know where I can find him.”
The German’s voice was humorously gruff. “My friend, my friend.”
Larry said impatiently, “I’m not interested in arresting him at this time.
I want to talk to him.”
The other said heavily. “This goes beyond favors, my friend. On the face
of it, I am not in business for my health. And what you ask is dangerous
from my viewpoint. You realize that upon occasion my organization does
small tasks for the Soviets....”
“Ha!” Larry said bitterly.
“... And,” the German continued, unruffled, “it is hardly to my interest
to gain the reputation of betraying my sometimes employers. Were you on an
assignment in, say, Bulgaria or Hungary, would you expect me to betray you
to the _Chrezvychainaya Komissiya_?”
“Not unless somebody paid you enough to make it worth while,” Larry said
dryly.
“Exactly,” the espionage chief said.
“Look,” Larry said. “Send your bill to this department, Hans. I’ve been
given carte blanche on this matter and I want to talk to Frol. Now, where
is he?”
The German chuckled heavily. “At the Soviet Embassy.”
“What! You mean they’ve got the gall to house their top spy right in—”
Distelmayer interrupted him. “Friend Eivazov is currently accredited as a
military attaché and quite correctly. He holds the rank of colonel, you
know. He entered this country quite legally, the only precaution taken was
to use his second name, Kliment, instead of Frol, on his papers.
Evidently, your people passed him by without a second look. Ah, I
understand he went to the trouble of making some minor changes in his
facial appearance.”
“We’ll expect your bill, Distelmayer,” Larry said. “Good-by.”
He got up and reached for his hat, saying to Irene Day, “I don’t know how
long I’ll be gone.” He added, wryly, “If either Foster or the Boss try to
get in touch with me, tell them I’m carrying out orders.”
He drove over to the Soviet Embassy, parked his car directly before the
building.
-------------------------------------
The American plainclothesmen stationed near the entrance, gave him only a
quick onceover as he passed. Inside the gates, the impassive Russian
guards didn’t bother to flicker an eyelid.
At the reception desk in the immense entrada, he identified himself. “I’d
like to see Colonel Frol Eivazov.”
“I am afraid—” the clerk began stiffly.
“I suppose you have him on the records as Kliment Eivazov.”
The clerk had evidently touched a concealed button. A door opened and a
junior embassy official approached them.
Larry restated his desire. The other began to open his mouth in denial,
then shrugged. “Just a moment,” he said.
He was gone a full twenty minutes. When he returned, he said briefly,
“This way, please.”
Frol Eivazov was in an inner office, in full uniform. He came to his feet
when Larry Woolford entered and said to the clerk, “That will be all,
Vova.” He was a tall man, as Slavs go, but heavy of build and heavy of
face.
He shook hands with Larry. “It’s been a long time,” he said in perfect
English. “That conference in Warsaw, wasn’t it? Have a chair, Mr.
Woolford.”
Larry took the offered chair and said, “How in the world did you expect to
get by with this nonsense? We’ll have you declared _persona non grata_ in
a matter of hours.”
“It’s not important,” Eivazov shrugged. “I have found what I came to find.
I was about to return to report any way.”
“We won’t do anything to hinder you, colonel,” Larry said dryly.
Eivazov snapped his fingers. “It’s all amusing,” he said. “In our country
we would quickly deal with this Movement nonsense. You Americans with your
pseudo-democracy, your labels without reality, your—”
Larry said wearily, “Please, Frol, I promise not to convert you if you
promise not to convert me. Needless to say, my department isn’t happy
about your presence in this country. You’ll be watched from now on. We’ve
been busy with other matters....”
Here the Russian laughed.
“... Or we’d already have flushed you.” He allowed his voice to go
curious. “We’ve wondered about your interest in this phase of our internal
affairs.”
The Russian agent let his facade slip over farther, his heavy lips
sneering. “We are interested in all phases of your antiquated
socio-economic system, Mr. Woolford. In the present peaceful economic
competition between East and West, we would simply _loathe_ to see
anything happen to your present culture.” He hesitated deliberately. “If
you can call it a culture.”
Larry said, unprovoked, “If I understand you correctly, you are not in
favor of the changes the Movement advocates.”
The Russian shrugged hugely. “I doubt if they are possible of achievement.
The organization is a sloppy one. Revolutionary? Nonsense,” he scoffed.
“They have no plans to change the government. No plans for overthrowing
the regime. Ultimately, what this country needs is true Communism. This
so-called Movement doesn’t have that as its eventual goal. It is
laughable.”
Larry said, interestedly, “Then perhaps you’ll tell me what little you’ve
found out about the group.”
“Why not?” The Russian pursed his lips. “They are composed of impractical
idealists. Scientists, intellectuals, a few admitted scholars and even a
few potential leaders. Their sabotage of your Department of Records was an
amusing farce, but, frankly, I have been unable to discover the purpose of
their interest in rockets. For a time I contemplated the possibility that
they had a scheme to develop a nuclear bomb, and to explode it over
Greater Washington in the belief that in the resulting confusion they
might seize power. But, on the face of it their membership is incapable of
such an effort.”
“Their interest in rockets?” Larry said softly.
“Yes, as you’ve undoubtedly discovered, half the rocket technicians of
your country seem to have joined with them. We got the tip through”—the
Russian cleared his throat—“several of our converts who happen to be
connected with your space efforts groups.”
“Is that so?” Larry said. “I wondered what you thought about their
interest in money.”
It was the other’s turn to look blank. “Money?” he said.
“That’s right. Large quantities of money.”
The Russian said, frowning, “I suppose most citizens in your capitalist
countries are interested largely in money. One of your basic failings.”
-------------------------------------
Driving back to the office, Larry Woolford let it pile up on him.
Ernest Self had been a specialist in solid fuel for rockets. When Larry
had questioned Professor Voss that worthy had particularly stressed his
indignation at how Professor Goddard, the rocket pioneer, had been treated
by his contemporaries. Franklin Nostrand had been employed as a technician
on rocket research at Madison Air Laboratories. It was too darn much for
coincidence.
And now something else that had been nagging away at the back of his mind
suddenly came clear.
Susan Self had said that she and her father had seen the precision dancers
at the New Roxy Theater in New York and later the Professor had said they
were going to spend the money on chorus girls. Susan had got it wrong. The
Rockettes—the precision chorus girls. The Professor had said they were
going to spend the money on _rockets_, and Susan had misunderstood.
But billions of dollars expended on rockets? How? But, above all, to what
end?
If he’d only been able to hold onto Susan, or her father; or to Voss or
Nostrand, for that matter. Someone to work on. But each had slipped
through his fingers.
Which brought something else up from his subconscious. Something which had
been tugging at him.
At the office, Irene Day was packing her things as he entered. Packing as
though she was leaving for good.
“What goes on?” Larry growled. “I’m going to be needing you. Things are
coming to a head.”
She said, a bit snippishly, Larry thought, “Miss Polk, in the Boss’
office, said for you to see her as soon as you came in, Mr. Woolford.”
“Oh?”
He made his way to LaVerne’s office, his attention actually on the ideas
churning in his mind.
She looked up when he entered.
Larry said, “The Boss wanted to see me?”
LaVerne ducked her head, as though embarrassed. “Not exactly, Larry.”
He gestured with his thumb in the direction of his own cubicle office.
“Irene just said you wanted me.”
LaVerne looked up into his face. “The Boss and Mr. Foster, too, are
boiling about your authorizing that Distelmayer man to bill this
department for information he gave you. The Boss hit the roof. Something
about the Senate Appropriations Committee getting down on him if it came
out that we bought information from professional espionage agents.”
Larry said, “It was information we needed, and Foster gave me the go ahead
on locating Frol Eivazov. Maybe I’d better see the Boss.”
LaVerne said, “I don’t think he wants to see you, Larry. They’re up to
their ears in this Movement thing. It’s in the papers _now_ and nobody
knows what to do next. The President is going to make a speech on TriD,
and the Boss has to supply the information. His orders are for you to
resume your vacation. To take a month off and then see him when you get
back.”
Larry sank down into a chair. “I see,” he said, “And at that time he’ll
probably transfer me to janitor service.”
“Larry,” LaVerne said, almost impatiently, “why in the world didn’t you
take that job Walt Foster has now when the Boss offered it to you?”
“Because I’m stupid, I suppose,” Larry said bitterly. “I thought I could
do more working alone than at an administrative post tangled in red tape
and bureaucratic routine.”
She said, “Sorry, Larry.” She sounded as though she meant it.
Larry stood up. “Well, tonight I’m going to hang one on, and tomorrow it’s
back to Florida.” He said in a rush, “Look LaVerne, how about that date
we’ve been talking about for six months or more?”
She looked up at him. “I can’t stand vodka martinis.”
“Neither can I,” he said glumly.
“And I don’t get a kick out of prancing around, a stuffed shirt among
fellow stuffed shirts, at some goings-on that supposedly improves my
culture status.”
Larry said “At the house I have every known brand of drinkable, and a
stack of ... what did you call it? ... corny music. We can mix our own
drinks and dance all by ourselves.”
She tucked her head to one side and looked at him suspiciously. “Are your
intentions honorable?”
“We can even discuss that later,” he said sourly.
She laughed. “It’s a date, Larry.”
-------------------------------------
He picked her up after work, and they drove to his Brandywine
auto-bungalow, largely quiet the whole way.
At one point she touched his hand with hers and said, “It’ll work out,
Larry.”
“Yeah,” he said sourly. “I’ve put ten years into ingratiating myself with
the Boss. Now, overnight, he’s got a new boy. I suppose there’s some moral
involved.”
When they pulled up before his auto-bungalow, LaVerne whistled
appreciatively. “Quite a neighborhood you’re in.”
He grunted. “A good address. What our friend Professor Voss would call one
more status symbol, one more social-label. For it I pay about fifty per
cent more rent than my budget can afford.”
He ushered her inside and took her jacket. “Look,” he said, indicating his
living room with a sweep of hand. “See that volume of Klee reproductions
there next to my reading chair? That proves I’m not a weird. Indicates my
culture status. Actually, my appreciation of modern art doesn’t go any
further than the Impressionists. But don’t tell anybody. See those books
up on my shelves. Same thing. You’ll find everything there that _ought_ to
be on the shelves of any ambitious young career man.”
She looked at him from the side of her eyes. “You’re really soured,
Larry.”
“Come along,” he said. “I want to show you something.”
He took her down the tiny elevator to his den.
“How hypocritical can you get?” he asked her. “This is where I really
live. But I seldom bring anyone here. Wouldn’t want to get a reputation as
a weird. Sit down, LaVerne, I’ll make a drink. How about a Sidecar?”
She sank onto the couch, kicked her shoes off and slipped her feet under
her. “I’d love one,” she said.
His back to her, he brought brandy and cointreau from his liquor cabinet,
lemon and ice from the tiny refrigerator.
“What?” LaVerne said mockingly. “No auto-bar?”
“Upstairs with the rest of the status symbols,” Larry grunted.
He put her drink before her and turned and went to the record player.
“In the way of corny music, how do you like that old-timer, Nat Cole?”
“King Cole? Love him,” LaVerne said.
The strains of “For All We Know” penetrated the room.
Larry sat down across from her, finished half his drink in one swallow.
“I’m beginning to wonder whether or not this Movement doesn’t have
something,” he said.
She didn’t answer that. They sat in silence for a while, appreciating the
drink. Nat Cole was singing “The Very Thought of You” now. Larry got up
and made two more cocktails. This time he sat next to her. He leaned his
head back on the couch and closed his eyes.
Finally he said softly, “When Steve Hackett and I were questioning Susan,
there was only one other person who knew that we’d picked her up. There
was only one person other than Steve and me who could have warned Ernest
Self to make a getaway. Later on, there was only one person who could have
warned Frank Nostrand so that he and the Professor could find a new
hideout.”
She said sleepily, “How long have you known about that, darling?”
“A while,” Larry said, his own voice quiet. “I figured it out when I also
decided how Susan Self was spirited out of the Greater Washington Hilton,
before we had the time to question her further. Somebody who had access to
tapes made of me while I was making phone calls cut out a section and
dubbed in a voice so that Betsy Hughes, the Secret Service matron who was
watching Susan, was fooled into believing it was I ordering the girl to be
turned over to the two Movement members who came to get her.”
LaVerne stirred comfortably and let her head sink onto his shoulder.
“You’re so warm and ... comfortable,” she said.
Larry said softly, “What does the Movement expect to do with all that
counterfeit money, LaVerne?”
She stirred against his shoulder, as though bothered by the need to talk.
“Give it all away,” she said. “Distribute it all over the country and
destroy the nation’s social currency.”
It took him a long moment to assimilate that.
“What have the rockets to do with it?”
She stirred once again, as though wishing he’d be silent. “That’s how it
will be distributed. About twenty rockets, strategically placed, each with
a _warhead_ of a couple of tons of money. Fired to an altitude of a couple
of hundred miles and then the money is spewed out. In falling, it will be
distributed over cities and countryside, everywhere. Billions upon
billions of dollars worth.”
Larry said, so softly as hardly to be heard, “What will that accomplish?”
“Money is the greatest social-label of them all. The Professor believes
that through this step the Movement will have accomplished its purpose.
That people will be forced to utilize their judgment, rather than depend
upon social-labels.”
Larry didn’t follow that, but he had no time to go further now. He said,
still evenly soft, “And when is the Movement going to do this?”
La Verne moved comfortably. “The trucks go out to distribute the money
tonight. The rockets are waiting. The firing will take place in a few
days.”
“And where is the Professor now?”
“Where the money and the trucks are hidden, darling. What difference does
it make?” LaVerne said sleepily.
“And where is that?”
“At the Greater Washington Trucking Corporation. It’s owned by one of the
Movement’s members.”
He said. “There’s a password. What is it?”
“Judgment.”
Larry Woolford bounced to his feet. He looked down at her, then over at
the phone. In three quick steps he was over to it. He grasped its wires
and yanked them from the wall, silencing it. He slipped into the tiny
elevator, locking the door to the den behind him.
As the door slid closed, her voice wailed, still sleepily husky, “Larry,
darling, where are you—”
He ran down the walk of the house, vaulted into the car and snapped on its
key. He slammed down the lift lever, kicked the thrust pedal and was
thrown back against the seat by the acceleration.
Even while he was climbing, he flicked on the radio-phone, called Personal
Service for the location of the Greater Washington Trucking Corporation.
Fifteen minutes later, he parked a block away from his destination, noting
with satisfaction that it was still an hour or more to go until dark. His
intuition, working doubletime now, told him that they’d probably wait
until nightfall to start their money-laden trucks to rolling.
He hesitated momentarily before turning on the phone and dialing the Boss’
home address.
When the other’s face faded in, it failed to display pleasure when the
caller’s identity was established. His superior growled, “Confound it,
Woolford, you know my privacy is to be respected. This phone is to be used
only in extreme emergency.”
“Yes, sir,” Larry said briskly. “It’s the Movement—”
The other’s face darkened still further. “You’re not on that assignment
any longer, Woolford. Walter Foster has taken over and I’m sympathetic to
his complaints that you’ve proven more a hindrance than anything else.”
Larry ignored his words, “Sir, I’ve tracked them down. Professor Voss is
at the Greater Washington Trucking Corporation garages here in the
Alexandria section of town. Any moment now, they’re going to start
distribution of all that counterfeit money on some scatterbrain plan to
disrupt the country’s exchange system.”
Suddenly alert, the department chief snapped, “Where are you, Woolford?”
“Outside the garages, sir. But I’m going in now.”
“You stay where you are,” the other snapped. “I’ll have every department
man and every Secret Service man in town over there within twenty minutes.
You hang on. Those people are lunatics, and probably desperate.”
Inwardly, Larry Woolford grinned. He wasn’t going to lose this opportunity
to finish up the job with him on top. He said flatly, “Sir, we can’t
chance it. They might escape. I’m going in!” He flicked off the set,
dialed again and raised Sam Sokolski.
“Sam,” he said, his voice clipped. “I’ve cornered the Movement’s leader
and am going in for the finish. Maybe some of you journalist boys better
get on over here.” He gave the other the address and flicked off before
there were any questions.
-------------------------------------
From the dash compartment he brought a heavy automatic, and checked the
clip. He put it in his hip pocket and left the car and walked toward the
garages. Time was running out now.
He strode into the only open door, without shift of pace. Two men were
posted nearby, neither of them truckmen by appearance. They looked at him
in surprise.
Larry clipped out, “The password is _Judgment_. I’ve got to see Professor
Voss immediately.”
One of them frowned questioningly, but the other was taken up with the
urgency in Woolford’s voice. He nodded with his head. “He’s over there in
the office.”
Now ignoring them completely, Larry strode past the long rows of sealed
delivery vans toward the office.
He pushed the door open, entered and closed it behind him.
Professor Peter Voss was seated at a paper-littered desk. There was a cot
with an army blanket in a corner of the room, some soiled clothing and two
or three dirty dishes on a tray. The room was being lived in, obviously.
At the agent’s entry, the little man looked up and blinked in distress
through his heavy lenses.
Larry snapped, “You’re under arrest, Voss.”
The professor was obviously dismayed, but he said in as vigorous a voice
as he could muster, “Nonsense! On what charge?”
“Counterfeiting, among many. Your whole scheme has fallen apart, Voss. You
and your Movement, so-called, are finished.”
The professor’s eyes darted, left, right. To Larry Woolford’s surprise,
the Movement’s leader was alone in here. Undoubtedly, he was awaiting
others, drivers of the trucks, technicians involved in the rockets, other
subordinates. But right now he was alone.
If Woolford correctly diagnosed the situation, Voss was playing for time,
waiting for the others. Good enough, so was Larry Woolford. Had the
Professor only known it, a shout would have brought at least two followers
and the government agent would have had his work cut out for him.
Woodford played along. “Just what is this fantastic scheme of yours for
raining down money over half the country, Voss? The very insanity of it
proves your whole outfit is composed of a bunch of nonconformist weirds.”