"Is this a survey?"
Lee grinned. "I'm the lobbyist for the Guggenheim Foundation. Asking
that kind of question is a reflex."
The girl walked around the room. She looked out the window and
stretched. Sordman bellowed lust at her flanks and the long curve of
her hips.
"Why do men do anything?" Raven yawned. "When he was in Voc school some
kid took him in the back room and showed him some tricks. Maybe that
did it. Is there a psycher in the house?"
"There is," George said. "Is Citizen Smith an astronautical engineer?"
"You could say so. He works on instruments for space labs."
"That's funny." George stared at the sun flashing on the far-off ocean.
"I remember I felt bitter once because I couldn't be a space engineer.
I wanted to build rockets and ride to the planets. But the Voc people
told me I was too weak in math. So I became a healer of the psyche and
I learned my love for rockets was a hunger for power. But still I love
the brutes and now I'm an old man I still sometimes wish I'd been an
engineer."
"That's too bad," the girl said politely.
"Yes. I suppose your husband feels that way about art?"
"He gets drunk about it sometimes."
"Double motive!" Sordman said.
"One conscious," George said, "plain jealousy. The other
half-conscious--resentment. Nobody kills at random. There's always a
reason why he took these lives instead of others."
"Plus a lot of self-pity," Lee said, "and I think his wife despises
him."
"What are you talking about?" Raven said. "What did you say about me?"
"We think we've got a suspect," Sordman said.
"I didn't do it!"
"I'm going to probe your husband."
"My husband hates Talent."
"We have to hurry," Sordman said. "If your husband's innocent, I'm
sorry. We're not saying he's guilty. But I have to examine him."
At the door he paused and thought, God of Infinite Compassion.... The
girl sat down and stared at the wall.
* * * * *
Many drugs activate the psi powers. The commonest, available in any
drug store, is a pill of codeine and half a dried peyote bean. Leonard
Smith had both in his pocket when he ran out the side door of the beer
hall.
Sordman swore wildly. The girl screamed. The men, the hunters of
witches and killers, either froze or shouted and ran to the door. Only
John Dyer and two others ran shouting down the hall.
Sordman ran to the door and saw Smith leap into the elevator. He
grabbed a wall phone and dialed the Manager's office.
"We've got the killer," he shouted. "His name's Leonard Smith. He's
a young man, dark, wiry, good looking, and he's on the elevator going
down."
"We'll get him!"
"Leave him alone! I saw him swallow something as he left. I think he's
drugged. Clear the lobby but watch him from hiding. I'll get him before
he goes far."
John Dyer trudged back to the beer hall. "Give me your rifle," he told
an armed man. Before the man could say anything Dyer snatched the rifle
from him.
"All right," Dyer said. "Who's going with me?"
"Hold on," Sordman said. "Where are you going?"
"After Smith."
"I'm going after him. Let him go and I'll have him out cold before an
hour's up."
"There isn't anything a rifle can't stop."
Sordman understood. These men were afraid of Talent. But some, like
Dyer, had to fight that fear. They had to prove that intelligence
and the technical power organized society gives individual men were
superior to Talent.
"I can't stop you," Sordman said. "But listen to me. Smith has to be
captured alive. The man is insane. He's no more a villain than you or
me. He just tampered with a force he couldn't control. You might stop
him with a bullet but you'll have to kill him to do it."
"He killed two of us," a man said.
"He's drugged. He can hide and kill you from a distance."
"So can we," Dyer said. "That's what we do with rifles."
Sordman ran his fingers through his hair. "Stay under cover then. And
if I get him pacified, let him live."
* * * * *
The wall phone buzzed.
"Sordman."
"This is the Manager. He stole a hatchet in the leisure store. He's out
in the park."
"Did anybody try to stop him?"
"I cleared the place out."
"Some of your tenants are going after him. Don't let anybody else join
them. I wish myself they wouldn't go."
After he hung up the three of them went up a floor and rang the buzzer
of a one-tenant apartment. As politely as they could, Lee and George
bundled the occupant out.
"I wish you'd let the state police capture him," George said.
"I've got to get to him before they kill him," Sordman said.
"Andy, there are limits to what you can take! Smith has gone berserk.
You connect with an insane man and you may shatter all over the place."
Sordman stroked his beard.
"Let him go," Lee said. "Can't you feel he has to do this?"
"Yes, but I won't admit it. I trained you, Andy. You're my life's
work. I don't want you to wreck yourself."
Sordman nodded soberly. "I know, George. I'll take care of myself." He
thought tender thoughts and tried to make them feel how much he loved
them.
"Let's go," Lee mumbled. "Come on, George."
He closed the door gently. The window of the apartment overlooked the
park. He stared at the thick trees and wondered where Smith was running
under that green roof. Then he turned to the picture phone and punched
out a number.
The screen lit. It was in full color, praise God.
"_Andy!_"
His wife smiled when she saw him. She was a big girl with long breasts
and full thighs. She wore a dark kimono.