LITMIR.BIZ

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of the hour he was due, and had brought with him what was undoubtedly his idea of a princely gift for newlyweds—a paid-up extra-coverage maternity benefit rider on our Blue Blanket policies.

      We thanked him effusively. And, for my part, sincerely. That was before I had known Marianna’s views on children; she had no intentions of raising a family.

      *

      As I walked in on Defoe in his private suite at the clinic, he was standing with his back to me, at a small washstand, peering at his reflection in a mirror. He appeared to have finished shaving. I rubbed my own bristled chin uneasily.

      He said over his shoulder, “Good morning, Thomas. Sit down.”

      I sat on the edge of an enormous wing chair. He pursed his lips, stretched the skin under his chin and, when he seemed perfectly satisfied the job was complete, he said as though he were continuing a conversation, “Fill me in on your interview with Zorchi, Thomas.”

      It was the first I’d known he’d ever heard of Zorchi. I hesitantly began to tell him about the meeting in the hospital. It did not, I knew, do me very much credit, but it simply didn’t occur to me to try to make my own part look better. I suppose that if I thought of the matter at all, I simply thought that Defoe would instantly detect any attempt to gloss things over. He hardly seemed to be paying attention to me, though; he was preoccupied with the remainder of his morning ritual—carefully massaging his face with something fragrant, brushing his teeth with a maddening, old-fashioned insistence on careful strokes, combing his hair almost strand by strand.

      Then he took a small bottle with a daub attached to the stopper and touched it to the distinguished gray at his temples.

      I spluttered in the middle of a word; I had never thought of the possibility that the handsomely grayed temples of the Company’s senior executives, as inevitable as the vest or the watch chain, were equally a part of the uniform! Defoe gave me a long inquiring look in the mirror; I coughed and went on with a careful description of Zorchi’s temper tantrum.

      Defoe turned to me and nodded gravely. There was neither approval nor disapproval. He had asked for information and the information had been received.

      He pressed a communicator button and ordered breakfast. The microphone must have been there, but it was invisible. He sat down at a small, surgical-looking table, leaned back and folded his hands.

      “Now,” he said, “tell me what happened in Caserta just before Hammond disappeared.”

      Talking to Defoe had something of the quality of shouting down a well. I collected my thoughts and told him all I knew on the riot at the branch office.

      While I was talking, Defoe’s breakfast arrived. He didn’t know I hadn’t eaten anything, of course—I say “of course” because I know he couldn’t have known, he didn’t ask. I looked at it longingly, but all my looking didn’t alter the fact that there was only one plate, one cup, one set of silverware.

      He ate his breakfast as methodically as he’d brushed his teeth. I doubt if it took him five minutes. Since I finished the Caserta story in about three, the last couple of minutes were in dead silence, Defoe eating, me sitting mute as a disconnected jukebox.

      Then he pushed the little table away, lit a cigarette and said, “You may smoke if you wish, Thomas. Come in, Susan.”

      He didn’t raise his voice; and when, fifteen seconds later, Susan Manchester walked in, he didn’t look at all impressed with the efficiency of his secretary, his intercom system, or himself. The concealed microphone, it occurred to me, had heard him order breakfast and request his secretary to walk in. It had undoubtedly heard—and most probably recorded—every word I had said.

      How well they did things on the upper echelon of the Company!

      Susan looked—different. She was as blonde and pretty as ever. But she wasn’t bubbly. She smiled at me in passing and handed Defoe a typed script, which he scanned carefully.

      He asked, “Nothing new on Hammond?”

      “No, sir,” she said.

      “All right. You may leave this.” She nodded and left. Defoe turned back to me. “I have some news for you, Thomas. Hammond has been located.”

      “That’s good,” I said. “Not too badly hung over, I hope.”

      He gave me an arctic smile. “Hardly. He was found by a couple of peasants who were picking grapes. He’s dead.”

      Chapter Six

      Hammond dead! He had had his faults, but he was an officer of the Company and a man I had met. Dead!

      I asked, “How? What happened?”

      “Perhaps you can tell me that, Thomas,” said Defoe.

      I sat startledly erect, shocked by the significance of the words. I said hotly, “Damn it, Mr. Defoe, you know I had nothing to do with this! I’ve been all over the whole thing with you and I thought you were on my side! Just because I said a lot of crazy things after Marianna died doesn’t mean I’m anti-Company—and it certainly doesn’t mean I’d commit murder. If you think that, then why the devil did you put me in cadet school?”

      Defoe merely raised his hand by bending the wrist slightly; it was enough to stop me, though. “Gently, Thomas. I don’t think you did it—that much should be obvious. And I put you in cadet school because I had work for you.”

      “But you said I knew something I was holding back.”

      Defoe waggled the hand reprovingly. “I said you might be able to tell me who killed Hammond. And so you might—but not yet. I count heavily on you for help in this area, Thomas. There are two urgent tasks to be done. Hammond’s death—” he paused and shrugged, and the shrug was all of Hammond’s epitaph—“is only an incident in a larger pattern; we need to work out the pattern itself.”

      He glanced again at the typed list Susan had handed him. “I find that I can stay in the Naples area for only a short time; the two tasks must be done before I leave. I shall handle one myself. The other I intend to delegate to you.

      “First we have the unfortunate situation in regard to the state of public morale. Unfortunate? Perhaps I should say disgraceful. There is quite obviously a nucleus of troublemakers at work, Thomas, and Gogarty has not had the wit to find them and take the appropriate steps. Someone else must. Second, this Zorchi is an unnecessary annoyance. I do not propose to let the Company be annoyed, Thomas. Which assignment would you prefer?”

      I said hesitantly, “I don’t know if Mr. Gogarty would like me to—”

      “Gogarty is an ass! If he had not blundered incessantly since he took over the district, I should not have had to drop important work to come here.”

      I thought for a second. Digging out an undercover ring of troublemakers didn’t sound particularly easy. On the other hand, I had already tried my luck with Zorchi.

      “Perhaps you’d better try Zorchi,” I said.

      “Try?” Defoe allowed himself to look surprised. “As you wish. I think you will learn something from watching me handle it, Thomas. Shall we join Signore Zorchi now?”

      “He’s here?”

      Defoe said impatiently, “Of course, Thomas. Come along.”

      *

      Zorchi’s secretary was there, too. He was in a small anteroom, sitting on a hard wooden chair; as we passed him, I saw the hostility in his eyes. He didn’t say a word.

      Beyond him, in an examination room, was Zorchi, slim, naked and hideous, sitting on the edge of a surgical cot and trying not to look ill at ease. He had been shaved from head to knee stumps. Esthetically, at least, it had been a mistake. I never saw such a collection of skin eruptions on a human.

      He burst out, faster than my language-school

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