“Clark,” the other snapped. “C. I. C.’”
“What’s that?”
“You should know,” Clark retorted with a suggestion of wryness. “Your Devlin character works for us.”
“Oh, you mean that. The Counter-Intelligence Corps. Say, I’ll bet you guys really get around. Do you like to read my stories?”
“We’ve been reading them—closely. What about it?”
“What about what?”
“Where did you get the classified material on the atomic bomb you published?”
“Research, I told you.”
“Research my eye! That hasn’t been published.”
Henry sat up triumphantly. “I’ve got you! It has.”
“Has not.”
“Has.” He pointed dramatically. “Right there.” His triumphant finger indicated an encyclopedia set. The set was his pride and joy, a veritable gold mine of information on every subject under the sun. Time and again it had come to his rescue to provide an authentic background, a tropical setting, a concise history or a hidden date or fact. That particular encyclopedia set had repaid him many times its cost by giving him the material to fabricate many stories.
The C. I. C. operative glanced at the set only long enough to identify it. “You’d better have a good alibi.”
Cary Carew gave him a scornful glance. “I don't understand how you made the Corps. You can’t come to a rational conclusion until you’ve examined the evidence. Dan Devlin lives by that rule.”
“Just between you and me, buddy, Dan Devlin hasn’t got long to live. Where did you get the classified data?”
“There!” Henry almost shrieked.
“Oh, take a look and let’s get on with it,” Groves interposed. He had lost a modicum of his politeness. “We want to find out about that rocket material, as well.”
Cary Carew brightened. “Oh yes, my White Sands story. One of my better ones, really. The enemy spy gave Devlin a real chase for his money in that one.”
Groves said wearily, “Between the enemy spy and Dan Devlin, several cats were let out of the bag in that one. Where did you obtain the classified information on the fuel mixture used to fire the rocket, and where did you gain the data on the height it reached and the meteorological matter it obtained while up there, and how did you learn of the alloy and construction methods used in the rocket? How did you know the exact date it was fired and how long it was aloft, and where it fell and how much of it was recovered?”
A casual Carew pointed to the encyclopedia set, his expression revealing his opinion of real government agents.
Clark was fingering the pages of the first volume, leafing toward the section headed atom. Henry watched him, inwardly grinning. Clark finally reached atom, turned a few more pages to atomic energy, and settled back to read. The room was quiet except for a solitary fly buzzing against the window, vainly seeking an exit. Henry glanced around his den, examining his many bookshelves, fondly contemplating the filing cabinets, feeling quite proud of it all. His filing cabinets bulged with already-published stories and early drafts of others waiting only to be polished and mailed out. His shelves contained many reference works of invaluable nature.
Upon those few occasions when he was called upon to lecture a ladies club or a student-writer’s meeting, he liked to say that a successful writer is a well-read writer. It was best to instill in those eager young minds there was no shortcut to literary fame, no easy way; one must—
“Hey!” Clark’s startled yell punctured his thoughts and the silence of the room. “It is here!”
“Of course,” Cary Carew said with simple dignity. Authenticity was the life-blood of fine fiction.
“What?” an incredulous Groves demanded.
“Every blasted word of it,” Clark declared. “Word for word!”
“Oh, come now,” Carew protested mildly. “I’m not a plagiarist. I always make it a point to rewrite my source material.”
“But it can’t be—it hasn’t been released!”
“Has,” Henry repeated.
“This is impossible! it isn’t supposed to be in public print.”
“Is,” Henry said.
“There’s something wrong here—something awfully wrong.”
“You,” Henry suggested.
Groves reached for the volume and almost tore it from his companion’s hand. Clark whirled to the bookcase and searched rapidly along the spines, checking the alphabetical keys. He was searching for the matter on rocketry, especially those recent rockets fired from White Sands, New Mexico.
“Volume twenty-nine,” Henry said helpfully.
Clark muttered his thanks and jerked at the volume. The period of silence was repeated, and in due time, the stunned exclamation of disbelief. Groves meanwhile had read the article on atomic energy and was gaping at the wallpaper. There, in print, was a concise summary of millions of secret words now locked away in Washington vaults! It was fantastic. He looked across the room to Clark’s face and found a similar answer there. Clark had just finished reading another summary on the White Sands experimental rockets, information supposed to be known only to White Sands and Washington. Wonderingly, Groves turned over the volume in his hands and stared at the spine. The encyclopedia had been published by an old and respected New York firm.
“What else,” he asked, in somewhat of a daze, “has Dan Devlin done? What more have you released?”
“Well,” Cary Carew said modestly, “there was the adventure of the atomic cannon, and some nasty business involving plutonium hand grenades, and right now a magazine is preparing for publication my latest story about biological warfare. An enemy spy sneaks into the Maryland—”
A suspicious Clark cut him off short. “Is that in here too?”
Henry nodded. “Volume three, I think.”
“Oh, no!”
“Oh, yes,” Henry assured him.
Groves seemed to have recovered his presence of mind. “Where did you get this encyclopedia set?”
“From a peddler.”
“A peddler?”
“Yes. There’s always somebody stopping here, interrupting my work. The doorbell is broken—well, not broken altogether, but it goes ting-ting-thunk you see, and that gets on my nerves after a while. Only I didn’t mind one day last week because a good-looking girl stopped by, selling pots and pans, and I said to her—”
“The book peddler,” Groves repeated impatiently.
“He was just a peddler. I was working on something or other and the doorbell went ting-ting-thunk and there he stood. I really didn’t mind after a while because it is a good set, and I needed it. Sixty-five dollars.”
“Sixty-five dollars!” Clark was holding his head in his hands. “More than ten years work, for sixty-five dollars.”
“What’s the matter with him?” Henry asked.
Groves regarded Henry Mason as he would a child.
“He’s upset,” he explained clearly and slowly. “He’s unhappy. He’s a United States secret agent. For ten years or more he and hundreds like him have labored long and hard to keep our wartime secrets secret to keep them from the prying eyes of the world, and you buy a sixty-five dollar set of books which permits your Dan Devlin to reveal everything. To be blunt, he’s disenchanted.”
Henry gazed at the bent head of the other agent and said, “Oh.”
“Now listen carefully. I want you to tell me about this peddler; I want you to describe him in detail, and repeat what he said to you. I want to know the whole thing.”
“Why?”
“Because it still might not be too late. If only a few thousand copies of this set have been sold, we may be able to gather them up and burn them.”
“You expect me to remember a casual transaction that happened a year ago?” Henry demanded petulantly.
“You have a keen ear for dialogue,” Groves said.
The unfair blow found its mark. “Certainly,” Henry declared. “Well now, let me think for a minute—” He closed his eyes a
nd put his fingertips on them. “It was like this....”
The door bell chimed its familiar one-two-three pattern, a tinkling ting-ting-thunk. Henry frowned at the galley proofs he was reading, and twisted around in his chair to stare through the window. One irritating interruption after another; if he didn’t finish correcting the proofs and get them off in another day they would be late in reaching the printer—and most likely that would mean his book would lose its scheduled presstime, and so be late in reaching the bindery and then the stores, and wouldn’t be published in time for the Christmas trade after all. And in addition to all those horrible things, Miss Winston in his publisher’s production department would write him a scathing letter.
Henry sighed and pushed the galleys aside, to get up from the desk and go through the adjoining room to the door. He opened it and found an elderly gentleman wearing a walrus moustache standing there, beaming cheerily.
"Ah, good morning, Mr. Carew, good morning, good morning. A fine day for the creative instinct, is it not? And how is your work coming?”
“Well ... okay, I guess,” Cary Carew told him. “But I don’t want any.”
“Mr. Carew, how can you say that? No man may boast he is well-read or well-informed without a solid backgrounding in the literary treasure of the world, a repository of the accumulated wealth and knowledge of the centuries. Mr. Carew, a man of your reputation simply can’t afford to be without one.”
Cary Carew watched the walrus moustache bouncing on the fellow’s upper lip as he talked. “Without one what?”
“Mr. Carew, I was hoping you would ask me that question! It reveals you as a man of discernment, a man of eager and inquiring mind, a man who seeks truth and light in an otherwise dark and ignorant world. Mr. Carew, you may well pride yourself on your advanced mental faculties.” The elderly gentleman blew steadily on, bewailing the backward ways of the outside world and loudly admiring the towering pillar of strength and light in the person of Cary Carew. The moustache wagged madly and the old gentleman worked up quite a head of steam. “You sir,” he said, “need one.”
“Need one what?” Henry repeated.
“A modern and up-to-date world encyclopedia in only thirty-six magnificent volumes, a storehouse of knowledge smartly and fully covering the world of yesterday and today. I happen to have in my hand the initial volume. Notice the fine binding and the delicate, expensive goldleaf lettering; now let us flip open a few pages so that you may see the expensive printing techniques and the sturdy paper. This set is guaranteed to last a lifetime, Mr. Carew, and the life-times of those children who will come after you.”
“I’m not married.”
“A man of your literary worth simply can’t afford to be without one.”
“How much?” Henry asked cautiously.
“Only sixty-seven dollars and fifty cents. A rare bargain in this day of advancing prices and shoddy materials.”
Henry fingered the volume. “Is it new?” he asked suddenly. “I don’t want anything out of date—”
“New? My dear Mr. Carew, look at this!” And the peddler opened the front cover to turn a few pages, stopping at last on a colored frontispiece facing the title page. He turned the book about so that Henry might see. Lithographed in four beautiful colors was a picture of a handsome and distinguished man, while below it ran the printed legend:
Dwight D. Eisenhower
President of the United States
1952—
“Well, yes,” Henry agreed. “It’s new all right.” His practiced eye ran down the title page, noting the type arrangement and layout, the names of the several editors and the publisher, coming to rest at last on the copyright date. The Roman numerals caught his eye, and he returned to them to read them a second time, more slowly.
“Aha!” he crowed in the salesman’s face. “An error!”
“No!” The walrus moustache shot high.
“Yes. It so happens I can read Roman numerals. Look at this: MCMLV. Clearly, a typographical error. The proofreader was not on the job.”
“Oh, my, my, my,” the salesman said. “Tch, tch, tch. Mr. Carew, I am most distressed at this flaw in my offering. I am moved to make a reduction. Sixty-five dollars.”
Henry grinned to himself, believing he had driven a hard bargain. “I’ll take it.”
The old gentleman scurried out to an automobile standing at the curb and returned with the remaining thirty-five volumes. He accepted Henry’s check, bid him a cheery farewell, and drove away. Henry at once forgot about the waiting galley proofs, to sit down and thumb the volumes, searching for information he might put into the hands of Dan Devlin.
“And that’s all there was to it,” he said to Groves.
Groves had followed the recital by opening the first volume to the lithographed picture and the title page. Now he started at the copyright notice. “What does MCMLV mean? Why is it an error?”
Henry leaned over his shoulder. “The MCM is nineteen hundred; that first M indicates one thousand while the following CM indicates nine hundred—a hundred less than a thousand. Had the C followed the M it would have indicated one hundred plus a thousand. So, nineteen hundred. The L is fifty and the V, five. 1955. It should have read 1954, of course.”
Across the room, Clark was rapidly pulling volumes from the shelf to examine the date in each. After a while he looked up. “They all have the same date.”
“Of course,” Henry agreed. “I got two-fifty off.”
He thought to add, “I’ve had only one disappointment with the set. There’s nothing in it about the space station.”
Clark jerked around suddenly. “Space station?”
“Yeah, you know. During the last war, Germany had plans for a space-platform to be anchored in the sky—a thousand miles up. Following the war the United States took over the plans. There has been an awful lot of speculation in the magazines about the space-station, pictures and such; some say it will be a refueling station for rockets going to the moon, and other claim it will make a military observation post as it encircles the earth. It had occurred to me that Dan Devlin could make an adventure of it.”
“And there is nothing in these books about it?” Clark demanded anxiously. “Nothing about a space station?”
“Not a word. Quite a disappointment, really.”
Clark looked at Groves, closed his eyes and sighed. Quite clearly and audibly he thanked his God. When he had opened them again he made a request of Henry.
“I want to use your telephone.”
“In there,” pointing.
Henry and Groves remained silent, listening. They couldn’t help listening because the instrument was so near. Clark called his headquarters in Washington and described the entire situation; holding a volume in his hand, he read off the title page and then told of the typographical error that had been discovered, told the supposedly-secret information contained in its pages, and told how Dan Devlin had made free use of that classified information to win many fictional battles with an enemy spy. There followed a long period of silence. Clark waited, toying with the phone, staring out the window, turning around to find the two men watching him.
“They’re calling New York to check with the publisher,” he explained to Groves. Groves nodded and the silence went on. After several minutes the distant voice spoke again and the C. I. C. agent exploded violently.
“It is too! I’ve got one right here in my hand!” The voice continued at a fast clip. Clark said, “Yes, he’s here with me. He’ll verify it. Thirty-six volumes.” He listened some more and his face became a dull crimson. He said finally, stiffly, “Yes sir,” and hung up.
Groves watched him expectantly.
“That edition doesn’t exist,” Clark said, waving his hand at the book shelf. “The New York publisher hasn’t printed it yet.”
“Nonsense,” Henry exclaimed.
Clark stabbed a glance at the writer. “The publisher said he hasn’t issued an edition of that encyclopedia since 1949. He further said t
hey are considering a new edition in about a year, pending the release of certain material by Washington. In short, if Washington reveals enough to make a new edition worthwhile, they’ll go to press.”
“Sixty-five dollars,” Henry reminded him, pointing to the sprawled books. “I’ve used them for months.”
“Yes, you have.” Clark brought forth a wallet and carefully counted out sixty-five dollars. He handed the money to the writer. “I’ll need a receipt.”
“What’s this for?”
“For an encyclopedia set which doesn’t exist. My orders are to seize the books.”
“You can’t do that!”
“I am doing it. The receipt, please.”
“But I need that set!”
“You can buy another downtown,” Clark reminded him, and then added bitterly, “And this time buy a set that does exist. Buy some that were printed a few years ago—” He stooped and began picking up books. Groves jumped to help him.
Henry watched them. “Big-brothers!” he snarled suddenly.
They went on with their seizure.
The doorbell chimed its familiar one-two-three pattern, ting-ting-thunk. Henry paused in the middle of a sentence and contemplated stuffing the chimes with rags to prevent the constant interruptions. It had been difficult going the last few days without the familiar volumes to encourage him, and at the moment Dan Devlin was involved in a plot with counterfeiters that was downright stupid.
He growled aloud and pushed back the chair to go to the door. A shiny new car stood at the curb, a car he had not seen on the streets before. It seemed to resemble those experimental models found only at Automobile shows, a hint of things to come. The car was very low and sleek and futuristic. He stared in wonder.
A voice below the level of his eyes sang out a cheery greeting. “Ah, good morning, Mr. Carew, good morning, good morning! A striking day for the creative urge of an author, is it not? And how is your good work progressing?”
Cary Carew dropped his gaze from the remarkable automobile to stare at the elderly gentleman wearing a walrus moustache. “Bad,” he said. “I lost my encyclopedia set and can’t do research.”
Time Exposures Page 13
