The Right Time
Page 2
department stores."
Pheola's eyes grew round. Ordinarily she squinted when she wanted tosee anything. "What should I get?"
"Start from the skin and work out," I told her. "Tell the departmentstore you'll be working in an office, and that you'll need a couple ofcocktail dresses and wraps for evening, too. Get lots of shoes. O.K.?"
Was it ever!
I had an idea that clothes would be quite a change for Pheola. I hadmet her only three days before, in a Nevada gambling house. She'd madefor me like a lode-star, called me her Billy Joe and announced that Iwould be her next husband. I'll tell you, that was a shocker. I'm notabout to marry anybody. She was as tall as I was, which isn't so verymuch for a man, skinny to the point of emaciation, wearing a"borrowed" dress that didn't fit, and had that unmistakable slatternlylook that you associate with white trash. On top of that, she was vainenough about her bucktoothed and pointed-nose features to keep herglasses in her purse, and as a result she went around peering at youfrom a distance of eight inches to make sure you were the right guy.
But she had Psi powers. She had been hot as a firecracker predictingthe roll of dice on the gambling tables, the very dice that I wastipping with telekinesis. Much more important to me personally, shehad announced that she was a healer, and on my dare had "laid hands"on me, and brought my dead right arm to life.
My obligation as a Lodge official was to bring her to the ManhattanChapter for measurement and training, no matter what the Grand Masterfelt about the reality of her powers of precognition. Maragon had beenabout as obstreperous as I had figured. We have a lot of troubleworking together, probably because he resents my TK powers. He's goodat it, but I'm a good deal better. That's why I'm a Thirty-thirdDegree member of the Lodge.
* * * * *
Leaving Pheola's new home, I went next door to my own apartment andchecked in by phone with Memorial Hospital. Fortunately, I was not oncall, and could take a few steps to find out how much PC Pheola reallyhad. I went down to the forty-third floor, where we have ourlaboratories, and let myself into the data-processing center.
They don't like me to do that. That place is under full temperatureand humidity control, and every time an outsider barges in the wholesystem does nip-ups.
Norty Baskins came scurrying away from a card sorter. "What's this!"he exclaimed. "Oh, it's you, Lefty." His face went solemn with hiseffort, and I felt a twinge in my ear lobe. I returned the grip,tweaking his ear the same way. He began to smile, realizing that I hadfelt his lift and was returning it.
"You shouldn't be in here, Lefty," he said. "You know the rules."
"And I know this is the time to break them, Norty," I said. "I've gotsomething really rare for you."
"Rare?"
"This time I've really got one," I insisted. "A precog who can callthings with pin-point accuracy."
"Not again, Lefty," he said, disgusted. "Aren't you getting a littletired of striking out on that prediction? You've brought half a dozenflops in here in the last year."
"Not Pheola," I said. "Listen, Norty, I want this girl measured."
"I thought you said she was pin-point accurate," he sneered. "And whatdoes Maragon say?"
I waved a hand at him and walked over to sit on one of the lab stools.He went to the sorter and pulled cards from the bins, joggling them upinto one solid stack that he put back in the hopper. But he did notpress the "start" button.
"You know, Maragon," I told him. "This girl is hot, and then she'scold. But there is so much accuracy when she's right that I thinkthere's some future to training her. What I want out of you is ameasurement of how great her accuracy is."
Norty snorted. "When Maragon doesn't believe it?" he said. "Nothanks." He started the card sorter, filling the room with itsclatter.
I drew a pair of dice from my pocket. I'm never without the ivories.They are the original instruments of my TK skill. That's how Maragonfound me, unconsciously tipping dice in an alley crap game. I threwthem out on the table next to the sorter, when the cards had gonethrough and it fell silent. They came up with a four-three natural.
"Maragon!" I snapped. "You know he doesn't think enough of _your_ TKto have your training extended. Well, you and I both know we have donewonders for your grip. Just because he's Grand Master doesn't make himright all the time. I want you to test this girl, and I think she hasas much right to the facts as you have to the training I've beengiving you under the table all these months!"
"Blackmail," he said sadly. "Extortion!"
"So I'm extorting some work out of you," I agreed. "The only questionis whether you will pay."
"What do you want?" Baskins asked glumly.
"I want you to make this woman predict a series, a number of series,and I want you to use your computers here to tell me on what basis heraccuracy varies. You can do that, can't you?"
He nodded, staring at the dice on the table. "If I wasn't so sure youcan help me develop my TK, Lefty," he said, "I'd never do this. Allright, sneak her down here and I'll get her to PC some weatherinformation for a month or so."
"Weather?" I said. "Why the weather?"
"You'll see when I show the results," he said. "Roll those dice again.I swear I felt your lift that last time."
* * * * *
I made a few other calls around the building to catch up on what hadbeen going on while I was in Nevada. Our formal organization is lousy,because Maragon is a one-man show. You just have to rely on gossip,what the CV's pick up and what leaks by telepathy, to know all theinternal politics of the Lodge. I wouldn't want you to think thatPsi's are more devious or Machiavellian than normals, but sometimesthey act it.
By the time I reached up to tap on Pheola's door, it opened in frontof me, and a stylishly dressed young lady came out, smiling, withPheola standing in the doorway behind her.
"Lefty!" Pheola said happily.
"Is this your fiance?" the girl said to Pheola.
"No!" I said. "I'm her chiropractor, and I'm about to straighten outsome vertebrae in her neck!"
Something about the way I said it made the girl from the departmentstore scuttle down the corridor. I glared at her back, went intoPheola's apartment and shut the door.
"What were you telling her?" I started, and then I knew there was nopoint to it. I waved an irritated hand and kept on talking.
"When will your clothes be here?"
"Some things for tonight in about an hour," she said meekly. "I gotquite a lot. Was that all right?"
"If you keep shooting off your puss about our getting married, youwon't last long enough to wear them all," I threatened. "Can you findRoom 4307, or will I have to take you down?"
"I can find it if you want me to, Lefty," she said.
I was sick of being her darlin' Billy. "Then find it," I said. "Askfor Norty. Tell him you are my PC. Do what he tells you. I'll pick youup around seven o'clock back here. All right?"
"All right."
"And stop telling people we're going to get married!"
She didn't answer that, so I let myself out and went to my ownapartment, sizzling.
* * * * *
The phone was ringing as I came in, and I walked over to press the"Accept" button. The screen lit up to show me a lined and wrinkledface framed in scraggling hair streaked with gray.
"Hello, Evaleen," I said to her.
"This is dynamite," she said in a graveyard tone. "In the gym, inabout ten minutes?"
I could feel my eyebrows rise. "Sure," I said, and before I couldfoolishly ask her what it was all about, she cut the image.
It isn't that our phones are tapped. Maragon doesn't need that. But ina building full of telepaths, any conversation is going to be peepedif you carry it on long enough. And who can keep his mind closed whilehe's talking? It's hard enough when you're silent.
I rode directly down to twenty and let myself into the locker room. Bythe time I had changed into my gym suit, Evaleen Riley's ten minuteshad el
apsed, and I went into the gym.
If she wanted to be careful about our conversation there was no pointgoing directly to wherever she was working out, so I wandered.
There was the usual dozen or so TK's there practicing with theweights, as well as twice as many who thought they were TK's trying toget the milligram weights to wiggle. About half of them were clusteredaround one table where a member