by Isaac Asimov
A man appeared ahead of him at the end of the passage, like a pop-up target in a shooting gallery, and Hallman sprayed him with bullets. Then he ran on, into the first room, firing quick shots to clear the way. He’d got the rhythm of it now, the half-forgotten feel for killing that left him at times but always returned.
In the second office a screaming woman was hunched in one corner, covering her face. Hallman paused only an instant, and then fired a short burst into her body. She slid down the wall, torn and bleeding and already without life. She was the first woman he’d ever killed, and he was surprised at how little it bothered him.
He smashed out the window in a front room, seeking the others, and saw two more uniformed guards running around the front of the building. He fired fast, cutting them both down with a line of bullets across their backs. Then he saw the others break from the cover of the trees. Renger was in the lead, running with his gun ready, and he hurled a smoke bomb as he crossed the road. Then someone on the floor above cut loose with three quick shots and Hallman saw Yates stagger and go down in the street, just before the smoke obscured him.
Hallman found the stairs and started up. A figure appeared at the top and Hallman let go with the rest of the clip. Before he could reload, a second man fell on him with a roar, toppling him backward halfway down the steps. He felt the carbine slide away from him, but he rolled over and managed to get his knife out. He plunged it into the fleshy man’s side, heard his grunt of pain, and plunged it again. The man went suddenly limp, and Hallman rolled his body down the stairs.
There was shooting below him now, and he knew Renger and the others were past the gate. He made it the rest of the way to the top of the stairs, finding his weapon and then reloading it as he climbed. He burst through the door at the top landing and killed the man at the window with a sudden spray of bullets. Two others — short, frightened men — raised their hands and backed against the wall. Hallman shot them both.
He could feel the warmth of blood on his lower lip now, and he realized the man on the stairs had landed some damaging punches. But there was no pain. The exhilaration of the moment had blotted it out. He glanced out the window, but the smoke was too thick to see anything.
Leaning against the wall, he tried to remember how many he’d killed. The guard, and at least two of the three in the patrol car, and the man in the passage. And the woman. The two guards out the window. And the two on the stairs. And three in this room. That made twelve, in just under five minutes. Fast work. Good work.
He took out his knife again and made sure they were dead. He was on his last clip of bullets, so he couldn’t waste any more. Then he heard someone coming up the stairs, calling his name. It was Renger, carrying two suitcases. Hallman licked the blood from his lip, savoring it, and went to meet him.
“You did a damn good job,” Renger told him. “You’re a regular one-man army!”
“I said I was good with a gun. How many men did we lose?”
“Crowthy and Yates. The others are all right. Let’s plant these explosives and get the hell out of here!”
They did their job, working fast, and then left the building with the others.
“Damn!” Renger said as they started across the muddy road toward the shelter of the woods. “I’m going to see that you get a medal for this, Hallman!”
“Thank you, Major.”
“When they hear back home how you led an attack on the enemy’s forward command post and helped destroy it, almost single-handed, they’ll make you a hero. How many did you kill?”
“Twelve.”
“Damn good shooting!”
They passed the enemy patrol car, parked at a crazy angle on the road, and Hallman saw that the driver was still alive, gasping for breath behind the shattered windshield. He raised his carbine with one hand and killed the man with a single shot.
“That makes thirteen,” he said, and walked on.
Operative 375
by Gary Brandner
When the creature walked in the office door, Gus Blattner stopped cranking the printer and stared. The apparition wore a trench coat and a thrift-shop fedora pulled low over a pair of orange eyebrows. The eyes and mouth were concealed behind purple shades and an unlikely black moustache.
“Aren’t you supposed to say trick or treat?” said Gus.
With a flourish the trench-coated figure whipped off the hat, glasses, and moustache to reveal a grinning young man with orange hair to match the eyebrows. He stepped to the counter and announced, “I’m Dudley McBean.”
“So?”
“This is the Universal Academy of Investigation, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Gus admitted.
“Well, I’m Dudley McBean,” the young man repeated. “Operative 375.”
Gus wiped his hands across his ink-smudged sweat shirt. “I think you better talk to my partner,” he said and retreated to the rear of the office and into a plywood-partitioned cubicle. Inside, a round-faced man sat at a card table with a pile of envelopes in front of him. He was slitting these open with a nail file and removing cash and checks, which he stacked in tidy piles.
Gus said, “Secret Agent X-9 or somebody like that is out front. I’ve got a terrible feeling it’s one of our students.”
“What does he want here?” asked the man at the desk.
“How would I know? I’m just the muscle in this operation. All I do is crank the stupid machine.”
“Don’t sulk, partner,” the other man said. “You know how important it is that we keep turning out the lesson booklets. I would gladly spell you out at the machine, were it not for my old lacrosse injury. Shoulder stiffens right up.”
“I’d just like to get out of here once in a while, even if it’s only to go to the post office.”
“Now, Gus, the only reason I pick up the mail is because I have to be out anyway making the necessary personal contacts. That is, after all, my specialty. Besides, what difference does it make how we split up the work? The money goes fifty-fifty, and take a look at what came in just today. You never did this good sticking up gas stations.”
“Ah, don’t mind me,” Gus said. “I’m on edge from worrying about Natalie. I think she’s playing games with some other guy. If I could just catch her at it, then I could kill both of them and get it off my mind.”
The other man stood up and walked around the table to clap his partner on the shoulder. “That’s the curse of being married to a beautiful woman,” he sympathized. “While I go out and talk to our visitor, you sit down and count some money. Maybe that will help cheer you up.”
Adjusting his butterfly bow tie, the round-faced man left the cubicle and strode to the counter where Dudley McBean waited, smiling hopefully.
“Good afternoon, my friend. I’m Colonel Homer Fritch. What can I do for you?”
“Pleased to meet you, sir. I’m Dudley McBean.” The young man waited for a reaction, got none, and went on. “Operative 375. From Snohomish. I took your course in how to be a private detective.”
“Of course!” Colonel Fritch exclaimed. “From Snohomish. One of our very best students. What brings you to Los Angeles, Dudley? You do know that our classes are strictly home study?”
“Oh, yes, sir. But now that I’ve completed the course, I wanted to come down in person to pick up my solid bronze investigator badge and handsome embossed diploma. I brought the extra ten dollars for handling, like it said in your ad in Fearless Action magazine.”
The colonel searched the guileless blue eyes for a trace of mockery. Finding none, he said, “I think I can fix you up, young man.” He reached under the counter and brought up a badge in the shape of a shield with an eagle perched aggressively on top. It bore the words Official Private Investigator. Colonel Fritch laid it reverently in front of Dudley. “Wear it with pride,” he said. Reaching down again, he produced a printed sheet of stiff paper. “There wasn’t time to have your name embossed on it, but if I may borrow your pen I’ll take care of that. I have been told I write
a very fine hand.”
Dudley passed over a ballpoint pen, and the colonel carefully stroked the young man’s name in the blank space on the diploma. He added a touch of rococo scrollwork and slid it across the counter.
“There you are, my boy, and godspeed back to Sno-qualamie.”
“It’s Snohomish, Colonel Fritch, and I’m not going back.”
“You’re not?”
“No, sir. I figure there are probably more opportunities in the detective business here in Los Angeles than there would be back home.”
“I daresay. Now, if you’ll excuse me...”
“So I’d like to get the free job-placement assistance like it said in your ad.”
“Hmm, yes, right your are. Sharp-eyed lad. Very promising. I’ll take care of that right now.”
The colonel tore a sheet out of a spiral notebook and wrote rapidly:
This will introduce Mr. Dudley McBean. He has my personal recommendation for a position as Private Investigator.
Col. Homer Fritch
“There you are, my boy,” he said. “Just take this note to any of the larger detective agencies in town and they’ll have you out on a case before you can say Continental Op.”
“I don’t know how to thank you, Colonel.”
“Tut-tut, lad. Good luck to you and good-bye.”
With the new badge pinned discreetly inside his lapel, Operative 375 cinched up the belt of his trench coat and replaced the hat, shades, and moustache. “Lesson Eight — The Art of Disguise,” he explained, and slipped furtively out of the office.
Colonel Fritch sighed heavily and headed back to the plywood cubicle. Gus Blattner came out to meet him.
“Didn’t you lay it on a little thick?” Gus said.
“It doesn’t do any harm,” the colonel said, “and it made the boy feel good.”
“How will he feel when he finds out that your name at the legitimate detective agencies carries about as much weight as Daffy Duck?”
The colonel shrugged. “I am afraid the young man will be disillusioned, but he will have learned one more valuable lesson — Be Wary of Strangers.”
“That won’t help much when the cops come for us.”
“There is nothing to fear from the police. We have made good, to the letter, on all offers put forth in our advertisement. Try to remember, Gus, that we are honest businessmen, so stop your worrying.”
“Sure, if you say so,” Gus muttered, and resumed cranking the machine.
The next afternoon the colonel and Gus were stuffing handsome embossed diplomas into mailing envelopes when Dudley McBean entered their office again — undisguised this time.
“Hello, there,” the colonel said coolly. “I didn’t expect to see you back here.”
“I think I need more assistance,” Dudley said. “I took my diploma and your personal note to every detective agency in the Yellow Pages. Some of them laughed at me, and the others weren’t that polite.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, my boy, but I’ve done all I can for you.”
“So I decided to go into the business on my own,” Dudley continued, as though there had been no interruption.
“I see. Well, best of luck.” The colonel returned to stuffing diplomas.
“I thought you might want to put up the money to get me started.”
The jaws of Gus Blattner and Colonel Fritch dropped in unison, and they stared at the orange-haired young man. When the colonel found his voice, he said, “What gave you that preposterous idea?”
“It would be a good investment for you,” Dudley said. “I’ve learned a lot about detective work. For instance, how do you think I found your office? All the ad gave was a post office box number.”
Colonel Fritch started to answer, then his eyes grew suddenly thoughtful and he turned to his partner. “Gus,” he said, “how about running down to the stationer’s for some more of these envelopes?”
“What for? We got two boxes in the back.”
“It wouldn’t hurt to have two more.”
“Oh, all right,” Gus grumbled, and walked around the end of the counter and out the door.
When he was alone with Dudley, the colonel asked, “Tell me, my boy, how did you find our office?”
“Lesson Three,” Dudley said proudly, “Shadowing and Surveillance. I waited at the post office until somebody — it turned out to be you — came to pick up the mail from the box. Then I trailed you, just for practice.”
“Very enterprising.”
“But you didn’t come straight here from the post office. You stopped at an apartment on Franklin Avenue where you visited a blonde lady for one hour and twenty-two minutes.”
The colonel dabbed at his forehead with a crisp white handkerchief. “Dudley,” he said, “I have reconsidered and decided to finance you after all. If you will step back into my private office, we will discuss the terms.”
“I sure appreciate that, Colonel Fritch,” the young man said. “Some coincidence, isn’t it, how that blonde lady has the same last name as your partner.”
He’ll Kill You
by Richard Deming
I said, “I think I’d better report Ellen missing tomorrow. If we wait any longer, the police may think it strange.”
Margot’s freckled face spread in the grin I had grown to love. She always laughed when I mentioned Ellen, and while I loved the sound of her deep, good-humored laughter, her jollity on this subject upset me. I suppose humor was the sanest attitude toward Ellen’s departure, and I for one certainly felt no regrets, but somehow Margot’s laughter indicated a lack of delicacy I would not have expected from her.
It was the laughter and the wide, unaffected grin that first drew me to Margot. When we moved to Bradford, the faculty house assigned us was next door to hers, and my study window looked directly into the broad windows of Margot’s sun room, where she kept her phone. She was fond of phone gossip, and often I would see her there, her sun-freckled face animated with laughter, and one lean, strong hand making wide gestures as she talked. When she phoned Ellen I particularly enjoyed watching her, for in the hall I could hear Ellen’s part of the conversation, and from Ellen’s words and Margot’s gestures, sometimes piece together what Margot was saying.
Almost from the first we were attracted to each other — as early as the faculty tea given in my honor as the new head of the English Department. Miss Rottell, the dean of women, introduced us, saying in her precise, inhibited drawl, “Professor Brandt, Miss Margot Spring. She’s Music,” and moving away to leave us together.
I remember bowling formally and saying, “An appropriate name, my dear. You have the look about you of nature’s fairest season.”
She laughed. “Why, Professor! I do believe you’re a romantic.”
It started as simply as that, and grew as the months passed into a deep but quiet love. Oh, on the surface we were merely good-natured friends, for in a college town gossip can be fatal to careers, and Margot chose to accept my compliments as laugh-provoking jokes, even when no one was nearby to hear. I too was meticulously careful to arouse no comment. Not once did I even so much as kiss her on the cheek, restraining my physical love-making to an occasional accidental touch — my fingers brushing against her hair when I held her coat as she prepared to leave after a visit with Ellen, or lightly managing to touch her hand as I passed her a cup at a faculty tea.
But the depth of understanding that springs from mature love made my innocent words and gestures as meaningful to Margot as though I held her in my arms, just as her apparently joking replies had a meaning for me that a less perceptive nature might have missed entirely. As a matter of fact, it was best that no one aside from me understood her sublety, for she had a breathtaking flair for danger and seemed to love making me shudder at the risks she took. She had a trick of brazenly stating her true thoughts as though they were rather clumsy jokes, such as the time she lightly remarked to Ellen, when Ellen first began to plan her visit home, “You better hurry back again, or you m
ay find I’ve stolen your romantic husband.” But Ellen only laughed, and I pretended Margot’s remark was a great joke.
I waited until two days prior to Ellen’s scheduled departure before even mentioning what opportunities her absence would leave us, and even then I brought it up to Margot casually. But she surprised me with the blunt frankness of her reply.
“It’s too bad Ellen means to stay only two weeks,” I remarked.
“Ask her to stay a month,” Margot said. “I’m sure if you explained you wanted to elope with your next-door neighbor, Ellen would be glad to cooperate.”
Margot’s habit of affixing a completely fantastic suggestion to a sensible statement was another twist her odd sense of humor sometimes took, and I knew of course she had no expectation of my explaining any such thing to Ellen.
I asked, “Would you like it if she stayed away permanently?”
“You mean bury her body in the cellar?” She dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Is there enough insurance to finance our honeymoon?”
I said patiently, “I meant ask her to get a divorce.”
“And have a campus scandal?” Somehow she managed to grin and look horrified at the same time. “No, Theodore. The safest way is the cellar.” She closed one eye and made a cutting motion across her throat.
I said, “I’ve never even killed a chicken.”
“There’s nothing to it,” Margot said. “Read the papers. Husbands do it all the time. I’ll phone Ellen tonight and ask her to stand still.”
“Now please don’t make clever comments to Ellen,” I told her. “I know Ellen misses the double meaning of your jokes, but it’s an unnecessary risk.”
But Margot disobeyed my request when she phoned Ellen that evening. From my study I could see Margot’s wide smile and loosely gesturing hand, and in the hall behind me I could hear Ellen’s restrained laughter.
“It amazes me that you find Theodore so excruciating,” Ellen said. “I’ve never been able to detect the slightest sense of humor in him.”