“So long,” Malone said. He hung up the phone, put the car into gear again and roared off down U. S. Highway Number One. He didn’t feel entirely happy about the way things had gone; he’d been forced to lie to Tom Boyd, and that just wasn’t right.
However, there was no help for it. It was actually better this way, he told himself hopefully. After all, the less Tom knew from now on, the better off he was going to be. The better off everyone would be.
He went on through Fredericksburg without incident, but he didn’t continue on to Richmond. Instead, he turned off U. S. 1 when he reached a little town called Thornburg, which was smaller than he had believed a town could be and live. He began following a secondary road out into the countryside.
The countryside, of course, was filled with country, in the shape of hills, birds, trees, flowers, grass and other distractions to the passing motorist. It took Malone quite a bit longer than he expected to find the place he was looking for, and he finally came to the sad conclusion that country estates are just as difficult to find as houses in Brooklyn. In both cases, he thought, there was the same frantic search down what seemed to be a likely route, the same disappointment when the route turned out to lead nowhere, and the same discovery that no one had ever heard of the place and, in fact, doubted very strongly whether it even existed.
But he found it at last, rounding a curve in a narrow black-top road and spotting the house beyond a grove of trees. He recognized it instantly.
He had seen it so often that he felt as if he knew it intimately.
It was a big, rambling, Colonial-type mansion, painted a blinding and beautiful white, with a broad, pillared porch and a great carved front door. The front windows were curtained in rich purples, and before the house was a great front garden, and tall old trees. Malone half-expected Scarlett O’Hara to come tripping out of the house at any moment.
Inside it, however, if Malone were right, was not the magnetic Scarlett. Inside the house were some of the most important members of the Psychical Research Society.
But it was impossible to tell from the outside. Nothing moved on the well-kept grounds, and the windows didn’t show so much as the flutter of a purple curtain. There was no sound. No cars were parked around the house, nor, Malone thought as he remembered Gone With the Wind, were there any horses or carriages.
The place looked deserted.
Malone thought he knew better, but it took a few minutes for him to get up enough courage to go up the long driveway. He stared at the house. It was an old one, he knew, built long before the Civil War and originally commanding a huge plantation. Now, all that remained of that vast parcel of land was the few acres that surrounded the house.
But the original family still inhabited it, proud of the house and of their part in its past. Over the years, Malone knew, they had kept it up scrupulously, and the place had been both restored and modernized on the inside without harming the classic outlines of the hundred-and-fifty-year-old structure.
A fence surrounded the estate, but the front gate was swinging open. Malone saw it and took a deep breath. Now, he told himself, or never. He drove the Lincoln through the opening slowly, alert for almost anything.
There was no disturbance. Thirty yards from the front door he pulled the car to a cautious stop and got out. He started to walk toward the building. Each step seemed to take whole minutes, and everything he had thought raced through his mind again.
Nothing seemed to move anywhere, except Malone himself.
Was he right? Were the PRS people really here? Or had he been led astray by them? Had he been manipulated as easily as they had manipulated so many others?
That was possible. But it wasn’t the only possibility.
Suppose, he thought, that he was perfectly right, and that the PRS members were waiting inside. And suppose, too, that he’d misunderstood their motives.
Suppose they were just waiting for him to get a little closer.
Malone kept walking.
In just a few steps, he would be close enough so that a bullet aimed at him from the house hadn’t a real chance of missing him.
And it didn’t have to be bullets, either. They might have set a trap, he thought, and were waiting for him to walk right into it. Then they would hold him prisoner while they devised ways to…
To what? He didn’t know. And that was even worse; it called up horrible terrors from the darkest depths of Malone’s mind. He continued to walk forward, feeling about as exposed as a restaurant lamb chop caught with its panty down.
He reached the steps that led up to the porch, and took them one at a time.
He stood on the porch. A long second passed.
He took a step toward the high, wide and handsome oaken door. Then he took another step, and another.
What was waiting for him inside?
He took a deep breath, and pressed the doorbell button.
The door swung open immediately, and Malone involuntarily stepped back.
The owner of the house smiled at him from the doorway. Malone let out his breath in one long sigh of relief.
“I was hoping it would be you,” he said weakly. “May I come in?”
“Why, certainly, Malone. Come on in. We’ve been expecting you, you know,” said Andrew J. Burris, director of the FBI.
CHAPTER 15
Malone sat, quietly relaxed and almost completely at ease, in the depths of a huge, comfortable, old-fashioned Morris chair. Three similar chairs were clustered with his, around a squat, massive coffee table made of a single slab of dark wood set on short, curved legs. Malone looked around at the other three with a relaxed feeling of recognition: Andrew J. Burris, Sir Lewis Carter, and Luba Vasilovna Garbitsch.
“That mind shield of yours,” Burris was saying, “is functioning very well. We weren’t entirely sure you had actually located us until you pulled into that driveway.”
“I wasn’t entirely sure what I was locating,” Malone said.
“And so it’s over,” Burris said with a satisfied air. “Everything’s over.”
“And just beginning,” Sir Lewis put in. He drew a pipe from an inside pocket and began to fill it.
“And, of course,” Burris said, “just beginning. Things do that; they go round and round in circles. It’s what makes everything so confusing.”
“And so much fun,” Lou said, leaning back in her chair. She didn’t look hostile now, Malone thought; she looked like a cat, wary but content. He decided that he liked this Lou even better than the old one. Lou, at home among her psionic colleagues, was even more than he’d ever thought she could be.
“More what?” she said suddenly. Burris jerked upright a trifle.
“What’s more what?” he said. “Damn it, let’s stick to one thing or the other. As soon as this thing starts mixing talk and thought it confuses me.”
“Never mind,” Lou said. She smiled across the table at Malone.
Malone jerked a finger under his collar.
“What made you decide to come here?” Sir Lewis said. He had the pipe lit now, and blew a cloud of fragrant smoke over the table.
Malone wondered where to start. “One of the clues,” he said at last, “was the efficiency of the FBI. It hit me the same way the efficiency of the PRS had hit me, while I was looking at the batch of reports that had been run off so rapidly.”
“Ah,” Sir Lewis said. “The dossiers.”
“Dossiers?” Burris said.
Sir Lewis puffed at his pipe. “Sorry,” he said. “I thought you had been tuned in for that.”
“I was busy,” Burris said. “I can’t tune into everything. After all, I’ve only got one mind.”
“And two hands,” Malone said at random.
“At least,” Lou said. Their eyes met in a glance of perfect understanding.
“What the hell do hands have to do with it?” Burris said.
Sir Lewis shrugged. “Tune in and see,” he said. “It’s an old joke; but you’ll never really adjust to telepathy un
less you practice.”
“Damn it,” Burris said, “I practice. I’m always practicing. This and that and the other thing—after all, I am the director of the FBI. There’s a lot to be done.”
Sir Lewis puffed at his pipe again. “At any rate,” he said smoothly, “Mr. Malone had requested some dossiers on us. On the PRS, myself, and Luba. They arrived very quickly. The efficiency of that arrival, and the efficiency he’d been noting about the FBI ever since he began work on this case, finally struck home to him.”
“Ah,” Burris said. “You see? The FBI’s a full-time job. It’s got to be efficient.”
“Of course,” Sir Lewis said soothingly.
“Anyhow,” Malone said, “Sir Lewis is right. While every other branch of the government was having its troubles with the Great Confusion, the FBI was ticking along like a transistorized computer.”
“A good start,” Sir Lewis said.
“Darn good,” Burris said. “Malone, I knew I could depend on you. You’re a good man.”
Malone swallowed hard. “Well, anyway,” he said after a pause, “when I saw that I began to remember a few other things. Starting with a couple of years ago, when we first found Her Majesty, remember?”
“I’ll never forget it,” Burris said fervently. “She knighted me. Knight Commander of the Queen’s Own FBI. What a moment.”
“Thrilling,” Malone said. “But you got to Yucca Flats for your knighting awfully quickly, a little too fast even for a modern plane.”
“It had to be done,” Burris said. “Anyhow, I’ve never really liked planes. Basically unsafe. People crash in them.”
“But you wouldn’t,” Malone said. “You could always teleport yourself out.”
“Sure,” Burris said. “But that’s troublesome. Why bother? Anyhow, I’d been to Yucca Flats before, so I could teleport there—a little way down the road, where I could meet my car—without any trouble.”
“Anyhow, that was one thing,” Malone said. “And then there was Her Majesty, when she pointed at that visiphone screen and accused you of being the telepathic spy. Remember?”
“She wasn’t pointing at me,” Burris said. “She was pointing at the man in the next room. How about you doing some remembering?”
“Sure she was,” Malone said. “But it was just a little coincidence. And I have a hunch she felt, subconsciously, that there was something not quite right about you.”
“Maybe,” Burris conceded. “But that doesn’t answer my question.”
“It doesn’t?” Malone said.
“Now look, Malone,” Burris said. “None of this is proof. Not real proof. Not the kind the FBI has trained you to look for.”
“But—”
“What I want to know,” Burris said, “is why you came here, to my home? And in spite of everything you’ve said, that hasn’t been tied down.”
Malone frowned. After a second’s thought he said, “Well… All I know is that it just seemed obvious. That’s all.”
“Indeed it is,” Sir Lewis said. “But one of the things we’ll have to teach you, my boy, is how to distinguish between a deduction from observed fact and a psionic intuition. You’ve been confusing them for some years now.”
“I have?” Malone said.
“Sure you have,” Burris said. “And, what’s more—”
“Well, he’s no worse than you are, Andrew,” Lou said.
Burris turned. “Me?” he said in a voice of withering scorn.
“Certainly,” Lou said. “After all, you’ve never really become used to mixtures of thought and speech. And, what’s more, you’ve been using telepathy so long that when you try to communicate with nothing but words you only confuse yourself.”
“And everybody else,” Sir Lewis added.
“Hmpf,” Burris said. “I’m busy all the time. I haven’t got any extra time for practice.”
Malone nodded, comparatively unsurprised. He’d wondered for years how a man so obviously unable to express himself clearly could run an organization like the FBI as well as he did. Having psionic abilities evidently led to drawbacks as well as advantages.
“Actually,” he said, “my prescience made one mistake.”
“Really?” Burris said, looking both worried and pleased about it.
“I expected the place to be full of people,” Malone said. “I thought the elite corps of the PRS would be here.”
“Oh,” Burris said, looking crestfallen.
“Why, that was no mistake,” Sir Lewis said. “As a matter of fact, they are all here. But they’re quite busy at the moment; things are coming to a head, you know, and they must work quite undisturbed.”
“And this,” Burris added, “is a good place for it. There are sixty rooms in this house. Sixty.”
“That’s a lot of rooms,” Malone said politely.
“A mansion,” Burris said. “A positive mansion. And my family has lived here ever since—”
“I’m sure Ken isn’t very interested in your family just now,” Lou broke in.
“My family,” Burris said with dignity, “is a very interesting family.”
“I’m sure it must be,” Lou said demurely. Sir Lewis choked with laughter suddenly and began waving his pipe. After a minute, Malone joined in.
“Damn it,” Burris said. “Let’s stick to one thing or the other. Did I say that?”
“Twice,” Malone said.
“Sixty rooms,” Burris said. “All built by my family. And local contractors, of course. That’s enough to house sixty rooms full of people. And that number of people is a large houseful, I should think.”
“It sounds like a lot,” Malone said.
“It is a lot,” Burris said. “All in my house. The house my family built.”
“And we’re grateful for it,” Sir Lewis said soothingly. “We truly are.”
“Good,” Burris said.
“You must have had a large family,” Lou said.
“A large family,” Burris said, “and many guests. Many, many guests. From all over. Including famous people. General Hood slept in this house, and he slept very well indeed.”
“As a matter of fact,” Lou added, “he’s still sleeping. They call it being dead.”
“That’s not funny,” Burris snapped.
“Sorry,” Lou said. “It was meant to be.”
“I—” Burris shut his mouth and glared.
Malone was far away, thinking of the sixty rooms full of people, sitting quietly, their minds ranging into the distance, meshed together in small units. It was a picture that frightened and comforted him at the same time. He wasn’t sure he liked it, but he certainly didn’t dislike it, either.
After all, he told himself confusedly, too many cooks save a stitch in time.
He veered away from that sentence quickly. “Tell me,” he said, “were you receiving my broadcast on the way here?”
Burris and Sir Lewis nodded. Lou started to nod, too, but stopped and looked surprised. “You mean you didn’t know we were?” she said.
“How could I know?” Malone said. “After all, I was just tossing it out and hoping that somebody was on the listening end.”
“But of course somebody was,” Lou said. “I was.”
“Good,” Malone said. “But I still don’t see how I was supposed to know that you—”
“I answered you, silly,” Lou said. “I kept on answering you. Remember?”
Malone blinked, focused and then said, very slowly, “That was my imagination. Please tell me it was my imagination before I go nuts.”
“Sorry,” Lou said. “It wasn’t.”
“But that kind of thing,” Malone said, “it takes a tremendous amount of power, doesn’t it?”
“Not when the receiver is a telepath,” Lou said sweetly.
Malone nodded slowly. “That,” he said, “is exactly what I’m afraid of. Don’t tell me—”
There was silence.
“Well?” Malone said.
“You said not to tell you,
” Lou said instantly.
“All right,” Malone said. “I rescind the order. Am I a telepath, or am I not?”
Lou’s lips didn’t move. But then, they didn’t have to.
The message came, unbidden, into Malone’s mind.
Of course you are. That was the whole reason for Andrew’s assigning you to this type of case.
“My God,” Malone said softly.
Sir Lewis laid down his pipe in a handy ashtray. “Of course,” he said, “you will find it difficult to pick up anyone but Lou, at first. The rapport between you two is really quite strong.”
“Very strong indeed,” Lou murmured. Malone found himself beginning to blush.
“It will be some time yet,” Sir Lewis went on, “before you can really call yourself a telepath, my boy.”
“I’ll bet it will,” Malone said. “Before I can call myself a telepath I’m going to have to get thoroughly used to the idea. And that’s going to take a long, long time indeed.”
“You only think that,” Sir Lewis said. “Actually, you’re used to the idea now. That was Andrew’s big job.”
“His big job?” Malone said. “Now, wait a minute—”
“You don’t think I picked you for our first psionics case out of thin air, do you?” Burris said. “Before anything else, you had to be forced to accept the fact that such things as telepaths really existed.”
“Oh, they do,” Malone said. “They certainly do.”
“There’s me, for instance,” Burris said. “But you had to be convinced. So I ordered you to go out and find one.”
“Like the Bluebird of Happiness,” Malone said.
Burris frowned. “What’s like the Bluebird of Happiness?” he said.
“You are,” Malone said.
“I am not,” Burris said indignantly. “Bluebirds eat worms. My God, Malone.”
“But the Bluebird,” Malone said doggedly, “was right at home all the time, while everyone searched for it far away. And I had to go far away to find a telepath, when you were the one who ordered me to do it.”
“Right,” Burris said. “So you went and found Her Majesty. And, when you did find her, she forced acceptance on you simply by being Her Majesty and proving to you, once and for all, that she could read minds.”
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