"You're very smart, professor. Now if you're really smart, you'll tell us what we want to know."
All right. Time, Remo thought.
He stepped in through the partially opened door. "Good afternoon, professor," he said, smiling stupidly. There were only three men and it took no imagination at all to pick Dr. Quake. He was a heavy man, not really fat, but heavy, wrapped in a tweed Jacket and pants that matched neither each other nor him. His face was a perfect sphere and an electric shock of graying black hair ran halfway down his forehead, where it met the upward thrust of a giant set of iron-gray eyebrows that splayed in all directions like frozen splashes of hair, shooting up to the sides and down over his metal-rimmed glasses. He was sitting on a high stool next to the laboratory table. The other two men were standing. They were young, Mafia types.
A typical Mafia pair. One looked as if he had an IQ of seven. The other looked intelligent enough, but had all the facial character of the third boy from the left in the road production of Guys and Dolls.
IQ Seven turned to Quake. "Who the hell is this creep?" he said, nodding his head in derision at Remo, who still wore the white trousers, shirt and sneakers of the morning.
"I'm Remo Blomberg, the professor's assistant," Remo said. "Professor, there's no point in trying to fool these men any longer. I think, yes, I truly think that we should give them the secret of the earthquakes."
The two Mafia men stared at Remo and did not notice Dr. Quake start to say "but . . .".
Remo talked to the two men directly. "It's a new machine we've invented," raising his voice to carry over the steady thumping that filled the room. "We call it the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scalerizer." So much for Smith's geology textbooks.
"Yeah?" said the smart one. "Well, how do you work it?"
"It works off Vitamin E compound. You treat the ground as if it were a yeast, you see, and you pump it full of carbon dioxide. This creates a gaseous imbalance. Then you inject large quantities of Vitamin E-not the stuff you buy in the drugstore, of course-but real, power-packed Vitamin E. And you pump it into the fissures with pneumatic ninja shots. It relieves the gaseous imbalance and you have an earthquake. It's really quite simple," he said, bending over, playing with the crease of his pants, trying not to laugh.
He looked up. "Anyone can work it. A geological belch. We've caused a few minor earthquakes with it, already. Do you want to buy one? Got a town you want destroyed?"
The two hoodlums were confused now. Their instructions obviously did not carry this far. They looked at each other, then the smarter one spoke again: "We want to see it first."
Remo addressed Dr. Quake. "Professor. There's really no use in not cooperating. I'll show them the Mercalli Scalerizer." That's two for Smith. Remo was fast becoming a convert to the cause of education.
Remo turned to go back through the door. Get them away from Quake. The one hood who had done all the talking waved at the professor. "You stay put, Professor, and don't try anything stupid. We're not forgetting that you tried to lie to us. We'll be back."
The two men followed Remo who led them through the next laboratory and out into the hall. Remo heard one of them say: "Blomberg, eh? Trust a Jew to know when to play ball."
Remo led them down the stone hall toward the other end of the building, looking for a door that was sure to be open. To his left, he saw one slightly ajar.
"It's in here, men," he said, waving his arm to the left. He pushed open the door and walked in, the two men right at his heels.
He was in a small kitchen.
"This is a kitchen," one man said.
"That's right," Remo said. "We keep it in the refrigerator. You don't think we'd leave it laying around where prying eyes could see it, do you?"
He opened the refrigerator door and beckoned the two men closer. "There it is," he said, pointing with a royal index finger into the bowels of the refrigerator where a quarter-pound stick of margarine sat on a red saucer. The two men stepped forward. A step, two steps, then around the door and in front of the refrigerator. Remo went up in the air and came down with an elbow on the top of the skull of the one who had yet to speak a word; the skull went all soft and mushy under his elbow, then the man dropped to the floor.
Remo was behind the second man, his right hand around the back of the man's neck, his fingers like talons, biting into the clusters of the nerves. The man screamed. His arms were extended rigidly at his sides, frozen there by pain.
"All right," Remo said. "Which one of you is Musso?"
He relieved the pressure a little so the man could answer.
He gasped. "Musso ain't here. He went back. He told us to call him later and tell him what we found out."
Remo squeezed again. "Which one killed Curpwell?" then released the pressure and the man hissed, "Musso did. With an ice-pick. That's how he works."
"What are you guys after?" Remo asked.
The man's arms were still extended stiffly at his sides. He answered: "Somebody's making earthquakes and shaking down people. Don Fiavorante sent Musso to find out about it."
"Don Fiavorante?"
"Yeah. Pubescio. He's the head man."
"What's your name?"
"Festa. Sammy Festa," the man snivelled.
"All right, Sammy. I'm going to let you live. For awhile." He squeezed harder again. "You go back. You tell Musso and you tell Pubescio that they stay away. Tell them to forget earthquakes if they know what's good for them. Tell them to stay away from Doctor Quake. Tell them if they come back to San Aquino County, they're going out in a doggy bag. Especially Musso. You tell him that" He squeezed even harder. "You got that?"
"I got it. I got it."
Remo released his grip on the man's neck and Festa made a clumsy move for a gun under his jacket. He wheeled toward Remo. Then Remo's hand was around Festa's and around the gun.
"That Cadillac got power steering?"
"Yeah."
"Then you can drive it with one hand?"
"Yeah."
Remo fractured Festa's forearm. The gun clattered on the floor. Festa screamed with pain, then looked down at the gun, then up at Remo.
Remo was smiling. "Remember to tell Musso what I said. My name is Remo. He may want to know that."
Festa clutched his broken arm, pain contorting his pretty-boy features. "I'm sure he's gonna want to know that."
"Be sure to tell him. Remember, my name is Remo. Now get out of here, before I change my mind."
Festa was out the front door before Remo reached the corridor. When Remo passed the front door, he saw the Cadillac swerving back out of its parking space and speeding away from the institute.
Good. That'll bring Musso back. Remo wanted him . . . for Curpwell. But his chief job was to track down the earthquake people and he couldn't spend time on side trips. But if Musso came back? Well, not even Smith could complain if Remo defended himself. After all, what else can you do against a man with an icepick?
Doctor Quake was still seated at the high stool in his laboratory office when Remo returned.
The infernal machine in the corner was still running, filling the laboratory with thumping, and Remo said: "Can't you turn that damn thing off?"
"No," Quake said. "It's an endurance test. It's been running for three days. The goal is a whole week. You know, I don't think they were from the FBI at all."
"They weren't," Remo said. "Mafia."
"Mafia? Oh, dear. What would they want with me?" Dr. Quake's eyebrows lifted, as if with a life of their own. When they lowered, they threatened to cover his entire eyeball.
"They want to know how to make earthquakes. Someone around here knows how and those two goons thought it was you."
"Two? Oh yes, two. But there were four before."
"Four? What happened to the others?"
"They went off with my girls. The laboratory assistants."
"Now where the hell did they go?," Remo asked. "The girls might be hurt." He was worried now.
Then another voice
came. "We're not hurt."
Remo turned behind him, toward the door, and his eyes opened wider. Two girls stood there, perhaps in their early 20's. They wore identical clothing, white tee shirts with a clenched red fist on them and the imprint N.O.W., and blue jeans. But that wasn't what caught Remo's eye.
What caught Remo's eye was the extraordinary breasts on both of them. They were bra-less, but their breasts were firm and vibrant, and so large that they intimidated the fabric of the tee-shirts they wore. Remo thought of the two girls instantly as the eighth and ninth wonders of the world. Or considering two each, the eighth, ninth, tenth and eleventh wonders of the world.
Only as an afterthought did Remo look at their faces, alabaster white and lovely under jet-black hair- which proved that Remo had been in California too long because he regarded as an oddity any girl who wasn't blonde and tanned. He thought all this, then realized the girls were identical twins.
"Are you all right, daddy?" one of them asked, and they walked up to Doctor Quake's side, boobs a-jiggle, bubbly and bouncy under the tee shirts, butts awobble that he told himself was sick and degenerate, then leaned back to savour.
He sat back onto a chair, crossed his legs discreetly, and if he had it in him to blush, he would have blushed.
Imagine. Two of them looking like that,
One girl put a hand on Dr. Quake's shoulder. "We were worried," she said.
"Oh, no. Nothing to worry about. This gentleman here saw to that."
Both girls now looked closely at Remo and one stepped toward his side, and stood next to his chair.
Remo said, "But we were worried about you. Those were Mafia guys, you know. What happened to the two you were with?"
The girl by Quake hesitated. Then she said, "They left."
"Without their car?"
The girl looked confused. The girl by Remo's side spoke up. "They decided to stretch their legs and walk. They said their friends would pick them up along the road." The other girl giggled. Obviously, she thought that was funny.
"Oh," Remo said.
"By the way," said the girl standing next to Dr. Quake, "who are you?"
"Name's Remo. Remo Blomberg." He tried to force his eyes to her face, tried to meet her eyes, tried desperately to look at something beside her breasts.
He was not successful. If he had been, he would have seen surprise. Instead, he saw only bosom. The girl next to Remo moved even closer to him, then put her hand on the back of his chair. She was only a bite away, throbbing and pulsating with each heart beat and breath.
"What are your names?" Remo said.
"I'm sorry," Doctor Quake said. "These are my two daughters. They assist me. This is Jacki and that's Jill."
Remo looked up at the girl next to him and caught her eyes past the edge of her bosom.
"Jacki and Jill," he said. "That's cutesy poo."
The girl leaned down close to his ear. "Would it be cutesy-poo if I grabbed you and squeezed?" she whispered.
"No," Remo said. "That would be a no-no. Or, maybe a no-no no-no," he said, recalculating his arithmetic.
"They're identical twins," Doctor Quake said, belatedly and unnecessarily.
Remo nodded, then to the girl at his side, he said softly: "You're not really identical."
"No?"
"No. I make you out to be a 42-D. I figure she's only a 41%."
"Mother always liked me best," Jill said, then added, "I didn't think you'd notice."
"Yeah. And if you put me in the Sistine Chapel, I wouldn't look at the ceiling."
"A lot of men don't. In California, anyway. You know how they are. I thought maybe you."
"Don't let the sailor suit fool you," Remo said. Then louder, "What is it you do here?"
Remo had addressed the question to Quake, but the scientist's head was turned, looking over toward the corner from which the steady thumping sound came.
Remo repeated the question, this time to the girls. "What is it you do here?"
"If you can stand up without embarrassing yourself," said 41DD at Doctor Quake's shoulder, "we'll show you."
Inhale. Heavy on the oxygen. Drain blood out of the groin. Flood the lungs, the brain. Think of fields of daises . . . daisies. It took Remo a split second and he was able to stand almost straight up.
"The power of negative thinking," he pronounced. Then Jill, standing next to him, put her hand on the small of his back.
Remo sat down again. "On second thought, why don't you tell me about it while I sit here? I'm rather comfortable."
He crossed his legs awkwardly.
"Don't be embarrassed," Jill said, whispering hotly in his ear. "We do that to people sometimes." Her hot breath didn't help. Neither did her left breast laying heavily on his shoulder.
"You're like a pornographer's daydream," Remo said. "Go ahead. I'll give you a head start."
Jill walked away from Remo to the far corner of the room where the machine thumped away. Carefully and with great effort, Remo arose and followed her. Jacki's eyes played with Remo as he passed her, and then she followed him. Doctor Quake brought up the rear.
"This is daddy's invention. The way we're going to make the world earthquake proof," Jill said, pointing to the machine on the table. It was the size and shape of a five-gallon gas can and was painted bright blue.
"What is it?" Remo asked.
"Well, you could call it a water laser."
"A water laser?" Remo's mind shuffled through the one percent of the geology book that he still remembered.
Then, "I never heard of such a thing."
"Of course not. It's still experimental." Jacki's voice came from over Remo's shoulder.
"What does it do?"
Jill answered. "You've seen light lasers, which intensify the power of light by amplifying their waves. You know. Lasers can cut stone and metal. Even diamonds. Well, the professor has done the same thing with water. Water flows in a wave pattern, crests and troughs. Doctor Quake has smoothed out the waves, so that the force is steady-no pulsations and no vibration. This machine will be able to focus a flow of water into a stream of tremendous power."
"What has that got to do with earthquakes?" Remo asked, forgetting Jill's boobs for the moment.
Dr. Quake spoke up, in that funereal, words-of-God voice. "The San Andreas fault is six hundred miles long, Mr. Blomberg. Every mile along the fault, we have drilled and dropped shafts. These shafts are loaded with sensors-to measure heat, pressure and other things, too-and their readings are recorded back on the computer in the other room.
"With constant monitoring, we can tell when the pressure on one side of the fault is building higher than the pressure on the other side. That's the pressure that creates an earthquake as nature tries to equalize the pressure."
He stopped as if he had answered Remo's question.
"Yes," Remo said. "But what does this machine have to do with earthquakes?"
"Oh, yes. The water-laser. Well, by hooking this device up to those shafts before the pressure reaches a critical point, we could pour water pressure down into the fault. The tremendous power of the water surge will literally force the rock apart, with only a modest tremor. But it relieves the pressure instantly and can prevent a major earthquake."
"If it works," Remo said, "That's a great invention."
"Oh, it works," said Jacki, standing alongside Dr. Quake.
"Can you convince your idiotic government that they should assist us with our research? No," she hissed. "They'd rather be building bombs and spending billions to mess up people's lives in Asia. And the Professor has had to struggle along without funds."
"Without funds?" Remo said. "Somebody built the building. Somebody pays your salaries."
Jill interrupted. "Friends," she said. "Donations from people and foundations that understand the importance of our work. Without them, we never would have gotten this far."
"How far?"
"Far enough to test the device," Jill said. "And it works. At least, theoretically. What
we have to do now is to improve our water-laser. Its power and its endurance." She thumped her hand on the side of the blue metal pump. As she hit it, her breasts jiggled under her thin tee shirt.
She smiled at Remo. "Like a demonstration?" she said.
"Anytime," he said, and then realized she was talking of the water-laser. "Sure," he said.
From a pitcher on the table, she poured a small glass of water. "Mind you," she said. "This model's just experimental. But it shows the principle."
She turned off the motor and the laboratory rang with the sudden silence. She lifted off the top of the water-laser and poured in the glass of water. "The device uses its own internal water supply," she explained.
From the side of the water-laser, there was a nozzle similar to a spout on a gas can. She began to twist a knurled nut. "I'm narrowing the stream," she said. "It's adjustable."
She turned the laser so the spout faced Remo. From a bench she took a steel plate a few inches square, and handed it to Remo. "Hold it in front of the spout," she said. "And brace yourself."
Remo took a good grip on the steel plate and held it in front of the spout. Just one cup of water. How much force could be generated from one cup of water?
Jill tossed a switch and the pump began to groan again. Remo could hear it churning and could tell by its rising pitch that it was building up to top power. And then he was almost lifted off his feet, as a jet of water shot from the front of the water-laser, smashing against the steel plate. His arms were rigid and Remo had gripped the plate with all his strength, but the force of the water acted as a battering ram and knocked Remo five feet backwards.
Remo's arms throbbed with the pressure of the water against the plate, and then the pressure suddenly stopped as the machine stepped itself down, resuming a steady, low throb.
Jill laughed at the look on Remo's face.
"I'm impressed," Remo said.
"The secret is the lack of wave pattern in the water," Jill said. "There's no surge, just a steady force. If we focus a stream of water to a narrow extreme it can cut through metal. If we use a wide stream, it can crush. You just saw us use a cup of water. The water-laser holds five gallons when it's full."
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