"Oh, you conceivably might see Lotta again anyhow. I'm not threatening you; I'm offering you an absolute guarantee." Once again Ann seemed poised, in control of yerself. "We'll put the resources of the Library behind persuading her to leave Joe Tinbane and returning to you; it won't be coercion; it'll be nothing more than making her appreciate how much you care for her. How much you've given up for her sake. You gave up forty-five billion poscreds to get her back; she'll understand that
... some of the Erads are very good at making intricate issues clear."
"I'll take you elsewhere," Sebastian said to the robot Carl Junior. "Where we can work the sale out." He seized Ann Fisher by the arm, led her in one swift motion from the store and out onto the sidewalk. The robot Carl Junior silently followed.
As he locked up the vitarium, Ann said, "You stupid foodhead. You stupid, stupid foodhead." Her voice rang sharply, as he and Carl Junior started toward the rickety outside stairs which led to the roof and his parked car.
"We have always pitted ourselves against the Library," Carl Junior said as they ascended the unpainted wooden stairs. "They want to erad the new teachings of the Anarch; they want to expunge every trace of the transcendental doctrine which he has brought back. Which I _presume_ he has brought back. Is that so, Mr. Hermes? Has his discourse so far indicated a religious experience of magnitude and depth?"
"Very much so," Sebastian said. "He's been dictating and talking from the moment we revived him, to everyone in sight."
They reached his parked car; he unlocked the door and the robot got inside.
"What power does the Library have over your wife?" Carl Junior asked as the car shot up into the night. "As much as that girl alleged?"
"I don't know," Sebastian said. He wondered how well Joe Tinbane could protect Lotta, while she remained with him. Probably fairly well, he decided. Joe Tinbane had gotten her out of the Library in the first place... he could therefore be expected, reasonably, to keep her from being hauled back. How persistent, really, would the Library be? After all, this was a side issue, a vendetta on the part of Ann Fisher, not a fundamental aspect of Library policy.
And it appeared to be the Erad Council which dictated policy, not Ann.
"A threat," he said aloud to the robot. "Intimidation. A power-oriented woman always hints at violence unless you do what she says." He thought about Lotta, and how different she was; how impossible it would be for her to utilize the intimidation of hinted-at force to get what she wanted.
I'm lucky, he thought, to have a wife like that. Or _was_ lucky. Whichever it turns out to be. With the help of God.
"If the Library injures your wife," the robot seated beside him said, "you will probably retaliate. Against that girl personally. Am I wrong or am I right? Choose one."
Sebastian said tightly, "You're right."
"That girl must realize that. It will probably deter her."
"Probably," he agreed. A bluff, he thought; that's what it is; Ann Fisher must know what I'd do to her. "Let's talk about other topics," he said to the robot; he was afraid to think further in that direction. "I'm taking you to my conapt," he said. "The Anarch is not there, but we can work out price and the method of custody-transfer. We have a standard operating procedure; I see no reason why it can't be applied in this case."
'We trust you," the robot said warmly. "But of course we'll need to see the Anarch before we pay over the money. To certify that you do in fact have possession of him and that he's alive. And we'd like to talk briefly with him."
"No," Sebastian said. "You can see him but not talk to him."
"Why not?" The robot regarded him curiously.
"What the Anarch has to say," Sebastian said, "isn't a factor in this sale. It never is; the business of a vitarium isn't conducted on that basis."
After a pause the robot said, "So we must take your word for it that the Anarch brought something of value back."
"That's correct," he agreed.
"At the price you're asking--"
"It makes no nevermind," Sebastian said. He always had a canny sense about this aspect of his business; he never budged.
The robot said, "Payment will be made to you in our own currency. In banknotes of the Free Negro Municipality."
As Ann Fisher warned me, Sebastian thought with a chill. In this instance she told the truth. And the Rome party--they warned me, too. "In W.U.S. notes," he said.
"We deal only in our own specie." The robot's voice was flat. Final. "I have no. power to negotiate on any other basis. If you insist on W.U.S. notes, then let me off. I'll have to report to His Mightiness Mr. Roberts that we couldn't reach an agreement."
"Then he goes to the People's Topical Library," Sebastian said. And, he thought, I get my wife back.
"The Anarch would not want that," Carl Junior said.
True, Sebastian realized. However, he said, "We're required to make the decision; we possess the legal right, in these cases."
"There has never been a case like this before," the robot said, "in the history of the world. Except," he hastily amended, "once. But that happened long ago."
"Can't you help me get my wife back?" Sebastian demanded. "Don't the Uditi have a corps of commandos for operations like this?"
"The Offspring exist only for vengeance," the robot said dispassionately. "And anyhow we are not strong in the W.U.S. Back home it would be different."
Lotta, he thought. Did I lose you? To the Library?
And then, strangely, he found himself contemplating--not his wife--but Ann Fisher. The earlier hours, when they had walked the evening streets window-shopping. When they had fiercely besported themselves in bed. I shouldn't remember that, he realized. That was faked; she had been given a job to do.
But it had proved good, for a time. Before the power-play manifested itself, and the chic, soft exterior ebbed away to reveal the iron.
"An attractive girl, that Library agent," the robot said, acutely.
"Misleading," he said gruffly.
"Isn't it always? You buy the wrappings. It's always a surprise. I personally found her typical of Library people, attractive and otherwise. Have you decided to let me off, or will you accept F.N.M. currency?"
"I'll accept it," he said. It didn't really matter; the ritual of business, which he had maneuvered through for so many years, meant nothing, now. Considering the greater context.
Maybe I can reach Joe Tinbane by way of the police radio system, he conjectured. Warn him. That would be enough; if Joe Tinbane knew that the Library was seeking him he'd do the rest... for himself and Lotta. And isn't that what matters? Not whether I get her back?
He lifted the receiver of his car's vidphone and dialed the number of Joe Tinbane's precinct station. "I want to get hold of an Officer Tinbane," he informed the police switchboard operator, when he had her. "He's off duty, but this constitutes an emergency; his personal safety is involved."
"Your name, sir." The police operator waited.
Food, Sebastian thought. Joe'll think I'm trying to track him down to retrieve Lotta; he won't acknowledge my call. So there's no way I can get through, at least not via the police. "Tell him," he said to the operator, "that Library agents are out after him. He'll understand." He rang off. And wondered bleakly if the message would be conveyed.
"Is he your wife's paramour?" the robot inquired.
Sebastian, soundlessly, nodded.
"Your concern for him is most Christian," the robot acknowledged. "You are to be commended."
Sebastian said curtly, "This is the second calculated risk I've taken in less than two days." Digging up the Anarch in advance of his rebirth had been risky enough; now he gambled that the Library wouldn't reach out and squash Tinbane and Lotta. It made him ilclass="underline" he did not possess the mental constitution for such ventures, one right after the other. "He'd do the same for me," he said.