Slowly and carefully, Troy went through the rest of the house. Room by room. There was a desk in the living-room, but all of the drawers were locked. That would require special attention later. Some magazines in the rack next to the couch. Army and sports magazines, some well-thumbed copies of Newsweek and the Reader's Digest. A few shelves of books. Old texts and military manuals from OCS. Some newer ones still in their dustjackets. Popular novels, engineering texts, some historical studies, 'a guide to western ski resorts. He wanted a record of the titles to look at later.
One thing about QCIC, they had some interesting gadgets. The small Japanese camera was completely electronic. Instead of film it recorded pictures on an electronic card — up to ten exposures a second. It could also be adjusted to any range of visible or invisible light. He set it now to ultraviolet. The UV flashgun emitted only a weak blue glow that he could see. It was a brilliant flash to the camera. He photographed the spines of all the books, then stowed the camera away again.
It was in the main bedroom upstairs, under the rug beside the double bed, that he found the inset panel. The floor was made of polished oak boards and the wooden panel had been set into them, flush on all sides. There was a small indentation on one edge that his finger just fitted into. When he pulled, the panel opened like a door on its concealed hinges. Set into concrete beneath it was a combination safe.
'Now isn't that nice,' he said, rubbing his hands together in appreciation. 'A really big one. Too big just for his medals and cheque-books. It would be very interesting to find out just what it does contain.'
He used the phone beside the bed to dial Kelly's number. It was picked up on the first ring.
'Harmon here. I've found a floor safe, a large one. I wonder if you can help me.'
'That's very interesting. I'm sure that we can. Did you notice what make it is?'
'Yes. An Atlas Executive. No keyholes. No hinges visible. A single dial with numbers running up to ninety-nine.'
'Very good. We'll have someone there in under an hour.'
While he was waiting, Troy went back downstairs and looked into the desk; a picklock opened it quickly. There was some correspondence, the usual collection of bills and receipts, cancelled cheques and cheque-book stubs. He made no attempt to examine the contents in detail, but photographed it instead. It was a quick job and he had put everything in order and locked the desk again when the well-worn truck pulled up less than forty-five minutes later. The sign on the side said ANDY THE PLUMBER—24 HOUR EMERGENCY SERVICE. Andy was dressed in work-clothes and carried a large and battered toolbox. He locked the truck and strolled, whistling, up the drive. Troy opened the door, just before he pressed the bell, and let him in.
'I'm Andy, just like the truck says. I hear you got a problem with some financial plumbing.' He took the toothpick from his mouth and carefully put it into his pocket. 'Where's it at?'
'Upstairs. I'll show you.'
Andy knew his job well. The battered toolbox was pristine inside, with tools and equipment set into shaped niches in the velvet-lined trays. He knelt and admired the safe.
'Nice,' he said, rubbing his hands together. 'Very secure. Fireproof, good for a couple of thousand degrees for a couple of hours. Impossible to crack.'
'Then you can't open it?'
'Did I say that?' He took a metal box with a wire antenna from its niche and switched it on. 'I mean your run-of-the-mill safecracker couldn't do a thing with it. He would just walk away. I can open anything. But let's first see if there are any electronics or alarms wired to it. No, it's clean. Now let's listen to it sing. No tumblers, so you can't hear them fall. But there are ways.'
Troy didn't ask what they were. It wasn't his business. Andy was using supersonics, something, to probe the guts of the safe. A number of small battery powered devices were attached to the knob and the front plate. The largest of the gadgets had solid state circuitry and a digital read-out. It took Andy less than fifteen minutes to work his electronic magic. Then he whistled as he detached all of his machines and put them away.
'Aren't you going to open it?' Troy asked. Andy shook his head no.
'Not my job. I'm a technician, not a lawbreaker.' One of his compact instruments looked like a printing calculator. Andy tapped out a series of instructions; and it buzzed and ejected a slip of paper. He handed it to Troy. The paper had a short list of letters and numbers printed on it.
'R means right,' Andy said. 'And as you might have guessed L is left. Turn the knob a couple of times counterclockwise to clear it before you start, then just set the numbers in the order the way it reads. The door is spring loaded, it'll just pop open at the last number. After you close it again give it a couple of more spins, then set it to fifty-six which is what it was at when I came in. Someone might remember that number. Have a good day now.'
Troy watched him drive away, then went back to the bedroom. Andy's electronics had done their job well. When Troy had set the last number he felt the safe door push up against his hand. It opened about an inch, leaving more than enough room for him to get his fingers under the edge to open it all the way. He looked inside and saw that the safe contained only one thing.
Neatly stacked ingots of gold, gold sheets and gold wire.
It was very attractive indeed. The more he worked with gold the more he admired it. There really was nothing else like it in the world. Reaching down into the safe he lifted off the top ingot and weighed it in the palm of his hand. It was solid gold all right. Nothing else, not even lead, had that massive feel to it, the dense weight-to-size ratio. He started to put it back in its resting place — then stopped, his eyes narrowed in thought. Something here was just not right.
Troy placed the gold ingot onto the carpet, then bent over the safe, making a rough count of the rest of the ingots. He could not see them all, but he could make an estimate. A moment's work on the calculator verified his suspicion. But he had to be sure.
He opened his notebook beside the safe, then lay flat on his stomach. He wasn't much of an artist, but a rough sketch would be good enough. With careful strokes he drew the pile of ingots, then outlined the positions of the wire and sheets of gold. When this was done to his satisfaction he laid aside the notebook and carefully, piece by piece, removed the gold from the safe, piling it onto his closed attaché case. When almost a third of the gold had been stacked on the case he stood and went into the bathroom to get the spring scale he had noticed there earlier. It would be accurate enough for a rough count.
Troy stood on the scale. One seventy-five fully dressed; the thing was at least five pounds off. That wouldn't matter. He made a note of the weight in his notebook then stepped back onto the scale holding the attaché case with its burden of gold. He did this three times, making careful record of the total weight each time. When he was finished he replaced the gold exactly as he had found it.
The mathematics were simple indeed. His weight, along with that of the unburdened attaché case, was one hundred and eighty-three pounds. He multiplied that by three, then multiplied his fully laden weight by three, and subtracted the smaller number from the larger.
The result was just over thirty-nine pounds.
Thirty-nine pounds of gold.
That was an awful lot of gold. A moment's work with the calculator verified that. The last time he had looked gold was around four hundred and thirty-six dollars an ounce. But a Troy pound was only point eight-two-three of an Avoirdupois pound. He fed this correction in, then divided by twelve since there were only twelves ounces to the Troy pound.