He saw, between the two FBI men, a scrawny woman, attractive, but with wild, animosity-filled eyes. "Hello, Mrs. Zoe Hada," Max said. "Listen, I know sumpthin' about you; you're the only genuine Mrs. Hada – the others are imposters, right? And Sebastian's done you dirt." He waited, and saw the expression on her face change.
"Yes," Zoe said. "I've been in courts for six years trying to prove what you just said. I can hardly believe it; are you really going to help me?"
"Sure," Max said. "But you got to do it my way; I mean, if you're waiting for that skunk Hada to change, you're wasting your time. About all you can do" – he paused – "is even up the score."
The violence which had left her face crept back as she understood, gradually, what he meant.
Frowning, Dr. Ito Yasumi said, "I have now made my examination, Hada." He began putting away his battery of cards. "This Rags Park is neither telepath or precog; he neither reads my mind nor cognates what is to be and, frankly, Hada, although I still sense psi power about him, I have no idea what it might be."
Hada listened in silence. Now Rags Park, this time with a guitar over his shoulder, wandered in from the other room. It seemed to amuse him that Dr. Yasumi could make nothing of him; he grinned at both of them and then seated himself. "I'm a puzzle," he said to Hada. "Either you got too much when you hired me or not enough… but you don't know which and neither does Dr. Yasumi or me."
"I want you to start at once over CULTURE," Hada told him impatiently. "Make up and sing folk ballads that depict the unfair imprisonment and harassment of Jim-Jam Briskin by Leon Lait and his FBI. Make Lait appear a monster; make Fischer appear a scheming, greedy boob. Understand?"
"Sure," Rags Park said, nodding. "We got to get public opinion aroused. I knew that when I signed; I ain't just entertaining no more."
Dr. Yasumi said to Rags, "Listen, I have favor to ask. Make up folk-style ballad telling how Jim-Jam Briskin get out of jail."
Both Hada and Rags Park glanced at him.
"Not about what is," Yasumi explained, "but about that which we want to be."
Shrugging, Park said, "Okay."
The door to Hada's office burst open and the chief of his bodyguards, Dieter Saxton, put his head excitedly in. "Mr. Hada, we just gunned down a woman who was trying to get through to you with a homemade bomb. Do you have a moment to identify her? We think maybe it's – I mean it was – one of your wives."
"God in heaven," Hada said, and hurried along with Saxton from the office and down the corridor.
There on the floor, near the front entrance of the demesne, lay a woman he knew. Zoe, he thought. He knelt down, touched her.
"Sorry," Saxton mumbled. "We had to, Mr. Hada."
"All right," he said. "I believe you if you say so." He greatly trusted Saxton; after all, he had to.
Saxton said, "I think from now on you better have one of us close by you at all times. I don't mean outside your office; I mean within physical touch."
"I wonder if Max Fischer sent her here," Hada said.
"The chances are good," Saxton said. "I'd make book on it."
"Just because I'm trying to get Jim-Jam Briskin released." Hada was thoroughly shaken. "It really amazes me." He rose to his feet unsteadily.
"Let me go after Fischer," Saxton urged in a low voice. "For your protection. He has no right to be President; Unicephalon 40-D is our only legal President and we all know Fischer put it out of commission."
"No," Hada murmured. "I don't like murder."
"It's not murder," Saxton said. "It's protection for you and your wives and children."
"Maybe so," Hada said, "but I still can't do it. At least not yet." He left Saxton and made his way with difficulty back to his office, where Rags Park and Dr. Yasumi waited.
"We heard," Yasumi said to him. "Bear up, Hada. The woman was a paranoid schizophrenic with delusions of persecution; without psychotherapy it was inevitable that she would meet a violent death. Do not blame yourself or Mr. Saxton."
Hada said, "And at one time I loved that woman."
Dolefully strumming on his guitar, Rags Park sang to himself; the words were not audible. Perhaps he was practicing on his ballad of Jim Briskin's escape from jail.
"Take Mr. Saxton's advice," Dr. Yasumi said. "Protect yourself at all times." He patted Hada on the shoulder.
Rags spoke up, "Mr. Hada, I think I've got my ballad now. About -"
"I don't want to hear it," Hada said harshly. "Not now." He wished the two of them would leave; he wanted to be by himself.
Maybe I should fight back, he thought. Dr. Yasumi recommends it; now Dieter Saxton recommends it. What would Jim-Jam recommend? He has a sound mind… he would say, Don't employ murder. I know that would be his answer; I know him.
And if he says not to, I won't.
Dr. Yasumi was instructing Rags Park, "A ballad, please, about that vase of gladioli over there on the bookcase. Tell how it rise up straight in the air and hover; all right?"
"What kind of ballad is that?" Rags said. "Anyhow, I got my work cut out for me; you heard what Mr. Hada said."
"But I'm still testing you," Dr. Yasumi grumbled.
To his cousin the Attorney General, Max Fischer said disgustedly, "Well, we didn't get him."
"No, Max," Leon Lait agreed. "He's got good men in his employ; he's not an individual like Briskin, he's a whole corporation."
Moodily, Max said, "I read a book once that said if three people are competing, eventually two of them will join together and gang up on the third one. It's inevitable. That's exactly what's happened; Hada and Briskin are buddies, and I'm alone. We have to split them apart, Leon, and get one of them on our side against the other. Once Briskin liked me. Only he disapproved of my methods."
Leon said, "Wait'll he hears about Zoe Hada trying to kill her ex-husband; then Briskin'll really disapprove of you."
"You think it's impossible to win him over now?"
"I sure do, Max. You're in a worse position than ever, regarding him. Forget about winning him over."
"There's some idea in my mind, though," Max said. "I can't quite make out what it is yet, but it has to do with freeing Jim-Jam in the hopes that he'll feel gratitude."
"You're out of your mind," Leon said. "How come you ever thought of an idea like that? It isn't like you."
"I don't know," Max groaned. "But there it is."
To Sebastian Hada, Rags Park said, "Uh, I think maybe I got me a ballad now, Mr. Hada. Like Dr. Yasumi suggested. It has to do with telling how Jim-Jam Briskin gets out of jail. You want to hear it?"
Dully, Hada nodded. "Go ahead." After all, he was paying the folksinger; he might as well get something for his money.
Twanging away, Rags sang:
"Jim-Jam Briskin languished in jail,
Couldn't find no one to put up his bail.
Blame Max Fischer! Blame Max Fischer!"
Rags explained, "That's the chorus, 'Blame Max Fischer!' Okay?"
"All right," Hada said, nodding.
"The Lord came along, said, Max, I'm mad.
Casting that man in jail, that was bad.
Blame Max Fischer! the good Lord cried.
Poor Jim Briskin, his rights denied.
Blame Max Fischer! I'm here to tell;
Good Lord say, Him go straight to hell.
Repent, Max Fischer! There's only one route:
Get on my good side; let Jim-Jam out."
Rags explained to Hada, "Now here's what's going to happen." He cleared his throat: