I grinned. "Maybe we'll improve with practice. Anyway, it's nice to lie in bed after sitting up all night on the plane. We might as well make ourselves comfortable and hold a council of war; we may not have another chance to talk freely for quite a while. Can I get you a drink or cigarette or something?"
"My cigarettes are in my purse, on the dresser. Thanks."
Standing by the bed, I held a match for her, and set an ashtray on the little table beside her. There was something pleasantly illicit about loafing around a luxurious hotel room in pajamas in the middle of the day with a pretty girl for company, even if she did know judo and karate and could keep all her shots inside the critical ones of a man-sized target at combat ranges. I decided that our romantic interlude, for all its shortcomings, had served a useful purpose. Certainly it had averted a lot of the strains and frustrations that would inevitably have developed had we tried to fake the essential man-wife relationship indefinitely.
Standing there, I looked down at my pint-sized partner thoughtfully. Her eyes were very blue against her brown skin, which in turn looked smooth and warm against the pale hair and white nightie.
She blew smoke up at me and said, "Cut it out, Helm."
"Cut what out?"
"Don't be a sentimental slob. You're standing there willing yourself to like me, aren't you? Maybe even fall in love with me a little, for God's sake! Just because we've made a little sex together-and rather badly, at that-you feel obliged to tell yourself how cute the wittle girl looks in the gweat big bed. Well, pour yourself a drink or something and stop romanticizing. Remember that any resemblance between us and a pair of lovebirds is strictly phony. We're just a couple of hired clowns practicing our vaudeville turn."
She was right, of course. I grinned and got back into bed beside her, pulled up the covers, and arranged some pillows behind us.
"Sure," I said. "Now if you're quite through putting me in my place, maybe we can discuss some matters of real importance."
She turned to look at me, a little startled. After a moment she laughed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean… well, maybe I did. Matters of importance like what?"
"Like a guy named Buchanan, who's dead. And a guy named McRow, who isn't, but you're supposed to correct that unfortunate condition at your earliest convenience. Always assuming that somehow we can manage to locate Dr. McRow and bring you within effective range of him."
She frowned. "McRow. They wouldn't tell me. It was a big secret. They just gave me the general background of the job. McRow. I never heard of him. McRow." She tasted the sound of it. "First name?"
"Archibald," I said. "It doesn't seem quite fair, does
"What do you mean?"
"A poor guy saddled with a name like Archibald would seem to have troubles enough already without having nasty characters like us gunning for him."
Winnie didn't smile. Well, maybe it wasn't very funny. She said curtly, "Description?"
"Forty-seven, five-seven, one-ninety."
"A middle-aged butterball," she murmured.
"That's right. Short and chubby. Round face. Dark hair combed to cover a bald patch. Brown eyes, somewhat myopic, corrected with gold-rimmed glasses. Small hands and feet. Clean-shaven when he bothers to shave, but he's apt to neglect such minor details when in the grip of scientific enthusiasm, and I gather he gets gripped fairly often. Clothes generally shabby, adorned with acid burns and other chemical decorations. Lots of brains and a terrible character, they say. He can't get along with anybody, and nobody can get along with him. He sees himself as the only intelligent person in a world full of morons, all of whom are trying to take advantage of his genius."
"Are they?"
"Well, sure. Isn't that what genius is for?" I asked. "He worked for a big drug company first. They made a mint off one of his discoveries-some fancy antibiotic-and he just got his salary and a small bonus. That was the way his contract read. Then he got himself a new contract and dug up some other stuff that was interesting and potentially lucrative, only without knowing it he'd kind of crossed the fence into fields that were being cultivated by the government for military purposes. Suddenly he found himself working for the biological warfare boys under very strict security, still making no more than a lousy four figure salary-well, maybe five by this time-and he's a man, we're told, who likes to dream in millions. Don't for a minute get Archie mixed up with your idealistic, scientific dreamers, doll. His fantasies, sleeping or waking, seem to deal mainly with dough."
"Go on."
"With this attitude, it was only natural," I said, "that when somebody came along and waved some real cash under his nose, he grabbed it and vanished. He left behind a note saying that the Fourteenth Amendment had abolished slavery and nobody had the right to tell him where to work or for how much. He also intimated that there was no need for the U.S. authorities to worry about his compromising their silly security in any way, since neither he nor his new sponsors had the slightest interest in the childish and obsolete stuff the government people had had him on. He had much more fascinating projects in mind. Under the circumstances, he wrote, he saw no reason why ~ his departure should be the subject of any official concern whatever, and he would resent, strongly, any further interference in his affairs." I shrugged. "In a way, you can see his point. After all, it's his brain and it seems to be a pretty good one. You can hardly blame him for wanting to cash in on it."
Winnie said coolly, "It isn't our business to see people's points, Mr. Helm."
I glanced at her sideways, and moved my shoulders slightly. There had been a few moments when we'd been practically human together; perhaps it was just as well we were getting away from that. If she wanted to take a tough and humorless attitude toward the work-well, it's generally considered pretty tough and humorless work.
I said, "You may call me Matt. Incredible though it may seem, wives do address their husbands with such disrespectful familiarity these decadent days."
She said, still unsmiling, "I don't suppose the government paid much attention to Dr. McRow's warning, Matt."
I said, "Hell, you know those Washington bureaucrats, Winnie. They didn't even realize it was a serious warning.
They were so impressed with their own importance that it simply didn't occur to them that one chubby little man with glasses would have the nerve to warn them off.- them, and the United States of America. They went after him." I grimaced. "That is to say, they sent people after him. Despite the note, they decided that he was endangering the national security, or something."
"What happened?"
"Nothing much," I said, "at first. They had a hell of a time locating him. Then, after several months, an agent picked up some kind of a trail out west in the California mountains. Shortly thereafter, said agent disappeared. A little while later he reappeared, dead. He'd apparently contracted a severe case of measles while he was missing."
"Measles? You don't die of measles."
I said dryly, "It kind of depends on the measles. And on the natural immunity of the subject. There are cases on record of primitive tribes wiped out by ordinary measles, when they made contact with civilization. Apparently, since he vanished, Archie has developed a private brand that affects civilized people the same way. He was thoughtful enough to have a warning sign pinned to the infected body, or California might have had a nasty epidemic."
Winnie said, "That sounds like grandstanding to me."
"Not only to you," I said. "The idea has occurred to others. Anyway, investigation of the area turned up a deserted building that had been used as a lab-quite an elaborate setup, as a matter of fact-but it was stripped and deserted. McRow's sponsors, whoever they are, had had time to move their genius and his operation elsewhere. The next time he was spotted, he had a place up in the Andes, but again the agent who picked up the trail managed to stick his neck in a noose before he could pinpoint the location. This one died of chicken pox. And don't tell me you don't die of chicken pox, doll. The agent's health record even showed he'd had a severe case as a child, but Archie's trained bugs paid no attention to his built-in immunity. They killed him dead."