On Monday morning Ripley drove to the bank and deposited sixty thousand dollars in the rarely-used company account, then went on to his office. The weather was better than usual for late September and the only hint of approaching Fall was in the ochreous tinge of the grass in the park. He put his car in the busy parking lot at the side of the building, went into the cool brown cave of the entrance hall and reached his third-floor office without seeing another person. He felt as though he lived in a ghost town.
In the cramped stillness of his office he picked up the phone, buttoned Logicon Incorporated’s Vancouver number and got through to Sara Peart, secretary to the Western Region sales manager.
“Hi, Sara,” he said brightly. “This is Hank.”
“Hank who?”
“Hank Ripley. In Lethbridge. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the name.”
“I wasn’t sure if you still worked for us, that’s all.”
“Sharp as ever, Sara, sharp as ever. Is the old man in?”
“You sure you want to disturb him on a Monday morning?”
“I’m not going to disturb him. I just want to find out if he can let me have a Model 30 off the shelf, in a hurry.”
“You mean you’ve sold one?” Sara sounded more incredulous than was strictly necessary, and Ripley began throttling the cord that carried her voice.
“Of course I’ve sold one.” He kept cool. “Didn’t you read my latest report? I mailed it Friday night.”
“I never was much of a science fiction buff.”
Before Ripley could attempt an answer the phone clicked, and he was through to Boyd Devereaux.
“Nice to hear from you again, Hank—sometimes I think you neglect us a little out here on the coast.”
With a thrill of almost superstitious dread, Ripley recognised that Devereaux was doing his coolly menacing bit. “Good morning, Boyd. I’ve closed a cash deal for a Logicon 30,” he said quickly, wishing he had caught his boss in his jovial tyrant incarnation. “Can you let me have one out of inventory right away?”
“A cash deal?” Devereaux said after a slight pause.
“Yes. The money’s in the company account as of half an hour ago.”
“Well, that’s just great, my boy—I knew I was right in defending you at the last few regional sales conferences.”
“Thanks, Boyd.” Ripley squirmed, marvelling at Devereaux’s skill in making a pat on the back feel like a karate blow.
“Who’s the customer? I don’t remember seeing anything …’
“Mervyn Parr—I mentioned him in my last report. As a matter of fact, Boyd, I’ve been working on this man for quite a few weeks now, but it was such an off-beat way-out hunch that I didn’t like to list him as a genuine prospect till I was sure.” Sweating freely under the strain of creative labour. Ripley went on to sketch in a picture of an idiosyncratic oil baron whose hobby was higher mathematics, and who had been interested in buying his own computer through meeting Ripley at an exclusive cocktail party. When he had finished there was a ruminative silence on the line and he wondered if he had overdone it with the invention of the party.
“Hank, my boy, this is great,” Devereaux said at last. “Do you know what I’m going to do?”
“Uh—no, Boyd. I don’t.”
“I’m going to see that you get a bit of recognition. Young Julian Roxby, our PR chief, tells me he is on the look-out for a good feature on the prairie provinces for the Logicon Review. I’m going to get him to send a reporter and a cameraman across to Lethbridge and give this sale of yours a real splash. We’ll get you and this man Parr together; a shot of the Model 30 in his ranch-style living room …’
“We can’t do that,” Ripley neighed frantically. “Sorry, Boyd. Strictly no publicity—Mr. Parr insists.”
“That’s not so good, Hank.”
“It can’t be helped. Mr. Parr is very publicity-shy. Almost a recluse, you might say. Why, he even wants to take delivery of the unit himself, from my office here, so that nobody’ll see our truck going to his place.”
“Are you sure his hobby is mathematics?” Devereaux demanded suspiciously.
“Well, I can’t imagine him doing anything very immoral with a Model 30. Hah! Unless he gets up to some trick with the high-speed print-out.” Ripley laughed dustily then remembered, too late, that Devereaux was running for office in the Social Credit government and had a strong Puritanical streak.
“I find myself wondering just how effective our product orientation course was in your case, Hank,” Devereaux said coldly. “Now I want you to speak to your friend Mr. Parr, and get his agreement for full internal and external publicity. Have you got that?”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
When Ripley finally got off the phone he felt as though he had completed a full day’s work—and the morning had only just begun.
The computer was delivered to the office early on Wednesday, and Parr rang to enquire about it an hour later. He sounded agreeably surprised at the promptness of the delivery, but hung up before he could be tackled about publicity for the sale. Ripley walked round and round the slick grey-and-white plastic cube of the crate in an agony of decision. Devereaux had sounded determined; Parr had sounded even more determined—and Hank Ripley was caught squarely between them. He began to feel it-would have been better had he never spoiled his record of failure.
It was almost lunchtime when the office door opened and Parr came in wearing a different but equally expensive dark suit. He showed his grey teeth in satisfaction when he saw the crate.
“Good morning, Mr. Parr,” Ripley said heartily. “Well, there she is—the most compact middle-range computer in the world.”
“Don’t start selling it to me now.” Parr spoke tersely, with none of the rueful friendliness he had shown on their first meeting. “You’ve provided a full set of operating instructions?”
“Of course. There shouldn’t be any difficulty in …’
“Help me get it down to the van.”
“Sure—but there’s just one thing …’
“Well?” Parr’s cholesterol-rimmed eyes were distinctly impatient.
“It’s about publicity for the deal. Logicon has a firm policy about these things.”
Parr sighed. “Refund my money in cash, please. My department doesn’t want any traceable credit transactions.”
“I … It isn’t really a firm policy. I just thought I should mention it.” Ripley began to perspire.
“Help me get this crate down to the van.” Parr made the request in exactly the same tone of voice as before, signifying his contempt.
“Glad to.” Ripley decided he had done all that Logicon could expect of him. He began pushing the plastic cube, which moved fairly easily on its runners, and Parr hovered around guiding it through doorways to the elevator. The ring finger of his right hand was still banded with white. At street level they slid the crate out to a blue Dodge van which had the words “Rockalta Transport Hire’ on the sides, and stowed it in the back. When the doors were closed on the computer, Parr signed the delivery receipts without speaking and turned away.
“It’s been a pleasure to do business with you, Mr. Parr.” Ripley’s sarcasm seemed to go unnoticed, and he went back into the foyer swallowing his resentment. He paused at the inner door and looked back. Parr had just got into the driving seat and was doing something with his hands, one of them performing a screwing movement over the other. The van had moved off into the traffic stream before Ripley realised Parr had been putting on a ring. He went back up to his office, thinking hard about Mr. Mervyn Parr. The business with the ring had aroused his curiosity. What reason could Parr have for not wanting Ripley to see it? And, while questions were being asked, why did an academic dress like a highly successful businessman and speak like a preacher? On impulse, Ripley looked up the number of the New University of Western Canada and rang its Department of Sociology. Ten minutes later he had talked to almost as many people and had established that the department had nobody called Parr on either its administrative or lecturing staff.