The Penultimate Truth

14

In the sun that filtered through the vine-entangled latticework of the patio of his Capetown villa, Louis Runcible lay prone, listening to the report by the Footeman, the abstract-carrier representative from the international private police corporation originating in London, Webster Foote, Limited.

"On Monday morning," the Footeman said, reading from his compiled documents, "our monitoring devices picked up a vidcall between two Yance-men, Joseph Adams who is in Ideas and Verne Lindblom who is in Construct, that is, a builder for Eisenbludt, generally speaking, although of late Brose has had him at the Agency in New York."

"And this conversation," Louis Runcible said. "It mentioned me?"

"No," the Footeman admitted.

"Then for chrissake--"

"We feel--that is, Mr. Foote himself personally feels that you should be given this data. Allow me to summarize it."

Dully, Runcible said, "Okay. Summarize." Hell, he thought; I know they're out to get me. I better be receiving something from you for my money besides just knowing _that_. Because I don't need Webster Foote to tell me _that_.

The Footeman said, "Adams and Lindblom discussed the next visual project which Eisenbludt will film at his Moscow studios; it will be the destruct of San Francisco. Adams mentioned a new speech which he had written to be 'vacked and then programmed to the sim. 'Hand done,' he described it."

"And for this I'm paying you--"

"A moment please, Mr. Runcible," the Footeman said frostily in his English manner. "I will now quote the direct words of the Yance man Lindblom, as our monitors picked them up. 'I heard a rumor.' He was speaking, you understand, to his friend. 'You're going to be pulled off speeches and put onto a special project. Don't ask me what; my source didn't know. A Footeman told me.' " The Footeman was silent, then.

"What next?"

"Then," the Footeman said, "archeology was mentioned."

"Hmm."

"They joked about the destruct of ancient Carthage and the war fleet of Athens. It was amusing, but of no relevance. Allow me, however, to make this point. What the Yance-man Lindblom said was untrue. No one from our corporation informed him of any 'special project.' He undoubtedly told Adams that so that Adams would not press him for details. Obviously his source came from within the New York Agency. However--"

"However," Runcible said, "we know there's a special project being inaugurated and that an idea man and one of Eisenbludt's fake city builders are involved, and that it's top secret. Even within the Agency."

"Correct. This is indicated by Lindblom's unwillingness to--"

"What's Webster Foote's theory about it?" Runcible asked. "What's he think might be going on?"

"Since this vidphone conversation on Monday the builder Verne Lindblom has been perpetually at work; he has slept either at the Agency or at Eisenbludt's studios in Moscow--he has not had time to return to his demesne and take his leisure. Second. No speech by Adams has been 'vacked this week. In other words, before he could 'vac the speech which he--"

"And that," Runcible said, "is _all_ you guys have found out? That's it?"

"We know only one more item which might pertain. Brose left Geneva several times and flew by high-velocity flapple to the Agency. And at least once--and possibly twice--conferred with Adams, Lindblom, and possibly one or two others; we're not sure, frankly. As I say, Mr. Foote believes that this 'special project' is connected with you in some manner, and, as you know, Mr. Foote relies on his mild but quite helpful parapsychological hunches, his precog ability to foresee coming events.

"He does not, however, in this instance, foresee anything clearly. But he wants to emphasize this point; _please notify him of anything unusual that occurs in your business operations_. No matter how trivial. And contact Mr. Foote immediately, before you do anything else; Mr. Foote is quite frankly, on an extrasensory level, concerned as to your welfare."

Runcible said tartly, "I wish Webster's concern had brought more actual data to light."

With a deprecatory, philosophic gesture the Footeman said, "No doubt so does Mr. Foote himself." He shuffled and reshuffled his documents, in an effort to conjure up something more. "Oh. One item. Not related that we know of, but interesting. A Yance-man, female, named Arlene Davidson, who has a demesne in New Jersey; the Agency's top draftsman. Died of a massive coronary during the past weekend. Late Saturday night."

"Any effort made to obtain an artiforg heart for her?"

"None."

"The skunk," Runcible said, meaning Brose. Hating him--if it were possible to hate Brose any more than he did already.

"She was known," the Footeman said, "to have a weak heart. Enlarged, from childhood, due to rheumatic fever."

"In other words--"

"She may have been given a deadline for something major; overworked. But that's conjecture. It is not usual, however, for Brose to go so often out of Geneva to New York; he is, after all, in his eighties. This 'special project'--"

"Yeah," Runcible agreed. "It must really be something." Again he pondered, and then he said, "Brose has, of course, penetrated deep into my enterprise."

"Correct."

"But I don't know and you don't know--"

"We have never been able to tag the Brose agent or agents in your operations. I'm sorry." He looked, too, genuinely unhappy; it would have been a major coup of Webster Foote, Limited, to have unearthed the Brose-creatures on Runcible's payroll.

"What I'm wondering about," Runcible murmured, "is Utah."

"Pardon?"

"I'm all ready to give the signal to my auto-rigs and leady teams near what used to be St. George to go ahead." This was pretty widely known.

"Mr. Foote is aware of that, but he has no recommendation; at least none he passed on to me."

Raising himself up, then turning over and getting to his feet, Louis Runcible said, "I guess there's no use in waiting. I'll vid them to go ahead and start digging. And hope."

"Yes sir." The Footeman nodded.

"Fifty thousand people," Runcible said.

"Yes, it'll be large."

"Who will be living where they ought to be, under the sun. Not down in a septic tank. Like a salamander at the bottom of a dried-up well."

Still shuffling his documents, trying to come up with something of use, trying and unhappily failing, the abstract-carrier Footeman said, "I wish you good luck. Maybe next time..." And he wondered if, for Runcible, there would _be_ a further report. This inadequate-- admittedly so--one today might well be the last, if his employer Webster Foote's extrasensory intimation were at all correct.

And generally they proved to be.