didn't know about," saidLindsay. "Mind telling me who sent you?"
"Not at all. It was my sponsors, the New Hibernian A.C." He frowned."According to the computers I was in. There's going to be hell to payover my muffing it."
"How do you feel about that?" the Martian asked him.
O'Ryan shrugged. "It's okay by me," he said. "They can hardly degrade mefor fouling up this kind of a job. I'll simply tell them theirinformation was incomplete. No one knew you knew _judo_." He eyed thegin, added, "A good thing you didn't feed me whiskey. I'm allergic toall grain products--even in alcohol. Comes from being fed too muchMcCann's Irish oatmeal when I was a kid."
"Interesting," said Lindsay, wondering how the conversation had takenthis turn. "What does whiskey do to you?"
The gladiator shuddered. "It usually hits me about twenty-four hoursafterward. Makes my eyes water so I can't see much. I've got a match atthe Colosseum tomorrow night. I hope you'll be there."
"So do I," said Lindsay dryly. "You wouldn't know _who_ gave you thislittle chore on me, would you?"
"Not likely," said the gladiator. "When we report at the club everyevening we find our assignments stuck in our boxes. Usually we getorders to meet a dame. This was something different."
"I see what you mean," Lindsay told him.
O'Ryan got up, said, "Well, I might as well be running along. I'll givethem hell for fouling up the computer-prophecy. Look me up after thematch tomorrow. And thanks for not having me pinched. I might have hadto spend the night in a cell. That's bad for conditioning."
"You're quite welcome," said Lindsay, feeling like a character in asemi-nightmare. "Will I be seeing you again--this way?"
"Unlikely," the gladiator told him. "They'll have to run a lot of checkson you after this before they try again. See you tomorrow."
Lindsay looked after his visitor with amazement. Then it occurred to himthat computers were substituting not only for human judgment but forhuman conscience as well. And this, he felt certain, was important.
Turning in on his contour couch, Lindsay recalled that he had givenwhiskey to the allergic athlete. He decided then and there that he wouldbe in attendance at the match in the Colosseum that evening.
* * * * *
He got to his office about eleven o'clock. His desk was stacked highwith messages, written and taped, and all sorts of folk wished to talkwith him on the vidarphone. Nina, looking more slovenly than ever, hadarranged them neatly, according to their nature and importance inseparate little piles.
"Next time you tear up the pea-patch," she informed him resentfully,"I'm going to get in some help." She eyed him with somber speculation,added, "I hear the Sec-Gen turned in early last night."
"You've got big ears," said Lindsay.
"I get around," she said. "I'm supposed to keep tabs on you, boss."
"Then you must know someone tried to kill me early this morning when Icame back from Natchez."
Nina's eyes narrowed alarmingly under the glasses that covered them. Shesaid, "Why didn't you report it?" She sounded like a commander-in-chiefquestioning a junior aide for faulty judgment.
"I won," Lindsay said simply. "There was no danger."
"Who was it?" she asked. And, when he hesitated, "I'm not going to shoutit from the housetops, boss."
"It was Pat O'Ryan."
"_You_ handled _Pat_?" she asked, apparently astonished. Something inher tone told him Nina knew his would-be assassin.
"Why not?" he countered. "It wasn't much of a brawl."
"But Pat...." she began, and hesitated. Then, all business again, "We'dbetter get at some of this. You have a date to be psyched by Dr. Cravenat two o'clock."
"What for?" he asked, startled.
"Routine," she told him. "Everyone connected with UW has to go throughit. But cheer up, boss, it doesn't hurt--much."
"Okay," he said resignedly. "Let's get to work."
While he dictated Lindsay found himself wondering just who was payingNina's real salary. If she were a spy for the same group that had sentO'Ryan to kill him, his position was delicate, to put it mildly. But forsome reason he doubted it. There were too many groups working at once tomake any such simple solution probable.
When she departed briefly to superintend a minor matter out of theoffice, he found himself staring at the wastebasket by his tilt-chair. Aheart-shaped jewel-box of transparent crystoplastic lay within it.Curious, Lindsay plucked it out. It had evidently held some sort ofnecklace and bore the mark of Zoffany's, the Capital's costliestjeweler. Within it was a note that read: _For Nina, who lost lastnight--as ever...._ The signature was an indecipherable scrawl.
Lindsay stuck the card in his wallet, returned the box to thewastebasket. Who in hell, he wondered, would be sending this sort ofgift to his slatternly thick-bodied secretary. The answer seemedobvious. The sender was her real boss, paying her off in a personal waythat would obviate suspicion. Lindsay wondered exactly what Nina hadlost.
He was not surprised when she said she would come along to thepsychiatrist's with him after an office lunch of veal pralines, soyabuns and coffee. He suggested she might be tired, might want the dayoff.
She said, "Night soil, boss! Between the Sec-Gen's daughter and thingslike Pat O'Ryan I'm going to keep an eye on you."
As if on signal the vidar-screen lit up and Maria's face appeared on it.She had not donned harmopan or glasses and looked quite as lovely as shehad the night before. She said, "Zalen, I've got to see you tonight.Something has come up."
Lindsay nodded. He figured out his schedule, suggested, "I'm going tothe match in the Colosseum. Why not take it in with me?"
She shook her head, told him, "I'm tangled up at a banquet for theEgypto-Ethiopian delegation. I can meet you afterward though. How aboutthe Pelican?"
"That's not very private," he protested.
"All the more reason," she announced. "This is _important_!"
"And seeing me in private isn't?" Despite himself a trace of woundedmale entered his tone.
Maria laughed softly, her dark eyes dancing. "Perhaps later," she saidsoftly. "You'll understand when I talk to you." She clicked off and thescreen was empty.
"Damned cat!" said Nina through a haze of cigarette-smoke. "Watch outfor her, boss--she's a cannibal."
"And I'm a bit tough and stringy," he told her.
Nina said, "Night soil!" again under her breath and led the way out ofthe office. Lindsay wondered if she were jealous.
* * * * *
Dr. Craven received them in a comfortable chamber, the north wall ofwhich was all glass brick, the south wall a solid bank of screens anddials. He was a soft-faced man who wore lozenge-shaped light bluespectacles and seemed afflicted with a slight chin rash. He caughtLindsay's regard, rubbed his chin in mild embarrassment, said, "I've amild allergy to paranoids."
Lindsay looked at Nina distrustfully but she nodded and said, "Goahead--he won't break your arm. I'll wait outside."
The psychiatrist closed his office door. After settling him in acomfortable contour couch, Dr. Craven opened up with, "I don't want youto have any worries about this test, Ambassador. If anybody's crazy hereit's me. According to very sound current theory all psychiatrists areinsane. If we weren't we wouldn't be so concerned with sanity inothers."
Lindsay asked, "Why in hell am I being tested anyway?"
Craven replied, "President Giovannini himself came in for a voluntarycheckup just last week." As if that were an answer.
Lindsay suppressed a desire to ask if the North American president hadall his marbles. He had an idea any levity he displayed would registeragainst him. Dr. Craven asked him a number of apparently routinequestions which Lindsay answered via a recorder. How old he was, whetherhe liked flowers, how often he had fought with his schoolmates as a boy,what sort of food he preferred.
"Good," the doctor said, pushing aside the microphone on his desk andmotioning Lindsay to do likewise. He rose, wheeled a device like anold-fashione
d beautician's hair-drier close to the couch, adjusted thehelmet to Lindsay's head. "Now," he added, "I want you to think asclearly as you can of your mother. Keep your eyes on the screen and giveme as clear a picture as you can."
He pressed a button and the whir of a camera, also focussed on thescreen, sounded from the wall behind Lindsay. When Dr.