E:\ZFICTION\OTHER\ARRANGE.TXT The First Arrangement There was an annoying hissing sound, the static of a radio adjusted between stations. Ryan was thirsty, and his neck was painfully twisted. As he turned his head to ease the strain, his neck turned within a band that didn't move with him. He wanted to touch it, but he didn't seem to have arms. No legs, either, and something was over his eyes. Everything else seemed to be functioning, painfully, but his movements were restricted in a way that suggested that in addition to the restraint around his neck, he was fastened at wrist and ankle. One could hope that someone expected him to recover the use of his limbs. Between the static and whatever was stuffed into his ears, he could not hear. Neither could he see, but vibrations, air movements, and infrared suggested that someone was near. That someone moved away and returned with a second warm body and the reek of used tobacco. A light moved over his face. "Please." The word was so blurred that Ryan stopped and began again. "Please . . . may . . . I . . . have . . . water." A buzzer of the sort that might come with a radio code practice set said "dahdit dahdahdah". "Howmuch . . . ransom." Tobacco-breath's fist wasn't much clearer than Ryan's hoarse whisper, but the message was simple: "5-0-0- K". "Half millun . . . take a week . . . prolly more." The only reply was a flash of light, painful even through the blindfold, accompanied by a welcome flash of infrared. Ryan faded out again. He was awakened by the touch of a warm hand and a light inspecting his face. The presence moved on as though inspecting the rest of him. He was all too aware of having arms and legs, and instinctively began to flex them as best he could to restore the circulation. The presence, as if in response, moved to the head of the slab on which he lay. "GOOD EEUENINME". This fist was even more uncertain than the other, with many irregular pauses as if looking up the symbol. The operator, however, smelled faintly of cologne. "Good Evening." His voice was no less hoarse, and now it was thick with thirst, but he had control again. "May I have some water now?" "NOT YET" "May I use the washroom?" Cologne did not answer, but presented a bedpan with competence that contrasted sharply with her sloppy fist. In continued silence she bathed him from head to toe, combed his hair, and skillfully rubbed life into his limbs. While Cologne was rubbing him down, Tobacco approached and offered Ryan the nipple of a baby's bottle. It was filled with pure water and Ryan accepted, but he'd scarcely taken four ounces when Tobacco snatched it away again and both presences moved away from the table. Ryan called after them, "Thank you. May I have a blanket?" There was no response. He began to stretch, that being the only movement possible. A flashbulb went off, not so close this time. Presently Tobacco returned and seated himself at the sending key that was fastened to the table between Ryan's outstretched arms. "WE ARE GOING TO MAKE RECORDING. I WILL SEND ONE SENTENCE. YOU WILL REPEAT IT EXACTLY WHEN MICROPHONE IS PLACED ON YOUR CHEST. YOU WILL NOT SAY ANYTHING ELSE. iT THIS CLEAR?" Ryan said, "Yes, sir." The recording was short, but making it was a long and exhausting task because Tobacco's sending was slow and hard to read. Tobacco fed Ryan the rest of the bottle in installments to keep his voice from failing, four whole ounces of water. Drug-induced thirst would have enabled him to put away a gallon over the same length of time. After Tobacco left, Ryan (knowing that he would never be stronger) proved that the strands over his wrists would neither break, stretch, nor slip. * * * Molly woke in the night and went to check on the prisoner. The flashlight beam spotlighted a man-sized foot, toenails a healthy pink, ankle cords snug but not tight. The left foot the same. The bruises on his legs had begun to fade, likewise those around the waist and across the hairless chest. Neck cords were secure, and his face showed him to be peacefully asleep. She turned the light aside before it woke him. The bruises on his arms were fading too, fingernails a healthy pink, wrist cords . . . there were red stains on the wrist cords. Molly tried to pry back the fingers. The hand uncurled of itself, turned its back, turned palm up, and relaxed again. Molly sighed for her broken rest and turned the static up to daytime level. She closed the door carefully, warmed some water, and shook Bill respectfully. "Honey! Wake up, Darlin'! I need you." "What's happenin'?" "I have to wash his hands. He's cut himself." Groaning, Bill heaved himself to his feet, groped for his flashlight, and entered the cell. Bill stood by Ryan's hip, holding the light and lending help when needed while Molly cleaned Ryan's left hand, tried to wash the stains out of the cords, and applied antiseptic and dressings. When she began to tie his fingers individually to tongue depressors stuck through a bandage around his wrist, Ryan spoke. "Do you really think I'm dumb enough to do it again?" Molly considered saying, "What makes you think I think these little sticks would stop you?" but the remark did not seem worth sending in code. She laid a towel over the finished hand and began work on the other. When she had done and was gathering up her equipment, Ryan said, "Thank you." Bill slammed the cell door behind him. "Damned idiot! Waking us up in the middle of the night!" "I should have known he would try it, but I don't see how we could have stopped him." "I could try breaking both his arms." By the time she'd cleaned up and gone to bed, Bill was sound asleep. Pity. He could be a real tiger when he was angry. The next morning, while she was frying bacon on the camp stove, Bill nibbled her ear and said, "Hey, what was the idea with the sticks?" "Just to keep his fingers straight while the scabs are forming. I'll take them off after breakfast, if you'll hold the light." "Our little golden boy could have done without." Uneasily remembering the automatic way the hands had stretched and turned when she touched them, and the rest of him as limp as a wet rag, Molly suspected that there was more truth in the words than was intended. "Are you sure you won't be seen at Difficulties?" "There will have been a hundred people in and out between the time I leave and the time they notice the envelope. Stop fretting and get my breakfast ready." "It'll be done by the time you've washed. How much water does he get today?" "Four bottles. Spread three through the morning, one at noon, and none after noon." "It's ready, come and get it. I've been worried about chilling. The boy is tough, but he hasn't any fat insulation to speak of, he can't move anything but his fingers and toes, he will soon be starving, and if he turns blue we are in no position to drop him into a hot tub." "So he looks good in blue." "He could die before we can collect." "You can cover him up at night. Why aren't you eating?" "I haven't had a chance to work up an appetite yet." "See that you do. He's the only one that's supposed to get feeble." "Yes, sir." Bill gave Molly a sharp look, but decided that he liked being called "sir". Removing bandages without any sort of cutting tool was a tedious procedure, but Molly had been told that if Ryan got his hand on a pair of scissors, he would be gone. When she had removed everything but the bandage under the wrist cords from his left hand and pulled the towel off the right hand, Bill drew her away from the table, climbed up on the chair, and took one more picture. Molly turned down the static and gave Ryan his first bottle as soon as Bill had gone. He said, "Thank you. I feel like a new man." He sounded like one, too. If Bill had seen that grateful smile, he would have knocked it off. "There seems to be only one of you. Has your friend gone to deliver the ransom note?" "NMES" "If you would allow me to teach you, I think I could improve your code." Molly thought this offer over during Ryan's bath and rubdown. Her code could certainly stand improvement, and it was going to be a long dull day for both of them. She accepted. *** "Again." "THIS TIME THE SMOOTH THEME SOOTHES ME" "Good. Now send 'To Tom it seems some mess.'" "TO TOM IT SEEMS SOME MESS" "Again." Halfway through she broke up, not so much because the word-string could be made to apply to Tom Ryan's situation as because she had forgotten it while they "talked" there in the dark like teacher and student. "Take five. We must have been at this for an hour." Molly stood and stretched out the cramps. She hadn't realized that she had been motionless so long. Her fingers found her flashlight. All cords were still secure, no new signs of ill health on his well-tended body. What a pity to let it atrophy. She tugged at him, Obedient, he rolled as far as his neckband would allow so that she could inspect his back. *** "Take it straight over to Tom's apartment and I'll meet you there. Come yourself, and don't handle it more than you have to." Charley hung up and dialed. "Russel? A secretary at the downtown office of Difficulties found an envelope addressed to me in a potted palm. I'm having it taken to Tom's lab." Soon two men anxiously contemplated a fat envelope lying on a laboratory table. Charley said, "That's school stationery, and it could well be the typewriter in the teachers' lounge." Russel cautiously slit the envelope along a crease. "I'll wager that any prints we can't account for turn out to be the pressman's." He used tongs to remove three Polaroid prints and a tape cassette from the envelope. "This is it, all right." He was wearing his poker face. Charley sent for a cassette player and studied the pictures while Russel tried to develop latent prints on the cassette. "I figure that this close-up was taken soon after the kidnapping, the full-body shot a few hours later, and the waist-up shot this morning. The bruises are fresh and red in this first one and he is plainly still under the influence of the drug. He is definitely awake in this one and the bruises have turned blue, but there is no sign of the wounds that have already begun to heal in this third one; the bruises have begun to fade in the third one, too." A young man entered with the cassette player. Charley introduced him: "This is Alfred Rand, Tom's lab assistant." Russel kept his eyes on the job at hand. "Tom choose him?" "Yes." "He can stay." "Mr. Ryan, who's he and what's going -- oh, may the Lord protect him." Rand had seen the pictures. Charley prevented him from touching the photographs. "He's Russel Wagner. He's had a lot of experience with this sort of thing. He's with the F.B.I." Without looking up, Russel said, "On leave, at present." Rand's mind was still on the photographs. "What have they done to his hands?" "He did it himself, trying to break the strings." "No one could get hold of those strings. They are too close to the hand." "How long have you been working for him?" "We were in Kosciusko together. Tom could have cut himself." The boy was beginning to imitate the stone-faced calm of the older men. "I give up," said Russel, "It's cleaner than a hound's tooth. Let's play it." Rand surrendered the cassette player. The message was interrupted frequently by clicks and pauses showing that the recorder had been switched off, then on again. If you want to see Tom Ryan again . . . you will do exactly as you are told. . . . You will not call the police. . . . You will put an answering device . . . on his unlisted office phone . . . and keep the line clear for further orders. . . . The device will use this recording: . . . This is Tom Ryan's office. I am temporarily indisposed. Please leave a message when you hear the tone. . . . When you have one half million dollars . . . in small, used, unmarked bills . . . change to this recording: . . . Tom Ryan will soon return. Please leave a message when you hear the tone. . . . I recommend that you hurry . . . because he is being held . . . in uncomfortable circumstances -- isn't that something of an understatement? There was a sound like a chair falling over, a moment of silence, and four sharp slapping sounds. Rand turned pale . . . and he will get nothing to eat until the ransom is paid. . . . I have received permission to tell you that there are things in my laboratory safe that will help you to ransom me. The combination is 8-16-32-6-7. There was nothing more. Russel said, "Those 'things' must be his tracer bills." "Tracer bills?" "Before Tom's Daddy left, he made him a couple of twenty-dollar bills that could be located with a gadget like a radio direction finder. I've borrowed them on more than one occasion." "What do you mean by saying that Tom's father left?" "Not father, Daddy." Charley said to the phone, "This is Charles Ryan. I'm going to put Russel Wagner on. Do exactly as he says, it's important for Tom." Russel took the phone. "Is there an answering device on the premises?" Charley led Rand into Ryan's little sitting room. "Russel is going to need you often before we get Tom back, and I don't want him handicapped by the need to keep my peculiar relationship with Tom Ryan secret from you. Legally, I'm his father, but putting my name on his birth certificate was simply one of the services I performed as Daddy's lawyer. When Daddy left last October, I became Tom's lawyer and the trustee of his estate." "Why didn't Tom's father put his own name on the certificate?" "Tom's Daddy wasn't his father and didn't have a name that we could spell in Roman letters." Charley spent a moment in thought. Rand sat quietly, trying to think of a sensible question. "Daddy arrived in this state in October of 1949. A couple of months later he found himself in need of a human agent for the darndest set of self-owning corporations you ever saw, and hit upon an alcoholic junior law clerk that Schwartz and Petrocelli were keeping on out of mistaken charity. I haven't touched a drop since, and if I died for Daddy's boy today, I'd still be life ahead on the deal." Rand had his question. "What is Daddy?" "I guess you could call him an anthropologist. It must take a lot to graduate from college in his culture. He thought nothing of travelling literally astronomical distances and spending twenty years just to write a dissertation. You'd think that studying a whole planet would keep a fellow busy, but he needed a hobby. He turned to making heredity-unit arrangements. When you were in school, did Tom ever share his lunch with you?" "I traded him a chocolate mousse for an apple once. It was beautiful, crunchy, full of cider, tasted like quince jelly. I've never seen such a thing before or since." "It could have been accomplished by selective breeding, that was one of the rules of the game, but Daddy had more direct methods. In November of 1950, he told me that he had made an arrangement of human genes and would need a birth certificate." "Tom wasn't born until October fourth, 1951." "It wasn't the first eleven-month gestation." "Now he is pushing twenty and doesn't look sixteen." "It has been hard to keep him inconspicuous. If we have to call in the police, it will be impossible." "What about the F.B.I.?" "Russel is on leave. He and Daddy used to have an arrangement to take advantage of being in different branches of the information business. Here!" Charley had fetched a box of tissues from an end table. "If fifty isn't too old to cry, nineteen isn't. Get it over with." Charley held Rand like a baby. When Rand showed signs of regaining control, Charley said, "There are millions of people on the Earth, but Tom might as well be the only member of his race in the universe. Now the loneliest man in the world is naked, blind, and helpless in the hands of a sadist." Charley's comforting arms became painfully confining. There was no escape for Rand from the words that scourged him every time he became calm enough to hear. When he ceased to respond, Charley laid him face down on the davenport, took off his shoes, and covered him with a patchwork afghan. Charley stepped back looking, not at the boy, but at the afghan. Each patch was embroidered, and the designs graduated from crude stitches in parallel rows to intricate patterns so precisely placed that only a needleworker would think of the skill required. Charley wasn't seeing the colorful squares. He saw the intent face of a boy forcing his immature nervous system to guide his tiny fingers through the motions that his mind comprehended so easily. Charley slumped, stretched, and relaxed into his normal confident posture. When he stepped into the adjoining room, Russel said, "How's the kid?" "Broken as far as he will break. When he wakes up, he'll be thoroughly ashamed of himself." Russel noted the distaste in Charley's voice. "Tom would laugh at you for feeling guilty over something you would do again." "Saying it's right isn't saying it doesn't hurt. Any progress?" "No reports back. By tomorrow we should know which building-supply dealers remember selling four by eight plywood and fiberglass to the same person." Charley examined the three enlargements taped to the wall. "Three sheets, I see. Any evidence that it is fiberglass between them?" "Only that it is the most obvious stuff to use. I've sent the originals by messenger to a computer-enhancement man I can trust. We may get some details of the room out of those shadows." "If only we could use Tom's machine!" "Should I lay you out beside Rand?" "I'll be too busy compiling a list of people who might know that you can't tie Tom up, toss him into a closet, and expect him to stay there. It will be something to compare with my list of people who could have drugged the milk." "It is worth doing, and the sooner the better. It seems as though half the town knew Tom was going to drink that particular carton of milk." ***** "Let's do some more work on rhythm. Give me a string of dits." "Enough. String of dahs." "Good. String of didahs . . . don't drawl . . . that's it . . . I felt a door shut." "How'd it go?" "Slick as grease. They had the recording on the second time I called. How is our golden boy?" "In good spirits. He's been teaching me code; wait's you hear!" "Good spirits! He acts like he was at a garden party. When is that child going to find out he's been kidnapped?" "I think he knows." "Let's see to it that he stays kidnapped." Molly released Bill, lit a lantern, and found his flashlight for him. Bill led the way into the dark cell. He held his light close to the nearest hand and examined each of the strands around the wrist, looking particularly at the point where it went through the board. He moved to the head of the slab and examined the other side of that wrist, both sides of the neckband, and the near side of the other wrist. He leaned forward in order to examine the other ends of the strands around Ryan's right wrist and cried out as the hand seized his wrist with enough force to knock his elbow on the table. "Just reach into your pocket and bring out your knife." Sweating, Bill obeyed. He stopped a second wave of agony by touching the knife to Ryan's knuckles. "Open it. Unh! Cut this hand free, hurry!" Bill sawed desperately, but the cords were tough and the blade was very dull. When at length the last strand parted, the freed hand moved toward the fettered wrist, carrying Bill along. "Give knife, give." Bill gave, laying the knife in the waiting palm, and staggered back a step as Ryan released him in order to snatch the knife with his free hand. One slash cut through a third of the cords, a second snapped off the blade. Ryan tried to open the other blade. Molly snatched away the broken blade. Ryan's efforts to open the knife were increasingly clumsy. The knife fell out of his hands and Molly took it. She led Bill into the outer room, helped him lie down on his air mattress, put a pillow under his feet, and examined the injured arm. "I can't tell, Bill. We'll have to go to the emergency room as soon as we've got him secure again. You try to think of a good story to tell the doctor while I get him ready to turn over. He's probably as far under as he's going to go by now." With no-one to hold the light, Molly was obliged to set a lantern on the table while she worked. She used her handkerchief to tie the free hand to the one that was still anchored while she trimmed off the dangling strings and drilled out the holes. Then she untied the handkerchief and moved each joint of the arm through its full range of motion before she patiently laced a bowstring through the holes, around the wrist, through the holes, around the wrist . . . Crouching under the makeshift table, she knotted the ends and smeared the knot with instant glue. After Molly cut the other hand free and repeated the whole procedure, she worked the folded blanket out from under him, revealing holes through the slab which enabled her to tie wide strips of cloth over his legs and upper thighs, around his waist, X- wise across his chest over the shoulders, and across the arms. One more sling restrained the head. She returned to Bill. "If I tie your arm up firmly, I think you can let out the rope without hurting yourself." She had a scarf that would do for a sling, and tied a belt around his chest to keep the sling from swinging out. The block and tackle were still in place. She unwrapped the rope from the cleat and lowered the hook gently onto Ryan's midriff. She found the proper hole in the edge of the slab and put the hook through. Then Bill steadied the slab while she raised it. It wasn't nearly so easy for her as it had been for Bill. The slab pushed the sawhorses aside as it rose, because Bill could not push them back as she had done. When it came free of them, the slab swayed sickeningly. Molly reminded herself that the child could not feel his injuries. She put one sawhorse parallel to the slab and pulled it as far to the side as it would conveniently go, then held on there so that the slab could hinge on the sawhorse as Bill let out the rope. It became more stable as it became more horizontal. Soon it was easy to put the other sawhorse in the space between his other arm and leg and release the tackle. Molly whispered, "Lie down, Bill. What will become of me if you should go into shock? We can't run even a slight risk." Though time was valuable now, she escorted him back to the outer room to make sure he did lie down. Then, in careful haste, she tacked the new strands to their places with instant glue and coated them with quick-setting epoxy, not omitting to glue them to the sides of the holes. She set a catalytic heater halfway between the two patches of fresh glue and made a sort of tent over all with a sheet. From the outer room she fetched a kitchen timer and her air mattress. She rested with her head under the table, where it would be easy to inspect him if there were any change in his breathing. On one such occasion she was chilled to see that he was writhing to put more of his weight on his arm and leg bonds, so that he could draw a deep breath for once. He was too far under to do that. The timer dinged. She removed the tent, set the heater in the corner, attached the hook through the hole opposite to the one she had used before, pulled on the rope until the slab began to rise, snubbed the rope on the cleat, and removed the sawhorse thus relieved of duty. Molly turned the radio on and entered the outer room. "Up and at 'em lover. Time to get to work." "What's with the static?" "Hearing is the last to go and the first to come back. We may need to talk." "He'll be under a good three hours." "With him, I'm not so sure. He took twice as long to pass out as he should have." "It sure felt like eternity. Tough as he is, he couldn't help groaning a little when you stuck the needle in." "I'm afraid that he didn't make a sound when the needle went in." "But I heard him. He sounded like he'd been kicked in the stomach." "You know how when you're in desperate hurry you have to do everything strictly in the habitual way?" "Go on." "I sponged the vein with alcohol before I shot him." "You took time for that while my arm was breaking?" "This wasn't exactly rehearsed. Anyhow, it was when the alcohol swab touched him that he grunted." "Let's get Tarzan flipped before he strangles and takes our half-million with him." The sawhorse fell away without knocking against the helpless boy, but the slab swayed heavily again. Bill muttered, "Well, now he will be symmetrical." Molly snubbed the rope and manhandled the sawhorses into place two feet from each end of the slab while Bill leaned against the slab to keep it off to one side. Molly went around to the side where Ryan hung and took hold of the lower edge, straining every nerve to keep it from pushing the sawhorses aside when Bill moved away. "Lower it quickly!" Bill obeyed, bringing it down with a nasty thump. "Wait for me in the van. I'll come as soon as I get him safe. Slow and easy, now. No heroics, no big man ignores pain." She kissed him cautiously and sent him on his way. She made sure the new bonds hadn't been loosened by the recent stress, then ran her flashlight over every inch of the room with a new horror of leaving some object behind. The heater would have to stay. One could not be sure the epoxy was really solid yet. Before she left, Molly laid two blankets over Ryan's body. * * * * * Dead, deafening silence. If a silk pin had dropped, Ryan could have heard it in spite of his plugged ears. Well, he could have if it had dropped onto his table. Bone conduction brought him the sounds of his slow heartbeat and his still slower lungs. In Asia, in Australia, in places you never heard of, Ryan's Daddy had taught him to bear pain; but Ryan's Daddy had also seen to it that he never suffered a moment of ill health. Now he was sick for the second time within twenty-four hours, and this attack seemed worse than the first. Ryan felt that a little self-pity was in order. His attention was immediately distracted from the luxurious exercise of feeling sorry for himself by an unfamiliar and unpleasant sensation in his stomach. Ah, now he had it. A full ten years ago, Daddy had built an android with a stomach for the sole purpose of teaching Ryan how to retch. The android had felt like this when it had needed to throw up. The lesson had stood him in good stead yesterday, when he realized that he'd been poisoned, but didn't seem to be useful now. Even if there were something to come up, he'd be likely to choke on it because he was unable to turn his head very far. Ryan overrode his stomach and began to analyze his sensations. They hadn't deadened his arms again. Ryan wasn't sure whether to be grateful for that or not. All four limbs had been wrenched more unmercifully than before, and he had been only half healed from the first time. All his bruises had been reactivated and each one had some sort of soft band over it. He was also covered with something that felt like wool. The room temperature was up, too. For the first time since his capture, Ryan didn't feel chilled. He felt about, raising and turning his hands. There was definitely a source of infrared off approximately in the direction that his right arm pointed. The new wrist- bonds seemed identical in all respects to the old ones and Ryan's hands were already in poor shape. He decided not to test them. Ryan was extremely thirsty with no prospect of obtaining water. He ached all over. He could think of nothing more constructive to do than wiggling his toes. He invented a set of isometric exercises, ran through them twice, and went into a coma. When he woke, the remains of the drug had been cleared away in spite of his slowed metabolism. Movement, such as was possible, still hurt, the more so because he was sore under each restraint. Pain when not moving was down to ignorable level, which left him free to notice how uncomfortable it was to lie directly on varnished wood. He had only been switched off for an hour, and it was unlikely that he had been drugged for more than three, for all that he'd tried to drag it out. He should have waited for midnight, when the emergency room could run a simple fracture through in less than half a day. How tempting was the thought of slipping back into coma! He occupied an hour or so in taking stock of his injuries, blocking off the thought of how quickly he could do the job if he were free, and found none that would not disappear after a day or two of good food and exercise. After several days of starvation and atrophy? Block that thought too. The effort had been tiring; he felt capable of natural sleep. * * * * * Bill had forgotten all about the lunch he had come "home" for, and by the time they got away from the emergency room he was late for his supper. He nearly fainted from hunger on the way back to the van, and Molly had to support him for a few minutes. She propped Bill up in his bed, gave him a glass of milk, and opened a can of beef stew as quickly as she could. Then she filled a bottle with water and turned the campstove as low as it would go. Beyond doubt, the prisoner would be in sore need of attention. She was frightened to see how quietly he lay, but he took the nipple eagerly enough. Before beginning to untie the cloth bands, she tapped out "SORRY SO LONG". "I expected it. I was far enough gone to crack his ulna, but not too far gone to know I'd done it. But I owe you an apology -- you singular -- I underestimated you badly. Should've waited until you were gone." His voice was as hoarse as ever, and his breathing was slow. By the time he finished his speech, she had untied all the knots. She ran off to stir the stew and bring Bill another drink, assuring him that milk was full of bone- building calcium. They compromised on a beer. Ryan explored his slight increase of freedom. The stiffness of these small movements was a reminder of what he would face when finally released. After less than a day, moving his arm to use the knife had been painful. Molly returned with an unprecedented second bottle. Ryan did not question it. "NO APOLOGY FOR HIM?" Ryan coughed. Laughter can hurt when you have been strangled. "Him I overestimated. If he kept his knife sharp, I'd be in my own bed now. I could tell him the injury I meant to inflict was less severe than the one he received, but I don't think he'd find that comforting." Molly cleared away the bands she had loosened, worked a fresh blanket under Ryan, and covered him again. That would have to do for a while. Bill needed his supper and she needed her rest. The stew wasn't very appetizing, but Bill wolfed down his share and half of hers. Molly forced down enough to keep up her strength. When she'd eaten all she could, she lay down until Bill called her to remove his dish and bring another beer. She decided to finish without further rest: she might not be able to get up again. Ryan had done himself one favor: with no orders about water, she had no guide to follow but to bring him all he wanted. When she'd done the dishes, swept, straightened, and refueled the heater, when Ryan had had his rubdown and she had covered him again, Molly wanted nothing more than to fall asleep. Unfortunately, by this time Bill was well rested and he found his cast no impediment at all. It seemed as though she had barely drifted off, though it was hours later, when she heard a low voice over the subdued hissing of the radio: "Nurse! Nurse!" It seemed that she was developing a mother's ear. As she dragged herself out of bed, she reflected ruefully that this disturbance was one she had let herself in for. * * * * * "Lie back down and go to sleep. And don't interfere." Bill shut Molly out of Ryan's cell. He set the lantern on the table and watched the prisoner, who was writhing in a stereotyped pattern, as if he were trying to exercise. Bill swabbed his thigh with alcohol. Ryan stopped moving and relaxed, waiting. As Bill had expected, Ryan didn't mind the touch of alcohol. What had happened to elicit his only complaint? Bill fished a sewing needle out of the alcohol and stabbed it into Ryan's thigh. Ryan tensed, his breathing was interrupted momentarily and became less regular, but he gave no other sign. We'll see how long you can keep that up, little boy. Bill stabbed a second needle an inch or two from the first. The tension disappeared. Bill blinked. A third needle brought no reaction at all and Bill already knew what a hasty examination revealed: Ryan was out cold. Nobody humiliates William Condor in front of his girl, but how do you explain that to a kid who faints so easily? Bill pulled out the needles and decided to have Molly fix breakfast. Later, Bill held the light and watched Molly rubbing Ryan down. Perhaps if he studied him, he would find out why a boy who could stand up under a mickey finn that would have downed a horse should faint at a needle prick. Practically unconscious, clinging to the posts of the room divider for support, without the strength to open his eyes, still he wouldn't fall down until Molly relaxed his fingers with some of the stuff they had found in Kosciusko's dentist's office. "Ah! There are at least two minor puncture wounds in the rectus femoris." Now why would Ryan refuse to notice being stuck, then cry out when Molly barely touched the wound? There was a direct experiment handy. Bill examined the injured thigh until he remembered where the needles had gone in, then jabbed a sore spot with his thumb. Ryan hardly twitched. Awkwardly, because his right hand was in a sling, Bill tapped out "WHY DON'T YOU SAY OUCH?" Ryan shrugged, or maybe he was just loosening up his shoulders. Bill let Molly get on with her work and continued to brood. He concluded that Ryan complained when it would do him some good and didn't when it wouldn't. It was the same way with passing out. He had fainted, not at the first shock nor when he was worn down, but as soon as he knew Bill intended to go on sticking needles into him. It had worked: he'd stopped; even if he hadn't, Ryan would have been ahead. He hadn't felt that third puncture. On the other hand, clinging to those spool-turned posts, out on his feet and unable to fight for freedom, he could still fight for time and hope for rescue. It had been a near thing, too. If Molly hadn't already had plans to paralyze his limbs, if she hadn't been so quick and skillful, even if Ryan hadn't been wearing a sleeveless shirt, they might have still been there when the classes changed and teachers started coming into the lounge. Bill not only indicated that Molly could put the blanket back over Ryan, he fetched another from the outer room. Before he left, he told Molly, "Keep him covered up nice and warm. Give him all the water he wants. And at ten o'clock on the dot, feed him that can of chicken broth." Molly had been easier in her mind when Bill had asked for her needle-case. Bill, on the other hand, was full of cheer. Now he had only two things on his mind. One was the question of why the touch of an alcohol swab could be a body blow, the other: where do you buy a winch on a Sunday? * * * * * "This time there's news. I've got a report from an emergency room on that janitor we haven't been able to find. They treated him for a hairline fracture of the ulna yesterday afternoon, and his story and his wound didn't match. He said he tripped over a skate and fell, but the doctor who treated him said it looked more like it had been clamped in a vise. There were bruises completely around the wrist and bruises that resembled finger marks." "Sounds possible, but if Tom got his hands on him, why isn't Tom here?" "That's been bothering me," That was an understatement. Russel's eyes were haunted. "A hardware clerk picked him out of a mug book. He sold him three sheets of half-inch plywood, two four-by-eight sheets of fiberglass cloth (coarse weave), the makings of two sawhorses, a hand brace with a half-inch bit, a keyhole saw, some pulleys and rope, half a gallon of epoxy, and ten Dacron bowstrings. He showed no interest at all in the compound bow hanging over the sporting goods." "There is no gentle way to make Tom let go." "If Condor wasn't able to cut Tom loose for some reason, the confederate could have drugged Tom. You know that if Tom were fully conscious he wouldn't need to break the guy's arm." "You're sure there was a confederate?" "When Mrs. Jameson's staff searched the school, Condor was innocently mopping floors. He didn't have time to take Tom anywhere." "The question is, where did the confederate take Tom?" "When I get my hands on Condor he'll answer that question if I have to take him to Jane." "There isn't a way in the world she could find out where Tom is without finding out what Tom is." "Not by interviewing a man Tom has laid hands on. And suppose she let Condor see what she is. Then we'd either have to explain why Tom can't see Condor, or we have to stand up to Tom while he tries to get her name and address out of us." Charley laughed, and said, "I'd stand up about thirty seconds." "I could hold out for maybe forty, and all I could tell him is that Jane's mother's first name is Melissa, but it won't come to that. I know a lot more about arm-twisting than I've ever used. How is the ransom coming?" "Picking a weekend didn't help a bit. Even with Melissa's help, I can't get it together before Tuesday morning." "Change the recording the minute you know for sure." * * * * * Bill's idea was fiendishly simple. He just bored an extra hole in he head of Ryan's slab, attached the tackle, and pulled it upright. Now the boy could either support himself with his arms, or strangle in the strings around his neck. That was very strong motivation for staying awake. Bill's original plans were more elaborate, but a little experiment showed that the pain of hanging from his awkwardly-bent arms was too great to allow Ryan to notice any other discomfort. After ten minutes, Molly reminded him that if the boy strangled, so did their half million. Bill allowed her to lay the slab out level on its sawhorses again. Molly pulled Ryan's shoulders toward the head of the table so that the wrist bonds could lie slack, toweled off the sweat, and massaged his aching muscles. Her mind on Bill's arm, she carefully avoided Ryan's hands. When Ryan had control of his breathing again, he said, "Ma'am, please take care of my hands . . . If I hurt you, there would be no-one to take care of me; he would let me die . . . Besides, they have gone numb, I couldn't hurt you if I wanted to." Molly believed him. She pulled the strings out of the grooves in his flesh and set to work. Ryan passed out. That afternoon Molly tended the prisoner much more tenderly than fear for her share of the ransom could account for. Was it pity, or guilt, did his apparent youth awaken her dormant mother instinct, or was it something else? For the whole afternoon, Ryan was at best half-awake whenever Molly wasn't sending code to him. Good student, Molly. After only two mornings of instruction she was sending at thirteen wpm with a respectably even rhythm. Sleeping out of season, on top of hunger, inactivity, and stress, was too much. By the time Molly left him to prepare Bill's supper, Ryan had a raging headache. This was something Daddy hadn't prepared him for. He considered asking Condor's girl for a headache tablet, but he had had enough unprecedented experiences in the last three days. It didn't seem wise to invite another. He overrode the automatic controls on his circulation and banished the pain again. Each time it returned sooner and with increased intensity. Ryan decided that sleeping now would be worth the pain he would pay for it later. Molly was pensive over her supper. "If they take much longer to get the ransom, I'm no longer sure the kid can make it. He was very weak this afternoon, and he is in pain he won't confess to." "Maybe his father will have news for me when I phone in tomorrow." "I don't think you should." "Eh?" "When you don't show for work tomorrow, even if you phone in sick, they are going to start looking for you. But nobody knows I have any connection with Kosciusko School or the Ryan boy. Nobody will pay any attention to me." "You're right, I should stay holed up here. Are you sure you trust me alone with your baby?" "I'll have to. I'll have to walk, too. Your van would be easier to spot than you are, and we can't be sure they haven't called in the police." Ryan felt patheticly grateful whenever Molly took a few minutes away from Bill to tend to him that evening, and not because she usually rubbed away some of his pain, but simply because she it was the touch of a human hand. Once, a female teacher at Kosciusko had hugged another first-grader and said, "You would take a beating just for a little attention, wouldn't you?" Ryan was in just such a mood. A beating would have been welcome, if it came from a fellow- creature, but he had no fellow on Earth. He longed for Daddy, for the first time aware emotionally that Daddy would never return. It is a common joke that grammar-school boys regard girls as soft boys. At Kosciusko there hadn't been that much difference. The girls did everything the boys did except visit the men's room. It is true, the matter came to Ryan's attention when his playmates began to pair off, but he knew himself by then: it was a matter that would not concern him for years to come, and he was not one to worry over matters that did not concern him. But what else did he have to do at the moment? He knew that it was normal for a child at his stage of development to show no interest in the opposite sex, but the image of the peacock at the zoo kept returning to him. The peacock had been hand-reared from an egg and could be depended upon to put on a good exhibition of the courtship dance for any human visitor, but the zookeeper had tried in vain to breed him. Suppose Ryan did mature normally? If he married a fifteen-year-old when he was twenty-five, they would be a good physical match when she was thirty, but chances were that he would never get over thinking of her as a child. What sort of companionship was that? Suppose the children took after him, how could she handle them? Suppose they didn't, how would he handle it? Better by far to do without. Ryan knew what he needed, but even the best of us will postpone an unpleasant task. Like a man with the flue, who knows that he will feel better when he has gotten rid of his dinner but postpones the revolting process of doing so, Ryan fought against the inevitable. It was after nine when Molly checked on the prisoner and found him twisted against his restraints. She was badly frightened before she realized that it was not labored breathing that afflicted him, but soundless weeping. Her first impulse was to comfort him as one would pick up a crying baby, but one can't cuddle someone who is strapped to a board, and she knew that if he wanted sympathy he would not make such a great effort to avoid noise. It was nearly eleven when, working deftly in the dark, she took off his wringing-wet blindfold, washed and dried his face, and applied a fresh bandage to his eyes. He thanked her as politely as though she were not the cause of his grief, and promptly dropped off into a healing slumber. Molly wished she could do the same. She was bone-weary and looked forward to the payoff not because it would make her a rich woman, but only because it would mean the job was over. Where she was disturbed by the incident, Bill was relieved. At last Ryan was behaving like a kidnapped child. Molly lay awake for hours, listening to Bill's regular breathing. On Monday morning Ryan had had nothing to eat since Friday noon, except for a small can of rather weak chicken broth, but he seemed stronger and more cheerful. Some time after Molly had prepared breakfast, tended to Ryan, cleaned up the place, and gone out, Bill, having nothing else to do, went in to look at the hostage. Ryan said, "I only feel one presence. Has the lady gone out?" "YES" "Then, having been left alone, how shall we amuse ourselves? I didn't care at all for yesterday's entertainment; perhaps you would care to improve your code?" "HOW CAN YOU BE SO DAMN CHEERFUL?" "I remembered last night that Daddy never did anything by halves." Ryan knew that Bill would think that he was referring to Charley and the ransom. That proves, I suppose, that even the truest passion for truth can be warped on occasion. "MY CODE SUITS ME FINE" "I'm in no position to play gin rummy, you'd have to read my hand to me. Are you fond of chess?" Bill stalked out of the cell, but he was as bored as Ryan. After a while he unearthed a checkerboard and checkers and took them into the cell. At first he occasionally moved one of Ryan's men to a less favorable position, but Ryan never became angry or made accusations, he simply asked for a description of the board each time the picture in his head became inconsistent with the moves, and played on from there. Cheating just spoiled the game, and Bill contented himself with removing a few of Ryan's men near the beginning of each game to even up the odds. He was engrossed in their eighth game when someone kissed the back of his neck. Bill knocked over the board. Molly gathered up the scattered pieces and he followed her into the outer room. She had brought him a six pack, a half gallon of milk, and some news. "They have changed the recording!" "They've got the ransom?" "Not yet. They added a line to the tape: 'Tom Ryan will return by ten A.M. Tuesday morning.' That must meant that they will have the money by ten tomorrow." "We can make the recording today and play it to them at ten in the morning." "Good. I really want to get out of here." "Now how about fixing me some lunch, woman? I'm starved." "Molly flinched a little, and put the milk and beer into the ice chest. The ice was long gone, but it would stay cool longer there. She began to cook. * * * * * "The number has been dialed since you changed the recording. We should be getting the ransom demand soon." "Good. I should have the money in your bugged attache' case well before the deadline. I've got news myself, not likely to help us, but it explains a few things." "I'll judge what's useful." "Haven't I brought you every crumb?" "Some of them were crummy, too. What is your news?" "We knew all along that Condor had often seen Tom playing with the students at Kosciusko, and must have seen them playing Houdini. One of the teachers says that Condor was there the last time they played that game, when one of the boys tied Tom up with a bowstring and fastened the knots with instant glue. Tom couldn't get loose until he cut the string with a knife he had up his sleeve. The teacher remembers it because of the long discussion as to whose point it was. They decided that Tom had won the round because the other boy had searched him." "Tom had a perfect score, then, until Friday noon. I wonder whether the students would regard drugging one's opponent as cheating." "The teachers would regard that as a violation of the school rules. At least we know why they stripped him. Guess we just have to put it down to bad luck that they undressed him in the school basement instead of taking the shirt with the special button to their hideout." "It would have saved a lot of time if they had." Russel was silent for a moment, thinking of what the extra time could cost. "If Tom fails to survive this, so will Condor." "Would you do me a favor, if it comes to that? It would make a lot more sense to let me run the risk . . . " * * * * * Just when Molly was running out of stratagems to delay the making of the tape, it was time for her to fix supper. Since it was now awkward for Bill to use the key, he agreed that it was advisable to wait until after supper so that she could send the dictation to Ryan. She prepared an elaborate meal in celebration of the payoff to come, they lingered over it, then she spent an hour cleaning up. By the time they'd made one tape giving instructions for delivering the money and another giving directions for retrieving the hostage, it was time for bed before it could occur to Bill that Ryan was unnecessary now and represented a means of relieving his boredom. The next morning, they were busy packing their supplies into the van and cleaning the room of clues to their identity. She had Ryan add a postscript to the first tape: "They tell me that it is nine-thirty Tuesday morning, and the low temperature at the airport last night was fifty-one degrees." Then she made him as comfortable as possible and they left. They played the tape to the answering machine at ten. By eleven, they had a money-stuffed attache' case in the van and Molly counted it hastily. A block away on a different street, a young and healthy man was driving an inconspicuous car and watching the indicator of an even more inconspicuous direction finder while the steel-gray man beside him listened intently to a button in his ear. The button said, "Bill, it's all here. Find a phone and I'll play the other tape." "We've got the money; we won't risk it." Russel Wagner pressed the button on his microphone and said "Take 'em." Molly's protest at Bill's hard-hearted decision turned into astonishment. When Wagner's driver arrived on the scene, Bill and Molly were each in the grip of two unarmed, but strong and skillful, men. Ten more were securing the scene. Russel came out of his car asking for the tape recorder. One of the men held it out to him. Molly said, "You won't need that. He's in the sub-basement of a condemned building . . . " One of the men holding Bill stifled him until she was finished. The button in Russel's ear said, "I got that, chief. ETA five minutes." Bill and Molly were put into separate windowless vans. When they arrived, Molly found herself in the bedroom of a two-room apartment. The man who had brought her here (where-ever here was) remained in the outer room. She was greeted by a hard-eyed woman any director would have cast as a prison matron. She said, "I'm here to keep you in good condition until you are sent for." Molly threw herself onto the bed and put her head under the pillow. The woman settled into a rocking chair and watched her thoughtfully. * * * * * Ryan felt doors opening and the vibration of footsteps. A filtered voice said, "It's the boss all right." Flashbulbs went off. Someone was loosening his blindfold. "Is that you, Rand?" "It's Rand, boss." "Clean my ears out, too. I can barely hear you." Rand unplugged his ears. Other people sliced away the cords holding him to the board. Ryan kept his eyes shut. Dim though the light was, it hurt. They put his arms down by his sides, put his feet together, and scooped him up with an orthopedic stretcher. "You guys bring anything to eat?" "It's waiting in the ambulance, Ryan." They carried him up a flight of stairs, deposited him on a padded stretcher, and wrapped him in a blanket. The stretcher was loaded onto an ambulance and Rand got behind the wheel. While Rand carefully drove up a ramp into the painfully-bright sunlight, the attendant adjusted the stretcher so that Ryan was sitting up a little. "Rand, did you get Bill Condor and the girl?" "Sure thing! How did you know him?" "His fist is distinctive." "So that is what the key was for. Guess he did know you would know his voice." Ryan did not answer. The attendant had begun to feed him the best soup he had ever tasted. When Ryan was back in his own apartment, the attendant introduced himself as a physiotherapist named Andrew Kozkin and did a job of working Ryan over that Bill would have envied. Then Rand fed Ryan a small rare steak. When he had eaten, Ryan said, "I'm ready if all the evidence is." Rand relayed this news and wheeled Ryan into his lab, which had been converted into a television studio. * * * * * The matron touched Molly on the shoulder. "Get up and make yourself presentable. You are going to get your picture taken." "Mug shots?" This was a funny sort of jail, and you didn't need experience with jails to know it. "Not exactly." The matron supplied a comb and brush. The mirror in the bathroom seemed subtly wrong. At last she noticed a tiny engraving: "stainless steel". Then she realized that nothing in the whole apartment was sharp. The matron led her through a maze of hallways and staircases into a large and brilliantly-lit room with four television cameras hanging from the middle of the ceiling. One was aimed at Tom Ryan, resting on a stretcher. One was aimed at Bill, strapped into an armchair. Two more were focused on empty chairs. The matron escorted Molly to one of the empty chairs, and took a seat just out of camera range. The young man sitting beside Ryan raised the head of the stretcher so that he was sitting nearly erect. The sheet fell down, revealing that he was naked to the waist; the merciless lights revealed every mark. He said, "Is the tape running?" One of the two men sitting at the monitors said, "Yes." "It is five minutes past twelve noon on Tuesday, the twenty-sixth of May, 1971. My full name is Tom Ryan. I frequently visit the Kosciusko School. My latest visit to the school was on Friday, the twenty-second of May. I went to the teacher's lounge at about three o'clock to have a glass of milk, and drank half of a one-quart carton." He went on to describe his experiences in detail right up to the present. Then he was lowered to a semi-reclining position while one of the two men watching the monitors came and sat in the chair under the fourth camera. "My name if Charles Fletcher Ryan. At half-past three last Friday, the headmaster of Kosciusko School telephoned me to say that she could not locate my son, Tom Ryan." They had missed him so soon? They had still been loading Ryan into the van. How near they had come to getting caught before they had done any harm. Someone handed Mr. Ryan the attache' case and he spread out the ransom money before the camera and packed it away again before he returned to his seat by the monitor. The other man introduced himself as Russel Ward Wagner and related his experiences from the time, a few minutes after half-past three, that he had been asked to investigate the disappearance of Tom Ryan. He produced the cassette and photographs, played it, and held up enlargements of the photographs and the computer enhancements -- what on Earth is a computer enhancement? More evidence dotted his speech. She half expected to see the van driven in, but he settled for enlarged photographs of the van and its contents. After Mr. Wagner finished, Molly was relieved to hear Ryan say, "It is after one o'clock now. I think we could all do with a rest and some lunch. Please turn off the tape." The young man attending Ryan wheeled him out one door while the matron escorted Molly out the other. Two men were unstrapping Bill. Once back in her room, Molly dropped into an armchair. "I've really put my foot in it. Who is he?" "The founder of Difficulties, Inc." "We knew that when we snatched him. But we've stirred up something a lot bigger than that." "All I know is that he was one of Kosciusko's best students, but never went on to Porter like the rest of them. He just stayed on until . . . last year, when he opened the first office of Difficulties. And that there was a big flap last Friday that had my staff searching the place from attic to cellar." "If you'd searched from cellar to attic instead, you'd have caught us." "I've been trying not to think about that. This isn't the first time someone has tried to steal one of my kids, but this is the first time anyone has succeeded. Right out of the teacher's lounge, too." Molly didn't think that they had succeeded, but just then the arrival of two trays of lunch interrupted the conversation. The meal was much better than those Molly had been fixing out of cans the last week. She tasted it and said, "He is certainly treating me better than we treated him." Then she couldn't eat any more. The matron held her against her ample bosom and soothed her like a frightened child. Molly was only eighteen, after all. The reassuring phrases must have sounded empty to the matron herself. "I could have fed him, don't you see? I _could_ have sneaked him some food." If the matron thought that she could have avoided the whole situation, she didn't say so. Tom allowed a full hour for lunch, so the both of them finally got a proper meal down. When they returned to the recording studio, Bill was already there, remaining in his chair without restraints, and Ryan was being wheeled in. He didn't look rested at all. None of the people called in after lunch spoke for long, but there seemed to be dozens of them. At four, Ryan called for a ten-minute break. Molly and her guard spent it drying tears in a powder room off the room occupied by those who were waiting their turn to testify. It was nearly six when the slab was brought in, accompanied by the sawhorses and dozens of photographs taken before, during, and after Ryan's removal from it. Russel Wagner read a deposition from the clerk who had sold the materials to Bill, and displayed, but did not play, a tape of that interview. Bill had given up trying to cross-examine the witnesses when he saw that he was making himself look silly. He had demanded a lawyer once, and was told that he wasn't under arrest or on trial. Molly had thought he would try to leave then, but Bill didn't mention it. That had been while he was still strapped into his chair. The next witness came through the door that Ryan used, not the one that the other witnesses and Molly entered by. "My name is Andrew Kozkin. I am a physiotherapist. Last Sunday I received a visit from Charles Ryan. He said that he had a case for me which might give me occasion to learn things that my patient would prefer to keep confidential. I agreed to discuss the case only with the permission of the patient or Charles Ryan. He then informed me that he did not know the location of the patient, but had reason to believe that he would, when found, have been immobilized for a matter of days without food and that he might have other injuries. I agreed to be available on short notice, and he told me that the patient was his son, Tom Ryan. Yesterday evening I came to stay in the adjoining apartment, which I was told was that of Tom Ryan. At ten o'clock this morning I left here in an ambulance driven by an MET named Alfred Rand. Shortly after eleven, he acknowledged a message he had received over his radio, then informed me that Tom Ryan had been located. We arrived at a condemned building a few minutes later, shortly before a car containing several other men. Rand led us to the sub- basement. He opened a large storage closet and found a boy tied to a board resting on sawhorses. He was bruised on all parts of his body and had partially healed cuts and abrasions on his hands and wrists, but did not have any obvious permanent injury. Rand took off his blindfold and unplugged his ears while I cut the cords holding his left hand and neck and two of the other men freed his feet and other hand. We put him on a stretcher and loaded him into the ambulance, then the other people returned to the room where he'd been found and Rand drove us back here while I fed the boy a thermos of extract of beef. When we had him in his apartment, I gave him a workout, then Rand fed him a steak and took him away for about an hour. When he brought him back, we fed him a light lunch, after which I gave him as much passive exercise as I thought he could stand. He told me to prepare this statement and to be as brief as possible. They went out again, and returned for a few minutes at four, when I gave him some orange juice and a brief massage. Then he came back here and I stayed in the apartment until called." "Thank you, Mr. Kozkin. Would you wait for me in my apartment? I hope not to be much longer." Molly looked at the way Ryan lay back on his pillow while Mr. Kozkin was leaving and thought that there was more sincerity than courtesy in that last remark. She herself could not hold up much longer. When the physiotherapist had gone, Ryan said, "Molly Kokotelmo, have you anything to say?" Molly was shocked. She gathered her wits a little and almost wailed, "No, No. It all happened just the way you said!" She ran for comfort, not to Bill, but to her guard. "William Condor, do you have anything to say?" Bill did. It was neither relevant nor printable, but they all waited patiently until he began to repeat himself, then shut him up. "Charles Ryan, will you present the bill?" Charles Ryan gave a sheet of paper each to Molly, Bill, and Tom Ryan, then sat in the chair Kozkin had vacated to read a fourth copy to the camera. Molly did not hear him. She stared numbly at the bottom line: just under one quarter of a million dollars. Everything was here from the expense of turning a half-million dollars into cash and Wagner's astronomical fee to the quart of milk they had spoiled. She looked for the lunch she had eaten, failed to find it, and diverted herself by wondering about it until it occurred to her that that had been a non-necessary expense. Charles had finished. Tom Ryan addressed Bill: "Charles Ryan is my lawyer. I recommend that you see him tomorrow to arrange terms and means of payment." "What makes you think you can collect?" "Do you really want me to sue for it?" That was open blackmail, but it didn't seem likely that any jury would convict Tom Ryan on the basis of this tape. "You may stay in my guest room tonight, Mr. Condor, or one of my men will take you where you want to go." Bill left. Molly never tried to find out what became of him. "Miss Kokotelmo, would you come over here, please?" The matron led Molly to Ryan's side and Rand gave her his chair. "How many eighteen-year-old nurse's aides do you know of who can hit the brachial plexus on the first stab?" That came out of left field. With equal irrelevance, Molly replied, "It took three, one for each nerve." Ryan smiled. "The point is that very few people would even recognize the term, but you were capable of making practical use of it. Porter College has an excellent pre- medical program. If you want to attend the fall term, I'll lend you the money and pull a few strings to get you in." "Why?" "Without education, you will never even make interest payments on what you owe me." Molly nodded. She didn't feel up to speaking. "I would advise you to stay here tonight and register at Kosciusko in the morning. They can teach you what you will need to know to take advantage of Porter. Mrs. Jameson has said that she will chaperon you tonight and take you to the school in the morning." Molly was all too willing to do as she was told. That was a feeling that would pass off during her few months at Kosciusko, but now she quietly followed the matron, Mrs. Jameson. As she left, Ryan called, "Uncle Charley, shut off the tape." * * * * * When Ryan was back in his apartment, he called Rand to him. "Would you do me a favor, Mr. Rand? There's a copy of Farnsworth's _Radio Code_ in the record rack in the library. I would like for you to gift-wrap it and take it to Miss Kokotelmo. I hate to leave a job half-finished." Puzzled, but unquestioning, Rand wrapped the album in a sheet of drafting paper, made a bow out of a scrap from one of Ryan's shirts, and took it out. "Mr. Kozkin, I would like to have a few words with my uncles in private." Mr. Kozkin retreated into the library. "Uncle Charley, Uncle Russel, I've had a lot of time to think. I've never had that before. There was such a busy lot to learn. Then when . . . the lessons stopped, I was busy setting up Difficulties. But when Condor and Molly gave me an enforced vacation, I went over and over what I know about the way Daddy thinks. He never made anything incomplete in his whole life. Then you came and rescued me two full days before you could have raised the ransom alone." Charley saw Tom seeing him flinch. He had been so concerned for Tom's body that he hadn't given more than a passing thought to his mind, and now he had confirmed Tom's suspicions. Tom said, "Don't either of you ever be alone with me again." He was exhausted. He didn't look a day over twelve, and Charley longed to touch him, to kiss him good- by, but even Tom's self-control would go only so far. The two men left him with Kozkin. When they were a good block from the warren Tom inhabited, Russel said, "It is going to be a long five years." "If we are lucky," said Charley. They parted. Charley walked on for a mile and stopped at a pay phone. He laid the handset on the counter and punched a number while standing as far back as he could and whistling tunelessly; he ignored the curious glances of the patrons of the bar. A woman's voice said, "Hello." "I may be bugged." "I'll miss you." "I'll miss you." He broke the connection, called a taxi, and went home. * * * * * "Mr. Kozkin, you have been very patient. Thank you. I'd like to behave like a convalescent now, but I'll have to go in to the office tomorrow. I've missed two days of work." Ryan lay quiet a few minutes. Kozkin could see that the taping session had been a strain even though Ryan had taken it lying down. He was built like a gymnast, though, a decided contrast to the wasted limbs that were his usual care. Working with a body capable of returning to perfect health in a matter of days would be like a vacation. "Mr. Rand brought me several glasses of milk during the afternoon. Please skip the food, work me over, and put me to bed. It's been a long day for all that it didn't start until eleven." "I'm not sure you are up to a workout." "Mr. Kozkin, in all the Earth I have only two friends who know me for what I am. I have just sent them away and they won't dare to return until I don't need them any more. I need your attention." Only Kozkin's awareness that the subject was a sore one enabled him to refrain from asking questions. He cranked up the stretcher to match the height of the padded table that Charles Ryan had had installed and helped Ryan roll himself onto it. "I haven't been babied since I was a baby. I'd best make the most of it. How good it will be to get into my own bed. I never slept anywhere but under this roof until this week. Not in my own body anyway. I suppose that they have given you Nanny's room; now I have a nurse again. Are you going to follow me when I go out to play? Should have got another nurse when Nanny went, a fellow who lets himself be kidnapped by a pair of rank beginners needs a nanny. The girl had talent, though, wonderful talent . . . " Koskin ignored Ryan's expressed desire to lie in his own bed and left him asleep on the table. When Rand returned, they went into the library. "How is he?" "Physically, amazing. I'll only be a convenience." "Mentally?" Kozkin considered. Rand seemed to be privy to more of Ryan's secrets than would ever be revealed to him. He might be of help. "He says he has lost his last friend." "You had better explain that." "He wanted a few words alone with his uncles. They left right away. Later he said that he had just sent away the only two people in the world who knew him for what he was." "He is wrong for once. I knew what he was long before I knew where . . . I don't know what happened between Ryan and the two men, but Mr. Ryan must have seen it coming. At least he provided for it. I'd best stay the night. Is there still a rollaway in the closet in Nanny's room?" "There is." Kozkin helped Rand set up the bed, then the two of them sat down to wait for Ryan to wake up.