“Bloody pathetic.”
“Time to do your party trick, Jim,” said Omally. “Professor?”
The old man indicated a dimly-lit panel on the bleak wall. “Just there,” he said.
“I don’t know if this is such a good idea,” Jim complained. “I think the best idea would be to give the place a good leaving alone.”
“Stick your mitt out, Jim.”
The cursed Croesus placed his priceless palm on to the panel. There was a brief swish and a section of the wall shot aside. A very bad smell came from within.
“Quickly now,” said the Professor. “Keep your hand on the panel until we’re all in, Jim.”
A moment later the gap closed upon three men, one robot shopkeeper, and a bike called Marchant.
“Blimey,” said Omally. “I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t this.”
They stood now in what might have been the lobby and entrance hall of any one of a thousand big business consortiums. The traditional symbols of success and opulence, the marble walls, thick plush carpeting, chromium reception desk, even the rubber plant in its Boda plant-stand, were all there. It was so normal and so very ordinary as to be fearful. For behind this facade, each man knew, lurked a power more evil than anything words were able to express.
“Gentlemen,” said Professor Slocombe, “we are now in the belly of the beast.”
Omally suddenly clutched at his stomach. “I think I’m going to chuck up,” he said. “I can feel something. Something wrong.”
“Hold on.” The Professor laid a calming hand upon Omally’s arm. “Speak the rosary; it will pass.”
Beneath his breath Omally whispered the magical words of the old prayer. Its power was almost instantaneous, and the sick and claustrophobic feeling lifted itself from his shoulders, to alight upon Jim Pooley.
“Blech,” went Jim. Being a man of fewer words and little religious conviction, he threw up over the rubber plant.
“That will please the caretaker,” chuckled Omally.
“Sorry,” said Jim, drawing his shirt-sleeve over the cold sweat on his brow. “Gippy tummy I think. I must be going cold turkey for the want of a pint.”
“You and me both. Which way, Professor?”
The old man fingered his chin. “There is no-one on the desk, shall we take the lift?”
Norman the Second shook his head, “I would strongly advise the stairs. A stairway to oblivion is better than no stairway at all I always say. Would you like me to carry your bike, John, or would you prefer to chain it to the rubber plant?”
“I’ll carry my own bike, thank you.”
Pooley squinted up at the ragged geometry, spiralling into nothingness above. “Looks like a long haul,” said he. “Surely the cellar would be your man, down to the fuse boxes and out with the fuse. I feel that I have done more than my fair share of climbing today.”
“Onward and upward.”
Now there just may be a knack to be had with stairs. Some speak with conviction that the balls of the feet are your man. Others favour shallow breathing or the occupation of the mind upon higher things. Walking up backwards, that one might deceive your legs into thinking they were coming down, has even been suggested. In the course of the next fifteen minutes it must fairly be stated that each of these possible methods and in fact a good many more, ranging from the subtly ingenious to the downright absurd, were employed. And each met with complete and utter failure.
“I’m gone.” Pooley sank to his knees and clutched at his heart.
“Nurse, the oxygen.” Omally dragged himself a stair or more further and collapsed beneath his bike. “We must give poor Jim a breather,” he said. “The life of ease has gone to his legs.”
“Are you all right yourself?” Norman the Second enquired.
“Oh yes.” Omally wheezed bronchitically and wiped the sweat from his eyes. “It is Jim I fear for.”
Professor Slocombe peered down from a landing above. If his ancient limbs were suffering the agonies one would naturally assume them to be, he showed no outward sign. The light of determination burned in his eyes. “Come on now,” he urged. “We are nearly there.”
“Nearly there?” groaned Jim. “Not only can I hear the grim reaper sharpening his scythe, I am beginning to see the sparks.”
“You’ve enough breath, Jim; lend him your arm, John.”
“Come on, Jim.” Omally shouldered up his bike and aided his sagging companion. “If we get out of this I will let you buy me a drink.”
“If we get out of this I will buy you a pub.”
“Onward and upward then.”
Another two flights passed beneath them; to John and Jim it was evident that some fiendish builder was steadily increasing the depth of the treads.
“Stop now.”
“With the greatest pleasure.”
Professor Slocombe put his eye to the smoked glass of a partition door. “Yes,” said he in a whisper. “We shall trace it from here, I think.”
Norman the Second ran his fingertips about the door’s perimeter and nodded. “Appears safe enough,” he said.
“Then let us see.” Professor Slocombe gestured to Jim. “You push it, please.”
Pooley shook his head dismally but did as he was bid. The door gave to expose a long dimly-lit corridor.
Omally fanned at his nose. “It smells like the dead house.”
Professor Slocombe pressed a large gingham handkerchief to his face. “Will you lead the way, Norman?”
The robot entered the corridor. “I can feel the vibration of it,” he said, “but it is some distance away. If I could get to a VDU.”
“Stand alone, clustered, or wide-area network?” Omally asked, sarcastically.
“Super advanced WP and a spread-sheet planner, hopefully,” said Jim.
“Do I take the piss out of your relatives?” Norman the Second asked. “Stick your palm against this panel will you please?”
“Security round here stinks as bad as the air,” Pooley pressed the panel. A gleaming black door slid noiselessly aside.
“Ah,” said Norman the Second, “magic.”
The room was nothing more than a cell, happily unoccupied. Black walls, floor and ceiling. A cunningly concealed light source illuminated a centralized computer terminal, bolted to the floor. “And people have the gall to ask me why I never take employment,” said Omally, parking his bike. “Imagine this place nine to five.”
The robot faced the console and cracked his nylon knuckles. “Now,” said he, “only one small problem. We do not possess the entry code.”
Professor Slocombe handed him a folded sheet of vellum. “Try this.” The automaton perused the paper and stared up at the old man.
“Don’t ask,” said John Omally.
“All right then.” With a blur of digits the robot punched in the locking code. The words “ENTER ENQUIRY NOW” sprang up upon the now illuminated screen. Norman’s hand hovered.
“Ask it for permission to consult the main access body,” said the Professor.
Norman punched away at the keyboard.
PERMISSION DENIED, INFORMATION CLASSIFIED Professor Slocombe stroked at his chin. “Ask it for a data report.”
Norman did the business. Rows of lighted figures plonked up on to the monitor. Row upon coloured row, number upon number, little illuminated regiments marching up the screen. “Magic,” crooned Norman the Second.
“Looks like trig,” said Jim disgustedly. “Never could abide trig. Woodwork and free periods, but trig definitely not.”
“The music of the spheres,” said Norman the Second.
Professor Slocombe’s eyes were glued to the flickering screen. His mouth worked and moved, his head quivered from side to side. As the projected figures darted and weaved, so the old man rose and fell upon his toes.
“Does it mean something to you?” Omally asked.
“Numerology, John. It is as I have tried to explain to you both. Everything, no matter what, can be broken down into its base elements and resolved to a final equation: the numerical equivalent; all of life, each moving cell, each microbe, each network of cascading molecules. That is the purpose of it all. Don’t you see?” He pulled Omally nearer to the screen, but John jerked away.