But she was bored. During the coffee break she photographed it from several angles; a Chinesey thing some eight inches tall. Even then, it took another three days before she got around to taking the photographs to a bric-a-brac dealer with Chinesey things in his window.
He said promptly, "I don't want it, lady. It's a copy, and they copied it wrong."
She handed him money. He looked surprised, but he explained, "It's a copy of a very well-known piece, a Chinese funerary jar. If memory serves—" and it obviously, pridefully did "—from the Fairy Kiln of Wu Chang, near Soo Chou. The proportions of this copy are good, and so are the colors. But the characters on the four medallions and on the band around the shoulder are wrong. Funerary jars always have the characters for 'never,' 'mountain,' 'aging,' and 'green.' I don't know what these characters on the copy are, but they aren't the right ones. I guess you got stuck."
"Thanks," she said thoughtfully.
Further inquiry turned up the name of a man who could translate the characters for her. A professor at Columbia.
She caught the man wiping his television makeup off in his office. He gallantly assured her it would be a pleasure. He wrinkled his brows over the photographs and finally said:
"It's gibberish. Not Chinese of any period, I'll swear to that. Here and there a piece of a character looks like something or other, but that's as far as the resemblance goes. One can easily imagine the layman being fooled, of course. Does it matter? After all, somebody simply faked a vase, and did a poor job of decorating it. Though why he didn't copy authentic characters I don't understand."
"I do," Norma Lavin whispered, her face bloodless.
Ryan and Mundin and her brother shifted impatiently as she tried to explain:
"They must be printed circuits. Maybe the crackle in the glaze is metallic—an antenna. There must be transistors and little silver-acid batteries and God knows what in the body of the thing. We could X-ray it—but anybody who'd make a communicator like that would probably have it booby-trapped."
Mundin asked slowly, "Have you handled the thing?"
"No!"
"Norma's right," Ryan said. "Work through the clerk. The gadget's dynamite. Don, find out who she is."
Don Lavin went to his files. Mundin exploded, "Damn it, I'm not convinced. This thing coming right in the middle of our whole campaign—are Haskell Arnold and his crowd that smart?"
"No," Ryan said gravely. "Not Haskell Arnold and his crowd."
"Here it is." Don Lavin produced a card. "The clerk's name is Harriet Elbers. Single, twenty-six, B.B.A. from Columbia, corporate-case researcher for Choate Brothers three years, discharged in staff reduction on closing a case. Um, efficiency rating high, yes, contract status standard—uh—nothing much else about her. Lives with widowed mother."
"Fine-sounding girl," Ryan said dispiritedly.
"Ryan, if it isn't Arnold——"
Ryan looked at Mundin and shrugged. "Who? Who but Green, Charlesworth? Arnold wouldn't play it this way. He's a slugger, nothing else. Green, Charlesworth—they're judo experts. They wait until we're charging full speed ahead and then they stick one foot out and we go crashing and break our necks. Or—they don't. As they think appropriate. I tangled with them once. You may recall my recent career."
Mundin said, "One thing's for certain. We've got to buzz Hubble, Nelson, and Coett on this. That's orders; and they've been putting up the cash."
"Sure," said Ryan absently. He was staring at the flower vase on his own desk.
The three money-men weren't scared; they were petrified.
Coett said in a rage, "By God, those bastards! Letting us run along like idiots, spending money like water!"
Nelson wailed, "My Coshocton employees! And this damn law-suit against G.M.L.—it's already on the calendar! My God, Mundin, can't there be some mistake?"
Hubble was almost philosophical, as he could afford to be. He had spent least; if anything, he had picked up some change on increased circulation of his publications. "Better lose some than all," he said consolingly. "Anyway, I'm still going to take some convincing that a screwy-looking vase and our— ah—breakdown of communications with Green, Charlesworth means that they're against us. Naturally, when I am convinced, that's that."
Norma Lavin looked thunderstruck. "You'd quit?" she gasped.
They looked at her. "My dear," Harry Coett said, "we remember what happened to your father. Don't you?"
Mundin said furiously, "Damn it, Coett, this is crazy! They're just people. They've got nothing but money. We're people and we've got money too, plenty of it All right, maybe they've got more, but they're not God Almighty! We can lick them if we have to!" He stopped; Hubble, Nelson, and Coett were wincing at every word.
Hubble opened his eyes. "Mundin," he remonstrated faintly. That was all he could manage to say.
Ryan said shakily, the jerks in his hands more visible than Mundin had seen them in weeks, "Maybe if one of us went to see them, Coett. Maybe—" his whole body was shaking, but he said, "I'll do it myself. At the worst they'll refuse to see me. That's happened before, God knows, but I can't see how we'll be any worse off—"
Coett said, "Shut your face, you old fool"
Hubble, more kindly, said, "You know how it is, Ryan. If we sent anyone but a very top man—God!"
"I'm not going," said Nelson very positively.
"I'm not," said Harry Coett.
And Nelson said, "So you see? There's just too much to lose. Sorry."
Norma Lavin, pale and quivering, stood up. "My Daddy invented the bubble-house for—" she began tremblingly, then caught herself. "No! The hell with that. Leaving my Daddy out of this, one-quarter of G.M.L. Homes belongs to Don and myself. It's ours, understand? Ours! Not yours or Green, Charlesworth's. If you yellow bastards want out, you can have out. We're sticking, and I can tell you right now we're sticking until we drop dead, or hell freezes over, or we win—in descending order of probability. It isn't just money, you know. We got along fine on no money. We can do it again. It's people, Coett! It's making life worth living for the poor slobs who buy their bubble-houses with their life's blood! Slavery's against the law. G.M.L.'s been breaking the law, but we are taking over, and we are going to make some changes. You hear me?"
They heard her, and that was the ball game. Seven people were shouting at once, even old Ryan: "—no better than a Republican, young lady!" Nelson was howling; and "For God's sake, let her talk!" screamed Mundin; and Coett was spouting endless obscenities.
And the door opened. Mishal, the guide, stared in, looking upset. "Visitor," he got out, and disappeared.
"Oh, hell," said Mundin in the sudden silence, starting toward the door, "I told those idiots—oh, it's you!" He looked irritatedly at the figure of William Choate IV, now entering. "Hello, Willie. Look, I'm awfully busy right now."
Willie Choate's lower lip was trembling. "Hello, old man," he said dismally. "I have a—uh—message for you."
"Later, Willie. Please." Mundin made pushing motions.
Willie stood his ground. "Here."
He handed Mundin a square white envelope. Mundin, torn between annoyance and hysteria, opened it and glanced absently at the little white card inside.
Then he glanced at it again.
Then he stared at it until Coett came to life and leaped forward to take it out of his hand. It said in crabbed handwriting:
Messrs. Green, Charlesworth request the appearance of Mr. Charles Mundin and Miss Norma Lavin when convenient