* * *
“Regina! What a heaven design for a quilt!”
“But what is it?”
“The Seal of Solomon.”
“The seal of who? Whom? Whose?”
“King Solomon, Mary. You must remember his name.”
“Oh, of course. He had a thing with Libra.”
“That’s Sheba, darling. We used to sing sexy songs about them at school.”
“Not sexy Solomon this time, Nell; wizard Solomon from my wicked books. We put in enough time memorizing his wicked spells.”
“In obscene languages.”
“What does his seal do, Regina?”
“It’s heavy magic that’s supposed to like make Satan do a number.”
“Oh Lord! Not that false alarm again!”
“Perish the thought. No, this is just something different from
those kitsch designs you see in the museums; cutesy cottages and schools and barns and birds and flowers; that whole Pennsylvania Dutch schmeer. We’ll repeat it in big squares. Pi, light all the lamps. Come, ladies, to work, to work.”
* * *
But one does not summon Gretchen Nunn, not even if you’re the chairman of CCC. You work your way up through the echelons of her staff until you’re finally granted an audience. This involves much backing and forthing between your staff and hers, and ignites a good deal of exasperation, particularly in applicants who are pressed for time. Consequently, Mills Copeland was understandably provoked when at last he was ushered into Ms. Nunn’s cluttered workshop.
Gretchen Nunn’s business was working miracles; not miracles in the sense of the extraordinary, anomalous, or abnormal brought about by a superhuman agency, but rather in the sense of her extraordinary perception and manipulation of reality on the supraliminal level. She was a master of psychodynamics. In most situations she achieved the impossible begged by her clients, and her fees were so enormous that she was considering going public on the Big Board.
Quite naturally, the chairman had taken it for granted that this mysterious psytech would look like one of Macbeth’s Witches of Endor, or Merlin in drag. He was flabbergasted to discover that Ms. Nunn was a Watusi princess with velvety black skin and aquiline features. She was in her late twenties, tall, slender, and ravishing in crimson. The chairman’s irritation vanished. Ms. Nunn dazzled him with a smile, indicated a chair, sat in one opposite and said, “My fee is one hundred thousand. Can you afford it?” Her accent was a lilting Jamaican.
“I can, Miz Nunn. Agreed.”
“Not yet. Is your difficulty worth it?”
“It is.”
“Then we understand each other so far. I prefer to—Yes, Alex?”
The young secretary who had slipped into the workshop said, “Excuse me. LeClerque insists on knowing how you made the positive diagnosis of his wife’s one-month pregnancy.”
“LeClerque? The impotent one?”
“Yes, Miz.”
Ms. Nunn clicked her tongue impatiently. “He knows I never give reasons; only results. I made that clear.”
“Yes, Miz, but he is agitated. Naturally.”
“Has he paid?”
“Check cleared this morning.”
“All right, I’ll make an exception in his case. Psychometry gave me the clues. Pregnancy behavior unmistakable. Strong emotional revaluations. I checked with ultralight. Her face showed the banded pregnancy mask under the skin, and she isn’t using the pill. Tell LeClerque, but no sympathy, Alex. Always cool and professional.”
“Yes, Miz. Thank you, Miz.”
She turned to the chairman as the secretary backed out. “In case you’re alarmed, LeClerque is a code name known only to the client and my staff, which can be trusted. I never reveal a client’s true identity.”
“I understand.”
“And you heard me? I only give results.”
“Agreed, Miz Nunn.”
“Now your difficulty. I’m not committed yet. If that’s understood, go ahead. Everything. Stream of consciousness and free association if necessary.”
A half hour later, she illuminated the room with another dazzling smile. “Thank you. This one is really unique; a welcome change for me. It’s a contract… if you haven’t changed your mind.”
“I haven’t, Miz Nunn.”
“Consider for a moment, sir. Perhaps telling me about it has sorted it out in your mind. Then you’ll no longer need me. That happens sometimes.”
“Not this time, Miz Nunn,” Copeland said with massive conviction.
“You still believe you need me?”
“Definitely.”
“Then it’s a contract, Mr. Tinsmith.”
“What? Tins—? Oh. Of course. Thank you, Miz Nunn. Would you like a deposit or payment in advance?”
“Not from CCC.”
“Expenses? Shall we arrange that now?”
“No. My responsiblity, Mr. Tinsmith.”
“But what if you have to—That is, if you’re required to—”
She laughed. “My responsiblity. I never give reasons and never reveal methods. How can I charge for them? That’s why my set fee is so high. Now don’t forget, sir, I want the Skip-Trace and Burne reports.”
A week later Gretchen Nunn took the unusual step of visiting the chairman in his office at CCC. “I’m calling on you, sir, to give you the opportunity of withdrawing from our contract. There will be no charge.”
“Withdraw? Why?”
“Because I believe you’re involved in something more serious than anticipated.”
“But what?”
“You won’t take my word for it?”
“How can I? I must know.”
Ms. Nunn compressed her lips, then sighed. “Since this is an unusual case, I’ll have to break my rule. Look at this, please.”
She unrolled a large map of the Guff sector of the Corridor and flattened it on the chairman’s conference table. There was a star in the center of the map. “Shima’s Oasis,” Ms. Nunn said. There was a wide circle scribed around the star. “The limit to which a man can walk from the Oasis in two hours,” Ms. Nunn explained. “Two hours out, two hours back, four in all. This is a maximum plot allowing nothing for any events that might interrupt the walk.”
“I understand.”
Twisting trails straggled out from the star toward the boundary circle in all directions. “I got this from the Skip-Trace report. This is how their ops tailed your Dr. Shima.”
“Most ingenious, but I see nothing serious about this, Miz Nunn.”
“Look closely at the trails I’ve plotted, sir. What d’you see?”
“Why… Each ends in a red cross.”
“And what happens to each trail before it reaches the cross?”
“Why nothing. Nothing at all except that they’re rather corkscrewed. Wait… They start as dots coming from the star and then change to dashes.”
“And that’s what makes it serious.”
“I don’t understand, Miz Nunn.”
“I’ll explain, sir. Each cross represents the scene of a Lethal-One.”
“What! Murder?”
“The dashes represent Homicide’s backtracking of the actions and whereabouts of the murder victim just prior to death.”
“Murder!”
“They could trace the victim’s actions back just so far and no further. Those are the dashes. Skip-Trace could tail Dr. Shima from his Oasis just so far and no further. Those are the dots. The trails join up. The dates match. What’s your conclusion, sir?”
“It must be coincidence! It has to be!” the chairman shouted. “This brilliant, charming young man, with everything in the world that anyone could wish for… Lethal crime? Murder? Impossible!”
“D’you want more factual data?”
“No I do not, madame. I want the truth. Proof positive without farfetched inferences from dots and dashes.”
“Very well, Mr. Tinsmith. You’ll get your proof poz.”