I called her right after I left the Bureau office, and told her the chief had a new project for me. I didn’t tell her what it was, but from the tone of my voice she must have guessed it was something risky.
I saw her face in the screen go tight, with the mouth pulled up in the little frown she’s so fond of making every time I get stuck into another of the Bureau’s weirdies.
“Les, what is it this time?”
“Can’t tell you over the phone,” I said, in mock accents of melodrama. “But it’s a doozie, that’s for sure.” I fingered the leaden box in my pocket nervously.
“I’ll come over after work,” she said. “Les, don’t let that man get you doing impossible things again.”
“Don’t worry, baby. This new business won’t take any time at all,” I lied. “And the Bureau pays its help well. See you later, doll.”
“Right,” I broke the connection and watched her anxious face dissolve into a swirl of rainbow colors and trickle off the viewer, leaving the screen looking a dirty grey. I stared at the dead screen for a couple of minutes, and then got up.
I was worried too. The Bureau—that’s its only name, just plain The Bureau—was formed a while back, specifically to handle screwball things like this one. In a world as overpopulated and complex as ours is, you need a force like the Bureau—silent, anonymous, out of the limelight. We take care of the oddball things, the things we’d prefer the populace didn’t get to hear shout.
Like this one. Like this business of people fooshing off into thin air, leaving burnt-out diamonds behind. The only people on Earth who could have even a remote chance of worming some sanity out of that one were—us. More precisely, me.
I stopped at a corner tavern and had a little fortification before going home. The barkeep was an inquisitive type, and I rambled on and on about some fictitious business problems of mine, inventing a whole sad story about a lumber warehouse and my shady partner. I didn’t dare talk about my real business, of course, but it felt good to be able to unload some kind of trouble, even phony trouble.
Then I caught a quick copter and headed for home. I got out at the depot and walked, feeling the leaden box tapping ominously against my thigh every step of the way. Peg was there when I came in.
“You made it pretty quick,” I said, surprised. “Seems to me you don’t get out of work till four, and it’s only three-thirty now.”
“We got let off early today, Les. Holiday.” She looked up at me, with strain and worry evident on her face, and ran thin, nervous fingers through her close-cut red hair. “I came right over.”
I went to the cabinet and poured two stiff ones, one for each of us.
“Here’s to the Chief,” I said. “And to the Bureau.”
She shook her head. “Don’t make jokes, Les. Drink to anyone else, but not to the Bureau. Why don’t you drink to us?”
“What’s wrong, Peg? The Bureau is what’s going to keep us going, doll. The salary I get from them—”
“—will be just adequate to get you the finest tombstone available, as soon as he gives you a ,job you can’t handle.” She stared up at me. Her eyes were cold and sharp from anger, but I could also see the beginnings of two tears in them. I kissed them away, and felt her relax. I sat down and pulled out the handful of burnt-out diamonds.
“Here,” I said. “You can make earrings out of them.”
“Les! Where did these—”
I told her the whole story, starting at the beginning and finishing at the end. I always tell Peg exactly what each mission of mine is about. Doing that violates security regulations, I know, but I’m sure of Peg. Absolutely sure. When I tell her something, it’s like telling myself; it doesn’t get any further. Which is why I was able to keep company with her, with the eventual idea of marrying her. In the Bureau, you don’t think of getting married unless you can find a woman who could keep her mouth shut. Peg could.
“You mean these diamonds are instrumental in the disappearances?” she asked wonderingly.
I nodded. “That’s what we think, baby. And I have one other little exhibit for you.” Slowly I drew out the lead box and opened it, only a crack, and let a single beam of radiance escape before slamming it shut again.
She gasped in awe. “That’s beautiful! But how—”
“That’s where my job begins,” I said. “That diamond is an unused specimen, one that hasn’t functioned yet.”
“Just how do you fit into this?” she asked suspiciously.
I stood up. “I’ll find out soon enough. I’m going to go into the next room,” I said, “and see how this diamond works. And then I’m going to go wherever it takes me, and worry about getting back after I get there.”
The words fell so easily from my mouth that it seemed as if that had actually been my plan along. Really, it hadn’t; I didn’t have any idea where I was going to begin this case, but certainly that wasn’t any way to go about it.
But as I spoke the words, I saw that that was what I had to do. That was the way the Bureau worked. Go straight to the heart of the matter, and worry about the consequences to yourself later.
“Les—” Peg began, and then knocked it off. She knew it wouldn’t do her any good to complain, and she didn’t try. I loved her for it. I knew she didn’t like my job, and I knew she’d give anything to have me go into some sane, safe industry—like jetcar racing, or something, I suppose—but at least she kept her mouth shut once I got going on a project.
“You wait here,” I told her. “Fix a couple of drinks for us. I’m going to adjourn to the next room and play around with this piece of glitter for a while.”
“Be careful,” she urged.
“I always am,” I said. I gave her a kiss, and as I felt her soft, responsive lips against mine I wondered just where in hell that diamond was going to lead me. I didn’t want to get too far from Peg, I thought suddenly.
Then I broke away, scooped up the lead box, and went into my tiny den, closing the door behind me.
I sat down at the desk and spread the burnt-out diamonds in a little semi-circle around the box. The room was cold, and I was shivering a little—not only from the draft, either.
I turned on my desk light and sat there for a while, staring at the glistening row of gems, staring at the odd little brown cloud disfiguring each one.
Then, slowly, I reached for the box.
Sixty-six men—only men, for a reason I didn’t understand—had disappeared. The diamonds had something to do with it. I didn’t know what. But I had an overriding feeling that I was slated to be Number Sixty-seven.
It’s a job, I thought. It’s my job. And there was only one way to do it. My fingers quivered a little, just a little, as I started to open the box.
Brightness began to stream from it as soon as the upper half had parted from the lower, and I felt a bead of sweat break out on my forehead and go trickling down back of my ear. With perhaps too much caution, I lifted back the lid and lay bare the diamond nestling within, like a pearl inside an oyster.
I had never seen anything so lovely in my life. It was emerald-cut, neat and streamlined, with uncanny brilliance lurking in its smooth facets. It was small, but perfect, symmetrical and clear. It looked like a tiny spark of cold, blue-white fire.
Then I looked closer.
There was something in the heart of the diamond—not the familiar brown flaw of the others, but something of a different color, something moving and flickering. Before my eyes, it changed and grew.
And I saw what it was. It was the form of a girl—a woman, rather, a voluptuous, writhing nude form in the center of the gem. Her hair was a lustrous blue-black, her eyes a piercing ebony. She was gesturing to me, holding out her hands, incredibly beckoning from within the heart of the diamond.