“I wish I could be as certain of that as you seem to be.” Stirling probed very gently and saw the security man’s long face freeze into impassiveness. Uh-huh, the librarian said, item number three?
When the truck had reached the Record’s offices, the driver called back to Stirling through a sliding panel; and he opened the rear door and jumped out. The truck immediately moved away, caught up in the solid, creeping congestion of the fifth-level traffic arteries. Stirling went into the building, found a vacant elevator, and dropped himself to the floor occupied by the newspaper. By the time the elevator doors opened he was sweating gently, and his new shirt was developing the familiar stickiness under the collar which was something he had not experienced in a long time.
At the door to the main editorial office he paused for a moment, then went in as inconspicuously as possible. He ran into an almost palpable wall of warmth, smoke, and used air which made his lungs quail. The long office seemed to have shrunk to about half the size he remembered it. Walls clamped in on an incredible montage of desks, screens, columns, service cables, and an impossible number of people who were working, talking, crouching over machines, smoking, and threading their way through narrow aisles with eel-like speed. Stirling felt his breathing lapse into a ragged, uneasy rhythm.
“Say! There’s big Vic!”
A group of reporters surrounded him within seconds, some of them climbing over desks to get closer. He shook as many hands as possible and exchanged greetings with familiar faces to which he had a disquieting amount of difficulty in attaching names. The voices seemed to wrap him in a stifling blanket of sound.
“What was it like up there?”
“How did you lose so much weight? Didn’t they feed you up there?”
“Tell us about the gun battles, Vic.”
“Any women up there?”
“How much would it cost me to get a tan like that?”
“Did you bring any … ?”
In the middle of the confusion, a girl thrust a note into Stirling’s hand. He opened it and read: “PI. see me when you’ve finished—S. McL.”
Christ, Stirling thought in something approaching panic, McLeod is still sitting at his desk and sending notes to reporters who are all of fifteen feet away. The walls seemed to move in closer for an instant. He struggled free of the mob and worked his way across to the news desk. McLeod set down his plastic cup of synthejuice and stood up to shake hands.
“Welcome back, Victor.” He smiled painfully. “It’s good to see you again, Victor. Don’t worry about your contract—the company is overlooking the irregularities; so you’re still employed and have six months back salary to collect when you’re ready for it.”
Stirling prevented his jaw from dropping. “I didn’t expect this, Sam.”
“Think nothing of it.”
“But after the way I walked out . , .”
“The company is taking heed of the special circumstances, what with your brother being missing, and all that. It must have been pretty tough for you. And besides”—McLeod toyed with his cup—”we can’t afford to lose good reporters.”
Stirling almost burst out laughing. McLeod had not been able to look him in the eyes and come out with that one, not after four years of private warfare between them.
“Well, thanks a lot, Sam. I had no idea the paper thought so much of me.” Stirling allowed the faintest note of insincerity to creep into his voice and McLeod, a seasoned verbal skirmisher, looked at him thoughtfully from yellowed eyes.
“There is only one tiling, Victor. Obviously you’ll not be ready to start work right away, but Mr. Selig left word he would like to see you for a few minutes at the earliest opportunity. Could you go down to his office now?”
Stirling nodded noncommittally. As news editor McLeod was responsible to the Records s editor, who in turn, was answerable to the editor-in-chief of the company group of papers. Above him again was the general manager of the proprietary corporation, and then one reached Mr. Selig, a man very few of the reporters had ever even seen. The librarian in the back of Stirling’s mind opened up his brand new file and stood waiting.
“Well, Vic. You’ve been in the news lately.”
“Yes. I’m doing my best to get back out of it again though.” Stirling leaned back in his chair and watched Leon Selig across an expanse of cluttered desk. He was a thick, round man with an incongruously tiny hooked nose which reminded Stirling of a budgerigar’s beak.
“Yeah, but the point is, you got into it by yourself. I like that, Vic. It shows you’ve got initiative and imagination, two qualities that are pretty scarce in the Record these days. I’ve got some ideas for reorganizing things upstairs, and I’ll be keeping an eye on you, my boy. This is between us, of course—in the meantime, anyway.”
“Thank you, Mr. Selig.” Stirling put a carefully calculated amount of gratitude into his voice and wondered exactly what he was being set up for. Selig appeared not to hear. He spent a full minute tidying paperwork on his desk, while Stirling concentrated on forcing his lungs to accept the machine-cleaned, lifeless air. Selig’s office—although palatial for one man by Compression standards— was much more claustrophobic than the editorial room. He decided he would be able to sit in it for a maximum of five minutes, perhaps less, if nothing interesting happened soon.
“Now, Vic,” Selig’s voice was warmly confidential. “As you know, I never interfere in matters of editorial policy, but we’re dealing with exceptional circumstances here. So, what I would like you to do if you don’t mind, is to outline for me the kind of story you’re planning to write about your experience.”
“I’m not planning to write anything,” Stirling said bluntly. “I wasn’t on an assignment. I went up there for personal reasons.”
“That’s how a good story is written, Vic. When the reporter isn’t just an impartial observer, but is personally involved, we get a good story, something that’s worth reading. Now, look. Your salary for the whole six months is being paid into your account today, and I’m going to offer you a special rate for a series of feature stories about those people up there. A dollar a word. Write it to any length you like, at a dollar a word. How does that sound?”
“It sounds great, Mr. Selig, but I can’t do the story.”
Selig began tidying his desk for the second time around. “I understand that Lester Raddall talked to you up there?” “Yes, but I’m not writing about that either.”
“He can’t touch you, Vic. We can all see his point of view, of course. He fluffed the whole business, by knuckling in to those bums, and now he wants the whole thing buried. It’s understandable he should want it forgotten; and I admire the stand you’re making, Vic. But don’t get your loyalties misplaced.
“Your duty is to the people of this country, not to any individual or group.”
“That’s the way I feel about it,” Stirling said. “And that’s why I’m not going to write this story. I guess I’d better clean out my desk and start looking for another job.”
Selig gave a booming laugh. “How little you know me, Vic. If, in your judgment, a story should not be printed, would no amount of money make you change your mind?”
“No.” I don’t sound like myself, Stirling thought. Am I going to be subject to rushes of idealism to the head? If so, I’d better look for another job.
“That’s it, then. Integrity is too scarce a commodity in employees for me to try subverting it. I want you to know that the impressions I’ve formed in this private little talk will improve your promotion prospects, Vic.