“A deal with me?” Kloofman delivered himself of a rumbling chuckle. “You’re incredible in your brazenness,” he said mildly. “Don’t you realize what I can do to you?”
“Yes.”
“And yet you come here to bargain with me?”
“I have Mortensen,” Quellen reminded him. “Unless I release him, he won’t be free to hop on 4 May. And that means—”
“Yes,” said Kloofman sharply. He felt tension levels climbing within his body. This man had found his zone of vulnerability, all right. It was preposterous that he should be held at bay by a prolet, but that was the situation. Kloofman could take no chances with a man who threatened to change the past. No computer simulation could possibly calculate the effects of subtracting the hopper Donald Mortensen from his proper time destination. The world leader was helpless. Kloofman said, “You’re playing a dangerous game, Quellen. State your business. Then you’ll be removed and the location of Mortensen will be dredged from your mind.”
“Mortensen is programmed to destruct in the event of any tampering with my brain,” said Quellen.
Could that be true, Kloofman wondered? Or was this all some gigantic bluff?
“Your business.”
Quellen nodded. He seemed to be gaining poise and strength, as though he had discovered that Kloofman was no super being, but merely a very old man with great power. Quellen said, “I was assigned to the investigation into the time-travel operation. I’ve succeeded in finding the man who controls it. He’s under arrest now. Unfortunately, he’s in possession of information that incriminates me in an illegal act.”
“Are you a criminal, Quellen?”
“I’ve done something illegal. It could bring me demotion and worse. If I turn the slyster over to your people, he’ll expose me. So I want immunity. That’s the deal. I’ll give you your man, and he’ll blab about my crime, but you’ll confirm me in my position and see to it that I’m not prosecuted or demoted.”
“What’s your crime, Quellen?”
“I maintain a Class Two villa in Africa.”
Kloofman smiled. “You are a scoundrel, aren’t you?” he said without rancour. “You connive out of your class, you blackmail the High Government—”
“Actually I regard myself as fairly honest, sir.”
“I suppose you do. But you’re a scoundrel all the same. Do you know what I’d do with a dangerous man like you, if I had my options? I’d put you in the time machine and hurl you far into the past. That’s the safest way to deal with agitators. That’s how we’ll cope, once we—” Kloofman fell silent. After a moment he said, “Your boldness stupefies me. What if I lie to you? I grant you your immunity, you turn Mortensen over to me and surrender the time-travel slyster, and then I seize you and arrest you all the same.”
“I have two other documented hoppers hidden away,” said Quellen blandly. “One is due to depart later this year and the other one early next year. They’re further insurance that you won’t harm me after I’ve given you Mortensen.”
“You’re bluffing, Quellen. You’ve invented those other two hoppers on the spot. I’ll put you under a neural probe and check on it.”
“The moment the probe touches my brain,” said Quellen, “Mortensen will die.”
Kloofman felt unaccustomed anguish. He was certain that this infuriating prolet was piling bluff upon bluff—but there was no way of proving that without peering into his brain, and bluff number one made it too risky for Kloofman to try that It might just not be a bluff.
He said, “What do you really want, Quellen?”
“I’ve told you. A pledge of immunity, before witnesses. I want you to guarantee that I won’t be punished for maintaining my place in Africa, and that I’ll come to no harm for having bearded you like this. Then I’ll give you the slyster and Mortensen.”
“And the other two hoppers.”
“Those also. After I’ve become assured of your good faith.”
“You’re incredible, Quellen. But you seem to hold a strong position. I can’t let you keep Mortensen. And I want that time machine. It’s got many uses for us. Profitable ones. Politically beneficial uses. Too dangerous to let it stay in private hands. All right. All right. You’ll have your pledge. I’ll give you more than that, Quellen.”
“More, sir?”
“Your villa’s Class Two, you say? I assume you want to go on living in it. We’ll have to make you Class Two then, won’t we?”
“Take me into the High Government, sir?”
“Of course,” said Kloofman warmly. “Consider: how can I send you back to lower levels, after you’ve triumphed over me like this? You’ve won status. I’ll put you up here. Giacomin will find room for you. A man who’s done what you’ve done can’t possibly remain in a low bureaucratic post, Quellen. So we’ll arrange something. You’ve won more than you came looking for.” Kloofman smiled. “I congratulate you, Quellen.”
Quellen erupted into the upper air, after having risen level upon level upon level from the mythical catacomb that was the lair of Peter Kloofman. He staggered out into the street and planted himself solidly, feet on the pavement, head upturned to the towers far above. He saw the lacy connecting bridges, the gleaming cones atop the buildings, the faint patch of blue light beyond the summits.
I don’t have much time, Quellen thought.
He was numb with shock after his interview with Kloofman. In retrospect he had no idea how he had carried off such an enterprise. To muscle his way into the lair of a Class One administrator, to stand there bluntly making demands and having Kloofman accede to them, to pile fraud upon fraud and carry his bluffs home—it was not real. It couldn’t be. It had to be some sniffer-palace fantasy, some dream of power that would fade with the ebbing of the drug from his brain.
Yet the buildings were real. The sky was real. The pavements were real. And the interview with Kloofman had been real, too. He had won. He had been invited to accept Class Two status. He had compelled Kloofman to retreat.
Quellen knew that he had not won a thing.
He had done his audacious manoeuvre with reasonable aplomb, but it had been a fool’s manoeuvre, and he saw that more clearly now than he had an hour before. Any man could be proud of having had the nerve to confront Kloofman like that, but, having done it, Quellen knew that he had gained no real safety, only the temporary illusion of triumph. It would be necessary to activate the alternate plan that he had been nurturing for some hours. His mind had prepared itself for this eventuality, and he knew what he had to do, though he was not at all sure that he would have time to do it.
He was in mortal danger. He had to act fast.
Kloofman had not fooled him with his smiles, his words of praise, his promise of an uptwitch to High Government status, his apparent delight in Quellen’s audacity. Kloofman was frightened that something might happen to Mortensen that could topple his own power, yes, but Kloofman could not be pushed around as easily as it seemed.
He’ll get Lanoy and Mortensen from me, Quellen knew, and then he’ll destroy me. I should have realized that from the start. How could I hope to outsmart Kloofman?
But he did not regret having made the attempt. A man is not a worm; he can stand up on his legs, he can fight for his position. He can try. Quellen had tried. He had done something foolhardy to the point of absurdity, and he had carried it off with honour, even if his success was probably unreal.
Now, though, he had to hasten to protect himself against Kloofman’s wrath. He had at least a little time in which to operate. The euphoria of his meeting with Kloofman had worn off, and he was thinking clearly and rationally.
He reached the headquarters of the Secretariat of Crime and immediately gave orders for Lanoy to be taken from the custody tank once again. The slyster was brought to Quellen’s office. He looked moody and downcast.