The Siege of Eternity

The interrogator didn't scowl at him. Didn't look at the mirror, either, just got up, walked stiffly to the door and summoned a male guard to escort Dannerman to the toilet. The deputy director was frowning. Hilda wasn't; in fact, she was feeling a faint glow of pride; her agent, faithful to his training, was controlling the interrogation. He was a good boy. . . .

Except, she reminded herself glumly, that he wasn't.

When Dannerman was back in his chair he was more cooperative; he'd made his point. Yes, he'd gone to Starlab looking for traces of alien presence. No, there hadn't been any. Yes, he was sure of that; he'd said so about a hundred times now, hadn't he? Yes (as the interrogator activated the table's pop-up screen and he glanced at it), he had seen that X-ray before. He was willing to take the Bureau's word that it was of his own head, but what that object was he had no idea.

"And you're aware that one just like it was found in Dr. Rosaleen Artzybachova's skull on autopsy, and that it is definitely a piece of alien technology."

"So you tell me," he agreed.

"Do you think the Bureau's lying to you?"

Agent Dannerman has one personal trait that comes in useful to the NBI. He was born rich, grew up among rich people and thus had entry to circles the average NBI agent couldn't penetrate. The late T. Cuthbert Dannerman, who was his uncle on his father's side, not only endowed the Dannerman Astrophysical Observatory but had enough left over to bequeath a tidy little fortune to his two surviving relatives, one of whom was Dan. Unfortunately for Dan, he was in deep cover abroad when the will was probated. By the time he got his hands on the money the world's rampant inflation had shrunk it to chump change.

"I hope not, but you think I'm lying to you and I'm not. Hell, friend, you ought to know that by now; your shrinks have tested me a thousand times, and I always came up clean."

In the spectator seats Hilda, and most of the others, looked at the pair of Bureau shrinks, who shrugged and nodded reluctantly.

"I don't know why that is," the interrogator agreed. "What it looks like is that you've found some way of beating the tests."

"Now, how could I do that?" Dannerman asked. "They shot me so full of drugs I was out of my head for weeks."

The interrogator paused. Then she said, "There is a way of settling this once and for all."

Dr. Patrice Dannerman Ely Metcalf Adcock attained her position as head of the Dannerman Astrophysical Observatory by virtue of her training as an astronomer, and also because she was the niece by marriage of the late T. Cuthbert Dannerman, whose money had funded the Observatory in the first place. Patrice Adcock was luckier in her inheritance than her cousin by marriage, Dan Dannerman; she was able to transfer her legacy to inflation-proof investments as soon as she received it. But two divorces depleted her cash . . . which was why she seized on the chance of riches from the Starlab orbiter.

"Yes, I know what that is. You want to cut my head open so you can get a good look at that thing."

"That's right. There's a release form right in front of you, if you'll just sign it-"

"No, I can't do that," Dannerman said apologetically. "I wish I could help. But I hear that the operation could turn me into a vegetable."

"Maybe could. No one knows for sure. Not until they open you up and get a look."

"I'm sorry. That's not good enough. I'm not signing."

"You don't have a choice," she said. "The deputy director is ordering you to sign the release."

"Well, that's different," Dannerman said cheerfully. "Let him give it to me in writing, and then let me give a copy of it to my lawyer . .. and then we'll see."

That was enough for the deputy director.

"I think we've heard enough from Agent Dannerman," he said to the room in general, then spoke into his microphone.

As the interrogator, hearing, terminated the interrogation and took Dannerman out of the Pit, Dr. Marsha Evergood raised her hand. "Mr. Pell, you understand I can't undertake the operation without his consent."

Pell said heartily, "Naturally. No one in the Bureau would ask you to, Dr. Evergood."

" But if he won't sign-"

"I give you my word that you won't have to pick up a scalpel until you have his signature on the release form. Now they'll be bringing Dr. Adcock in."

Signature, signature, Hilda thought, cudgeling her memory. There was something about signatures. . . .

Down in the pit they were bringing the Adcock woman in, but Hilda wasn't looking at her. She was looking at the other Bureau man, tardily remembering where she had seen him before. He was the man who'd replaced old Willy Godden when he retired as Chief of Documents: the branch of the Bureau which was in the business of providing you with any papers, and any signatures, you might happen to want.

CHAPTER THREE