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big room of glass casesā€”mounted specimens and articulated skeletons of Zarathustran mammals. More people were there, looking around and behind and even into the cases. He began to think that the escape was genuine, and not just a cover-up for the murder of the Fuzzies.

Jimenez took them down a narrow hall beyond to an open door at the end. Inside, the permanent night light made a blue-white glow; a swivel chair stood just inside the door. Jimenez pointed to it.

ā€œThey must have gotten up on that to work the latch and open the door,ā€ he said.

It was like the doors at the camp, spring latch, with a handle instead of a knob. Theyā€™d have learned how to work it from watching him. Fane was trying the latch.

ā€œNot too stiff,ā€ he said. ā€œYour little fellows strong enough to work it?ā€

He tried it and agreed. ā€œSure. And theyā€™d be smart enough to do it, too. Even Baby Fuzzy, the one your men didnā€™t get, would be able to figure that out.ā€

ā€œAnd look what they did to my office,ā€ Jimenez said, putting on the lights.

Theyā€™d made quite a mess of it. They hadnā€™t delayed long to do it, just thrown things around. Everything was thrown off the top of the desk. They had dumped the wastebasket, and left it dumped. He saw that and chuckled. The escape had been genuine all right.

ā€œProbably hunting for things they could use as weapons, and doing as much damage as they could in the process.ā€ There was evidently a pretty wide streak of vindictiveness in Fuzzy character. ā€œI donā€™t think they like you, Juan.ā€

ā€œWouldnā€™t blame them,ā€ Fane said. ā€œLetā€™s see what kind of a houdini they did on these cages now.ā€

The cages were in a roomā€”file room, storeroom, junk roomā€”behind Jimenezā€™s office. It had a spring lock, too, and the Fuzzies had dragged one of the cages over and stood on it to open the door. The cages themselves were about three feet wide and five feet long, with plywood bottoms, wooden frames and quarter-inch netting on the sides and tops. The tops were hinged, and fastened with hasps, and bolts slipped through the staples with nuts screwed on them. The nuts had been unscrewed from five and the bolts slipped out; the sixth cage had been broken open from the inside, the netting cut away from the frame at one corner and bent back in a triangle big enough for a Fuzzy to crawl through.

ā€œI canā€™t understand that,ā€ Jimenez was saying. ā€œWhy that wire looks as though it had been cut.ā€

ā€œIt was cut. Marshal, Iā€™d pull somebodyā€™s belt about this, if I were you. Your men arenā€™t very careful about searching prisoners. One of the Fuzzies hid a knife out on them.ā€ He remembered how Little Fuzzy and Ko-Ko had burrowed into the bedding in apparently unreasoning panic, and explained about the little spring-steel knives he had made. ā€œI suppose he palmed it and hugged himself into a ball, as though he was scared witless, when they put him in the bag.ā€

ā€œWaited till he was sure he wouldnā€™t get caught before he used it, too,ā€ the marshal said. ā€œThat wireā€™s soft enough to cut easily.ā€ He turned to Jimenez. ā€œYou people ought to be glad Iā€™m ineligible for jury duty. Why donā€™t you just throw it in and let Kellogg cop a plea?ā€

Gerd van Riebeek stopped for a moment in the doorway and looked into what had been Leonard Kelloggā€™s office. The last time heā€™d been here, Kellogg had had him on the carpet about that land-prawn business. Now Ernst Mallin was sitting in Kelloggā€™s chair, trying to look unconcerned and not making a very good job of it. Gus Brannhard sprawled in an armchair, smoking a cigar and looking at Mallin as he would look at a river pig when he doubted whether it was worth shooting it or not. A uniformed deputy turned quickly, then went back to studying an elaborate wall chart showing the interrelation of Zarathustran mammalsā€”heā€™d made the original of that chart himself. And Ruth Ortheris sat apart from the desk and the three men, smoking. She looked up and then, when she saw that he was looking past and away from her, she lowered her eyes.

ā€œYou havenā€™t found them?ā€ he asked Brannhard.

The fluffy-bearded lawyer shook his head. ā€œJack has a gang down in the cellar, working up. Max is in the psychology lab, putting the Company cops who were on duty last night under veridication. They all claim, and the veridicator backs them up, that it was impossible for the Fuzzies to get out of the building.ā€

ā€œThey donā€™t know whatā€™s impossible, for a Fuzzy.ā€

ā€œThatā€™s what I told him. He didnā€™t give me any argument, either. Heā€™s pretty impressed with how they got out of those cages.ā€

Ruth spoke. ā€œGerd, we didnā€™t hurt them. We werenā€™t going to hurt them at all. Juan put them in cages because we didnā€™t have any other place for them, but we were going to fix up a nice room, where they could play togetherā€¦.ā€ Then she must have seen that he wasnā€™t listening, and stopped, crushing out her cigarette and rising. ā€œDr. Mallin, if these people havenā€™t any more questions to ask me, I have a lot of work to do.ā€

ā€œYou want to ask her anything, Gerd?ā€ Brannhard inquired.

Once he had had something very important he had wanted to ask her. He was glad, now, that he hadnā€™t gotten around to it. Hell, she was so married to the Company itā€™d be bigamy if she married him too.

ā€œNo, I donā€™t want to talk to her at all.ā€

She started for the door, then hesitated. ā€œGerd, Iā€¦.ā€ she began. Then she went out. Gus Brannhard looked after her, and dropped the ash of his cigar on Leonard Kelloggā€™sā€”now Ernst Mallinā€™sā€”floor.

Gerd detested her, and she wouldnā€™t have had any respect for him if he didnā€™t. She ought to have known that something like this would happen. It always did, in the business. A smart girl, in the business, never got involved with any one man; she always got herself four or five boyfriends, on all possible sides, and played them off one against another.

Sheā€™d have to get out of the Science Center right away. Marshal Fane was questioning people under veridication; she didnā€™t dare let him get around to her. She didnā€™t dare go to her office; the veridicator was in the lab across the hall, and thatā€™s where he was working. And she didnā€™t dareā€”

Yes, she could do that, by screen. She went into an office down the hall; a dozen people recognized her at once and began bombarding her with questions about the Fuzzies. She brushed them off and went to a screen, punching a combination. After a slight delay, an elderly man with a thin-lipped, bloodless face appeared. When he recognized her, there was a brief look of annoyance on the thin face.

ā€œMr. Stenson,ā€ she began, before he could say anything: ā€œThat apparatus I brought to your shop this morningā€”the sensory-response detectorā€”weā€™ve made a simply frightful mistake. Thereā€™s nothing wrong with it whatever, and if anythingā€™s done with it, it may cause serious damage.ā€

ā€œI donā€™t think I understand, Dr. Ortheris.ā€

ā€œWell, it was a perfectly natural mistake. You see, weā€™re all at our witsā€™ end here. Mr. Holloway and his lawyer and the Colonial Marshal are here with an order from Judge Pendarvis for the return of those Fuzzies. None of us know what weā€™re doing at all. Why the whole trouble with the apparatus was the fault of the operator. Weā€™ll have to have it back immediately, all of it.ā€

ā€œI see, Dr. Ortheris.ā€ The old instrument maker looked worried. ā€œBut Iā€™m afraid the apparatus has already gone to the workroom. Mr. Stephenson has it now, and I canā€™t get in touch with him at present. If the mistake can be corrected, what do you want done?ā€

ā€œJust hold it; Iā€™ll call or send for it.ā€

She blanked the screen. Old Johnson, the chief data synthesist, tried to detain her with some question.

ā€œIā€™m sorry, Mr. Johnson. I canā€™t stop now. I have to go over to Company House right away.ā€

The suite at the Hotel Mallory was crowded when Jack Holloway returned with Gerd van Riebeek; it was noisy with voices, and the ventilators were laboring to get rid of the tobacco smoke. Gus Brannhard, Ben Rainsford and Baby Fuzzy were meeting the press.

ā€œOh, Mr. Holloway!ā€ somebody shouted as he entered. ā€œHave you found them yet?ā€

ā€œNo; weā€™ve been all over Science Center from top to bottom. We know they went down a few floors from where theyā€™d been caged, but thatā€™s all. I donā€™t think they could have gotten outside; the only exit on the ground levelā€™s through a vestibule where a Company policeman was on duty, and thereā€™s no way for them to have climbed down from any of the terraces or landing stages.ā€

ā€œWell, Mr. Holloway, I hate to suggest this,ā€ somebody else said, ā€œbut have you eliminated the possibility that they may have hidden in a trash bin and been dumped into the mass-energy converter?ā€

ā€œWe thought of that. The converterā€™s underground, in a vault that can be entered only by one door, and that was locked. No trash was disposed of between the time they were brought there and the time the search started, and everything thatā€™s been sent to the converter since has been checked piece by piece.ā€

ā€œWell, Iā€™m glad to hear that, Mr. Holloway, and I know that everybody hearing this will be glad, too. I take it youā€™ve not given up looking for them?ā€

ā€œAre we on the air now? No, I have not; Iā€™m staying here in Mallorysport until I either find them or am convinced that they arenā€™t in the city. And I am offering a reward of two thousand sols apiece for their return to me. If youā€™ll wait a moment, Iā€™ll have descriptions ready for youā€¦.ā€

Victor Grego unstoppered the refrigerated cocktail jug. ā€œMore?ā€ he asked Leslie Coombes.

ā€œYes, thank you.ā€ Coombes held his glass until it was filled. ā€œAs you say, Victor, you made the decision, but you made it on my advice, and the advice was bad.ā€

He couldnā€™t disagree, even politely, with that. He hoped it hadnā€™t been ruinously bad. One thing, Leslie wasnā€™t trying to pass the buck, and considering how Ham Oā€™Brien had mishandled his end of it, he could have done so quite plausibly.

ā€œI used bad judgment,ā€ Coombes said dispassionately, as though discussing some mistake Hitler had made, or Napoleon. ā€œI thought Oā€™Brien wouldnā€™t try to use one of those presigned writs, and I didnā€™t think Pendarvis would admit, publicly, that he signed court orders in blank. Heā€™s been severely criticized by the press about that.ā€

He hadnā€™t thought Brannhard and Holloway would try to fight a court order either. That was one of the consequences of being too long in a seemingly irresistible position; you didnā€™t expect resistance. Kellogg hadnā€™t expected Jack Holloway to

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