Robert Heinlein - A Stranger in a Strange Land

Even the twin discovery that Smith had taught himself to read with the speed of electronic scanning and appeared to have total recall of all that he read did not tempt Jubal Harshaw to make a "project" of Smith, one with controls, measurements, and curves of progress. Harshaw had the arrogant humility of the man who has learned so much that he is aware of his own ignorance and he saw no point in "measurements" when he did not know what he was measuring. Instead he limited himself to notes made privately, without even any intention of publishing his observations.

But, while Harshaw enjoyed watching this unique animal develop into a mimicry copy of a human being, his pleasure afforded him no happiness.

Like Secretary General Douglas, Harshaw was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Waiting with increasing tenseness. Having found himself coerced into action by the expectation of action against him on the part of the government, it annoyed and exasperated him that nothing as yet had happened. Damn it, were the Federation cops so stupid that they couldn't track an unsophisticated girl dragging an unconscious man all across the countryside? Or (as seemed more likely) had they been on her heels the whole way? - and even now were keeping a stake-out on his place? The latter thought was infuriating; to Harshaw the notion that the government might be spying on his home, his castle, with anything from binoculars to radar, was as repulsive as the idea of having his mail opened.

And they might be doing that too, he reminded himself morosely. Government! Three fourths parasitic and the other fourth stupid fumbling - oh, he conceded that man, a social animal, could not avoid having government, any more than an individual man could escape his lifelong bondage to his bowels. But Harshaw did not have to like it. Simply because an evil was inescapable was no reason to term it a "good." He wished that government would wander off and get lost?

But it was certainly possible, or even probable, that the administration knew exactly where the Man from Mars was hiding� and for reasons of their own preferred to leave it that way, while they prepared - what?

If so, how long would it go on? And how long could he keep his defensive "time bomb" armed and ready?

And where the devil was that reckless young idiot Ben Caxton?

Jill Boardman forced him out of his spiritual thumb-twiddling. "Jubal?"

"Eh? Oh, it's you, bright eyes. Sorry, I was preoccupied. Sit down. Have a drink?"

"Uh, no, thank you. Jubal, I'm worried."

"Normal. Who isn't? That was a mighty pretty swan dive you did. Let's see another one just like it."

Jill bit her lip and looked about twelve years old. "Jubal? Please listen! I'm terribly worried."

He sighed. "In that case, dry yourself off. The breeze is getting chilly."

"I'm warm enough. Uh, Jubal? Would it be all right if I left Mike here? Would you take care of him?"

Harshaw blinked. "Of course he can stay here. You know that. The girls will look out for him - and I'll keep an eye on him from time to time. He's no trouble. I take it you're leaving?"

She didn't meet his eye. "Yes."

"Mmmm� you're welcome here. But you're welcome to leave, too, if that's what you want."

"Huh? But, Jubal - I don't want to leave!"

"Then don't."

"But I must!"

"Better play that back. I didn't scan it."

"Don't you see, Jubal? I like it here - you've been wonderful to us! But I can't stay any longer. Not with Ben missing. I've got to go look for him."

Harshaw said one word, emotive, earthy, and vulgar, then added, "How do you propose to look for him?"

She frowned. "I don't know. But I can't just lie around here any longer, loafing and swimming - with Ben missing."

"Gillian, as I pointed out to you before, Ben is a big boy now. You're not his mother - and you're not his wife. And I'm not his keeper. Neither of us is responsible for him� and you haven't any call to go looking for him. Have you?"

Jill looked down and twisted one toe in the grass. "No," she admitted. "I haven't any claim on Ben. I just know� that if I turned up missing Ben would look for me - until he found me. So I've got to look for him!"

Jubal breathed a silent malediction against all elder gods in any way involved in contriving the follies of the human race, then said aloud, "All right, all right, if you must, then let's try to get some logic into it. Do you plan to hire professionals? Say a private detective firm that specializes in missing persons?"

She looked unhappy. "I suppose that's the way to go about it. Uh, I've never hired a detective. Are they expensive?"

"Quite."

Jill gulped. "Do you suppose they would let me arrange to pay, uh, in monthly installments? Or something?"

"Cash at the stairs is their usual way. Quit looking so grim, child; I brought that up to dispose of it. I've already hired the best in the business to try to find Ben - so there is no need for you to hock your future to hire the second best."

"You didn't tell me!"

"No need to tell you."

"But- Jubal, what did they find out?"

"Nothing," he said shortly. "Nothing worth reporting, so there was no need to put you any further down in the dumps by telling you." Jubal scowled. "When you showed up here, I thought you were unnecessarily nervy about Ben - I figured the same as his assistant, that fellow Kilgallen, that Ben had gone yipping off on some new trail� and would check in when he had the story wrapped up. Ben does that sort of stunt - it's his profession." He sighed. "But now I don't think so. That knothead Kilgallen - he really does have a statprint message on file, apparently from Ben, telling Kilgallen that Ben would be away a few days; my man not only saw it but sneaked a photograph and checked. No fake - the message was sent."

Jill looked puzzled. "I wonder why Ben didn't send me a statprint at the same time? It isn't like him - Ben's very thoughtful."

Jubal repressed a groan. "Use your head, Gillian. Just because a package says 'Cigarettes' on the outside does not prove that the package contains cigarettes. You got here last Friday; the code groups on that statprint message show that it was filed from Philadelphia-Paoli Station Landing Flat, to be exact - just after ten thirty the morning before - 10.34 AM. Thursday. It was transmitted a couple of minutes after it was filed and was received at once, because Ben's office has its own statprinter. All right, now you tell me why Ben sent a printed message to his own office - during working hours - instead of telephoning?"

"Why, I don't think he would, ordinarily. At least I wouldn't. The telephone is the normal-"

"But you aren't Ben. I can think of half a dozen reasons, for a man in Ben's business. To avoid garbles. To insure a printed record in the files of I.T. amp;T. for legal purposes. To send a delayed message. All sorts of reasons. Kilgallen saw nothing odd about it - and the simple fact that Ben, or the syndicate he sells to, goes to the expense of maintaining a private statprinter in his office shows that Ben uses it regularly.

"However," Jubal went on, "the snoops I hired are a suspicious lot; that message placed Ben at Paoli flat at ten thirty-four on Thursday - so one of them went there. Jill, that message was not sent from there."

"But-"

"One moment. The message was filed from there but did not originate there. Messages are either handed over the counter or telephoned. If one is handed over the counter, the customer can have it typed or he can ask for facsimile transmission of his handwriting and signature� but if it is filed by telephone, it has to be typed by the filing office before it can be photographed."

"Yes, of course."

"Doesn't that suggest anything, Jill?"

"Uh� Jubal, I'm so worried that I'm not thinking straight. What should it suggest?"