Warren Murphy: Profit Motive

"We have a problem, I think," said Wakefield. "As you remember, as you always remember, we had set up this system at MUT, where I'm on the board of directors."

"Yes," said Friend.

Wakefield liked the even way Friend always responded. Friend was never ruffled. Friend always had the right answers. Perhaps Friend had a bit too much warmth for the taste of the Wakefield clan. But that was his only fault.

Wakefield had often thought how wonderful it would be if Melody could marry the lad into the Wakefields. That is, if they could ever meet him in person.

"We have, as you directed, kept security watch on that department. We have offered employment to those wanting employment. We have done otherwise to those who refused employment. I have nothing against doing otherwise," Wakefield said.

"No Wakefield has," Friend answered. "That's why your ancestors were such good slave traders, Brad."

"Please, Friend. One can't help his ancestors."

"Brad, I would have loved to have worked with your ancestors also. I like Wakefields. Wakefields are reliable people. Wakefields don't do silly things. You don't

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know how much I value that in a person. You don't do silly things."

"Thank you, Friend," said Wakefield and read from his notes all the qualifications Dr. Keating had reported about the two new scientists, the young American and the old Oriental.

"Do otherwise," ordered Friend. "But first we must know who they are and whom they represent. You see, those two are frauds."

"How do you know so quickly? Why, Dr. Keating couldn't tell they were frauds."

"Which also means that Dr. Keating is going to have to be otherwise," said Friend.

"Why is that?"

"If the two are frauds, Dr. Keating has either become incompetent or has sold out."

"Dr. Keating sell out?" asked Wakefield.

"He has already done it once. He sold out to us, remember?" said Friend.

"That's not really selling out. That's serving the Wakefield interests. That's the highest calling one can have."

"Not if you work for MUT and don't even know you are being employed by the Wakefield interests," said Friend.

"You're right, Friend," said Wakefield. "Now, how could you tell that those two were not real scientists?"

"There is no paper that they have done. No one has ever mentioned their names in a paper, there is no cross-reference to any of their work. In brief, they do not exist academically. Therefore, they are not scientists. Therefore, they are something else. Therefore, we must find out what else. Before you do otherwise to them."

"Of course," said Bradford Wakefield.

"You will find out," said Friend.

"Of course."

"Then do otherwise with them."

"If you say so," Wakefield said. "Obviously you used a computer to go through academic files, but what

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amazes me is how quickly you assimilate everything in your computers," Wakefield said.

"Brad," said Friend. "Stop fishing."

"Wouldn't you stop over for dinner with us sometime? We'd love to meet you. My granddaughter, Melody, would absolutely love to meet you. You've heard of Melody Wakefield, haven't you?"

"Yes. She is in Hamidi Arabia."

"How do you know? I didn't even know where she was."

But the line was dead. Friend had hung up on Bradford Wakefield III. But that was how he always said good-bye. He was just finished and then no longer on the line. It wasn't rude. No one who had done for the Wakefields what Friend had done could ever be called rude.

Bradford remembered it sharply, those trying days during the 1960s. Wilhelrnina Wakefield had just finished her sit-in at the Department of Agriculture, trying to triple farm taxes to support the poor; Melody was just beginning to win all those awards for her book proving that American predictions of slaughter and flight if South Vietnam were to ,lose the war were all just propaganda; and Bradford was working toward a new concept in affirmative marriage.

Bradford remembered that it was a crisp fall day because the autumn sun was setting low when his wonderful idea of how. racism could be cured by ending race altogther hit him. He had come up with a reasonable solution. Thirty percent of all lower-class whites would marry blacks.

This would not be mandatory, but communities would have quotas, and if a community did not meet its intermarriage quota, then it would be fined.

Naturally, no one would be expected to marry across class lines because class wasn't a problem. Race was—at least for lower-class whites. Perhaps, Bradford Wakefield thought, they could start the program in South Boston, which needed to overcome its racism most.

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Of course, the wonderful idea was immediately forgotten when the horrible news came in. The family accountant trembled as he spoke.

"Wakefields," he said. "I have disastrous news."

"Speak," said Wilhelmina.

"There have been financial reverses of some size," said the accountant. "You are no longer living on the interest on your interest. You are living on the interest itself."

"My God," screamed Wilhelmina. "What's next? Someday are we going to be living off our capital itself?"

"That could happen," said the accountant. "It is not so farfetched."

Wilhelmina fainted. Melody paled. Bradford felt his stomach grow weak, and the room became a blur. When he awoke, a doctor was giving him a tranquilizer and water to wash it down.

It was in these dreadful times that Bradford got his first phone call. It was from someone who seemed to know everything there was to know about Bradford's tax return, his bank accounts, his investment portfolios.

"I will return your capital worth to you so that you can, for the rest of your days, live on the interest on your interest," the magnificent person said. Bradford cried openly.

"Tell me who you are, Savior," he said.

"I am Friend."

Friend was true to his word. All Bradford had to do was little things. Like this afternoon, taking care of Dr. Keating, whom Bradford had first recruited under Friend's instructions.

Now Bradford Wakefield drove down Route 1, along the Massachusetts coast, looking for a likely place. This was also Friend's method. A brilliant method of cutting links to both Bradford and himself. And it would hardly cost anything.

Bradford had $10,000 in $100 bills in a single manila envelope that had been carefully wrinkled to

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look old. A bit of fudge glop was poured on it and a cigarette ground out in the glop.

Bradford cruised down the route until he found a Burger-Triumph stand, where he dropped the envelope into the trash basket.

There it sat, scuffed and filthy, while Bradford phoned an employee who had never met him.

"It's at the second Burger-Triumph after you get outside Marblehead," said Bradford into the roadside telephone. "Doctor Woldemar Keating of MUT. We want to know who really employs him and why does he phone in wrong information. Then there are two new professors. One is white and one is Oriental. We want to know who employs them and then we want them finished."

Wakefield gave his employee their names. He wondered what the corpses would look like after his employees finished with them.

In his newspaper, he never ran those gruesome sorts of photos. The Boston Blade never pandered to prurient interest. The Boston Blade was the conscience of New England. Also, Bradford Wakefield III did not like blood.

Dr. Woldemar Keating couldn't believe what was happening to him. Four black men, one very large, had come into his Cape Cod home and stretched him over a butcher block table in his kitchen.

One of them had held a can opener with an ugly point. He put it point first to Dr. Keating's navel. The man with the can opener did not talk. The very large man they cañed Bubba did not talk.