paranoia, two whistle stops on the road to incurable depression. Once upon a time I took a random walk across a field. I went hither and yon, ambling along, looking at the slay and the trees, nibbling grass, kicking rocks. The first jeep to start across that field blew up. So did the people who went to get the people who'd been in the jeep. And I stood right there, sweaty and safe, trembling inside, while the experts dug over ninety mines out of that field, defused them, stacked them, and took them away. That's the way it goes sometimes. Philosophy 401, with Professor McGee. Life is a minefield. Think that over and write a paper on it, class.
I put the pin in my pocket. Talisman of some nd. Rub the tiny green face with the ball of the thumb. Like a worry stone, to relieve executive tensions. The times I remembered seeing it, she had worn it on the left side, where the slope of the breast began. She had bought *, she said, at a craft shop in San Francisco at Girardelli Square. I hadn't been there with her. All the places I hadn't been with her, I would never be with her. And at those unknown places, at unknown times, there would be less of me present. There can be few things worse than unconsciously saving things up to tell someone you will never see again.
'Coincidence,' I told Meyer. 'Maybe there was somebody thinning about hustling her on her way, but they didn't have to. She got sick. And antibiotics wouldn't touch it. And she died.'
'Maybe,' he said. 'Maybe it was that way.'
My phone aboard the Flush rang at eight fifteen the next morning, and when I answered it I heard the click of someone hanging up. Fifteen minutes later it rang again, and when I answered it, a voice said, 'remember this number, McGee. Seven- ninetwo, oh-seven-oh-one. Go to a pay phone as soon as you can and call this number. Seven-nine-two, ohseven- oh-one.'
He hung up. The voice was soft. There was no regional accent. I wrote the number down and finished my coffee while I thought about it. Then I locked up and walked to a pay phone.
The same voice answered. 'This is McGee,' I said.
'What was your mother's maiden name?'
'l~evlin. Mary Catherine Devlin.'
'Drive to Pier Sixty-six and park in the marina lot. Walk to the hotel and go in one of the lowerlevel entrances that face toward the marina, the one nearest the water. Turn right and walk slowly down the corridor toward the main part of the hotel.'
'Why?'
After a pause he said, 'Because you want to know why somebody died.'
'who the hell are you?'
The Green Ripper
'Can you remember what I told you to do?'
'Of course.'
He hung up. I went to Meyer's stubby little cabin cruiser, the John Maynard Keynes, and roused him. He came out, blinking into the sunlight, carrying his coffee onto the fantail, looking grainy and whiskery. I repeated the two conversations as accurately as I could.
Mother's maiden name. Standard security procedure. Not generally available.'
'A know that. Somebody wants to tell me why Gretel died.'
'You're going, of course.'
'That's why I came over to tell you. So you'll be able to give somebody a lead if I don't show up back here. If somebody wants to take me out, forget the hotel. It will be the marina parking lot. Drop me there at long range, and untie the lines and take off.'
'Y'll come along.'
'If you wouldn't mind. He didn't say to come alone. You could wait in the truck. Armed.'
'Tut not very dangerous.'
'~What we will have are those stupid walkie-talkies, the little ones you bought as a gag. With fresh batteries. The mysterious strangers are probably in one of those rooms. I am assuming more than one. I can keep my unit in my pocket. Without my aerial up you should be able to read a signal from me based on Off-On. We can test them here.'
With fresh batteries we found out that he would receive a definite alteration in the buying sound when my unit was turned on, even at a hundred yards. I could give him numbers. Short bursts for numbers from 1 to 9. A steady blast for a zero. Room 302 would be dit-dit-dit duaaa~ nitwit.
'In a building with a steel frame?' he asked.
'Listen harder. They'll take it away from me pretty quick, I imagine. I'll give you the room num- ber soon as I can.'
There are a lot of trees in that parking lot, and it has a considerable depth. I circled around the back of it, walking swiftly through the open areas. Then I circled back to an arched entrance, went in; turned right, walked slowly. The rooms were on my nght. So they could have watched me through a window.
I kept my hand in my pocket, finger on the switch. A door opened behind me and I spun around. Room 121. Very easy. A sallow young man, tall, with a lot of nose and a lot of neck, mo- tioned to me to come in. He wore pale-blue trunks, and he had a bath towel around his neck. His hair was still wet from his morning swim.
The familiar voice was right behind me, and I had neither heard him nor sensed him. 'Hand out of the pocket. That's nice. Move right on in. Fine. You're doing fine.'
With the voice still behind me and the room door
The Green Ripper closed, the swimmer patted me down and took the little gadget out of my pocket. He read the label on it aloud. 'Junior Space Cadet.' He grinned and tossed it onto one of the double beds. 'Clean,' he said.
'Sit right down aver there, in the straight chair by that countertop, Mr. McGee,' the voice said. Large room. Ivo double beds. Pile carpeting. Small refrigerator. Recently redecorated. Between the half-open draperies I could see beach chairs and a table on the tiny ground-level terrace outside sliding doors, and I could look out toward the marina parking lot.
When I sat down I got my first look at the voice. Like Swimmer, he seemed to be in his late twenties. Mid-height, with the shoulder meat of one who works out with weights. Glossy dark hair, square jaw, neck as broad as the jaw. Metal-rimmed glasses with a slight amber tint. A pleasant smile.
'My name is McGee,' I said.
'I think well try to get along without names.'
He took the toy off the bed, inspected it, pulled the sectional aerial to full length, and went over and opened the sliding door. 'Dr. Meyer? Every~ing is in order here. Why don't you come on in?'
When there was no answer, he tossed the unit to me. I pushed the little piano key and said, 'Jo rea- son why you shouldn't, Meyer.'
'Okay.' The voice was tinny and remote. 'ShaU I bring your hat?'
'No. Leave it in the car and lock up. Room One-two-one.'
When Meyer arrived, Swimmer frisked him, declared him clean, and then winked at me and said, 'I was looking for your hat.'
'Was it all that obvious?' I asked.
'~Don't worry about it,' Weightlifter said. Yt's good procedure. Simple and useful. Keep it. Because it doesn't work with us doesn't mean it isn't any good. But, Dr. Meyer, I'm CUfiOUS.'
'Just Meyer, please.'
'Fine. What if he'd asked you to bring his hat?.
'There are several ways he could have asked me to bring it. Each one is an option. If he felt the two of us could handle things, I would have been ready when I came through the door, and so would he.'
'~ice. Very nice,' Swimmer said.
'You seem to know a hell of a lot,' I said.
Weightlifter shrugged and sat on the edge of a bed, and motioned Meyer over to a wing chair by the sliding doors. 'Not as much as we tried to find out. I'll give you credit. You have some very solid friends around that marina, McGee. We didn't have much time to work on it. We put a lot of people on it. We pulled your military record. We put some tourists into that Bahia Mar Marina We had somebody at Timber Bay. We sent somebody to Petaluma. We know or at least we feel able to assume that you are not wanted anywhere, that
The Green Ripper your identity is correct, that you are not into the coke or grass trade, and that you are not political.'
'Who is we?' Meyer asked.
'Eve won't go into that. Just as I told Mr. McGee, we won't go into names either. And we won't show identification. And if you check the register later, it won't do you a bit of good. And, 111 be frank with you, the names and the connections wouldn't mean much to you. We are going to ask questions. Lots of them. This might take a long time. But we start with evidence of good faith.'
Swimmer went to the closet and came bac} with a nine-by-twelve manila envelope and handed it to Weightlifter.
'Before I show you these,' Weightlifter said, Y must explain how we happened to luck out. Dr. Tower reported the symptoms to the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta They have had standing orders for over a year to report any case which has those same symptoms to a certain branch of the Federal Government. An expert in forensic medicine flew down to Atlanta from New York, starting about an hour after word came to Washington. When it became obvious to Dr. Tower that Mrs. Howard was going to die, he phoned Atlanta. The expert came down here in time to participate in the autopsy. He found what we had instructed him to look for. Take a look at
