“My interest was fanned by two coincidencestfie kind of coincidences that cause-and-effect just can’t allow, but which seem to happen all the same in the world of un-changeable events. For most of my adult life, I’ve been in communications industries of one kind or another, mostly branches of video. I had communications equipment around me constantly, and I had coffee and doughnuts with communications engineers every day. First I picked up the jargon; then, some of the procedures; and eventually a little real knowledge. Some of the things I learned can’t be gotten any other way. Some other things are ordinarily available only to highly educated people like Dr. Wald here, and came to me by accident, in horseplay, between kisses, and a hundred other waysall natural to the environment of a video network.”
Weinbaum found, to his own astonishment, that the “between kisses” clause did not sit very well in his chest. He said, with unintentional brusqueness: “What’s the other coincidence?”
“A leak in your own staff.”
“Dana, you ought to have that set to music.”
“Suit yourself.”
“I can’t suit myself,” Weinbaum said petulantly. “I work for the government. Was this leak direct to you?”
“Not at first. That was why I kept insisting to you in person that there might be such a leak, and why I finally began to hint about it in public, on my program. I was hoping that you’d be able to seal it up inside the bureau before my first rather tenuous contact with it got lost. When I didn’t succeed in provoking you into protecting yourself, I took the risk of making direct contact with the leak myselfand the first piece of secret information that came to me through it was the final point I needed to put my Dirac communicator together. When it was all assembled, it did more than just communicate. It predicted. And I can tell you why.”