“Oh, of course! But what Mr. Mundin asked me was just what G.M.L. Homes models you had worked on—serial numbers and locations and so on. And I had to tell him that all that information was locked up, and you couldn’t possibly get your hands on it.”
Arnie shook his head wonderingly. “Laymen,” he said. “Norvell, there is no reason in the world why I can’t get microfilms of all that information. It’s only corporate fiddle-faddle that causes all the secrecy; We Engineers are accustomed to cutting right through the red tape.”
Norvell looked worshipful. “You mean you can?” he cried.
“I have already said so, have I not? It’s just a matter of going through the records and picking out the units I’ve worked on myself, then making microfilms——”
“Better microfilm everything, Arnie,” Norvell suggested. “It’ll help Mr. Mundin understand the Broad Picture.”
Arnie shrugged humorously. “Why not?”
“Don’t forget the serial numbers,” Norvell said.
Norvell met Mundin at Hussein’s late that night, by arrangement, and made his report.
Mundin’s expression began to relax. “So far,” he said, “so good. And I’ve done my rounds too; and I imagine Hubble and Coett and Nelson are right on schedule. Let’s have a drink.”
“Thanks, no,” said Norvell Bligh. “It’s a long way to Belly Rave and my wife’s all alone, except for the kid.”
Mundin said, “Look, Bligh, why do you stick to Belly Rave? If it’s money———”
Norvie shook his head. “You’re paying me plenty for right now. Tell you the truth, I’m getting so I kind of like Belly Rave. As long as I don’t have to stay there, you know, there’s a lot to be said for it.”
“There is?” Mundin asked.
Norvie laughed. “Maybe not a lot. Anyway, I’ll stick a while; and I better get along. The Wabbits are supposed to be watch-dogging the house, but they don’t think much of Sandy—that’s my little girl—and I don’t feel right without a man in the house at night.”
A vagrant memory stirred in Mundin’s mind. “I thought you had a kind of bodyguard?”
“Who? You mean Shep? He doesn’t work for me any more.” Norvie’s expression was unreadable. “He had an accident with a lead pipe.”
Chapter Nineteen
the sign on the door said:
ryan & mundin, attorneys-at-law
The office occupied a solid floor-through of a very good building.
Del Dworcas had to take several long, deep breaths before he pushed the door open and announced himself to a ripely curved blonde receptionist. One of Mundin’s minor pleasures these days, when he could spare time for it, was telling salesmen of automatic office equipment just what they could do with their merchandise.
“Pleased be seated, Mr. Dworcas,” the girl cooed. “Mr. Mundin asked me to tell you that you’ll be the very next person he sees.”
The dozen or so other individuals in the waiting room glared at Del Dworcas. However, being a professional politician, he had no difficulty in striking up a conversation with the fellows nearest him. One was a petrochemist who understood there were consultant jobs opening up at Ryan & Mundin. Another was a publisher’s bright young man who thought there must be a whale of a story in old man Ryan’s sensational comeback, and stood ready to sign it up. The others were easy enough to tag—a couple of crack-pots, two attorneys obviously seeking affiliation with the new firm, a handful of persons who seemed to be in the market for lawyers, and had suddenly come to think that it might be a good idea to retain
Ryan & Mundin. Nobody in the waiting room seemed to have any idea what, if anything, was going on in the remainder of the enormous suite.
Dworcas—being a professional politician—was able to absorb information, pump for more, evaluate what he had heard and speculate on its meaning. But the answers were slight and cloudy. All he could make out for sure was: Ryan & Mundin were rising like a rocket; and plenty of shrewd operators were trying to hitch a ride.
At last he got the nod from the receptionist. A hard-faced young man with a badge that said Guide took him in tow.
Ryan & Mundin operated the damnedest law offices that Dworcas, in a full life, had ever seen. Law offices . . . complete with such eccentricities as chemistry labs and kitchens, living quarters and a TV studio, rooms locked off from his view, and open rooms that he could make no sense of.