He switched the light back on, put the wallet away, and resumed his interrupted drawing. The loss of the card which should have been in the concealed pocket was annoying, certainly awkward, and conceivably disastrous, but he did not judge that the information on it was jeopardized by the loss of the wallet. The card was quite featureless unless examined by black light; if exposed to visible light — by some one taking the real wallet apart, for example — it had the disconcerting quality of bursting explosively into flame.
He continued to work, his mind busy with the wider problem of why they had taken so much trouble to try to keep him from knowing that his wallet was being stolen — and the still wider and more disconcerting question of why they had bothered with his wallet. Finished, he stuffed the remainder of the pad of address labels into a crack between cushions in the booth, palmed the label he had prepared, picked up the bag and the three mailing tubes. One tube he kept separate from the others by a finger.
No attack would take place, he judged, in the drug store. The crowded concourse between himself and the post office he would ordinarily have considered equally safe — but not today. A large crowd of people, he knew, are equal to so many trees as witnesses if the dice were loaded with any sort of a diversion. He slanted across the bordering slidewalk and headed directly across the middle toward the post office, keeping as far from other people as he could manage. He had become aware of two men converging on him when the expected diversion took place.
It was a blinding light and a loud explosion, followed by screams and startled shouts. The source of the explosion he could imagine; the screams and shouts were doubtless furnished free by the public. Being braced, not for this, but for anything, he refrained even from turning his head.
The two men closed rapidly, as on cue.
Most creatures and almost all humans fight only when pushed. This can lose them decisive advantage. The two men made no aggressive move of any sort, other than to come close to Gilead — nor did they ever attack.
Gilead kicked the first of them in the knee cap, using the side of his foot, a much more certain stroke than with the toe. He swung with his travel bag against the other at the same time, not hurting him but bothering him, spoiling his timing. Gilead followed it with a heavy kick to the man’s stomach.
The man whose knee cap he had ruined was on the pavement, but still active — reaching for something, a gun or a knife. Gilead kicked him in the head and stepped over him, continued toward the post office.
Slow march — slow march all the way! He must not give the appearance of running away; he must be the perfect respectable citizen, going about his lawful occasions.
The post office came close, and still no tap on the shoulder, no denouncing shout, no hurrying foot — steps. He reached the post office, was inside. The opposition’s diversion had worked, perfectly — but for Gilead, not for them, There was a short queue at the addressing machine. Gilead joined it, took out his stylus and wrote addresses on the tubes while standing. A man joined the queue almost at once; Gilead made no effort to keep him from seeing what address he was writing; it was “Captain Joseph Gilead, the Explorers’ Club, New York.” When it came his turn to use the symbol printing machine he still made no effort to conceal what keys he was punching — and die symbol address matched the address he had written on each tube.
He worked somewhat awkwardly as the previously prepared gummed label was still concealed in his left palm.
He went from the addressing machine to the mailing receivers; the man who had been behind him in line followed him without pretending to address anything.
Thwonk! and the first tube was away with a muted implosion of compressed air.
Thwonk! again and the second was gone — and at the same time Gilead grasped the last one in his left hand, sticking the gummed label down firmly over the address he had just printed on it — Without looking at it he made sure by touch that it was in place, all comers sealed, then thwonk! it joined its mates.