“Prophecy?” Diablo repeated. “Yes, I guess it is one, isn’t it? Well, this reference to some new product of the Gottschalks’, you see. There is one in the pipeline, somenew and very special, and I believe it’s due for introduction in the spring of next year.”
“How would you know about it?” Reedeth inquired skeptically.
“That’s a hell of a question for a blank to ask,” Diablo countered. “Don’t you know how the Gottschalks set you up as customers? They issue their ultra-late weaponry to the black enclaves, at not much over cost, knowing you’re so scared of us even spitting your way that you’ll pay whatever they ask to keep the balance of terror. Even so, it’s not very impressive, is it? Talking about a ‘Gottschalk coup of 2015’ doesn’t have to mean anything more than that Harry got word of what’s circulating among the enclaves.”
“Is there something?” Flamen demanded, his profesinstincts alerted.
“I just told you!”
“What specifically?” Flamen persisted.
“Blazes, don’t you follow the news out of Blackbury? I did a program myself about the latest equipment AnGottschalk handed us for trials, and it’s due on the beams tomorrow over three of the black-owned satellites. There’s a 250-watt laser with five-hundred-shot capacitance-some new breakthrough in accumulators, I was told, though they’re designed so you can’t take them to pieces without melting down the parts and up to the time I left I hadn’t heard that our engineers had figured out the principle. There’s a hand-launched self-propelled grenade with a micronuke head with a range of a thousand yards and power to bring down an average block of apts. There’s a whole gang of stuff, all being introduced at once. Though I never heard of it being given any such name as-what did you call it, Miss Clay?”
“I didn’t call it anything,” the pythoness said ob”But Harry said ‘System C integrated weapand talked about equipping one man with the power to raze a city.”
“I don’t get this,” Flamen said after a pause. “I never knew the Gottschalks to be secretive about their prodbefore. In the R D stages, yes of course, but not after samples have been issued for use.”
“Policy difference in the cartel?” Conroy suggested.
Flamen looked blank for a moment, then snapped his fingers. “Christ, I really am losing my touch! It never happened before, but it could just be that it’s concerned with this fight that’s going on among them.” He jumped to his feet. “I’m going to comp that right away, if you don’t mind. It fits entirely too well.”
“I’m afraid I don’t quite understand,” Lyla ventured.
Approaching the first and most worn of his computer input boards, Flamen glanced at her. “No? But you have heard that there’s a major disagreement among the Gottschalks? It’s been going on for weeks, and it climaxed the other day when Marcantonio celebrated his eightieth birthday and a bunch of high-level pollies deliberately stayed away. It just might be due to an argument about introducing these nasty new gimmicks Diablo’s been describing to us. You go ahead talking if you like; I’ve finally got something out of all this chitwhich I can make use of.” His fingers were coding orders to the automatics as he spoke. “That would be a story to gladden your heart, wouldn’t it,
Prof?” he added to Conroy. “The Gottschalks disagree* ing about a new line of weaponry and a splinter group of them going ahead against the old man’s wishes!”
“I don’t see any reason to be pleased about that!” Conroy snapped. “They’re gangsters, as far as I’m conand how will you like it if they start last-cengang warfare with modern equipment? It’ll be infinitely worse than anything the X Patriots have yet done!”
Flamen declined to answer, and in a moment he was lost in the series of cryptic probability ratings which glowed on the screen before him.
“Ah, the hell,” Conroy grunted. “It must surely be better for people to have some kind of warning about that sort of thing, even though not many of us pay attento warnings any longer. Half the time we don’t even trust ourselves, not enough that we rely on our judgment without a second opinion, preferably a meone, so why should we listen to other people’s advice?”