“That means it was the old Holocosmic directorate sabotaging us!”
“You may comp it how you wish, Mr. Flamen. I’m simply stating the fact.”
Flamen hesitated. Reverting to the most important subject, he said, “But-but look: how did you manage to set the Gottschalks up? Or rather, the splinter group, I guess, who forced through the Holocosmic purchase.”
“I think they set themselves up, Mr. Flamen.” Voigt tugged absently at the lobe of his right ear again, deit by mistake, and put it back with a hint of embarrassment. “I’m so sorry. But this is all very peculiar, Mr. Flamen. I’m still trying to get some sense out of our own computers, because we’ve had some highly improbadditional data fed into our circuits overnight. You know about Dr. Mogshack’s breakdown?”
“Just saw about it on the vuset.”
“Well, this of course is a major scandal, and Federal mental hygiene experts have been called in. Among other things they opened the data-banks of the Ginsberg to the Federal data-processing network, and analysis of the information we’ve acquired is going to take a very long time. It looks as though-possibly because for some while one of the inmates has been doing the servicing there-some nonsensical notions have been plugged in as pure gospel. For instance.”
“What?”
“Well, I’ve been trying to make sense of this all mornand so far I’ve run into a brick wall. I asked about the cessation of interference on the Holocosmic noon slot, and I was referred to a block of data newly acfrom the Ginsberg.” Voigt checked. “Is somewrong, Mr. Flamen?”
“I-I don’t know.” Vivid in memory, the suppressed recollection of the automatics in Reedeth’s office telling him that Mrs. Celia Prior Flamen possessed the ability to interfere with electromagnetic radiation in the bands used for.
But it was absurd. It had to be absurd.
Yet he could hear Voigt continuing, while on the screen of the vuset a commercial was playing silently-not the one for Guardian traps which ordinarily filled this spot. Of course, one could hardly expect Diablo to put up with a clip that showed a fellow kneeblank being painfully done to death.
“It all led back eventually to a prognosis for your wife, Mr. Flamen, a statement to the effect that she could somehow-ah-interfere with your appearances on the vu-beams, and was resentful of her own ability because on the conscious level she knew how much you valued your work. It further said that when she found a way to employ this talent for, rather than against, you, she would be completely recovered.” Voigt gave a deprecating smile. “To think that something of that kind could actualbe included in the data-banks of a major State hospital! If it’s typical of what will be turned up by the inquiry into Mogshack’s administration, it’s not too soon to get him out, in my view.”
But Flamen wasn’t listening. He was staring now at Celia, completely relaxed on the long lounge, eyes closed.
Effortfully, he said, “Mr. Voigt, will you do me a favor?”
“If possible,” Voigt agreed politely.
“Will you check the Federal computers about-?” He stopped. It was so ridiculous! He was going to make a fool of himself if he said one more word. And yet he couldn’t prevent his lips and tongue from finishing the sentence.
“Will you check them about Robert Gottschalk’s breaksee if by any outside chance what you’re told leads you back to the same block of data?”
“Ah. Yes, by all means, if you think it’s worth-” Voigt, in his turn, broke off short. “Mr. Flamen, I’m accustomed to thinking of you as a particularly well-informed person, but how in the world did you know that the Gottschalk computer was nicknamed ‘Robert’? Even members of the cartel were kept in ignorance of that fact unless they had already pledged their unquessupport to the faction led by Anthony Gott
I was told by a madman out of the Ginsberg.
But Flamen could not compel himself to that admisHe kept enigmatic silence, while his mind churned. If Madison was right about that, could he have been right about other things? And could the Ginsberg auto…?
He stared at Celia, wondering if that was the truth-wondering if her cure had happened the moment she came to peer over the shoulder of her brother and was told that Holocosmic had been bought out by the Gottand there would be no more Matthew Flamen Show.