Toward the end the going got pretty bad. It wasn’t just that I was aching from toe to navel, or that I was wasting time, of which I had none too much anyway. It was getting on toward ten o’clock, and the consumers whose living quarters were on the stairs were beginning to drift there for the night. I was as careful as I could be, but it nearly came to a fist fight on the seventy-fourth, where the man on the third step had longer legs than I thought. Fortunately, there were no sleepers above the seventy-eighth; I was in executive country. I skulked along the corridors, very conscious of the fact that the first person who paid any attention to me would either recognize me or throw me out. Only clerks were in the corridors, and none I’d known at all well; my luck was running strong. But not strong enough. Fowler Schocken’s office was locked. I ducked into the office of his secretary3, which was deserted, and thought things over. Fowler usually played a few holes of golf at the country club after work. It was pretty late for him still to be there, but I thought I might as well take the chance-it was only four more flights to the club. I made it standing up. The country club is a handsome layout, which is only fair because the dues are handsome too. Besides the golf links, the tennis court and the other sports facilities, the whole north end of the room is woods-more than a dozen beautifully simulated trees-and there are at least twenty recreation booths for reading, watching movies, or any other spectator pleasure. A mixed foursome was playing golf. I moved close to their seats as unobtrusively as possible. They were intent on their dials and buttons, guiding their players along the twelfth hole fairway. I read their scores from the telltale with a sinking heart; all were in the high nineties. Duffers. Fowler Schocken averaged under eighty for the course. He couldn’t be in a group like that, and as I came close I saw that both the men were strangers to me. I hesitated before retreating, trying to decide what to do next. Schocken wasn’t in sight anywhere in the club. Conceivably he was in one of the recreation booths, but I could scarcely open the doors of all of them to see; I’d be thrown out the first time I blundered into an occupied one, unless God smiled and the occupant was Fowler. A babble of conversation from the golfers caught my ear. One of the girls had just sunk a four-inch putt to finish the hole; smiling happily as the others complimented her, she leaned forward to pull
the lever that brought the puppet players back to the tee and changed the layout to the dogleg of the thirteenth hole, and I caught a glimpse of her face. It was Hester, my secretary. That made it simple. I couldn’t quite guess how Hester came to be in the country club, but I knew everything else there was to know about Hester. I retreated to an alcove near the entrance to the ladies’ room; it was only about a ten-minute wait before she showed up. She fainted, of course. I swore and carried her into the alcove. There was a couch; I put her on it. There was a door; I closed it. She blinked up at me as consciousness came back. “Mitch,” she said, in a tone between a whisper and a shriek. “I am not dead,” I told her. “Somebody else died, and they switched bodies. I don’t know who ‘they’ are; but I’m not dead. Yes, it’s really me. Mitch Courtenay, your boss. I can prove it. For instance, remember last year’s Christmas party, when you were so worried about-” “Never mind,” she said hastily. “My God, Mitch-I mean, Mr. Courtenay-” “Mitch is good enough,” I said. I dropped the hand I had been massaging, and she pushed herself up to get a better look at me. “Listen,” I said, “I’m alive, all right, but I’m in a kind of peculiar foul-up. I’ve got to get in touch with Fowler Schocken. Can you fix it -right away?” “Uh.” She swallowed and reached for a cigarette, recovering. I automatically took out a Starr. “Uh, no, Mitch. Mr. Schocken’s on the Moon. It’s a big secret, but I guess I can tell you about it. It’s something to do with the Venus project. After you got killed-well, you know what I mean-after that, when he put Mr. Runstead on the project and it began to slip so, he decided to take matters into his own hands. I gave him all your notes. One of them said something about the Moon, I guess; anyway, he took off a couple of days ago.” “Hell,” I said. “Well, who’d he leave in charge here? Harvey Bruner? Can you reach-” Hester was shaking her head. “No, not Mr. Bruner, Mitch. Mr. Runstead’s in charge. Mr. Schocken switched in such a hurry, there wasn’t anyone to spare to take over Aw job except Mr. Runstead. But I can call him right away.” “No,” I said. I looked at my watch, and groaned. I would have just about time to make it to the Met. “Look,” I said. “I’ve got to