He had just started to call and wave to attract Sandstrom’s attention when the howl of another aircraft battered their ears, rising in the blink of an eye from a drone to an intolerable roar. The shadow of it flickered over Turpin a fraction of a second before the noise hit; reflexively he glanced up at -;.he bright sky, and was blinded -in his haste to leave, home, he had forgotten his dark glasses. But he c^ ~ght a glimpse of its white paint-job, nonetheless, ? ua cursed silently. He had hoped to be here before a•:y of the senior security people showed, to plant his . picions about inter-corporation sabotage.
oo late now, though. Somebody very top indeed had arrived. That was no ordinary veetol, but a Mach 3 type, capable of crossing the continent in barely more than an hour.
Its pilot-if it was piloted, and not automatically controlled-set it down with meticulous accuracy in the middle of the cluster of choppers. Almost before the power had been cut its door was thrown open and a heavy-set man with black hair, wearing a bright blue windbreaker and orange pants, jumped to the ground. Sandstrom, naturally, broke off his conversation with his engineers and went running to meet him.
Turpin felt a brief pang of dismay. This was someone he didn’t recognize. He’d hoped at least that they would send an acquaintance of his, sympathetic to EG. Still, there was no alternative to putting a bold face on the matter. He too strode up to the newcomer, as he was checking Sandstrom’s redbook.
“Good morningl Or rather, good aftemoonl” he said. “I’m Turpin of Energetics General. I left home as soon as I heard what had happened.” He offered his hand.
The black-haired man looked at it for a while, not mov-
ing to take it, and then raised piercing eyes to Turpin’s face.
“Redbook?” he murmured.
Almost, Turpin let it be seen how insulted he felt, but he recovered in time and meekly produced the document -adding, as he handed it over, “Good afternoon to you too, Gunnar. Walked into a hornet’s nest. didn’t you?”
The crew-boss, looking troubled, didn’t answer.
“Right,” the dark-haired man said, handing Turpin’s redbook back. “I’m-”
Turpin interrupted, “Yours too, please!”
They locked gazes for a moment. Then the newcomer chuckled and reached towards his hip pocket.
“Yes, by all means, Mr. Turpin. Correct procedure-oh, shit!”
As he touched his pocket, a yammering alarm had gone off.
He did something under his sweat-p-•ched left armpit, and the row stopped, and he finally produc`erl–the redbook. “Sorryl” he muttered with some embarrassmeltt.- “New model alarm. Very efficient. -But in the heat of the”~owent . . .”‘”
The words trailed away.
Pleased to have rattled the security man, Turpin opened the redbook. Even before he read the first page, he had a strong idea of what he was going to fiild. Only the handful of key personnel who master-minded security throughout the States had those personalised alarm-systems in their clothes. Nonetheless, what he discovered amazed him. Apart from redbook #000 000 001, which was allotted to Prexy, he had never seen such comprehensive clearances. “Morton Kendall Clarke,” he read. “Substantive bailiff, acting warden, United States Security Force. Seconded Continental Defense HQ.”
Then: five pages of departmental stamps, four of special authorisations enabling him to assume command of Army, Navy, police, and National Guard detachments in an emergency; the usual warning to the civil population that resisting his orders carried a term of not less than one year’s jail ….
It was too much. He slapped it shut and gave it back. Clarke tucked it away with a self-conscious grin, as though all too aware of how it must have affected Turpin.
“Rightl” he said, turning to Sandstrom. “Let’s have the details again from the top.”
Sandstrom glanced at Turpin, but all the latter could do was nod. You didn’t argue with a redbook like Clarke’s. The crew-boss began to recite in a manner as impersonal as 6. machine.
“We set down here at fourteen-oh-three. Randomschedule maintenance assignment serial H-506-oblique-828oblique-97. I deployed my crew in the prescribed manner. My aide, Leo Wilkie over there”-he pointed at a frecklefaced young man with a shock of tow-colored hair-“set about deploying the status-check gear for use when the site had been pronounced A-OK. Immediately he fired up the lice-counter, he drew my attention to . . .” He interrupted himself. “Uh-sorry. I mean the live-circuit remotecondition reader.” .