It would not do.
“Ohara,” Bunny said tragically, “I would give—” he shrugged whimsically—”what little I have not to be bored with, ah, life.”
The impassive Oriental countenance of his manservant flickered briefly in a grimace. His orders were clear, and he knew how terrible would be the consequences of disobedience.
Bunny tossed fitfully alone in his bed an hour later, and Ohara was on the phone to an unlisted New York number. “This Ohara,” he whispered. “Missah Bunny talk about giving away money. Awr his money.”
The responding voice was that of an Englishman. It said: “Thank you, Ohara. One hopes, of course, for your sake, that the information has arrived in time. One hopes devoutly that it will not be necessary to inflict the Death of a Thousand Cuts on you. A book could be written about Number Three Hundred and Twenty-Eight alone, and as for Number Four Hundred and One—1 Well, I won’t keep you with my chattering.” He hung up.
Within minutes the lonely house in a canyon was surrounded; the Fourth Plutocratic Airborne and Amphibious Assault Force was the ultimate in efficient mercenary troops. By dawn they had Bunny on his way to Barsax’ Carolina estate under heavy sedation.
He woke in the guest room he knew, just off the corridor which contained the Museum of Suppressed Inventions. Little Mr. Witz and quiet Mr. Briggs were there. With granite faces they told him: “You have broken the Code, young Coogler. You said there was something you valued above money. You have got to go.”
“Please,” Bunny blubbered. “I didn’t mean it. Ill marry
your daughter. Ill marry both your daughters! Just don’t kill me.”
Mr. Witz said implacably, “Our decent, money-fearing girls wouldn’t have anything to do with a dirty plutophobe like you, young Coogler. If only your poor father had put through the trust fund in time—well, thank Heaven he’s not alive to
•ee this day. But we won’t kill you, young Coogler. It is not within our power to cause the death of a billionaire as if he were an animal or mere human being. What we can and will do is quarantine you. In Virginia.”
This sounded like a rank non sequitur to Bunny until they look him to the Museum and trundled out a one-man space
•hip invented early in 1923 by a Herr Rudolf Grenzbach of Czernovitz, Upper Silesia, whose body had been found in Lower Silesia later that year.
Officers of the Fourth PA.A.A.F. loaded him into the bomblike contrivance over his spirited protest and pre-set the course. Virginia, it seemed, was an asteroid rather than die neighboring state. They fired the rockets- and Bunny was on his way.
Four years later Mr. Witz and Mr. Briggs conferred again. Terhaps,” said Mr. Witz,