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camera range.
"Now where were we?" Prior said in an annoyed tone. "Oh yes: Matthew, I was
asking whether you'd done something to alarm the Gottschalks and if so whether
you "
He was cut short by an exclamation from Diablo, who had jumped to his feet and
thrust out an arm towards Madison.
"What's wrong with him all of a sudden?" he cried.
All heads turned. Madison had slumped in his chair, and his formerly stem face
had taken on an idiot slackthe lips so loose that a trace of drool was
glistening on his chin. After a moment he picked up his left hand in his right
and examined it curiously, seeming to count the fingers. When
Conroy spoke to him, his only rewas a bland foolish smile.
"Dr. Reedeth," Diablo said nervously, "I guess you'd better take a look at
him."
The psychologist approached cautiously, looking the knee over from head to
foot. He said, "Madison?" And then, more sternly, "Madison!"
The knee rose awkwardly, as though having difficulty in controlling his limbs,
and stood in a scuffling Uncle
Tom posture. "Here, captain, sir," he said whiningly. "Sir, I don't feel good,
honest. Please don't send me back to the stockade!"
While Reedeth and the others were still petrified with astonishment, Flamen
rounded oh Conroy.
"Well! I'm only a layman, of course, but that doesn't sound particularly
rational to me. What was it you were saying just now about going along with
his story until you were forced to disbelieve it?"
Conroy was standing dazed, mouth a little ajar. He tried to say something and
failed.
In command of the situation for the first time since he and Conroy met at the
airport in the morning, Flamen drew himself up triumphantly. "I," he
announced, "have had enough. Get out, the lot of you. You go back to Canada,
Professor go on. Apparently I won't have any need for your services now
because there won't be a Matthew Flamen show to attack Mogshack on, not that
we ever got around to that project. The same goes for you, Diablo; you'll have
to go find someone else to fulthe Washington-Blackbury contract. And you get
back to your hospital, doctor, and take him with you." A jerk of the head at
Madison, still playing with his own fingers and seeming to find
file:///D|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry/D...runner,%20John%20-%20The%20Jag
ged%20Orbit.txt (138 of 153) [2/1/2004 3:07:24 PM]
file:///D|/Documents%20and%20Settings/harry/Desktop/John%20Brunner/Brunner,%20
John%20-%20The%20Jagged%20Orbit.txt something amusing in their number, for he
shook with repressed chuckles every few seconds. "And you, Miss Clay! I have
absolutely no inof volunteering to mack for you in spite of what addlebrains
there may think. Move!"
Silent, like machines, they complied; Diablo and Reedeth each took one of
Madison's hands and he folthem docilely, Lyla bringing up the rear. The moment
the door had closed behind them, Prior burst out from the comweb screen,
"Matthew, what in the world has been going on there?"
"As far as I can figure out, some sort of contagious lunacy," Flamen grunted.
"I was nearly conned into sharing it. By Conroy. Come on, let's have the whole
story about this Gottschalk thing."
"I've given it to you as I had it from Voigt," Prior muttered.
"But can't we get back at them? Stay of execution, maybe? How about the ?"
Flamen broke off short, recollecting to his own surprise that in fact the very
items he had set so much store by, the news about new Gottschalk weaponry and
the attack on Mogshack as revised to derive from Madison's overlong
incarceration rather than Celia's treatment, were both now rendered obsolete,
Page 151
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
and he could not for the life of him work up so much enthusiasm over the next
biggest of the availstories, the one about Lares Penates Inc. being a
subsidiary of Conjuh Man.
Prior waited for him to finish; realizing he wasn't goto, he said, "I tried,
Matthew, believe me.
I kept at him for a quarter-hour solid, with everything I could think
of Monopolies Acts, Planetary Communications Charter, the whole list. Voigt
said it wasn't worth the effort Apparently the Gottschalks have built
themselves some new super-advanced data-processing installation, and it's
ahead of even Federal equipment, so any atto out-argue it in a court would&
Why, MatYou look so pale! You look sick! I mean, this is a shock, but it's not
the end of the world!"
Flamen stood there saying nothing, but at the back of his mind his little
sniggering demon said silently, "Isn't it?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
NINETY-FIVE THIS WAY TO THE DIGRESS
Hot dry desert summer and the current mistresses both very young and
beautiful. Sales up zoom.
Laughand swaying a little Anthony Gottschalk dripped swimming-pool water
across the ankle-deep carpet of his living-zone towards the liquor console and
heard a chatsound from the panel of hammered gold which concealed the Robert
Gottschalk printout
Cold instantly and not from the evaporation from his bare skin he yelled at [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]