Assignment to Disaster Read Free Page B

"Calvin's brother was there, too?"
    "And still there. Why?"
    "Nothing," Durell said. "I didn't know about it."
    "Not important. John is perfectly sound. What else?"
    "Calvin had trouble with the Senate Investigating Committee."
    Swayney nodded, his round head loose on his pipe-stem neck. "Somebody used his name to join various subversive organizations. Calvin was cleared, put back to work under his brother. John vouched for him."
    "I see. Anything on the girl?"
    "Two years younger than Calvin. Goucher graduate. Brilliant in her own way, works on the newspapers here. Had an unhappy love affair, boy killed in Korea. Keeps to herself since then. Passionately devoted to family, keeps the home fires burning. Quite a babe. Well stacked, I hear."
    "Stop licking your chops. Anything else on her?"
    "Devoted to Calvin. Cool toward John. Understandable. John is much older than Calvin and Deirdre." Swayney's eyes popped wide open, glacial blue. "Why won't the girl talk, hey?"
    "I gather she resents the treatment Calvin got last year."
    "Doesn't she understand how important this is?"
    "I don't know," Durell said.
    "Can we
make
her talk?"
    Durell shrugged. "Twist her arm. But I don't think it will work."
    "What about the men who tried to grab her? She say anything?"
    "A blank," Durell said.
    "I identified the meat, finally," Swayney said. "A steel worker named Stanislaus Lujec. Immigrant, hard-working type, no record of crime or subversive affiliations. Looked at his hands, figured his occupation, checked Pittsburgh. Neat, hey?"
    "Pin a rose on yourself."
    Swayney leaned forward. "You sore about something?"
    "I'm in the dark. I want to know more about this."
    "Wait a minute. Two hoods try to grab the girl. Why? She knows where her brother is, hey? And they want to know, too. They'd like to get Calvin Padgett. It's neck and neck, who gets him first. And maybe he'll spill everything to the newspapers beforehand. If he does, slit your throat, Sam. Hell breaks loose."
    "Why?" Durell asked.
    "Cyclops."
    "I asked you before. What is Cyclops?"
    "Something. A gimmick. If the world hears about it,
kaput.
Maybe bombers come over to blow Las Tiengas off the map. It's that hot."
    "You said we had five days to find Calvin Padgett," Durell said. "Why five days?"
    "Cyclops goes up on the Fourth of July. Symbolic date. You stand corrected. There are only four days left."
    Durell said angrily, "He must be somewhere!"
    "Everything else is covered. Your job is the sister. Calvin called her, we know that. She knows something, hey? You squeeze it out of her."
    "She hates us all," Durell said.
    Swayney grinned. "Put some wax on your mustache. Make her talk."
    Durell got up and went out.
    General Dickinson McFee was dictating a footnote for the minority opinion to be appended to the weekly intelligence estimate being readied for the President's desk, with copies for the intelligence heads of Army, Navy, Air Force, Joint Chiefs, the State Department, the AEC, and the FBL McFee was a small man, narrow-shouldered, with a bulging intellectual forehead and pale-brown, tired eyes. You forgot how small he was physically after you were with him any length of time. After a moment he seemed to fill the room. He waved Durell to a metal chair while he continued talking into a tape recorder. Durell smoked and waited.
    Then McFee said, "Sam, you need some sleep. You can spare two hours, I suppose. Who is with the girl now?"
    "Lew Osbourn."
    "He's good, but not that good. You'll have to crack her. Sleep, and then go back there. Talk to her. Take an hour or so. If she won't tell, bring her down here."
    "All right. But I need something to convince her. I'm not even convinced myself."
    "Anything I can do…"
    "Am I a good enough security risk to know about Cyclops?" Durell asked bluntly.
    McFee got up and shut the office door and then returned to the desk and snapped off two switches placed in the kneehole. Nothing changed in his small, hard face. Durell watched him and smoked his