Part 1 (1/2)
Excalibur and the Atom.
Theodore Sturgeon.
IN A FACE that was a statement of strength, two deep lines formed parentheses. They enclosed a mouth that was a big gentleness. Into the mouth he thrust the soggy end of the pretzel stick he had been dunking in his coffee. He grunted. The cla.s.sified ad read: that was a statement of strength, two deep lines formed parentheses. They enclosed a mouth that was a big gentleness. Into the mouth he thrust the soggy end of the pretzel stick he had been dunking in his coffee. He grunted. The cla.s.sified ad read: Lose something? Or maybe you want something found. Or maybe you just want something. Convince me it exists, pay my expenses, and I'll charge you a fee for finding it. Hadley Guinn, HE 6-2420.
”A h.e.l.l of a way to get business,” he said to the coffee container. It had two flyspecks and a brown stain that together looked like a grinning rat. ”Go ahead,” he growled. ”Laugh.”
She came in then, straight through the waiting room into his office. ”Hadley Guinn?” She had a voice to go with olive skin, the kind with a glow under it.
”You read signs on doors?”
”I still have to ask questions. You forgot to wear your dog-tag.” She came forward and sat down. She moved across the floor as if she were on tracks. She sat down as if she were folding wings.
”Have a wet pretzel?”
”Thanks, no. I just threw one away.” She regarded him evenly. She had not smiled, she had not raised a brow or arched a nostril. She was everything in the world that was completely composed. She was about twenty, with blue-black hair. Her blue eyes didn't belong with that complexion at all. They didn't belong with her age either. They were wise eyes. They were ten thousand years old. She wore a black dress with a built-on cape around her shoulders and a neckline down to here. She used a brown-red lipstick that went with the skin but not at all with the eyes or the dress. On her it looked fine.
”Reckon it'll rain tomorrow?” he asked eventually.
She took the remark at face value. ”Not in Barenton.”
”Where's Barenton?”
”Sorry” she said. ”Cla.s.sical reference. There's a hawthorne bush there.”
”Would that be the one you're beating around?” The thick lashes did not bat. ”You can find anything?”
”I'm near enough to being legal to be able to handle the language,” he said. He quoted: ” 'Convince me it exists...'”
”I see. If it's too much trouble, you're not convinced.”
He quoted: ” '...pay my expenses...'”
”Mmm. And then the fee comes automatically.”
”When I find it. You examine more clauses than the guy who manicures for Clyde Beatty.”
She said, deadpan, ”That job really gives one pause.”
His appreciation was in his eyes and in the parentheses. He left it there. ”It was nice of you to drop in, Miss Jones.”
”Morgan,” she said.
He drained the container, crushed it, filed it in the wastebasket. He swept the remaining pretzel sticks into the drawer. ”Lunch time's over,” he explained. ”Shall we dance?”
”Not while we have to watch our steps...What's your special signal that means you're about to go to work?”
”I answer a businesslike question.”
She nodded. ”Want to find something for me?”
He waited.
She said, coolly, ”Want to find something for me if I convince you that it is, and pay your expenses?”
He said nothing.
”In advance?”
”Certainly,” he said.
”Very well. I'm looking for a stone. It's a big one-seven or eight karats. Not a diamond. A diamond looks like a piece of putty beside it. It glows in the dark.”
”Where is it?”
She shrugged.
”Well, is it loose, or in a ring, or what?”
”It's on a cup. It looks like gold, but it isn't. The cup holds about a quart, and it has a five-sided pedestal and a five-sided foot.”
He closed his eyes, looked at the mental picture her words drew, and said, ”Got a lead?”
”There's a man in town who almost had it once. His name's Percival.”
Guinn reached under the desk and scratched his lower s.h.i.+nbone. ”You mean the Caveman?”
”That's the man.”
”h.e.l.l. He doesn't have any use for baubles. He doesn't even believe in money.”
”You meet all kinds of people,” she said gently.
”All right. I'll go see him. What else do you know about this cup?”
”What do you want to know?”
”Where did it come from? Where was it last seen? Why do you want it?”
”No one knows where it came from. The stone is supposed to have come from the sky. The cup was made in the Middle East more than two thousand years ago. It's been seen only twice, and that was too long ago to bother about. I do know it's been seen near here. As for why I want it...” The wise eyes looked deep into his. ”I want it very badly,” she whispered.