“The game,” Vanning said sadly, “is up. You win.”
“Eh?”
“If I tell you what I did with the suitcase, will you put in a good word for me?”
“Why… yeah. Where—”
“I ate it,” Vanning said, and retired to the couch, where he settled himself for a nap. Hatton gave him a long, hating look. The officers tore in— They passed by the locker, after a casual glance inside. The X rays revealed nothing, in walls, floor, ceiling, or articles of furniture. The other offices were searched, too. Vanning applauded the painstaking job.
In the end, Hatton gave up. There was nothing else he could do.
“I’ll clap suit on you tomorrow,” Vanning promised. “Same time I get a habeas corpus on MacIlson.”
“Step to hell,” Hatton growled.
“‘By now.”
Vanning waited till his unwanted guests had departed. Then, chuckling quietly, he went to the locker and opened it.
The copper-colored egg that represented the suedette suitcase had vanished. Vanning groped inside the locker, finding nothing.
The significance of this didn’t strike Vanning at first. He swung the cabinet around so that it faced the window. He looked again, with identical results.
The locker was empty.
Twenty-five thousand credits in negotiable ore bonds had disappeared.
Vanning started to sweat. He picked up the metal box and shook it. That didn’t help. He carried it across the room and set it up in another corner, returning to search the floor with painstaking accuracy. Holy— Hatton?
No. Vanning hadn’t let the locker out of his sight from the time the police had entered till they left. An officer had swung open the cabinet’s door, looked inside, and closed it again. After that the door had remained shut, till just now.
The bonds were gone.
So was the abnormal little creature Vanning had crushed. All of which meant—what?
Vanning approached the locker and closed it, clicking the latch into position. Then he reopened it, not really expecting that the copper-colored egg would reappear.
He was right. It didn’t.
Vanning staggered to the Winchell and called Galloway.
“Whatzit? Huh? Oh. What do you want?” The scientist’s gaunt face appeared on the screen, rather the worse for wear. “I got a hangover. Can’t use thiamin, either. I’m allergic to it. How’d your case come out?”
“Listen,” Vanning said urgently, “I put something inside that damn—locker of yours and now it’s gone.”
“The locker? That’s funny.”
“No! The thing I put in it. A… a suitcase.”
Galloway shook his head thoughtfully. “You never know, do you? I remember once I made a—”
“The hell with that. I want that suitcase back!”
“An heirloom?” Galloway suggested.
“No, there’s money in it.”
“Wasn’t that a little foolish of you? There hasn’t been a bank failure since 1949. Never suspected you were a miser, Vanning. Like to have the stuff around, so you can run it through your birdlike fingers, eh?”
“You’re drunk.”
“I’m trying,” Galloway corrected. “But I’ve built up an awful resistance over a period of years. It takes time. Your call’s already set me back two and a half drinks. I must put an extension on the siphon, so I can Winchell and guzzle at the same time.”
Vanning almost chattered incoherently into the mike. “My suitcase! What happened to it? I want it back.”
“Well, I haven’t got it.”
“Can’t you find out where it is?”
“Dunno. Tell me the details. I’ll see what I can figure out.” Vanning complied, revising his story as caution prompted. “O. K.,” Galloway said at last, rather unwillingly. “I hate working out theories, but just as a favor… My diagnosis will cost you fifty credits.”
“What? Now listen—”
“Fifty credits,” Galloway repeated unflinchingly. “Or no prognosis.”
“How do I know you can get it back for me?”
“Chances are I can’t. Still, maybe… I’ll have to go over to Mechanistra and use some of their machines. They charge a good bit, too. But I’ll need forty-brain-power calculators—”
“O. K., O. K.!” Vanning growled. “Hop to it. I want that suitcase back.”
“What interests me is that little bug you squashed. In fact, that’s the only reason I’m tackling your problem. Life in the fourth dimension—” Galloway trailed off, murmuring. His face faded from the screen. After a while Vanning broke the connection.
He re-examined the locker, finding nothing new. Yet the suedette suitcase had vanished from it, into thin air. Oh, hell!
Brooding over his sorrows, Vanning shrugged into a top coat and dined vinously at the Manhattan Roof. He felt very sorry for himself.
The next day he felt even sorrier. A call to Galloway had given the blank signal, so Vanning had to mark time. About noon MacIlson dropped in. His nerves were shot.
“You took your time in springing me,” he started immediately. “Well, what now? Have you got a drink anywhere around?”
“You don’t need a drink,” Vanning grunted. “You’ve got a skinful already, by the look of you. Run down to Florida and wait till this blows over.”
“I’m sick of waiting. I’m going to South America. I want some credits.”
“Wait’ll I arrange to cash the bonds.”