By Proxy Part 7

"No. This is hot. You're an eye-witness. Maxon will interview you.

Understand?"

"O.K.; you're the boss, Ole. Anything else?"

"Not right now, but if anything more comes up, call in."

"Right. 'Bye." He hung up and leaned back in his chair, c.o.c.king his feet up on the desk. It was Malcom Porter's desk and Malcom Porter's chair.

He was sitting in the Big Man's office, just as though he owned it. His jaw still hurt a little, but he loved every ache of it. It was hard to remember that he had ever been angry with Porter.

Just before they had landed, Porter had said: "They'll arrest me, of course. I knew that when I left. But I think I can get out of it. There will be various kinds of Government agents all over the place, but they won't find anything. I've burned all my notebooks.

"I'll instruct my attorney that you're to have free run of the place so that you can call in your story."

The phone rang. Elshawe grabbed up the receiver and said: "Malcom Porter's residence." He wished that they had visiphones out in the country; he missed seeing the face of the person he was talking to.

"Let me talk to Mr. Terrence Elshawe, please," said the voice at the other end. "This is Detective Lieutenant Martin of the Los Angeles Police Department."

"This is me, Marty."

"Good! Boy, have I had trouble getting to you! I had to make it an official call before the phone company would put the call through. How does it feel to be notorious?"

"Great. What's new?"

"I got the dope on that Skinner fellow. I suppose you still want it? Or has success gone to your head?"

Elshawe had almost forgotten about Skinner. "Shoot," he said.

The police officer rattled off Samuel Skinner's vital statistics--age, s.e.x, date and place of birth, and so on. Then: "He lived in New York until 1977. Taught science for fifteen years at a prep school there.

He--"

"Wait a second," Elshawe interrupted. "When was he born? Repeat that."

"March fourth, nineteen-thirty."

"Fifty-three," Elshawe said, musingly. "Older than he looks. O.K.; go on."

"He retired in '77 and came to L.A. to live. He--"

"Retired at the age of forty-seven?" Elshawe asked incredulously.

"That's right. Not on a teacher's pension, though. He's got some kind of annuity from a New York life insurance company. Pays pretty good, too.

He gets a check for two thousand dollars on the third of every month. I checked with his bank on that. Nice, huh?"

"Very nice. Go on."

"He lives comfortably. No police record. Quiet type. One servant, a Chinese, lives with him. Sort of combination of valet and secretary.

"As far as we can tell, he has made four trips in the past three years.

One in June of '79, one in June of '80, one in June of '81, and this year he made the fourth one. In '79, he went to Silver City, New Mexico.

In '80 and '81, he went to Hawaii. This year, he went to Silver City again. Mean anything to you?"

"Not yet," Elshawe said. "Are you paying for this call, or is the City of Los Angeles footing the bill?"

"Neither. You are."

"Then shut up and let me think for a minute." After less than a minute, he said: "Martin, I want some more data on that guy. I'm willing to pay for it. Should I hire a private detective?"

"That's up to you. I can't take any money for it, naturally--but I'm willing to nose around a little more for you if I can. On the other hand, I can't put full time in on it. There's a reliable detective agency here in L.A.-- Drake's the guy's name. Want me to get in touch with him?"

"I'd appreciate it. Don't tell him who wants the information or that it has any connection with Porter. Get--"

"Hold it, Terry ... just a second. You know that if I uncover any indication of a crime, all bets are off. The information goes to my superiors, not to you."

"I know. But I don't think there's any crime involved. You work it from your end and send me the bills. O.K.?"

"Fair enough. What more do you want?"

Elshawe told him.

When the phone call had been completed, Elshawe sat back and made clouds of pipe smoke, which he stared at contemplatively. Then he made two calls to New York--one to his boss and another to a private detective agency he knew he could trust.

The Malcom Porter case quickly became a _cause celebre_. Somebody goofed. Handled properly, the whole affair might have been hushed up; the Government would have gotten what it wanted, Porter would have gotten what _he_ wanted, and everyone would have saved face. But some bureaucrat couldn't see beyond the outer surface of his spectacle lenses, and some other bureaucrat failed to stop the thing in time.

"Gall, gall, and bitter, bitter wormwood," said Oler Winstein, perching himself on the edge of Terry Elshawe's desk.

"You don't Gallic, bitter, wormy, or wooden. What's up?"

"Got a call from Senator Tallifero. He wants to know if you'll consent to appear before the Joint Congressional Committee for Investigating Military Affairs. I get the feeling that if you say 'no,' they'll send a formal invitation--something on the order of a subpoena."

Elshawe sighed. "Oh, well. It's news, anyway. When do they want me to be in Was.h.i.+ngton?"

"Tomorrow. Meanwhile, Porter, of course, is under arrest and in close confinement. Confusion six ways from Sunday." He shook his head. "I don't understand why they just didn't pat him on the back, say they'd been working on this thing all along, and cover it up fast."

"Too many people involved," Elshawe said, putting his cold pipe in the huge ashtray on his desk. "The Civil Aeronautics crowd must have had a spotter up in those mountains; they had a warrant out for his arrest within an hour after we took off. They also notified the parole board, who put out an all-points bulletin immediately. The Army and the Air Force were furious because he'd evaded their radar net. Porter stepped on so many toes so hard that it was inevitable that one or more would yell before they realized it would be better to keep their mouths shut."

"Well, you get up there and tell your story, and I dare say he'll come out of it."

"Sure he will. They know he's got something, and they know they have to have it. But he's going to go through h.e.l.l before they give it to him."

Winstein slid off the desk and stood up. "I hope so. He deserves it. By the way, it's too bad you couldn't get a story out of that Sam Skinner character."

"Yeah. But there's nothing to it. After all, even the FBI tried to find out if there was anyone at all besides Porter who might know anything about it. No luck. Not even the technicians who worked with him knew anything useful. Skinner didn't know anything at all." He told the lie with a perfectly straight face. He didn't like lying to Winstein, but there was no other way. He hoped he wouldn't have to lie to the Congressional Committee; perjury was not something he liked doing. The trouble was, if he told the truth, he'd be worse off than if he lied.

He took the plane that night for Was.h.i.+ngton, and spent the next three days answering questions while he tried to keep his nerves under control. Not once did they even approach the area he wanted them to avoid.