He was going to be hit. That was for certain. Somewhere on the path he was taking, Bury had it all arranged. There was no IF about it. There was only WHEN?

An idiot had me on a chain and was leading me straight to my death! Maybe I would go as anonymously and unremarked as Mary Schmeck. The thought saddened me.

For a man about to be hit, Heller certainly was relaxed the next morning.

There was a small buzzer on my viewer which sounded when reception intensified, if you remembered to set it and I certainly had! At 2:00 P.M. Turkish time I was blasted out of bed by it. It was 7:00 A.M. in Maryland and Heller was up and taking a shower. At least he was still alive, though I was unconfident that it would be for long.

He was splashing around in the shower. His Fleet passion for cleanliness grated on my nerves. It had been just as hot in Turkey as it had been around Washington I was sure. I didn’t have air conditioning and I was certainly more sweaty and dirty and rumpled than he had been, yet I didn’t have to take any shower! The man was clearly mad.

I went out and got a small boy by the ear and hurled him in the direction of the cookhouse and, shortly, I was back hanging over the viewer, wolfing kavun, or melon, and washing it down with kahve, the Turkish name for coffee, which is a cousin to hot jolt. I was so intent that I was gulping it down with sade and omitting mineral water swallows between sips the way you are supposed to do. The fact was forcefully called to my attention when my already raw nerves began to leap peculiarly. I dumped in the sugar and drank about a quart of water very quick. But my nerves were still jumping.

It was absolutely horrifying to watch what Heller was doing — or, more correctly, what he was not doing!

He made no baggage inspection — he simply got out a clean set of underclothes and socks from the carry-all and put them on, thus denying me any real inspection of his suitcases.

Dressed, he did not look up and down the hall before he stepped into it. He gave not the slightest glance around corners before he rounded them. He did not inspect the parking lot as he passed it for new, strange cars. And he did not even look over the restaurant when he entered but, with indecent carelessness, walked over to a booth and sat down.

A teen-age girl with a ponytail came to wait on him. He said, “Where’s that elderly woman that was here last night?” Evidently the stupid idiot had formed some attachment — mother fixation no doubt!

The dumb girl went off to ask the manager of all things! She came back. “She was just temporary. You got no idea how the help shifts around in these motel chains. What’ll y’have?”

“A chocolate sundae,” said Heller. “That’s to start. Then… what’s these?” He was pointing at a picture.

“Waffles?” said the girl. “They’re just waffles.”

“Give me five,” said Heller. “And three cups of hot jo— coffee.”

I made a hurried note. Although I realized it was quite plain that he was imitating the accents of the people he talked to, he had almost strayed into a Code break. When I had the platen, those could be used to hang him high!

She came with a big, gooey chocolate sundae and he demolished it. Then she came with five separate plates of waffles and spread them around and he demolished those. Then she came with three separate cups of coffee. He emptied the sugar bowl of cubes into them and demolished those.

She was hanging around, not giving him his check. “You’re cute,” she said. “It’ll be fall semester soon. You going to sign up with a local high school?”

“I’m just passing through,” said Heller.

“(Bleep),” said the girl and stalked off. She came back with his check. She had put all the items on it. She was very frosty and uppity. Even the dollar tip didn’t seem to matter. She must have been looking at his back as she left the table but her voice came through clearly. “I never get the breaks.”

Heller said to the cashier, “I understand your lamp blew out last night.”

“Which one?”

“This one,” said Heller, tapping it.

The cashier asked the manager who was fiddling around with the cigarette display. He said, “Oh, yeah. Outside fuse. But it didn’t blow. The fuse got pulled somehow.”

He bought a whole bale of daily papers and went back to his room. A golden opportunity had been missed, I realized suddenly. I cursed Raht and Terb. They were somewhere within two hundred miles of him or I wouldn’t be getting a picture. They were depending on the fact that his clothes and suitcases were bugged to keep him ranged. I could have kicked them for not demanding a receiver-typer. Yes, I knew it was illegal for them to pack around more than a small transmitter that looked like an alarm clock. But they should have said, “(Bleep) the regulations, Gris must be served!” They hadn’t. A pair of (bleepards), both of them. A golden chance to ransack his baggage had been missed! If I had that platen, I wouldn’t be going through all this!

He got out a spin brush, filled its fluid container and washed his teeth and I was so bitter about the suitcases that I almost passed over a real Code break. That spin brush might even have a Voltarian manufacturing plate on it! Not that anybody on this planet could read it, but it was still a Code break. His obsession with cleanliness was going to ruin him yet. I didn’t even own a spin brush: they cost three credits.

With suitcases dragging from each hand and the carry-all under one arm and the mass of newspapers under the other, he went down to his car.

And did he carefully inspect it to see if it had been set up with bombs? No! He just put his baggage in the back, the newspapers in the front seat, started up and started off. I had turned the volume down in case there was an explosion.

He went up to U.S. 495 and, tooling along comfortably, got onto U.S. 95 and, at a leisurely fifty-five, rolled across the beautiful leafy green of Maryland, admiring the trees and fields and not even glancing into the rear-view mirror to see if he was tailed. That beauty he was impressed by was deceptive. I knew there was death waiting on that road!

He got into Delaware, admiring it down to the last huge barn. I didn’t know why he was looking so thoroughly at all these chicken factories with their huge signs. Snipers wouldn’t be concealed in them. Then suddenly a truck — glaringly labelled Delaware Chickens Corp. — swerved around to get ahead of him (he was dawdling), and he drove up so close to it he almost rammed it and then hung hard on its tailgate. It was a truck full of live chickens and he was looking them all over.

“So,” he muttered, “that’s what a chicken is!”

Hopeless! Absolutely hopeless!

Past Greater Wilmington Airport, he turned to the right onto the huge Delaware River Bridge. But was his mind on his business? No!

He stopped his car! Halfway across the span, disregarding traffic and horns and brake squeals, he stepped on his brakes!

A trailer-truck slued sideways frantically and blocked all lanes!

He got out. He left his car right there in the right lane, motor running, and got out! He gave only the slightest glance to the pandemonium he had abruptly caused.

He went over to the bridge rail and looked down at the Delaware River.

“Holy, jumping blastguns!” he said in Voltarian. Just like that!

And what was he looking at? He was looking down at the brown, roiling water. And what was there to see? Nothing but oil slicks and old floating tires and dead cats. Of course, I will admit the Delaware River is pretty big as rivers go and it looks bigger as at this point it becomes Delaware Bay and then part of the Atlantic.

The huge truck driver that had almost rammed the Cadillac now couldn’t get out because of the stacked up traffic. He came roaring at Heller, shaking his fists. I only saw him on peripheral vision. Heller wasn’t looking at him. He was looking northeast, up the river. The noise was absolutely deafening. Honking horns and angry yells and this truck driver. I had to turn down the gain.