". . . Give me a chance, will you?" I said, 'I can't put you in jail for wanting to kill yourself. That's no crime.' And he said, 'But I don't want to die.' So I said, 'Look, bud, get out of here.' I mean if a guy wants to commit suicide, all right, and if he doesn't want to, all right, but I don't want him weeping on my shoulder.
". . . I'm getting on with it. So he said to me. 'If I commit a crime, will you put me in jail?" I said, 'If you're caught and if someone files a charge and you can't put up bail, we will. Now beat it.' So he picked up the inkwell on my desk and, before I could stop him, he turned it upside down on the open police blotter.
". . . That's right! Why do you think we have 'malicious mischief tabbed on him? The ink ran down all over my pants.
". . . Yes, assault and battery, too! I came hopping down to shake a little sense into him, and he kicked me in the shins and handed me one in the eye.
". . . I'm not making this up. You want to come down here and look at my face?
". . . He'll be up in court one of these days. About Thursday, maybe.
". . . Ninety days is the least he'll get, unless the psychoes say otherwise. I think he belongs in the loony-bin myself.
". . . Officially, he's John Smith. That's the only name he'll give.
". . . No, sir, he doesn't get released without the proper legal steps.
", . . O.K., you do that, if you want to, bud! I just do my job here."
He banged the phone into its cradle, glowered at it, then picked it up and
began dialing. He said "Gianetti?", got the proper answer and began talking.
"What's the A.E.C.? I've been talking to some Joe on the phone and he says-
". . . No, I'm not kidding, lunk-head. If I were kidding, I'd put up a sign. What's the alphabet soup?"
He listened, said, "Thanks" in a small voice and hung up again.
He had lost some of his color. "That second guy was the head of the Atomic Energy Commission," he said to Brown. "They must have switched me from Oak Ridge to Washington."
Brown lounged to his feet, "Maybe the F.B.I, is after this John Smith guy. Maybe he's one of these here scientists." He felt moved to philosophy. "They ought to keep atomic secrets away from those guys. Things were O.K. as long as General Groves was the only fella who knew about the atom bomb. Once they cut in these here scientists on it, though-"
"Ah, shut up," snarled Mankiewicz.
Dr. Oswald Grant kept his eyes fixed on the white line that marked the highway and handled the car as though it were an enemy of his. He always did. He was tall and knobby with a withdrawn expression stamped on his face. His knees crowded the wheel, and his knuckles whitened whenever he made a turn.
Inspector Darrity sat beside him with his legs crossed so that the sole of his left shoe came up hard against the door. It would leave a sandy mark when he took it away. He tossed a nut-brown penknife from hand to hand. Earlier, he had unsheathed its wicked, gleaming blade and scraped casually at his nails as they drove, but a sudden swerve had nearly cost him a finger and he desisted.
He said, "What do you know about this Ralson?"
Dr. Grant took his eyes from the road momentarily, then returned them. He said, uneasily, "I've known him since he took his doctorate at Princeton. He's a very brilliant man."
"Yes? Brilliant, huh? Why is it that all you scientific men describe one another as 'brilliant'? Aren't there any mediocre ones?"
"Many. I'm one of them. But Ralson isn't. You ask anyone. Ask Oppen-heimer. Ask Bush. He was the youngest observer at Alamogordo."
"O.K. He was brilliant. What about his private life?"
Grant waited. "I wouldn't know."
"You know him since Princeton. How many years is that?"
They had been scouring north along the highway from Washington for two hours with scarcely a word between them. Now Grant felt the atmosphere change and the grip of the law on his coat collar.
"He got his degree in '43."
"You've known him eight years then."
" "That's right."
us "And you don't know about his private life?"
"A man's life is his own, Inspector. He wasn't very sociable. A great many of the men are like that. They work under pressure and when they're off the job, they're not interested in continuing the lab acquaintanceships."
"Did he belong to any organizations that you know of?"
"No."
The inspector said, "Did he ever say anything to you that might indicate he was disloyal?"
Grant shouted "No!" and there was silence for a while.
Then Darrity said, "How important is Ralson in atomic research?"
Grant hunched over the wheel and said, "As important as any one man can be. I grant you that no one is indispensable, but Ralson has always seemed to be rather unique. He has the engineering mentality."
"What does that mean?"
"He isn't much of a mathematician himself, but he can work out the gadgets that put someone else's math into life. There's no one like him when it comes to that. Time and again, Inspector, we've had a problem to lick and no time to lick it in. There were nothing but blank minds all around until he put some thought into it and said, 'Why don't you try so-and-so?' Then he'd go away. He wouldn't even be interested enough to see if it worked. But it always did. Always! Maybe we would have got it ourselves eventually, but it might have taken months of additional time. I don't know how he does it. It's no use asking him either. He just looks at you and says 'It was obvious', and walks away. Of course, once he's shown us how to do it, it is obvious."
The inspector let him have his say out. When no more came, he said, "Would you say he was queer, mentally? Erratic, you know."
"When a person is a genius, you wouldn't expect him to be normal, would you?"
"Maybe not. But just how abnormal was this particular genius?"
"He never talked, particularly. Sometimes, he wouldn't work." • "Stayed at home and went fishing instead?"
"No. He came to the labs all right; but he would just sit at his desk. Sometimes that would go on for weeks. Wouldn't answer you, or even look at you, when you spoke to him."
"Did he ever actually leave work altogether?"
"Before now, you mean? Never!"
"Did he ever claim he wanted to commit suicide? Ever say he wouldn't feel safe except in jail?"