They edged closer, goaded by a ruffian in a mink suit and a tricornered hat, and inspired by the curses percolating up from the floor below. The man in the tricorne threw a torch at Foyle. It burned him. Foyle accelerated again and the Jack-jaunters were transformed into-living statues. Foyle picked up half a chair and calmly clubbed the slow-motion figures. They remained upright. He thrust the man in the tricorne down on the floor and knelt on him. Then he decelerated.
Again the external world came to life. The jackals dropped in their tracks, pole-axed. The man in the tricorne hat and mink suit roared.
«Was there a body in here?» Foyle asked. «Negro girl. Very tall. Very beautiful.»
The man writhed and attempted to gouge Foyle's eyes.
«You keep track of bodies,» Foyle said gently. «Some of you Jacks like dead girls better than live ones. Did you find her body in here?»
Receiving no satisfactory answer, he picked up a torch and set fire to the mink suit. He followed the Jack-jaunter into the living room and watched him with detached interest. The man howled, toppled over the edge of the crater and flamed down into the darkness below.
«Was there a body?» Foyle called down quietly. He shook his head at the answer. «Not very deft,» he murmured. «I've got to learn how to extract information. Dagenham could teach me a thing or two.»
He switched off his electronic system and jaunted.
He appeared in Green Bay, smelling so abominably of singed hair and scorched skin that he entered the local Presteign shop (jewels, perfumes, cosmetics, ionics amp; surrogates) to buy a deodorant. But the local Mr. Presto had evidently witnessed the arrival of the Four Mile Circus and recognized him. Foyle at once awoke from his detached intensity and became the outlandish Fourmyle of Ceres. He downed and cavorted, bought a twelve-ounce flagon of Euge No. ~ at ~r ioo the ounce, dabbed himself delicately and tossed the bottle into the street to the edification and delight of Mr. Presto.
The record clerk at the County Record Office was unaware of Foyle's identity and was obdurate and uncompromising.
«No, Sir. County Records Are Not Viewed Without Proper Court Order For Sufficient Cause. That Must Be Final.»
Foyle examined him keenly and without rancor. «Asthenic type,» he decided. «Slender, long-boned, no strength. Epileptoid character. Self-centered, pedantic, single-minded, shallow. Not bribable; too repressed and straitlaced. But repression's the chink in his armor.»
An hour later six followers from the Four Mile Circus waylaid the record clerk. They were of the female persuasion and richly endowed with vice. Two hours later, the record clerk, dazed by flesh and the devil, delivered up his information. The apartment building had been opened to Jack-jaunting by a gas explosion two weeks earlier. All tenants had been forced to move. Robin Wednesbury was in protective confinement in Mercy Hospital near the Iron Mountain Proving Grounds.
«Protective confinement?» Foyle wondered. «What for? What's she done?»
It took thirty minutes to organize a Christmas party in the Four Mile Circus. It was made up of musicians, singers, actors, and rabble who knew the Iron Mountain co-ordinates. Led by their chief buffoon, they jaunted up with music, fireworks, firewater, and gifts. They paraded through the town spreading largess and laughter. They blundered into the radar field of the Proving Ground protection system and were driven out with laughter. Founnyle of Ceres, dressed as Santa Claus, scattering bank notes from a huge sack over his shoulder and, leaping in agony as the induction field of the protection system burned his bottom, made an entrancing spectacle. They burst into Mercy Hospital, following Santa Claus who roared and cavorted with the detached calm of a solemn elephant. He kissed the nurses, made drunk the attendants, pestered the patients with gifts, littered the corridors with money, and abruptly disappeared when the happy rioting reached such heights that the police had to be called. Much later it was discovered that a patient had disappeared too, despite the fact that she had been under sedation and was incapable of jaunting. As a matter of fact she departed from the hospital inside Santa's sack.
Foyle jaunted with her over his shoulder to the hospital grounds. There, in a quiet grove of pines under a frosty sky, he helped her out of the sack. She wore severe white hospital pajamas and was beautiful. He removed his own costume, watching the girl intently, waiting to see if she would recognize him and remember him.
She was alarmed and confused; her telesending was like heat lightning:
«My God! Who is he? What's happened? The music. The uproar. Why kidnapped in a sack? Drunks slurring on trombones. 'Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.' Adeste Fidelis. What's he want from me? Who is he?»
«I'm Fourmyle of Ceres,» Foyle said.
«What? Who? Fourmyle of…? Yes, of course. The buffoon. The bourgeois gentilhomme. Vulgarity. Imbecility. Obscenity. The Four Mile Circus. My God! Am I telesending? Can you hear me?»
«I hear you, Miss Wednesbury,» Foyle said quietly.
«What have you done? Why? What do you want with me? I…”
«I want you to look at me.»
«Bon jour, Madame. Into my sack, Madame. Ecco! Look at me. I'm looking,» Robin said, trying to control the jangle of her thoughts. She gazed up into his face without recognition. «It's a face. I've seen so many like it. The faces of men, oh God! The features of masculinity. Everyman in rut. Will God never save us from brute desire?»
«My rutting season's over, Miss Wednesbury.»
«I'm sorry you heard that. I'm terrified, naturally. I…You know me?»
«I know you.»
«We've met before?» She scrutinized him closely, but still without recognition. Deep down inside Foyle there was a surge of triumph. If this woman of all women failed to remember him he was safe, provided he kept blood and brains and face under control.
«We've never met,» he said. «I've heard of you. I want something from you. That's why we're here; to talk about it. If you don't like my offer you can go back to the hospital.»
«You want something? But I've got nothing. . . nothing. Nothing's left but shame and…Oh God! Why did the suicide fail? Why couldn't I…”
«So that's it?» Foyle interrupted softly. «You tried to commit suicide, eh? That accounts for the gas explosion that opened the building. . . And your protective confinement. Attempted suicide. Why weren't you hurt in the explosion?»
«So many were hurt. So many died. But I didn't. I'm unlucky, I suppose. I've been unlucky all my life.»
«Why suicide?»
«I'm tired. I'm finished. I've lost everything . . . I'm on the army gray list . . . suspected, watched, reported. No job. No family. No…Why suicide? Dear God, what else but suicide?»
«You can work for me.»
«I can . . . What did you say?»
«I want you to work for me, Miss Wednesbury.»
She burst into hysterical laughter. «For you? Another camp follower in the Circus? Work for you, Fourmyle?»
«You've got sex on the brain,» he said gently. «I'm not looking for tarts. They look for me, as a rule.»
«I'm sorry. I'm obsessed by the brute who destroyed me. I…I'll try to make sense.» Robin calmed herself. «Let me understand you. You've taken me out of the hospital to offer me a job. You've heard of me. That means you want something special. My specialty is telesending.»
«And charm.»
«What?»
«I want to buy your charm, Miss Wednesbury.»
«I don't understand.»
«Why,» Foyle said mildly. «It ought to be simple for you. I'm the buffoon. I'm vulgarity, imbecility, obscenity. That's got to stop. I want you to be my social secretary.»
«You expect me to believe that? You could hire a hundred social secretaries…a thousand, with your money. You expect me to believe that I'm the only one for you? That you had to kidnap me from protective confinement to get me?»