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starting to program the chauffeur’s home phone this morning. Any suggestions?”
    “Look for the usual,” the Weeder advised. “Odd words that could be codes for operations. Conversations in which nobody names
     names. Any reference to Savinkov. Noun-rich sentence structure.”
    Wesker groaned again. “Noun-rich sentence structure! What if they talk in verb-rich sentences to throw us off the scent?”
     He lowered his voice to a whisper and stared in mock alarm at the telephone on the table between them. “What if they’re listening
     to us listen to them?”
    “That’s why we’re working out of a loft in SoHo,” the Weeder said. “Even if they had the capability to do what we’re doing,
     it’d never occur to them to target this number. We’re just another mail-order house in another loft, as far as anyone knows.”
    “A mail-order house with an IBM mainframe, a two-hundred-and-fifty-phone trunk line, a reinforced steel shield welded on the
     inside of the door, an alarm system that goes off in some precinct house if anyone blinks after hours, and one of those new
     State Department cipher safes that needs a combination
and
a key to open it.” Shaking his head, Wesker went back to his printouts.
    The Weeder consulted the menu again, noticed new material under the heading of Farmer’s Almanac, which was the code he had
     assigned to Wanamaker’s Operations Subgroup Charlie. He punched in the appropriate call-up codes. Snatches of conversation
     began appearing on the screen. Two people were probably talking on the other side of the room from the telephone, which accounted
     for the computer getting only bits and pieces.
    “… feel bad about the American nationals who are there. Isn’t there some way …”
    “… out of the question, Parker. The last thing we want to do is open the door to speculation …”
    “… thinking out loud. I guess you’re …”
    “… I know I’m …”
    Wesker, across the table, swallowed a yawn. The only items that seemed to interest him were the ones with sexual overtones.
     He loved tuning in on people making love; he claimed that reading what they said to each other during the act was more arousing
     than watching. Right now all he had were people playing bridge. Two diamonds. Pass. Two hearts. Pass. Two no-trump. Pass.
     Three no-trump. Noun-rich sentences could be boring as hell. He saw the Weeder peering intently at his screen. “Anything sexy?”
     he asked hopefully.
    The Weeder said, “Savinkov is jerking off the assistant cultural attaché. All I’m getting is moan-rich sentences.”
    “You’re being ironic, right?” Wesker asked.
    “Right.”
    Another snatch of conversation flashed onto the Weeder’s screen.
    “Admiral Toothacher this. Admiral Toothacher that … it is a thrill just to be in the same room with you.”
    The Weeder read the line again to be sure he had gotten it right. What was Wanamaker’s old boss, Admiral Toothacher, doing
     for Operations Subgroup Charlie? Could Wanamaker have brought him in to walk back the cat on the leak? It wasn’t a pleasant
     thought. Toothacher was a formidable adversary. And he had an old score to settle with the Weeder. If the Admiral ever traced
     the leak back to its source, he would skin Sibley alive and nail his hide to the Company wall.
    “… paper trail.”
    “… paper trail … thin … never left this office.”
    “… naturally need to know …”
    “… out of the realm …”
    “… if there is a clock ticking.”
    “… by mid-March or call it off.”
    “How very poetic … to have the Ides of March as a dead …”
    “… at least know what code name your operation …”
    “… tingle.”
    “… tingle.”
    “… Stufftingle.”
    The Weeder stared at the screen. He felt himself being sucked into the heart of a mystery. What had started out as a prank
     had become a puzzle. The snatches of conversation raised more questions than they answered. What was the connection between