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to his lectures and stand around talking in the lobby afterwards. O'Shea is on the payroll—pump him for everything you can get. Find out about the Moon colony—find out what types they have there. And then we'll know whom to aim our ads at. Any arguments, for God's sake?" There weren't.
    Hester had done wonders of scheduling that first day, and I made progress with every section head involved. But she couldn't read my paperwork for me, and by quitting time I had six inches of it stacked by my right arm. Hester volunteered to stay with me, but there wasn't really anything for her to do. I let her bring me sandwiches and another cup of coffee, and chased her home.
    It was after eleven by the time I was done. I stopped off in an all-night diner on the fifteenth floor before heading home, a window-less box of a place where the coffee smelled of the yeast it was made from and the ham in my sandwich bore the taint of soy. But it was only a minor annoyance and quickly out of my mind. For as I opened the door to my apartment there was a snick and an explosion, and something slammed into the doorframe by my head. I ducked and yelled. Outside the window a figure dangling from a rope ladder drifted away, a gun in its hand.
    I was stupid enough to run over to the window and gawk out at the helicopter-borne figure. I would have been a perfect target if it had been steady enough to shoot at me again, but it wasn't.
     
    Surprised at my calm, I called the Metropolitan Protection Corporation.
    "Are you a subscriber, sir?" their operator asked.
    "Yes, dammit. For six years. Get a man over here! Get a squad over here."
    "One moment, Mr. Courtenay. . . . Mr. Mitchell Courtenay? Copysmith, star class?"
    "No," I said bitterly. "Target is my profession. Will you kindly get a man over here before the character who just took a shot at me comes back?"
    "Excuse me, Mr. Courtenay," said the sweet, unruffled voice. "Did you say you were not a copysmith, star class?"
    I ground my teeth. "I'm star class," I admitted.
    "Thank you, sir. I have your record before me, sir. I am sorry, sir, but your account is in arrears. We do not accept star-class accounts at the general rate because of the risk of industrial feuds, sir." She named a figure that made each separate hair on my head stand on end.
    I didn't blow my top; she was just a tool. "Thanks," I said heavily, and rang off. I put the Program-Printing to Quarry Machinery reel of the Red Book into the reader and spun it to Protective Agencies. I got turndowns from three or four, but finally one sleepy-sounding private detective agreed to come on over for a stiff fee.
    He showed up in half an hour and I paid him, and all he did was annoy me with unanswerable questions and look for nonexistent fingerprints. After a while he went away saying he'd work on it.
    I went to bed and eventually to sleep with one of the unanswered questions chasing itself around and around in my head: who would want to shoot a simple, harmless advertising man like me?
     

 
four
     
    I took my courage in my hands and walked briskly down the hall to Fowler Schocken's office. I needed an answer, and he might have it. He might also throw me out of the office for asking. But I needed an answer.
    It didn't seem to be the best possible time to ask Fowler questions. Ahead of me, his door opened explosively and Tildy Mathis lurched out. Her face was working with emotion. She stared at me, but I'll take oath she didn't know my name. "Rewrites," she said wildly. "I slave my heart out for that white-haired old rat, and what does he give me? Rewrites. 'This is good copy, but I want better than good copy from you,' he says. 'Rewrite it,' he says. 'I want color,' he says, 'I want drive and beauty, and humble, human warmth, and ecstasy, and all the tender, sad emotion of your sweet womanly heart,' he says, 'and I want it in fifteen words.' I'll give him fifteen words," she sobbed, and pushed past me down the hall. "I'll give that sanctimonious,