rkin brief you on it already?"

"Yeah. Before I could get my hat off. Funny set-up, all right. I punched
for basic data before you got in. Hardly any."

"Maybe that means something in itself. Maybe somebody saw to it that the
information never got into the central banks."

The C.I.B. computers could be hooked into the central banks which stored
information on nearly everything and everybody. If you incorporated,
filed for a patent, paid taxes, voted, or just were born, the central
banks had an electronic record of it.

Kronski jerked his thumb toward the computer room. "I punched for names
of Supremist members coupla minutes ago. Thought maybe we could start in
that way."

Pell followed, his mind not really on the job yet. He wasn't at his best
working with the computers, and yet operating them was ninety per cent
of investigation. He supposed he'd get used to it sometime.

Three walls of the big computer room were lined with control racks,
consisting mostly of keyboard setups. Code symbols and index cards were
placed in handy positions. The C.I.B. circuits, of course, were adapted
to the specialized work of investigation. In the memory banks of tubes
and relays there was a master file of all names--aliases and nicknames
included--with which the organization had ever been concerned.
Criminals, witnesses, complaints, everyone. Code numbers linked to the
names showed where data on their owner could be found. A name picked at
random might show that person to have data in the suspect file, the
arrest file, the psychological file, the modus operandi file, and so
forth. Any of the data in these files could be checked, conversely,
against the names.

Kronski walked over to where letter sized cards were flipping from a
slot into a small bin. He said, "Didn't even have to dial in Central
Data for these. Seems we got a lot of Supremist members right in our own
little collection."

Pell picked up one of the cards and examined it idly. Vertical columns
were inscribed along the card, each with a heading, and with further
sub-headed columns. Under the column marked _Modus Operandi_, for
instance, there were subcolumns titled _Person Attacked_, _Property
Attacked_, _How Attacked_, _Means of Attack_, _Object of Attack_, and
_Trademark_. Columns of digits, one to nine, were under each item. If
the digits 3 and 2 were punched under _Trademark_ the number 32 could be
fed into the Operational Data machine and this machine would th