ytime."

"How about the roof?"

"That's taken care of, sir; we've got 'copter that can be on the top of
the Lasser Building at any time you call. They can land within thirty
seconds of your signal."

"Okay," Houston said; "I'm going in now. Remember--no matter what I say
or do, no one is to leave that building if they're conscious. And keep
your eyes on me; if I act in the least peculiar, handcuff me--but don't
knock me out.

"And if I'm not back on time, come in anyway."

"Right."

* * * * *

Houston finished his coffee, dropped a coin on the counter, and headed
for the other side of the street.

The big problem was getting into the building itself. It was ringed with
alarms; Lasser & Sons didn't want just anybody wandering in and out of
their building.

So Houston had arranged a roundabout way. The building next to the
Lasser Building was a good deal smaller, only forty-five stories high. A
week before, Houston had rented an office on the eighteenth floor of
the building; on the door, he had already had a sign engraved: Ajax
Enterprises.

It was a shame the office would never be used.

Houston walked straight to the next-door building and opened the front
door with his key. Inside, a night watchman lounged behind a desk,
smoking a blackened briar. He looked up, smiled, and nodded.

"Evening, Mr. Griswold; working late tonight?"

Houston forced a smile he did not feel. "Just doing a little paper
work," he said.

He took the automatic elevator to the eighteenth floor. He didn't relish
the idea of walking up to the roof, but taking the elevator would make
the nightwatchman suspicious.

He didn't bother going to the office; he headed directly for the
stairway and began his long climb--twenty-seven floors to the roof.

All through it, he kept up a running comment through his throat mike. "I
wish I weighed about fifty pounds less; carrying two hundred and twenty
pounds of blubber up these stairs isn't easy."

"Blubber, hooey!" the earphone interrupted. "Any man who's
six-feet-three has a right to carry that much weight. Actually, you're
a skinny-looking sort of goop."

Both men were exaggerating; Houston wasn't fat, but his broad, powerful
frame couldn't be called skinny, either.

When he finally reached the roof, he paused and surveyed the wall of the
Lasser Building, which towered high above him, spearing an additional
thirty stories in the air. Up there, the lights