Morely tossed the last sheet to his desk and leaned forward, tapping
idly on the dull-finished plastic. Finally, he touched his call button
and waited till the clerk came in.
"You may send Mr. Bond in now," he directed.
He picked up the section of the report dealing with Graham's past
designs, and started scanning it. He would have the Fiscal chief go over
this and set up the necessary royalty agreements with Consolidated. Some
of them might generate worth-while amounts of funds.
* * * * *
He made no sign of recognition or awareness when Bond entered the
office, but continued with his reading. At last, he pulled a notepad to
him, wrote a brief indorsement to the Fiscal chief, and clipped it to
the part of the report dealing with Graham's older designs. He replaced
his pen in its stand and leaned back, to stare at his junior, who stood
at rigid attention.
"Yes?"
"Sector Leader Bond, sir, reporting as ordered." Bond saluted.
Negligently, Merely returned the salute, then picked up Bond's report.
"I have gone through this, Bond," he announced. "Very interesting. And
you thought it too unimportant to report on before?"
"I didn't want to bother you with some idle fantasy, sir. Until the
man's experiments showed definite results of some sort, I--"
"And then, you hoped to spring a completed device on me? Take credit for
it yourself, eh?"
"Not at all, sir. I--"
Morely raised a hand. "Never mind. I don't need any kind of aid to read
your intentions. They're quite plain, I see. It would have been quite a
credit to you, wouldn't it?
"'Look what I worked out, with a little, minor help from one of the
employees in my sector.'
"But I've seen that line worked before, Bond, and worked smoothly. You
don't catch the Old Man napping so easily as that." He paused.
"Of course we don't know whether or not this device is going to be of
any real use. But we do know that this man, Graham, has developed one
thing which can be profitably incorporated into conventional equipment.
That power source of his appears to be quite practical, and we'll adopt
it. Offer it to the man's employer, subject to community royalty. And
see if you can get Graham a little time off work in compensation. Then,
keep a close watch on his work on the rest of his device. He'll probably
use his time off to work on it--at least, he'll be a lot better off if
he does.
"I want frequent reports on his progress--daily reports, if any
significant developments occur. And I want a model of that device as
soon as it's developed and has had preliminary tests. If it works, it
might be valuable for community defense." He waved a hand.
"That's all."
Bond turned to go, and almost got to the door before Morely called him
back.
"Oh, one more thing, Bond. Keep a closer watch on the rest of your
people. If any more of them decide to do extra work of any unusual
nature, I shall expect an immediate report in full. Don't fail me again.
Is that clear?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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