I dove out of my hiding place as he came close. I wanted to tackle him hard and ask some pointed questions. He saw me as I saw him skidding to an unbalanced stop, and there was the dull glint of metal in his right hand. His needle-ray came swinging up and I went for my armpit. I found time to curse my own stupidity for not having hardware in my own fist at the moment. But then I had my rod in my fist. I felt the hot scorch of the needle going off just over my shoulder, and then came the godawful racket of my ancient forty-five. The big slug caught him high in the belly and tossed him back. It folded him over and dropped him in the gutter while the echoes of my cannon were still racketing back and forth up and down the quiet street. I had just enough time to dig his wallet, pockets, and billfold before the whole neighborhood was up and out. Sirens howled in the distance and from above I could hear the thin wail of a jetcopter. Someone opened a window and called: "What’s going on out there? Cut it out!" [Illustration] "Tea party," I called back. "Go invite the cops, Tommy." The window slammed down again. He didn’t have to invite the law. It arrived in three ground cruisers and two jetcopter emergency squads that came closing in like a collapsing balloon. The leader of the squadron was a Lieutenant Williamson whom I’d never met before. But he knew all about me before the ’copter hit the ground. I could almost feel his sense of perception frisking me from the skin outward, going through my wallet and inspecting the Private Operator’s license and my Weapon-Permit. I found out later that Williamson was a Rhine Scholar with a Bachelor’s Degree in Perception, which put him head and shoulders over me. He came to the point at once. "Any ideas about this, Hammond?" I shook my head. "Nope," I replied. He looked at one of his men. The other man nodded. "He’s levelling," he said. "Now look, Hammond," said the lieutenant pointedly, "You’re clean and we know it. But hot papas don’t go out for fun. Why was he trying to burn you?" "I wouldn’t know. I’m as blank as any perceptive when it comes to reading minds. I was hoping to collect him whole enough to ask questions, but he forced my hand." I looked to where some of the clean-up squad were tucking the corpse into a basket. "It was one of the few times I’d have happily swapped my perception for the ability to read a mind." The lieutenant nodded unhappily. "Mind telling me why you were wandering around in this neighborhood? You don’t belong here, you know." "I was doing the job that most private eyes do. I was tailing a gent who was playing games off the reservation." "You’ve gone into this guy’s wallet, of course?" I nodded. "Sure. He _was_ Peter Rambaugh, age thirty, and----" "Don’t bother. I know the rest. I can add only one item that you may not know. Rampaugh was a paid hotboy, suspected of playing with Scarmann’s mob."