"Why, you ... I never...." Ferber's outraged First Secretary could scarcely talk. "He ... he is...." "I know, Babe, I know--I could set that to music and sing it, with gestures. 'Chancellor Ferber is in conference and cannot be disturbed,'" he mimicked, savagely. "Put him on now--but _quick_!" * * * The tri-di tank brightened up; Chancellor Ferber's image appeared. He was disheveled, surprised and angry, but Garlock gave him no chance to speak. "Well, Fatso--at last! Where the _hell_ have you been all morning? I want some stuff, just as fast as God will let you get it together," and he began to read off, as fast as he could talk, a long list of highly technical items. Ferber tried for many seconds to break in, and Garlock finally allowed him to do so. "Are you crazy, Garlock?" he shouted. "What in hell's name are you bothering _me_ with _that_ stuff for? You know better than that--make out your requisitions and send them through channels!" "Channels, hell!" Garlock shouted back. "Hasn't it got through your four-inch-thick skull into your idiot's brain yet that I'm in a hurry? I don't want this stuff today; I want it day before yesterday--this damned junk-heap is apt to fall apart any minute. So quit goggling and slobbering at me, you wall-eyed, slimy, fat toad. Get that three hundred weight of suet into action. _Hump_ yourself!" "You ... you ... Why, I was never so insulted...." "Insulted? You?" Garlock out-roared him. "Listen, Fatso. If I ever set out to really insult you, you'll know it--it'll blister all the paint off the walls. All I'm trying to do now is get you off that fat butt of yours and get some action." Ferber became purple and pounded his desk in consuming anger. Garlock yelled louder and pounded harder. "Start rounding up this stuff--but _fast_--or I'll come down there and take your job away from you and do it myself--and for your own greasy hide's sake you'd better believe I'm not just chomping my choppers, either." "You'll _What?_" Ferber screamed. "_You're fired!_" "_You_ fire _me_?" Garlock mimicked the scream. "And make it stick? You'd better write that one up for the funnies. Why, you lard-brain, you couldn't fire a cap-pistol." "Foster!" Ferber yelled. "Terminate Garlock as of now. Insubordination, and misconduct, abuse of position, incompetence, malfeasance--everything else you can think of. Blacklist him all over the System!" At the word "fired" Belle, had leaped to her feet and had stopped laughing. "Miss Bellamy!" Ferber snapped. "Yes, sir?" she answered, sweetly. "You are hereby promoted to be Head of the...." "Oh, yeah?" Belle sneered, her voice cutting like a knife. "You unprincipled, lascivious, lecherous _Hitler!_ Have you got the unmitigated gall to take _me_ for a floozie? To think you can add _me_ to your collection of bootlicking, round-heeled tramps?" "You're fired and blacklisted too!"