It wasn't a stick-up. It was a kidnap job. Hawk-face had also heard the really important thing that Fradin had said in his speech. I had missed it for a few minutes, but he hadn't missed it. He had instantly realized how damned important it was. He had walked out of the meeting, gone around to the back, waited for the scientist. I should have called the police. But just then something happened that upset me so badly I completely forgot all about police. I recognized Hawk-face, and cold chills began to run up and down my spine. His name--or at least the name attached to the picture I had once seen in the hands of an F.B.I. man--was Marvak. The name didn't mean anything. He had others. A name to use in Asia, one for Russia, one for Europe, all different. Marvak was one of the names he used in America, but the F.B.I. suspected he had others. They would cheerfully have hung him by any of his names, if they could have caught him, but he didn't catch easily. Compared to him, an eel was a rank amateur in slipperiness, and a rattlesnake was man's best friend. Right out in front of the building, on a crowded city street, he forced Fradin into a cab. I was so close I could see the haunted, terrified expression on the little scientist's face. But I didn't think then and I know now that he wasn't afraid of the gun. He was afraid of something even more horrible than Marvak. The cab pulled away. An eternity seemed to pass before I could collect my faculties and grab the next cab in line. "Follow that cab," I hissed at the hacker. "There's a ten-spot in it for you if you don't lose it." He didn't lose it. We followed Fradin and Marvak down to an old, abandoned factory building on the outskirts of the city. They were getting out of their cab when we drove up. Marvak, with his right hand still in his coat pocket, was paying off the driver. "Drive on past," I told my driver. He went on past and around the block and I got out, but the driver had to remind me about the ten-spot I had promised him. I paid off like a slot machine. * * * * * That shows how excited I was. I had stopped thinking about the story I might get. The story was secondary now. What really mattered was that Fradin had to be rescued, and fast. The thing he had let slip was too big to fall into Marvak's hands under any circumstances. And I had to be the one who rescued him. There wasn't time to go for the police. Marvak would work fast. Marvak did work fast. I tried the front door first because that was the obvious thing to do. If I got caught coming in the front door I could say I had the wrong address and back out. But if I got caught at the back door, no amount of explanation would do me any good. The front door was unlocked. It opened into what had once been an office. A flight of stairs led up to the second floor. I listened--there wasn't a sound. "They went upstairs," I thought. "Hold it, bud," a voice said behind me.