Simon found himself putting his arms around the black-clad figure. With a straining effort he lifted her out of the tub, water sloshing all over his legs, and half carried, half slid with her down the stairs.
He fetched up panting and disheveled at the top landing, his attention riveted by the lightning-illuminated scene in the two-story-high living room below. At the far end of it a dark-robed figure crouched at the console of the mighty organ, like a giant bat at the base of the portico of a black and gold temple. In the center of the room Ivan was in the act of heaving above his head his globular leather case.
Mikhail darted a look over his shoulder and sprang to one side. The projectile crashed against the organ. Mikhail picked himself up, tearing something from his neck. Ivan lunged forward with a roar. Mikhail crashed a fist against his jaw. The Bomber went down and didn't come up. Mikhail unwrapped his crucifix from his fingers and resumed playing.
With a wild cry Simon heaved himself to his feet, stumbled over Grushenka's sodden garments, and pitched headlong down the stairs.
When he came to, the house was empty and the Stulnikov moving van was gone. At the front door he was met by a poker-faced young man who identified himself as a member of the FBI. Simon showed him the globular case Ivan had thrown at the organ. It proved to contain a bowling ball.
The young gentleman listened to his story without changing expression, thanked him warmly, and shooed him out.
The Stulnikov-Gureviches disappeared for good, though not quite without a trace. Simon found this item in the next evening's paper, the first of many he accumulated yearningly in a scrapbook during the following months:
MERMAID RAIN A HOAX, SCIENTIST DECLARES
Milford, Pa.—The "mermaid rain" reported here has been declared a fraud by an eminent European biologist. Vasily Stulnikov-Gurevich, formerly Professor of Genetics at Pire University, Latvia, passing through here on a cross-country trip, declared the miniature "mermaids" were "albino tadpoles, probably scattered about as a hoax by schoolboys."
The professor added, "I would like to know where they got them, however. There is clear evidence of mutation, due perhaps to fallout."