"If—for some reason—I am in your way because of the Z-wave, why was a man impersonating me, who could only impersonate me for a limited time?"
"Occasionally," said Hoagland loftily, "some broad highway to somewhere must be blocked for a limited time only."
"So I got a crack on the skull that wouldn't last. Eventually a man impersonating me would head for Proxima I to do something there—God knows what—while the real Paul Grayson was free to complain to everybody that he was really not on Proxima I doing his job?"
"Someone slipped. Supposing," Hoagland suggested, "that you were held incommunicado while your double went to Proxima I and performed your job, complete with the automatic motion picture cameras you installed for—ah—posterity and Haedaecker's greatness. Your double returns and hands in his—your—report. Later the man leaves for parts unknown and you are released, complete with the conviction that yelling to the Authorities about your imprisonment would be at variance with the report, the pictures, and the job's completion. Everything is done as your ultimate superior wants it done, and then you go to him complaining that you were held prisoner. Or—would you, Grayson?"
"Well, I—"
Hoagland laughed heartily. "You might if you were the simple, honest soul. But Paul Grayson has been making plans to test the Z-wave on Proxima I for a long time and couldn't afford to have someone asking questions as to why Paul Grayson got himself into a cockeyed mess."
"But what would it accomplish?"
"Stall you for some time."
In the back of Paul's mind there was a picture of a very attractive woman offering up eager lips and the warmth of a vibrant body beneath sheer silk—setting up the clay target. He had to know, he did not want to merely guess the answer, he—but Nora Phillips had turned up just as Haedaecker was getting nasty. Had she turned up to stall Haedaecker? Hoagland wanted the Z-wave business stalled for some reason. Nora's actions appeared to be that of someone bent upon aiding Grayson. Even—in the long run—her falsification of the Z-wave reception on Proxima I was one step in getting mankind interested in the problem of communicating with Neoterra.
"So you erased him? When he failed, I mean?"