Bodger swore softly, and returned to his own room to shower and dress. He had some heavy thinking to do.
When, minutes later, he was refreshed, dressed, and ready to appear in public again, he'd made a decision. He needed to discover the root of Lloyd's dangerous behavior. And the likely person to know something about it would be Lloyd's fiancee, Grace Horton.
Bodger left his Unit and started toward the lift. It was still short of one o'clock, but the Voteplate of the Secondary Speakster cut through a lot of mechanical red tape.
The lift arrived at Hundred-Level within seconds after his nocking his plate beside the call-button. He got aboard and began the descent toward Ninety-Three.
CHAPTER 7
Robert Lennick leaned far back in his swivel chair, and sighed a deep sigh at the ceiling, being careful it would not be heard by the party on the other end of the wire.
"Now, listen, sweetheart," he said. "You are good. Got that? Good, with a capital tremendous. But you don't click in urban dramas. You're too—" He didn't want to say tall, or gigantic, though these words were more readily at tongue-tip. "—too Junoesque for the parts we're casting.... No, I mean it. You just—Well, you're just not the housewife type, darling!"
The speaker crackled in his ear for another minute, and Lennick sat and studied the piled-up scripts in his in-box with wearily narrowed eyes. When his chance came again, he said, "No, not today. I'm sorry, Lona, really I am.... It's impossible, that's why.... All right, if you have to know—We're shooting Fredric Stanton, that's why—"
The speaker's reply to the phrase made some of the color wash out of Lennick's smooth-shaven face, and this time he interrupted with a snarl. "You better watch it, Lona, baby! A smartaleck pun like that can get you sent to the hospital. You know damned well I mean we're going to photograph him.... Okay, but simmer down, huh?!... Okay, baby, I will.... Yes, as soon as anything, anything at all in your line comes by my desk.... Word of honor.... Sure thing.... Yeah, that'd be lovely. We'll do it sometime.... Okay, Lona—Lona.... I said—.... O-kay, Lona!" He spat out the last words, and clamped the phone into the cradle with vicious pleasure. "Dumb broad!" he mumbled, then got up and opened the door to his anteroom.