The copy-cutter grumbled. "Better have a make-over, then. We won't have time to handle it."
But High-Pockets knew better. He poked his head over the desk and sneaked a look at No. 7. She was grinding away. High-Pockets went back to the dump and looked at the guideline of his stickful without copy. It said, "Two Women Murdered."
But nobody would ever give out a long take like that so near closing time. He looked again. He should have known. The half-a-stickful was divided into thirds, carefully guided "First Add" and "Second Add", and at the bottom of the last add was a turned slug and a line, "More to Come."
The copy tube swished, and a carrier thumped in the box. "Here," the copy-cutter said, "here's a precede on that atomic bomb explosion. You might as well set that while we're waiting."
"Okay," said High-Pockets, and in the now hazy recesses of his mind he made a mighty resolution: he would set this take himself; No. 7 be damned.
He went straight to the machine. Mats were dropping, but High-Pockets just raised his eyebrows and reached up and turned off the power. That would stop her.
He got his copy all fixed and his arms folded in, and then he unfolded one arm and turned on the power while his right hand hovered over the keyboard. Apparently No. 7 didn't quite know what to make of this new attack, and he was able to get several lines through before she figured it out. Then she seemed to sit back and get her breath, and High-Pockets, with a wide grin on his face, manipulated the keyboard fast enough to keep the machine hung so she wouldn't get a chance on her own hook.
But eventually he had a pileup of mats and had to miss a line. He was crestfallen. But strangely enough, she didn't start in when he got the assembling elevator clear. He watched her out of the corner of his eye while he gingerly assembled the line, but nothing happened. He sent that line in and watched it go through without any disturbance, then he sat back a moment and he and the machine sized each other up. Still no mats dropped of their own volition. High-Pockets grinned. Maybe he was beginning to sober up.
He set a line and sent it in, watching. It justified and the pot came forward to cast. "Hmp," said High-Pockets. "Who said she's human? Sub-human, I call it."
Something happened when he said that. The second justification lever went up with a bang that shook the whole machine, and High-Pockets reached for the clutch lever with his left hand.