When the cloud of smoke around his head was dense enough to cut with a knife, he went back to more serious subjects. He didn’t have to worry too much about his mind being spied on; if Her Majesty couldn’t read his deepest thoughts, and the mind-changers weren’t throwing any bolts of static in his direction, he was safe.
Now, then, he told himself—and sneezed.
He shook his head, cursed slightly, and went on.
Now, then....
There was an organization, spread all over the Western world, and with secret branches, evidently, in the Soviet Union. The organization had to be an old one, because it had to have trained telepaths of such a high degree of efficiency that they could evade Her Majesty’s probing without her even being aware of the evasion. And training took time.
There was something else to consider, too. In order to organize to such a degree that they could wreak the efficient, complete havoc they were wreaking, the organization couldn’t be completely secret; there are always leaks, always suspicious events, and a secret society that covered all of those up would have no time for anything else.
So the organization had to be a known one, a known group, masquerading as something else.
So far, everything made sense. Malone took another deep, grateful puff on the cigar, and frowned. Where, he wondered, did he go from here?
He reached for a pencil and a piece of paper. He headed the paper: Organization. Then he started putting down what he knew about it, and what he’d figured out.
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