Free Overload by Arthur Hailey

also go to specific
    buildings, selected because of known theft patterns. Supermarkets, for
    example, were always prime suspects because electricity was their seeond
    largest operating cost (labor was the first) and many such businesses had
    cheated in the past. Thus all supermarkets in tlie area wou Id be c
    liccked. As and when anything suspicious was located, the service
    engineers, backed up by Harry London's Property Protection men, would
    move in.
    "'flie quicker you put something like this together, the less danger
    there is of leaks." London grinned. "In the Marines there were bigger
    jobs Nve did a whole lot faster."
    "Okay, gyrcne," Niin said, "I was just a dogface. But I'd like to be in
    on this operation."
    Although Nim's own military service had been brief, it gave him
    40
     

something of a common bond with Harry London. Immediately after college Nim
    was drafted and sent to Korea. There, a month after arrival and while his
    platoon was probing the enemy from an advanced position, they were strafed
    and bombed by American planes. (Afterward the ghastly error was described in
    military double-talk as "friendly fire.") Four U.S. infantrymen were killed,
    others injured, including Nim, who sustained a perforated eardrum which
    became infected, leaving him permanently deaf on the left side. Soon after,
    he was sent home and quietly given a medical discharge, the Korean incident
    hushed up. Nowadays, most of Nim's colleagues and friends were aware they
    should sit on his right during con versa tion s-tbe side of his good ear.
    But only a few knew exactly why. Harry London was one of the few.
    "Be my guest on Thursday," London said.
    They arranged a rendezvous.
    Afterward they talked about the sabotage at La Mission which had killed
    Walter Talbot and the others. Although Harry London was not involved
    directly in the investigation, he and the utility's chief security officer
    were after-hours drinking cronies and exchanged confidences; also London's
    background as a police detective had given him contacts with law
    enforcement agencies which he kept operative. "The county sheriff is
    working with the FBI and our own city police," he informed Nim. "So far all
    leads have run up against a brick wall. The FBI, which does most processing
    of evidence in this kind of case, believe they're looking for a new batch
    of kooks without police records, which makes everything harder."
    "How about the man in Salvation Army uniform?"
    "That's being worked on, but there's a hundred ways they could have got the
    uniform, most not traceable. Of course, if they pull the same dodge again,
    that's something else. A lot of people will be alert and waiting."
    "You think they might?"
    London shrugged. "They're fanatics. Which makes them crazy-smart, brilliant
    in some ways, stupid in others. You never can tell. Often it just takes
    time. If I hear any rumbles I'll let you know."
    "Thanks."
    What he had just heard, Nim realized, was in essence what be bad told
    Ardytbe last Wednesday night. It reminded him that he should call Ardythe,
    and perhaps go to her, soon. Nim bad seen her once since Wednesday-briefly
    at Walter's funeral on Saturday morning, which many from GSP&L had
    attended. It had been, to Nim, a depressingly ritualistic occasion,
    supervised by an unctuous undertaker whom Walter Talbot would have
    detested. Nim and Ardythe had exchanged a few stilted words, but that was
    all.
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Now lie wondcred: Ought he to allow a "decent" interval before tele-
    phoning Ardythc? Or "as it hypocritical, at this stage, for him to
    consider decency at all?
    He told Harry London, "I'll see you on D-day."
    8
    it would be another scorching day in that long, hot summer. That much was
    evident, even at 9 A.M. when Nim reached Brookside.
    The D-day force had arrived an hour earlier. Its communications center
    was set Lip oil the parking lot of a conveniently central shopping plaza
    where a half-dozcn of the utility's vehicles were clustered,