Entities: The Selected Novels of Eric Frank Russell by Eric Frank Russell Read Free Book Online

and safer address. For more than four hours he could concentrate single-mindedly upon the job of defacing walls and making a mess of the largest, most expensive sheets of plate glass that daytimes were prominently in public view.
    Between seven-thirty and midnight he slapped exactly one hundred stickers on shops, offices and vehicles of the city transport system, also inscribed swiftly, clearly and in large size the letters D.A.G. upon twenty-four walls.
    The latter feat was performed with Terran crayon, a deceitfully chalk-like substance that made full use of the porosity of brick when water was applied. In other words, the more furiously it was washed the more stubbornly it became embedded. There was only one sure way of obliterating the offensive letters—to knock down the entire wall and rebuild it.
    In the morning he breakfasted, walked out with his case, ignored a line of waiting dynocars and caught a bus. He changed buses nine times, switching routes one way or the other and heading nowhere in particular. Five times he traveled without his case which reposed awhile in a rented locker. This tedious rigmarole may not have been necessary but there was no way of telling; it was his duty not only to avoid actual perils but also to anticipate hypothetical ones.
    Such as this: “Kaitempi check. Let me see the hotel register. H’m!—much the same as last time. Except for this Shir Agavan. Who is he, hi?”
    “A forestry surveyor.”
    “Did you get that from his identity-card?”
    “Yes, officer. It was quite in order.”
    “By whom is he employed?”
    “By the Ministry of Natural Resources.”
    “Was his card embossed with the Ministry’s stamp?”
    “I don’t remember. Maybe it was. I can’t say for sure.”
    “You should notice things like that. You know full well that you’ll be asked about them when the check is made.”
    “Sorry, officer, but I can’t see and remember every item that comes my way in a week.”
    “You could try harder. Oh. Well, I suppose this Agavan character is all right. But maybe I’d better get confirmation if only to show I’m on the job. Give me your phone.” A call, a few questions, the phone slammed down, then in harsh tones, “The Ministry has no Shir Agavan upon its roll. The fellow is using a fake identity-card. When did he leave the hotel? Did he look agitated when he went? Did he say anything to indicate where he was going? Wake up, you fool, and answer! Give me the key to his room—it must be searched at once. Did he take a dynocar when he departed? Describe him to me as fully as you can. So he was carrying a case? What sort of a case, hi?”
    That was the kind of chance that must be taken when one holes up in known and regularly checked haunts. The risk was not enormous, in fact it was small— but it was still there. And when tried, sentenced and waiting for death it is no consolation to know that what came off was a hundred to one chance. To keep going and to maintain the one-man battle the enemy had to be outwitted, if possible, all along the line and all the time.
    Satisfied that by now the most persistent of snoops could not follow his tortuous trail through the city, Mowry retrieved his case, lugged it up to the third floor of a crummy tenement building, let himself into his suite of two sour-smelling rooms. The rest of the day he spent cleaning the place up and making it fit to live in.
    He’d be lots harder to trace here. The shifty-eyed landlord had not asked to see his identity-card, had accepted him without question as Cast Hurkin, a low-grade railroad official, honest, hard-working and stupid enough to pay his rent regularly and on time. To the landlord’s way of thinking the unsavory neighbors rated a higher I.Q.—in terms of that environment—being able to get a crust with less effort and remaining tight-mouthed about how they did it.
    Housework finished, Mowry bought a paper, sought through it from front to back for some mention of yesterday’s