er
than that to come up with the old, old answer. "I start an
investigation," he said. "I get a committee and I talk to a lot of
newspaper editors and magazine editors and maybe I go on television
and talk some more, and my committee has a lot of meetings--"

"Exactly," Burris said.

"And we talk a lot at the meetings," Malone went on, carried away,
"and get a lot of publicity, and we subpoena famous people, just as
famous as we can get, except governors or presidents, because you
can't--they tried that back in the '50s, and it didn't work very
well--and that gives us some more publicity, and then when we have all
the publicity we can possibly get--"

"You stop," Burris said hurriedly.

"That's right," Malone said. "We stop. And that's what I'd do."

"Of course, the problem of inefficiency is left exactly where it
always was," Burris said. "Nothing's been done about it."

"Naturally," Malone said. "But think of all the lovely publicity. And
all the nice talk. And the subpoenas and committees and everything."

"Sure," Burris said wearily. "It's happened a thousand times. But,
Malone, that's the difference. It isn't happening this time."

There was a short pause. "What do you mean?" Malone said at last.

"This time," Burris said, in a tone that sounded almost awed, "they
want to keep it a secret."

"A secret?" Malone said, blinking. "But that's ... that's not the
American way."

Burris shrugged. "It's un-congressman-like, anyhow," he said. "But
that's what they've done. Tiptoed over to me and whispered softly that
the thing has to be investigated quietly. Naturally, they didn't give
me any orders--but only because they know they can't make one stick.
They suggested it pretty strongly."

"Any reasons?" Malone said. The whole idea interested him strangely.
It was odd--and he found himself almost liking odd cases, lately. That
is, he amended hurriedly, if they didn't get _too_ odd.

"Oh, they had reasons, all right," Burris said. "It took a little
coaxing, but I managed to pry some loose. You see, every one of them
found inefficiency in his own department. And every one knows that
other men are investigating inefficiency."

"Oh," Malone said.

"That's right," Burris said. "Every one of them came to me to get me
to prove that the goof-ups in his particular department weren't his
fault. That covers them in case one of the others happens to light
into the department."

"Well, it must be _somebody's_ fault,"