y from the dangerous subject, and for a moment his
mental processes refused to focus on anything at all.

The girl put the files down on his desk.

"Thanks, Helen. Now, let's see ..." _I'll work on this_, he thought. _I
won't even think about the other at all._

_[9]_

Colonel Walther Mannheim tapped with one thick finger the map that
glowed on the wall before him. "That's his nest," he said firmly. "Right
there, where those tunnels come together."

Bart Stanton looked at the map of Manhattan Island and at the gleaming
colored traceries that threaded their various ways across it. "Just what
was the purpose of all those tunnels?" he asked.

"The majority of them were for rail transportation," said the colonel.
"The island was hit by a sun bomb during the Holocaust and was almost
completely leveled and slagged down. When the city was completely
rebuilt afterwards, there was naturally no need for such things, so they
were simply all sealed off and forgotten."

"He's hiding directly under Government City," Stanton said.
"Incredible."

"It used to be one of the largest seaports in the world," Colonel
Mannheim said, "and it very probably still would be if the inertia drive
hadn't made air travel cheaper and easier than seagoing."

"How did he find out about those tunnels?" Stanton asked.

The colonel pointed at the north end of the island. "After the
Holocaust, the first returnees to the island were wild animals which
crossed over from the mainland to the north. The Harlem River isn't very
wide at this point, as you can see. There was a bridge right at about
this point here--the very tip of the island. It had collapsed into the
water, but there was enough of it to allow animals to cross. Because of
the rocky hills at this end of the island, there were places which were
spared the direct effects of the bomb, and grasses and trees began
growing there. That's why it was decided that section should be left as
a game preserve when the Government built the capital on the southern
part of the island." His finger moved down the map. "The upper three
miles of the island, down to here, where it begins to widen, are all
game preserve. There's a high wall at this point which separates it from
the city, which keeps the animals penned in, and the ruins of the
bridges which connected with the mainland have been removed, so animals
can't get across any more.

"Two years after he arrived, the Nipe was almost caught. He ha