There was a brisk knock on the bedroom door. I walked over and opened it, to see F.B.I. Special Agent A. J. Harcourt. He gave me a reproachful glance and pushed his way into the room.
"I can only stop a minute, Mr. Tompkins," he said, "but I have orders from the Director to call on you in person and present the apologies of the Bureau for having inconvenienced you. If you had only told us you were connected with Z-2 there would have been no trouble."
"Sit down, Harcourt," I urged him. Then I crossed to the bathroom door. "Don't come out until you're decent, dear," I called to Germaine. "The F.B.I. is here."
Some muffled instructions answered, so I went around the room and picked up the various scattered wisps of silk and rayon, and thrust them through to my wife.
"That's all I was to say, Mr. Tompkins," Harcourt repeated, still standing, "that the Bureau is mighty sorry about the whole business."
"Sit down!" I told him again. "Now get this Z-2 thing straight. There isn't any Z-2. I just invented it, trying to get myself out of this jam. I never was a Z-2 agent. What I told these people was all moonshine."
Harcourt nodded. "We know, of course, that you're not allowed to admit you're in Z-2 to anybody but the top guys, but we know that Z-2 does exist. If it didn't how could the President abolish it?"
"How's that again?" I asked, sinking into the one easy chair.
"Yeah, special confidential Executive Order No. 1734, signed today, abolishing Z-2 and transferring its duties to the War Department. There was something else, too, about giving you the Order of Merit for _quote_ special services which contributed usefully to the conduct of the war. _Unquote._"
"Listen here, Harcourt," I insisted. "I can't help it if the President pulled a boner. I _told_ him there wasn't any such thing as Z-2 and all he said was that I ought to take a good long rest. I simply got so damned tired of trying to prove that I couldn't remember what Winnie Tompkins had been doing before April 2, that I invented my own alibi--Z-2."
"Cross my heart and hope to die," I assured him.
For the first time since he had delivered his wooden official apology, the Special Agent relaxed. "That's one for the book," he said with deep feeling. "Mrs. Harcourt's little boy isn't going to let it go any farther. So far, only the President of the United States, the Army, the Navy, O.S.S. and the F.B.I. believe you were in Z-2. I'm not sticking my neck out to tell them it's all a lot of malarkey. That leaves only the State Department and the Secret Service. How come you've skipped them? You must be slipping, Mr. Tompkins."