*  *  *  *  *

Burgess Whitcomb did not believe the preposterous theory that was directing all the covert activity for a second.  Two dipsy lawyers had reported to Acquisitions at the Defense Department that a reputed genius inventor/medical doctor had developed a computer that could be implanted into a human brain; that this human-computer could be used as a secret government weapon. 

As if that were not enough rubbish, the lawyers also claimed the computer gave the implantee incredible strength and recuperative powers. 

Burgess Whitcomb knew it was all a crock of mule manure, and he was extremely irritated that he had been assigned to oversee the investigation in California.  He would be surprised if they even found some poor mutilated dead person with his cranium opened and some device inserted inside.  Burgess was forced to take the allegations seriously though, even if he found them wacky.  This was a top secret, Black Investigation. 

Burgess Whitcomb had methodically began the investigation with the career of Ferd Steinbrenner, M.D., Ph.d., biochemist, computer whiz; the creator of numerous surgical and technical inventions currently in use today.  In the past, Dr. Steinbrenner had supervised the most delicate brain surgeries, as he had been head of neurological surgery at the University of Chicago. 

Dr. Steinbrenner had been awarded medical research grants by the National Institute of Health in Maryland.  There was no doubt that the doctor, several times over, was a genius, but Burgess thought that maybe the old guy had gone bats and was raving in his old age about his ability to computerize a person.  Still, one had to be impressed with Dr. Steinbrenner's past accomplishments. 

Whitcomb was an old military man with a large barrel chest and the precise military bearing that went with the gray brush- cut hair and the large, red veined nose of a heavy whisky drinker.  Whitcomb's hooded eyes, whose color remained a mystery because of heavy upper lids, which turned the eyes into permanent slits, were formidable.  Even Willard Modert, his able administrator, who now was tapping on Whitcomb's office door, was leery of the man.

"What?"  Whitcomb barked at the small, nearly bald man who was nervously fidgeting like an anxious schoolboy in need of a potty break.

"Ivar Cousin called,"  Willard Modert said.  "A tall skinny blond went into the tanning salon and didn't come out.  The doctor put a 'Closed' sign in his window.  She's been there for hours."

"Tell Cousin and Stoner to follow her when she leaves.  Then post another surveillance team."

Modert nodded and left.

In one way Burgess felt himself fortunate because if there was anything to the allegations, the government was not stinting.  He had free rein in the amount of personnel he wished to use.  First, of course, there had been the men assigned to Dr. Steinbrenner.  The problem was, Dr. Steinbrenner seemed to have become a recluse, not leaving his apartment for days on end.  Then there was the surprising development that the doctor had opened a tanning salon.  At first Burgess thought that surveillance would be a problem, but there seemed to be little doing in the tanning business.  The doctor tanned only a couple of people a day.  People came out of the salon tinted golden brown, and the doctor had filled out all the necessary city forms to open the business.  There was nothing illegal. 

One of the investigators, Ivar Cousin, had gone into the tanning salon yesterday morning and exited a spectacular bronze color.  He had managed to photograph the appointment book.

Of course, there was also surveillance on the two lawyers.  Background data collected to see if they were the ones mentally disordered, but they seemed to be upstanding citizens.  There was no aberrant behavior that the investigators could find.  The two womanized a lot, but did not seem too kinky, except that they traded back and forth.

The only recourse was to keep the old doc under surveillance.  The two lawyers later claimed that the human computer had died.  If there had been an experiment that had failed, there should be a body. 

The other possibility, preposterous as it seemed, was that there now was a person with a computer in his brain.  No one screened in the investigation had had evidence of brain surgery.  One would expect bandages or maybe a wig to cover the evidence. 

Burgess Whitcomb had even gone so far as to ask Hollywood agents, providing people with special high intelligence in the Los Angeles area for T.V.  game shows, to contact him if they found an exceptional genius.  He thought it was impossible that such a scheme would come up with anything, but Burgess was a genius himself.  At covering his ass.  No one would ever say he hadn't capped all the bases.  And no one could have risen so high in the government from the military who was not constantly addicted to watching his behind.