Pst! This is top secret. Don't let it get around, but we've got the Russians right where we want them. They haven't got a secret left to their name. We know every detail. You see, the Russians were pretty sure their inner circle was leakproof, that no one could penetrate their vaults. But they reckoned without—

THE MAN WHO KNEW EVERYTHING

By RANDALL GARRETT

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Fantastic October 1956. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

He was sure of only one thing—he had a headache.

Dr. H. Wolstadt sat in a small, very secret laboratory in Arlington, Virginia, and twisted the dials on an oscilloscope. A pale green line wriggled up and down on the screen, and Dr. Wolstadt watched it with anticipation.

"If this works," he muttered softly, more to himself than to his assistant, "we will have a communication beam that will be better than radio."

The green line wriggled and changed form. Slowly, as the physicist manipulated the controls, the green line stopped moving.

"There!" shouted Wolstadt, "that is the wave form we want!" He reached over toward a switch. "Check your meters, Magruder!"

The assistant carefully adjusted the recording instruments of the huge machine that filled half the laboratory. "All right, Dr. Wolstadt, we're ready."

"Good!" Wolstadt pressed the switch.

The assistant watched the meters and automatic graphs.

"I'm afraid it didn't work, sir," he said at last. "The instruments aren't reacting as you expected."

Wolstadt shrugged resignedly. "Nevertheless, I think we are on the right track. Come, my boy, we will try again."

He shut off the machine.

The machine hadn't done what the scientists had expected of it, but it had another effect which was entirely unknown to them. During the few seconds of operation, an invisible ray had been beamed out of the machine. At the speed of light, the ray went through the wall of the lab and into Dr. Wolstadt's study. Like an X-ray, it went through the books and references on the physicist's desk. In a straight line, it shot out of the laboratory, silent and invisible. A mile or so farther on, it struck the Pentagon Building and went through. Among other things, it went through a complete copy of the Encyclopedia Brittannica, Roget's Thesaurus, the Oxford Unabridged Dictionary, a twenty volume set of The History and Analysis of Military Tactics, and a copy of Amazing Stories that some general had left on his desk.

Like a flashlight going through plateglass, the beam went through files, papers, memorandums, abstracts, reports, desks, chairs, brick, stone, and concrete. Through the Pentagon and across the Potomac it went, through building after building, unnoticed and invisible.

Then, on the far side of Washington, D.C., several miles from the laboratory of Dr. Wolstadt, it struck the head of a human being.

Philip Merriwether was a nobody. He made thirty-five dollars a week at a very dull job and lived in a cheap rooming house that had been built around 1880 and not remodeled since. He was still wearing a suit he had bought in 1947, and on his thin, five-foot-four frame, it looked even older. His education had stopped at the sixth grade, and he had almost flunked out of that. He had a mousy face, stringy hair, and a dull look in his eyes.

In other words, he was just about as nobody as a human being can get without being an absolute bum.

It wasn't that Phil Merriwether was really stupid; he was simply afflicted with an incredibly bad memory. He could forget more in five minutes than he could learn in five years. Oh, he could remember commonplace things easily enough—his name, where he lived, things like that. He could read and write tolerably well, although his spelling was intolerable. He could add and subtract with fair ease, but, having forgotten most of the multiplication table, he found "higher mathematics," such as long division, almost impossible to do without hours of laborious thinking.

In a way, his poor memory was economically useful. Phil loved to read mystery stories, and, having collected a total of fifty-seven paperback editions of the better detective novels, he found that there was no necessity of buying more, because he could re-read the old ones. By the time he got around to them again, he had forgotten the plot and the identity of the murderer. Naturally, he never tried to solve any of them; he could never remember the clues.

In routine work, Phil Merriwether was fairly efficient. If he did something every day, he could remember it overnight, and could do it again the next day. But his superiors soon found out that it was almost disastrous to give him a vacation, because he had a tendency to forget what he was supposed to do when he came back to work. That is, if he remembered to show up for work.

In spite of all that, Phil was a nice sort of fellow. He was likable, in a dull sort of way, and got along with most of his fellow workers. He couldn't tell funny stories, of course, nor play a decent game of cards, but he was an excellent conversationalist because, no matter what was said to him, he could never think of an argument against it. He was a good listener because he hadn't anything to say.

But his favorite pastime was walking. He liked to stroll around the nation's capital, taking in the sights, and just plain enjoying himself. He always walked the same route every night; if he didn't, he was likely to get lost. Once, several years earlier, he had taken a wrong turn and ended up in unfamiliar territory. He had asked a passer-by how to reach his address, but had forgotten the instructions, and so had ended up hopelessly lost. He had finally been forced to take a taxi home, a luxury he could ill afford. After that, he stuck to his routine.

It was on one of these evening strolls that a very peculiar thing happened to Philip Merriwether. He was walking slowly along the sidewalk, carefully minding his own business, when, without warning, there was a strange, buzzy feeling in his head. It grew stronger; it felt like someone was playing a fire-hose on his brain. His skull felt as though it were suddenly being filled with a vast, overpowering torrent of words—hundreds of words; thousands of words; millions upon millions of words!

Under the pressure of this verbal onslaught, Philip Merriwether's mind reeled. He pressed his palms to his temples and fainted dead away.

When he came to, there were several passers-by crowded around him. One of them was kneeling by his side, taking his pulse.

"Ha—Wha—what happened?" he asked, unoriginally enough.

"You fainted," said the man who was taking his pulse. "Just lie still; it's all right. I'm a physician."