CRONUS OF THE D. F. C.

BY LLOYD BIGGLE, JR.

She was wonderful and Forsdon was in love. But he'd seen the future and knew that in five days she was slated for murder!

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Worlds of If Science Fiction, February 1957. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

A bright, sunny day in May, and a new job for me. I found the room in the basement of police headquarters—a big room, with freshly stenciled letters D F C on the door, and an unholy conglomeration of tubes, wires and dials bulking large in one corner.

A bright young police cadet sat at a desk in the center of the room. "Are you Mr. Forsdon?"

I nodded, and dumped my bag beside the desk.

"Captain Marks is waiting for you," he said and jerked his head toward a door to the rear.

Captain Marks had his office in a cubbyhole off the main room. It was quite a comedown from the quarters he'd occupied upstairs as captain of detectives. He'd held onto that job past his retirement age and, when they were about to throw him out on his ear, D. F. C. came along and he jumped at it. The Captain was not the retiring type.

His door was open, and he waved me in. "Sit down, Forsdon," he said. "Welcome to the Department of Future Crime."

I sat down, and he looked me over. A lean, hard face, closely cropped white hair, and steely grey eyes that looked through a man, rather than at him. Small—five feet seven, a hundred and forty pounds. You looked at him and wondered how he'd ever gotten on the force in the first place, until you saw his eyes. I'd never felt comfortable in his presence.

"Do you know what we have here, Forsdon?" he said.

"Not exactly."

"I don't either—exactly. The brass upstairs thinks it's an expensive toy. It is. But they've given us a trial budget to see if it works, and now it's up to us."

I nodded, and waited for him to go on. He packed his pipe, lit it, and then leaned back and let the smoke go out.

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