"Sure," said Stevenson. "That's why he had it with him in the bank that day." "Maybe," said Marshall. "I just don't know. You know, I don't really believe there is a machine." "Of course there is," said Stevenson. "We've seen what it can do." "Oh, I'm not denying the boy caused those things. But I just have the completely insane conviction that there isn't any machine." Marshall shrugged. "Ah, well, never mind. Let's go back and soothe the mother." They soothed her, which took some doing, not because she was at all worried, but because she was so curious she could hardly sit still. But Marshall, by looking very stern and official, and by speaking in round long-syllabled sentences, finally convinced her that the welfare of the nation was absolutely dependent upon her not mentioning anything at all about this visit to Eddie, under any circumstances. "We'll be back to talk to the boy in a day or two," Marshall told her. "In the meantime, we'd prefer him not to be forewarned." "If you say so," she said, frowning. The school principal, a gray battleship named Miss Evita Dexter, was irate. The idea that pornographic materials were being sold in her schoolyard was absurd. It was ridiculous. It was unheard-of. Stevenson assured her that, adjectives notwithstanding, it was happening. And they were going to have a shakedown of the student body whether Miss Dexter liked it or not. Detective-Sergeant Stevenson and his associates, Marshall and Lang, were going to go through the student body with a fine tooth comb. Neither Marshall nor Lang had mentioned the fact that they were from the FBI. The search began at nine forty-five in the morning, and ended at ten past twelve. On the persons of three eighth-grade boys, they found pornographic photos. On the person of Eddie Clayhorn, they found absolutely nothing.... Abner Streitman Long was a government expert. He was more or less a government expert in the ready reserve, since he had never once been called upon to use his expertise for the government. Not until now.
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