condensed master

Will Bonner
going to bed Will secreted the tape dubber in one of his equipment boxes. It was
in the lap of the gods what would happen on the following day.
He got away from the depot early and set about his work without delay,
determined to be at the house in Toorak during the early afternoon. Mrs. Byer let
him in.
"Thank you for passing my name to your friend Margaret, she'll be calling
soon. I still haven't finalized the catering yet for Monday evening, but from the
conversation I had with her on the phone I think she'll be just the person to sort the
problem out for me."
Will swallowed hard, Margaret had wasted no time. "I'm sure she can, they've
been catering for government functions for a long time now."
He increased his pace as he headed for the study and setting up the Hi-Fi
amplifier once again filled the rooms with music, then cramming himself into the
projection room he flipped the latch and commenced to copy the tapes. Their
journey through the record heads seemed to take forever, but it was only minutes
before it was all over. After a quick check to see that the copy had been
successful, he put the tapes back into the drawer and returned to the study.
At least now he could partially relax, spending the time waiting for Margaret,
checking out the best place to record the commentary on Monday night. The
monitoring circuit in the projection room was an ideal point to tap in the miniature
wire recorder. His hands trembled at the thought of the classified copies of the
tapes on the dubbing machine making his efforts clumsy and amateur. To the
uninitiated it was just another recorder, but that explanation gave him little
consolation.
Margaret suddenly appeared with Mrs. Byer. She was carrying a small
briefcase and dressed to kill, the quintessence of an efficient business woman. "I'll
see that everyone is here two hours before the gathering to set up, leave it up to
me. All our staff are vetted and reliable."
Mrs. Byer nodded her head in agreement. "I'll leave you with Mr. Brenner,
you'll probably want a word with him before you go."
"Thank you, yes. I'll call in and see you before I leave."
As Mrs. Byer disappeared into the living-room Will looked across at
Margaret. Her composure had noticeably slipped, and a terrified look came over
her face. Grabbing her by the arm, he led her into the projection room and took
294