Burris sighed. "The man is a janitor, Kenneth," he said. "Do you know what a janitor is?"
Burris shrugged. "A janitor doesn't work in the office with the men," he said. "He can drink out of a faucet in the broom closet--or wherever the faucets might be. Nobody would notice. Nobody would think it odd."
Malone said: "But--" and stopped and thought it over. "All right," he went on at last. "But I still insist--"
"Now, Kenneth," Burris said in a voice that dripped oil. "I'll admit that psionics is new and wonderful and you've done a lot of fine work with it. A lot of very fine work indeed. But you can't go around blaming everything on psionics no matter what it is or how much sense it makes."
"But you do," Burris said. "Lately, you've been acting as though magic were loose in the world. As though nothing were dependable any more."
"But it is," Burris told him, "when you use it as an explanation for anything and everything." He paused, "Kenneth," he said in a more kindly tone, "don't think I blame you. I know how hard you've been working. I know how much time and effort you've put into the gallant fight against this country's enemies."
Malone closed his eyes and turned slightly green. "It was nothing," he said at last. He opened his eyes but nothing had changed. Burris' expression was still kindly and concerned.
"Oh, but it was," Burris said. "Something, I mean. You've been working very hard and you're just not at peak efficiency any more. You need a rest, Kenneth. A nice rest."
"A lovely rest," Burris went on, oblivious. "Somewhere peaceful and quiet, where you can just sit around and think peacefully about peaceful things. Oh, it ought to be wonderful for you, Kenneth. A nice, peaceful, lovely, wonderful vacation."
Through the haze of adjectives, Malone remembered dimly the last time Burris had offered him a vacation in that tone of voice. It had turned out to be one of the toughest cases he'd ever had: the case of the teleporting delinquents.
"Nice?" Malone said. "Peaceful? Lovely? Wonderful? I can see it now."
"What am I going to get?" Malone said. "A nice easy job like arresting all the suspected nose-pickers in Mobile, Alabama?"
Burris choked and recovered quickly. "No," he said. "No, no, no. I mean it. You've earned a vacation, Kenneth, a real vacation. A nice, peaceful--"