Sub-Director Vance-Krebs hit the wet curb outside the North Gate first.
His patent leather shoes slipped on the damp granite, and he caught himself against the crippled van’s crumpled fender. Black crankcase oil and red notary ink streaked his tailored charcoal overcoat. Behind him, two Notary Press-Guards tumbled out of the side cargo doors, their heavy oilskin coats rustling in the dark.
Neither guard reached for a service revolver or a wooden nightstick.
Instead, each man hoisted a three-foot steel wand connected by braided rubber hoses to a heavy brass pressure tank slung across his back. At the tip of each wand sat a rectangular brass stamping head, glowing cherry-red in the river fog.
“Hold the line!” Vance-Krebs snarled, his voice cracking like dry timber.
“Don’t let them touch the curb!”
A rush of dry, scorched heat washed through the wrought-iron pickets of the North Gate. It smelled of sulfur, burning linseed oil, and boiled pigskin.
Julian Vance stood on the campus side of the 1964 turnstile, his gloved fingers resting lightly on the cold iron rail. Behind him, the quadrangle path lay still under the dim campus lanterns. In his right ear, the steady 4,200 Hz tone dropped four full beats into the thick, greasy hum of 4,196 Hz, leaving the taste of copper filings beneath his tongue.
