Well, holy cow, Slothrop reckons, that must be me, huh. Barring the outside possibility of Tough Shit.

Listed as a “Schwarzknabe” liability is the unpaid remainder of a bill to Harvard University, about $5000 worth including the interest, “as per agreement (oral) with Schwarzvater.”

“Schwarzvater” is the code word for “B.S.” Which, barring the outside possibility of Bull Shit, seems to be Slothrop’s own father, Broderick. Blackfather Slothrop.

Nice way to find out your father made a deal 20 years ago with somebody to spring for your education. Come to think of it, Slothrop never could quite put the announcements, all through the Depression, of imminent family ruin, together with the comfort he enjoyed at Harvard. Well, now, what was the deal between his father and Bland? I’ve been sold, Jesus Christ I’ve been sold to IG Farben like a side of beef. Surveillance? Stinnes, like every industrial emperor, had his own company spy system. So did the IG. Does this mean Slothrop has been under their observation—m-maybe since he was born? Yaahhh…

The fear balloons again inside his brain. It will not be kept down with a simple Fuck You… . A smell, a forbidden room, at the bottom edge of his memory. He can’t see it, can’t make it out. Doesn’t want to. It is allied with the Worst Thing.

He knows what the smell has to be: though according to these papers it would have been too early for it, though he has never come across any of the stuff among the daytime coordinates of his life, still, down here, back here in the warm dark, among early shapes where the clocks and calendars don’t mean too much, he knows that what’s haunting him now will prove to be the smell of Imipolex G.

Then there’s this recent dream he is afraid of having again. He was in his old room, back home. A summer afternoon of lilacs and bees, and warm air through an open window. Slothrop had found a very old dictionary of technical German. It fell open to a certain page prickling with black-face type. Reading down the page, he would come to JAMF. The definition would read: I. He woke begging It no—but even after waking, he was sure, he would remain sure, that It could visit him again, any time It wanted. Perhaps you know that dream too. Perhaps It has warned you never to speak Its name. If so, you know about how Slothrop’ll be feeling now.

What he does is lurch to his feet, over to the door of the freight car, which is going up a grade. He drags open the door, slips out—action, action—and mounts a ladder to the roof. A foot from his face, this double row of shiny bright teeth hangs in the air. Just what he needs. It is Major Marvy of U.S. Army Ordnance, leader of Marvy’s Mothers, the meanest-ass technical intelligence team in this whole fuckin’ Zone, mister. Slothrop can call him Duane, if he wants. “Boogie, boogie, boogie! Catch all ’em jungle bunnies back ’ere in ’at next car! Sheee-oo!”