THE MOBIUS TRIP

Garner, a specialist in puzzles of the huh?/who?/which?/whazzat? variety (A Big Enough Wreath) now wastes his modicum of cool class on an absurdly choreographed scheme aimed at David Bailey, technical director of Roxborough Systems of London and creator of ""TTS."" Total Tuned Security, that is, involving not only voiceprints but also a sort of smell-o-vision to provide maximum protection for clients' vaults and valuables. The labyrinth gets under way when someone calling himself ""Worthington"" poses (brilliantly, of course) as a representative of the Prime Minister, demanding that Roxborough aid the nation by providing, no explanations asked, a TTS-type security blueprint. Could this demand have something to do with the fact that David's estranged wife Lena has just been found drowned dead in a Paris pond? Or that a Mafioso (a former Roxborough client) is then murdered while carrying a picture of Lena? Feel a headache coming on? David is certainly kept busy answering questions in Paris while his Roxborough colleagues allow ""Worthington"" to get hold of TTS. And ""Worthington"" even arranges for David to lose the chance of a new job in the States. As David's new girlfriend says, ""they must know everything, what you're doing, practically what you're thinking!"" All too true. Anyway, the denouement involves the richest (maybe) man in the world, twins, and a trust fund--none of which really explains why all those schemey contortions have been allowed to obliterate some decent characterizations and a few nifties of purely technical interest.