Friday

Robert A. Heinlein

I

As I left the Kenya Beanstalk capsule he was right on my heels. He followed me through the door leading to Customs, Health, and Immigration. As the door contracted behind him I killed him.

            I have never liked riding the Beanstalk. My distaste was fullblown even before the disaster to the Quito Skyhook. A cable that goes up into the sky with nothing to hold it up smells too much of magic. But the only other way to reach Ell-Five takes too long and costs too much; my orders and expense account did not cover it.

            So I had been edgy even before I left the shuttle from Ell-Five at Stationary Station to board the Beanstalk capsule . . . but, damn it, being edgy isn't reason to kill a man. I had intended only to put him out for a few hours.

            The subconscious has its own logic. I grabbed him before he hit the deck and dragged him quickly toward a rank of bonded bombproof lockers, hurrying to avoid staining the floor-shoved his thumb against the latch, pushed him inside as I grabbed his pouch, found his Diners Club card, slid it into the slot, salvaged his IDs and cash, and chucked the pouch in with the cadaver as the armor slid down and clanged home. I turned away.

            A Public Eye was floating above and beyond me.

            No reason to jump out of my boots. Nine times out often an Eye is cruising at random, unmonitored, and its twelve-hour loop may or may not he scanned by a human before it is scrubbed. The tenth

time- A peace officer may be monitoring it closely . . or she may be scratching herself and thinking about what she did last night.

            So I ignored it and kept on toward the exit end of the corridor. That pesky Eye should have followed me as I was the only mass in that passageway radiating at thirty-seven degrees. But it tarried, three seconds at least, scanning that locker, before again fastening on me.

            I was estimating which of three possible courses of action was safest when that maverick piece of my brain took over and my hands executed a fourth: My pocket pen became a laser beam and "killed" that Public Eye-killed it dead as I held the beam at full power until the Eye dropped to the deck, not only blinded but with antigrav shorted out. And its memory scrubbed-I hoped.

            I used my shadow's credit card again, working the locker's latch with my pen to avoid disturbing his thumbprint. It took a heavy shove with my boot to force the Eye into that crowded locker. Then I hurried; it was time to be someone else. Like most ports of entry Beanstalk Kenya has travelers' amenities on both sides of the barrier. Instead of going through inspection I found the washrooms and paid cash to use a bath-dressing room.

            Twenty-seven minutes later I not only had had a bath but also had acquired different hair, different clothes, another face-what takes three hours to put on will come off in fifteen minutes of soap and hot water. I was not eager to show my real face but I had to get rid of the persona I had used on this mission. What part of it had not washed down the drain now went into the shredder: jump suit, boots, pouch, fingerprints, contact lenses, passport. The passport I now carried used my right name-well, one of my names-a stereograph of my bare face, and had a very sincere Eli-Five transient stamp in it.

            Before shredding the personal items I had taken off the corpse, I looked through them-and paused.

            His credit cards and IDs showed four identities.

            Where were his other three passports?

            Probably somewhere on the dead meat in that locker. I had not given it a proper search-no time!-I had simply grabbed what he carried in his pouch.

            Go back and look? If I kept trotting back and opening a locker full of still-warm corpse, someone was bound to notice. By taking his cards and passport I had hoped to postpone identifying the body and thereby give myself more time to get clear but-wait a moment. Mmm, yes, passport and Diners Club card were both for "Adolf Belsen." American Express extended credit to "Albert Beaumont" and the Bank of Hong Kong took care of "Arthur Bookman" while MasterCard provided for "Archibald Buchanan."

            I "reconstructed" the crime: Beaumont-Bookman-Buchanan had just thumbed the latch of the locker when Belsen sapped him from behind, shoved him into the locker, used his own Diners Club card to lock it, and left hastily.

            Yes, an excellent theory . . . and now to muddy the water still more.

            Those IDs and credit cards went back of my own in my wallet; "Belsen's" passport I concealed about my person. I could not stand a skin search but there are ways to avoid a skin search including (but not limited to) bribery, influence, corruption, misdirection, and razzle-dazzle.

            As I came out of the washroom, passengers from the next capsule were trickling in and queuing up at Customs, Health, and Immigration; I joined a queue. The CHI officer remarked on how very light my jumpbag was and asked about the state of the up-high black market. I gave him my best stupid look, the one on my passport picture. About then he found the correct amount of squeeze tucked into my passport and dropped the matter.

            I asked him for the best hotel and the best restaurant. He said that he wasn't supposed to make recommendations but that he thought well of the Nairobi Hilton. As for food, if I could afford it, the Fat Man, across from the Hilton, had the best food in Africa. He hoped that I would enjoy my stay in Kenya.

            I thanked him. A few minutes later I was down the mountain and in the city, and regretting it. Kenya Station is over five kilometers high; the air is always thin and cold. Nairobi is higher than Denver, nearly as high as Ciudad de Mexico, but it is only a fraction of the height of Mount Kenya and it is just a loud shout from the equator.

            The air felt thick and too warm to breathe; almost at once my clothes were soggy with sweat; I could feel my feet starting to swell- and besides they ached from full gee. I don't like off-Earth assignments but getting back from one is worse.

            I called on mind-control training to help me not notice my discomfort. Garbage. If my mind-control master had spent less time squatting in lotus and more time in Kenya, his instruction might have been more useful. I forgot it and concentrated on the problem: how to get out of this sauna bath quickly.

            The lobby of the Hilton was pleasantly cool. Best of all, it held a fully automated travel bureau. I went in, found an empty booth, sat down in front of the terminal. At once the attendant showed up. "May I help you?"

            I told her I thought I could manage; the keyboard looked familiar. (It was an ordinary Kensington 400.)

            She persisted: "I'd be glad to punch it for you. I don't have anyone waiting." She looked about sixteen, a sweet face, a pleasant voice, and a manner that convinced me that she really did take pleasure in being helpful.

            What I wanted least was someone helping me while I did things with credit cards that weren't mine. So I slipped her a medium-size tip while telling her that I really did prefer to punch it myself-but I would shout if I got into difficulties.

            She protested that I did not have to tip her-but she did not insist on giving it back, and went away.

            "Adolf Belsen" took the tube to Cairo, then semiballistic to Hong Kong, where he had reserved a room at the Peninsula, all courtesy of Diners Club.

            "Albert Beaumont" was on vacation. He took Safari Jets to Timbuktu, where American Express had placed him for two weeks at the luxury Shangri-La on the shore of the Sahara Sea.

            The Bank of Hong Kong paid "Arthur Bookman's" way to Buenos Aires.

            "Archibald Buchanan" visited his native Edinburgh, travel prepaid by MasterCard. Since he could do it all by tube, with one transfer at Cairo and automated switching at Copenhagen, he should be at his ancestral home in two hours.

            I then used the travel computer to make a number of inquiries- but no reservations, no purchases, and temporary memory only.

            Satisfied, I left the booth, asked the dimpled attendant whether or not the subway entrance I saw in the lobby would let me reach the Fat Man restaurant.

            She told me what turns to make. So I went down into the subway-and caught the tube for Mombasa, again paying cash.

            Mombasa is only thirty minutes, 450 kilometers, from Nairobi, but it is at sea level, which makes Nairobi's climate seem heavenly; I got out as quickly as I could arrange it. So, twenty-seven hours later I was in the Illinois Province of the Chicago Imperium. A long time, you might say, for a great-circle arc of only thirteen thousand kilometers. But I didn't travel great circle and did not go through a customs barrier or an immigration checkpoint. Nor did I use a credit card, even a borrowed one. And I managed to grab seven hours of sleep in Alaska Free State; I hadn't had any sound sleep since leaving Ell-Five space city two days earlier.

            How? Trade secret. I may never need that route again but someone in my line of work will need it. Besides, as my boss says, with all governments everywhere tightening down on everything wherever they can, with their computers and their Public Eyes and ninetynine other sorts of electronic surveillance, there is a moral obligation on each free person to fight back wherever possible-keep underground railways open, keep shades drawn, give misinformation to computers. Computers are literal-minded and stupid; electronic records aren't really records . . . so it is good to be alert to opportunities to foul up the system. If you can't evade a tax, pay a little too much to confuse their computers. Transpose digits. And so on. .

            The key to traveling half around a planet without leaving tracks is:

Pay cash. Never credit, never anything that goes into a computer. And a bribe is never a bribe; any such transfer of valuta must save face for the recipient. No matter how lavishly overpaid, civil servants everywhere are convinced that they are horribly underpaid- but all public employees have larceny in their hearts or they wouldn't be feeding at the public trough. These two facts are all you need-but be careful!-a public employee, having no self-respect, needs and demands a show of public respect.

            I always pander to this need and the trip had been without incident. (I didn't count the fact that the Nairobi Hilton blew up and

burned a few minutes after I took the tube for Mombasa; it would have seemed downright paranoid to think that it had anything to do with me.)

            I did get rid of four credit cards and a passport just after I heard about it but I had intended to take that precaution anyhow. If the opposition wanted to cancel me-possible but unlikely-it would be swatting a fly with an ax to destroy a multimillion-crown property and kill or injure hundreds or thousands of others just to get me. Unprofessional.

            As may be. Here I was at last in the Imperium, another mission completed with only minor bobbles. I exited at Lincoln Meadows while musing that I had garnered enough brownie points to wheedle the boss out of a few weeks R&R in New Zealand. My family, a seven S-group, was in Christchurch; I had not seen them in months. High time!

            But in the meantime I relished the cool clean air and the rustic beauty of Illinois-it was not South Island but it was the next best thing. They say these meadows used to be covered with dingy factories-it seems hard to believe. Today the only building in sight from the station was the Avis livery stable across the street.

            At the hitching rail outside the station were two Avis RentaRigs as well as the usual buggies and farm wagons. I was about to pick one of the Avis nags when I recognized a rig just pulling in: a beautiful matched pair of bays hitched to a Lockheed landau. "Uncle Jim! Over here! It's me!"

            The coachman touched his whip to the brim of his top hat, then brought his team to a halt so that the landau was at the steps where I waited. He climbed down and took off his hat. "It's good to have you home, Miss Friday."

            I gave him a quick hug, which he endured patiently. Uncle Jim Prufit harbored strong notions of propriety. They say he was convicted of advocating papism-some said that he was actually caught bare-handed, celebrating mass. Others said nonsense, he was infiltrating for the company and took a fall to protect others. Me, I don't know that much about politics, but I suppose a priest would have formal manners, whether he was a real one or a member of our trade. I could be wrong; I don't think I've ever seen a priest.

            As he handed me in, making me feel like a "lady," I asked, "How did you happen to be here?"

            "The Master sent me to meet you, miss."

            "He did? But I didn't let him know when I would arrive." I tried to think who, on my back track, could have been part of Boss's data net. "Sometimes I think the boss has a crystal ball."

            "It do seem like it, don't it?" Jim clucked to Gog and Magog and we headed for the farm. I settled back and relaxed, listening to the homey, cheerful clomp clomp! of horses' hooves on dirt.

            I woke up as Jim turned into our gate and was wide awake by the time he pulled under the porte-cochère. I jumped down without waiting to be a "lady" and turned to thank Jim.

            They hit me from both sides.

            Dear old Uncle Jim did not warn me. He simply watched while they took me.

II

My own stupid fault! I was taught in basic that no place is ever totally safe and that any place you habitually return to is your top danger spot, the place most likely for booby trap, ambush, stakeout.

            But apparently I had learned this only as parrot rote; as an old pro I had ignored it. So it bit me.

            This rule is analogous to the fact that the person most likely to murder you is some member of your own family-and that grim statistic is ignored too; it has to be. Live in fear of your own family? Better to be dead!

            My worst stupidity was to ignore a loud, clear, specific warning, not just a general principle. How had dear old "Uncle" Jim managed to meet my capsule?-on the right day and almost to the minute. Crystal ball? Boss is smarter than the rest of us but he does not use magic. I may be wrong but I'm positive. If Boss had supernatural powers he would not need the rest of us.

            I had not reported my movements to Boss; I didn't even tell him when I left Eli-Five. This is doctrine; he does not encourage us to check in every time we move, as he knows that a leak can be fatal.

            Even I didn't know that I was going to take that particular capsule until I took it. I had ordered breakfast in Hotel Seward's coffee shop, stood up without eating it, dropped some money on the counter- three minutes later I was sealed into an express capsule. So how?

            Obviously chopping off that tail at Kenya Beanstalk Station had not eliminated all tails on me. Either there had been a backup tail on the spot or Mr. "Belsen" ("Beaumont," "Bookman," "Buchanan") had been missed at once and replaced quickly. Possibly they had been with me all along or perhaps what had happened to "Belsen" had made them cautious about stepping on my heels. Or last night's sleep may have given them time to catch me.

            Which variant was immaterial. Shortly after I climbed into that capsule in Alaska, someone had phoned a message somewhat like this: "Firefly to Dragonfly. Mosquito left here express capsule International Corridor nine minutes ago. Anchorage traffic control shows capsule programmed to sidetrack and open Lincoln Meadows your time eleven-oh-three." Or some such chatter. Some unfriendly had seen me enter that capsule and had phoned ahead; otherwise sweet old Jim would not have been able to meet me. Logic.

Hindsight is wonderful-it shows you how you busted your skull after you've busted it.

            But I made them pay for their drinks. If I had been smart, I would have surrendered once I saw that I was hopelessly outnumbered. But I'm not smart; I've already proved that. Better yet, I would have run like hell when Jim told me the boss had sent him . . instead of climbing in and taking a nap, fer Gossake.

            I recall killing only one of them.

            Possibly two. But why did they insist on doing it the hard way? They could have waited until I was inside and gassed me, or used a sleepy dart, or even a sticky rope. They had to take me alive, that was clear. Didn't they know that a field agent with my training when attacked goes automatically into overdrive? Maybe I'm not the only stupid.

            But why waste time by raping me? This whole operation had amateurish touches. No professional group uses either beating or rape before interrogation today; there is no profit in it; any professional is trained to cope with either or both. For rape she (or he-I hear it's worse for males) can either detach the mind and wait for it to be over, or (advanced training) emulate the ancient Chinese adage.

            Or, in place of method A or B, or combined with B if the agent's histrionic ability is up to it, the victim can treat rape as an opportu

nity to gain an edge over her captors. I'm no great shakes as an actress but I try and, while it has never enabled me to turn the tables on unfriendlies, at least once it kept me alive.

            This time method C did not affect the outcome but did cause a little healthy dissension. Four of them (my estimate from touch and body odors) had me in one of the upstairs bedrooms. It may have been my own room but I could not be certain as I had been unconscious for a while and was now dressed (solely) in adhesive tape over my eyes. They had me on a mattress on the floor, a gang bang with minor sadism. . . which I ignored, being very busy with method C.

            In my mind I called them "Straw Boss" (seemed to be in charge), "Rocks" (they called him that-rocks in his head, probably), "Shorty" (take that either way), and "the other one" as he did not have distinctive characteristics.

            I worked on all of them-method acting, of course-reluctant, have to be forced, then gradually your passion overcomes you; you just can't help yourself. Any man will believe that routine; they are suckers for it-but I worked especially hard on Straw Boss as I hoped to achieve the status of teacher's pet or some such. Straw Boss wasn't so bad; methods B and C combined nicely.

            But I worked hardest on Rocks because with him it had to be C combined with A; his breath was so foul. He wasn't too clean in other ways, too; it took great effort to ignore it and make my responses flattering to his macho ego.

            After he became flaccid he said, "Mac, we're wasting our time. This slut enjoys it."

            "So get out of the way and give the kid another chance. He's ready."

            "Not yet. I'm going to slap her around, make her take us seriously." He let me have a big one, left side of my face. I yelped.

            "Cut that out!" -Straw Boss's voice.

            "Who says so? Mac, you're getting too big for your britches."

            "I say so." It was a new voice, very loud-amplified-from the sound-system speaker in the ceiling, no doubt. "Rocky, Mac is your squad leader, you know that. Mac, send Rocky to me; I want a word with him."

            "Major, I was just trying to help!"

            "You heard the man, Rocks," Straw Boss said quietly. "Grab your pants and get moving."

            Suddenly the man's weight was no longer on me and his stinking breath was no longer in my face. Happiness is relative.

            The voice in the ceiling spoke again: "Mac, is it true that Miss Friday simply enjoys the little ceremony we arranged for her?"

            "It's possible, Major," Straw Boss said slowly. "She does act like it."

            "How about it, Friday? Is this the way you get your kicks?"

            I didn't answer his question. Instead I discussed him and his family in detail, with especial attention to his mother and sister. If I had told him the truth-that Straw Boss would be rather pleasant under other circumstances, that Shorty and the other man did not matter one way or the other, but that Rocks was an utter slob whom I would cancel at the first opportunity-it would have blown method C.

            "The same to you, sweetie," the voice answered cheerfully. "I hate to disappoint you but I'm a crèche baby. Not even a wife, much less a mother or a sister. Mac, put the cuffs on her and throw a blanket over her. But don't give her a shot; I'll be talking to her later."

            Amateur. My boss would never have alerted a prisoner to expect interrogation.

            "Hey, crèche baby!"

            "Yes, dear?"

            I accused him of a vice not requiring a mother or a sister but anatomically possible-so I am told-for some males. The voice answered, "Every night, hon. It's very soothing."

            So mark one up for the Major. I decided that, with training, he could have been a pro. Nevertheless he was a bloody amateur and I didn't respect him. He had wasted one, maybe two, of his ables, caused me unnecessarily to suffer bruises, contusions, and multiple personal indignities-even heartbreaking ones had I been an untrained female-and had wasted two hours or more. If my boss had been doing it, the prisoner would have spilled his/her guts at once and spent those two hours spouting her fullest memoirs into a recorder.

            Straw Boss even took the trouble to police me-led me into the bathroom and waited quietly while I peed, without making a production of it-and that was amateurish, too, as a useful technique, of the cumulative sort, in interrogating an amateur (not a pro) is to force him or her to break toilet training. If she has been protected from the harsher things in life or if he suffers from excessive amourpropre-as most males do-it is at least as effective as pain, and potentiates either with pain or with other humiliations.

            I don't think Mac knew this. I figured him for basically a decent soul despite his taste for-no, aside from his taste for a bit of rape-a taste common to most males according to the kinseys.

            Somebody had put the mattress back on the bed. Mac guided me to it, told me to lie on my back with my arms out. Then he cuffed me to the legs of the bed, using two pairs. They weren't the peaceofficer type, but special ones, velvet-lined-the sort of junk used by idiots for SM games. I wondered who the pervert was? The Major?

            Mac made sure that they were secure but not too tight, then gently spread a blanket over me. I would not have been surprised had he kissed me good-night. But he did not. He left quietly.

            Had he kissed me would method C call for returning it in full? Or turning my face and trying to refuse it? A nice question. Method C is based on I-just-can't-help-myself and requires precise judgment as to when and how much enthusiasm to show. If the rapist suspects the victim of faking, she has lost the ploy.

            I had just decided, somewhat regretfully, that this hypothetical kiss should have been refused, when I fell asleep.

I was not allowed enough sleep. I was exhausted from all the things that had happened to me and had sunk into deep sleep, soggy with it, when I was roused by a slap. Not Mac. Rocks, of course. Not as hard as he had hit me earlier but totally unnecessary. It seemed to me that he blamed me for whatever disciplining he had received from the Major. . . and I promised myself that, when time came to cancel him, I would do it slowly.

            I heard Shorty say, "Mac said not to hit her."

            "I didn't hit her. That was just a love tap to wake her up. Shut up and mind your own business. Stand clear and keep your gun on her. On her, you idiot!-not on me."

            They took me down into the basement and into one of our own interrogation chambers. Shorty and Rocks left-I think that Shorty left and I know that Rocks did; his stink went away-afid an interrogation team took over. I don't know who or how many as not one of them ever said a word. The only voice was the one I thought of as "the Major." It seemed to be coming through a speaker.

            "Good morning, Miss Friday."

            (Morning? It seemed unlikely.) "Howdy, crèche baby!"

            "I'm glad that you are in fine fettle, dear, as this session is likely to prove long and tiring. Even unpleasant. I want to know all about you, love."

            "Fire away. What will you have first?"

            "Tell me about this trip you just made, every tiny detail. And outline this organization you belong to. I might as well tell you that we already know a great deal about it, so if you lie, I will know it. Not even a little white fib, dear-for I will know it and what happens then I will regret but you will regret it far more."

            "Oh, I won't lie to you. Is a recorder running? This will take a long time."

            "A recorder is running."

            "Okay." For three hours I spilled my guts.

            This was according to doctrine. My boss knows that ninety-nine out of a hundred will crack under sufficient pain, that almost that percentage will crack under long interrogation combined with nothing more than raw fatigue, but only Buddha Himself can resist certain drugs. Since he does not expect miracles and hates to waste agents, standard doctrine is: "If they grab you, sing!"

            So he makes sure that a field operative never knows anything critical. A courier never knows what she is carrying. I know nothing about policy. I don't know my boss's name. I'm not sure whether we are a government agency or an arm of one of the multinationals. I do know where the farm is but so do many other people. . . and it is (was) very well defended. Other places I have visited only via closed authorized power vehicles-an APV took me (for example) to a practice area that may be the far end of the farm. Or not.

            "Major, how did you crack this place? It was pretty strongly defended."

            "I ask the questions, bright eyes. Let's have that part again about how you were followed out of the Beanstalk capsule."

            After a long time of this, when I had told all I knew and was repeating myself, the Major stopped me. "Dear, you tell a very convincing story and I don't believe more than every third word. Let's start procedure B."

            Somebody grabbed my left arm and a needle went in. Babble juice! I hoped these frimping amateurs weren't as clumsy with it as they were in some other ways; you can get very dead in a hurry with an overdose. "Major! I had better sit down!"

            "Put her in a chair." Somebody did so.

            For the next thousand years I did my best to tell exactly the same story no matter how bleary I felt. At some point I fell off the chair. They didn't stick me back onto it but stretched me on the cold concrete instead. I went on babbling.

            Some silly time later I was given some other shot. It made my teeth ache and my eyeballs felt hot but it snapped me awake. "Miss Friday!"

            "Yes, sir?"

            "Are you awake now?"

            "I think so."

            "My dear, I think you have been most carefully indoctrinated under hypnosis to tell the same story under drugs that you tell so well without drugs. That's too bad as I must now use another method. Can you stand up?"

            "I think so. I can try."

            "Stand her up. Don't let her fall." Someone-some two-did so. I wasn't steady but they held me. "Start procedure C, item five."

            Someone stomped a heavy boot on my bare toes. I screamed.

            Look, you! If you are ever questioned under pain, do scream. The Iron Man routine just makes them worse and it worse. Take it from one who's been there. Scream your head off and crack as fast as possible.

            I am not going to give details of what happened during the following endless time. If you have any imagination, it would nauseate you, and to tell it makes me want to throw up. I did, several times. I passed out, too, but they kept reviving me and the voice kept on asking questions.

            Apparently the time came when reviving didn't work, for the next thing I knew I was back in bed-the same bed, I suppose-and again handcuffed to it. I hurt all over.

            That voice again, right above my head. "Miss Friday."

            "What the hell do you want?"

            "Nothing. If it's any consolation to you, dear girl, you are the only subject I have ever questioned that I could not get the truth out of, eventually."

            "Go soothe yourself!"

            "Good night, dear."

            The bloody amateur! Every word I had said to him was the naked truth.

III

Someone came in and gave me another hypodermic shot. Presently the pain went away and I slept.

            I think I slept a long time. I either had confused dreams or halfawake periods or both. Some of it had to be dreams-dogs do talk, many of them, but they don't lecture on the rights of living artifacts, do they? Sounds of a ruckus and people running up and down may have been real. But it felt like a nightmare because I tried to get out of bed and discovered that I couldn't lift my head, much less get up and join the fun.

            There came a time when I decided that I really was awake, because cuffs no longer bothered my wrists and sticky tape was no longer across my eyes. But I didn't jump up or even open my eyes. I knew that the first few seconds after I opened my eyes might be the best and possibly the only chance I would have to escape.

            I twitched muscles without moving. Everything seemed to be under control although I was more than a little sore here and there and several other places. Clothes? Forget them-not only did I have no idea where my clothes might be hut also there is no time to stop to dress when you are running for your life.

            Now to plan- There didn't seem to be anyone in this room; was anyone on this floor? Hold still and listen, If and when I was fairly sure I was alone on this floor, get noiselessly out of bed and up the stairs like a mouse, on past the third floor into the attic, and hide.

Wait for dark. Out an attic gable, down the roof and the back wall and into the woods. If I reached the woods back of the house, they would never catch me . . . but until I did, I would be an easy target.

            The chances? One in nine. Perhaps one in seven if I got really cranked up. The weakest spot in a poor plan was the high probability of being spotted before I was clear of the house . . . because, if I was spotted-no, when I was spotted-I would not only have to kill but I would have to be utterly quiet in doing so-

-because the alternative was to wait until they terminated me which would be shortly after "the Major" decided that there was no more to be squeezed out of me. Clumsy as these goons were, they were not so stupid-or the Major was not so stupid-as to let a witness who has been tortured and raped stay alive.

I stretched my ears in all directions and listened.

            "Nothing was stirring, not even a mouse." No point in waiting; every moment I delayed brought that much closer the time when someone would be stirring. I opened my eyes.

            "Awake, I see. Good."

            "Boss! Where am I?"

            "What a time-ridden cliché. Friday, you can do better than that. Back up and try again."

            I looked around me. A bedroom, possibly a hospital room. No windows. No-glare lighting. A characteristic gravelike silence enhanced rather than broken by the softest of ventilation sighing.

            I looked back at Boss. He was a welcome sight. Same old unstyiish eye patch-why wouldn't he take time to have that eye regenerated? His canes were leaning against a table, in reach. He was wearing his usual sloppy raw-silk suit, a cut that looked like badly tailored pajamas. I was awfully glad to see him.

            "I still want to know where I am. And how. And why. Somewhere underground, surely-but where?"

            "Underground, surely, quite a few meters. 'Where' you will be told when you need to know, or at least how to get to and from. That was the shortcoming of our farm-a pleasant place but too many people knew its location. 'Why' is obvious. 'How' can wait. Report."

            "Boss, you are the most exasperating man I have ever met."

            "Long practice. Report."

            "And your father met your mother at a swing ding. And he didn't take off his hat."

            "They met at a Baptist Sunday-school picnic and both of them believed in the Tooth Fairy. Report."

            "Dirty ears. Snot. The trip to Eli-Five was without incident. I found Mr. Mortenson and delivered to him the contents of my trick bellybutton. Routine was interrupted by a most unusual factor: The space city was experiencing an epidemic of respiratory disorder, etiology unknown, and I contracted it. Mr. Mortenson was most kind; he kept me at home and his wives nursed me with great skill and tender loving care. Boss, I want them compensated."

            "Noted. Continue."

            "I was out of my silly head most of the time. That is why I ran a week behind schedule. But once I felt like traveling I was able to leave at once as Mr. Mortenson told me that I was already carrying the item he had for you. How, Boss? My navel pouch again?"

            "Yes and no."

            "That's a hell of an answer!"

            "Your artificial pochette was used."

            "I thought so. Despite the fact that there aren't supposed to be any nerve endings there, I can feel something-pressure, maybe-when it's loaded."

            I pressed on my belly around my navel and tightened my belly muscles. "Hey, it's empty! You unloaded it?"

            "No. Our antagonists did so."

            "Then I failed! Oh, God, Boss, this is awful."

            "No," he said gently, "you succeeded. In the face of great danger and monumental obstacles you succeeded perfectly."

            "I did?" (Ever had the Victoria Cross pinned on you?) "Boss, cut the double talk and draw me a diagram."

            ''I will.''

            But maybe I had better draw a diagram first. I have a 'possum pouch, created by plastic surgery, behind my bellybutton. It isn't large but you can crowd one whale of a lot of microfilm into a space of about one cubic centimeter. You can't see it because the sphinc

ter valve that serves it holds the navel scar closed. My bellybutton looks normal. Unbiased judges tell me that I have a pretty belly and a sightly navel . . . which, in some important ways, i~ better than having a pretty face, which I don't have.

            The sphincter is a synthetic silicone elastomer that holds the navel tight at all times, even if I am unconscious. This is necessary as there are no nerves there to give voluntary control of contraction and relaxation, such as is possible with the anal, vaginal, and-for some people-throat sphincters. To load the pouch use a dab of K-Y jelly or other nonpetroleum lubricant, and push it in by thumb- no sharp corners, please! To unload it I take the fingers of both hands and pull the artificial sphincter open as much as I can, then press hard with my abdominal muscles-and it pops right out.

            The art of smuggling things in the human body has a long history. The classic ways are in the mouth, in the nasal sinuses, in the stomach, the gut, the rectum, vagina, bladder, eye socket of a missing eye, ear canal, and exotic and not very useful methods using tattoos sometimes covered with hair.

            Every one of the classic ways is known to every customs officer and every special agent public or private the world round, Luna, space cities, other planets, and anywhere men have reached. So forget them. The only classic method that can still beat a pro is the Purloined Letter. But the Purloined Letter is high art indeed and, even when used perfectly, it should be planted on an innocent who can't give it away under drugs.

            Take a look at the next thousand bellybuttons you encounter socially. Now that my pouch has been compromised, it is possible that one or two will conceal surgically emplaced hideaways like mine. You can expect a spate of them soon, then no more will be emplaced as any novelty in smuggling becomes useless once the word gets around. In the meantime customs officers are going to be poking rude fingers into bellybuttons. I hope a lot of those officers get poked in the eye by angry victims-navels tend to be sensitive and ticklish.

            "Friday, the weak point of that pochette in you has always been that any skillful interrogation-"

            "They were clumsy."

            "-or rough interrogation using drugs could force you to mention its existence."

            "Must have been after they shot me with babble juice. I don't recall mentioning it."

            "Probably. Or word may have come to them through other channels, as several people know of it-you, me, three nurses, two surgeons, one anesthesiologist, possibly others. Too many. No matter how our antagonists knew, they did remove what you were carrying there. But don't look glum; what they received was a very long list reduced to microfilm of all the restaurants listed in a 1928 telephone book of the former city of New York. No doubt there is a computer somewhere working on this list right now, attempting to break the code concealed in it . . . which will take a long time as there is no code concealed in it. A dummy load. Sense-free."

            "And for this I have to chase all the way to Eli-Five, eat scummy food, get sick on the Beanstalk, and be buggered about by brutal bastards!"

            "Sorry about the last, Friday. But do you think I would risk the life of my most skillful agent on a useless mission?"

            (See why I work for the arrogant bastard? Flattery will get you anywhere.) "Sorry, sir."

            "Check your appendectomy scar."

            "Huh?" I reached under the sheet and felt it, then flipped the sheet back and looked at it. "What the hell?"

            "The incision was less than two centimeters and straight through the scar; no muscle tissue was disturbed. The item was withdrawn about twenty-four hours ago by reopening the same incision. With the accelerated repair methods that were used on you I am told that in two more days you will not be able to find the new scar in the old. But I am very glad that the Mortensons took such good care of you as I am sure that the artificial symptoms induced in you to cover what had to be done to you were not pleasant. By the way, there really is a catarrhal-fever epidemic there-fortuitous window dressing."

            Boss paused. I stubbornly refused to ask him what I was carrying-he would not have told me anyhow. Shortly he added, "You were telling me about your trip home."

            "The trip down was without incident. Boss, the next time you send me into space I want to go first-class, in an antigrav ship. Not via that silly Indian rope trick." -

            "Engineering analysis shows that a skyhook is safer than any ship. The Quito cable was lost through sabotage, not materiel failure."

            "Stingy."

            "I don't intend to bind the mouths of the kine. You may use antigray from here on if circumstances and timing permit. This time there were reasons to use the Kenya Beanstalk."

            "Maybe so, but someone tailed me out of the Beanstalk capsule. As soon as we were alone, I killed him."

            I paused. Someday, someday, I am going to cause his face to register surprise. I retackled the subject diagonally:

            "Boss, I need a refresher course, with some careful reorientation."

            "Really? To what end?"

            "My kill reflex is too fast. I don't discriminate. That bloke hadn't done anything to rate killing. Surely, he was tailing me. But I should either have shaken him, there or in Nairobi, or, at most, knocked him cold and placed him on ice while I went elsewhere."

            "We'll discuss your possible need later. Continue."

            I told him about the Public Eye and "Belsen's" quadruple identity and how I had sent them to the four winds, then I outlined my trip home. He checked me. "You did not mention the destruction of that hotel in Nairobi."

            "Huh? But, Boss, that had nothing to do with me. I was halfway to Mombasa."

            "My dear Friday, you are too modest. A large number of people and a huge amount of money have gone into trying to keep you from completing your mission, including a last-ditch attempt at our former farm. You may assume, as least hypothesis, that the bombing of the Hilton had as its sole purpose killing you."

            "Hmm. Boss, apparently you knew that it would be this rough. Couldn't you have warned me?"

            "Would you have been more alert, more resolute, had I filled your mind with vague warnings of unknown dangers? Woman, you made no mistakes."

            "The hell I didn't! Uncle Jim met my capsule when he should not have known the time I would arrive; that should have set off every alarm in my head. The instant I laid eyes on him I should have dived back down the hole and taken any capsule anywhere."

            "Whereupon it would have become extremely difficult for us to achieve rendezvous, which would have aborted your mission as thoroughly as losing what you carried. My child, if affairs had gone smoothly, Jim would have met you at my behest; you underestimate my intelligence net as well as the effort we put into trying to watch over you. But I did not send Jim to get you because at that moment I was running. Hobbling, to be precise. Hurrying. Trying to escape. I assume that Jim took the ETA message himself-from our man, or that of our antagonists, or possibly from both."

            "Boss, if I had known it at the time, I would have fed Jim to his horses. I was fond of him. When the time comes, I want to cancel him myself. He's mine."

            "Friday, in our profession it is undesirable to hold grudges."

            "I don't hold many but Uncle Jim is special. And there is another case I want to handle myself. But I'll argue with you later. Say, is it true that Uncle Jim used to be a papist priest?"

            Boss almost looked surprised. "Where did you hear that nonsense?"

            "Around and about. Gossip."

            'Human, All Too Human.' Gossip is a vice. Let me settle it. Prufit was a con man. I met him in prison, where he did something for me, important enough that I made a place for him in our organization. My mistake. My inexcusable mistake, as a con man never stops being a con man; he can't. But I suffered from a will to believe, a defect of character that I thought I had rooted out. I was mistaken. Continue, please."

            I told Boss how they had grabbed me. "Five of them, I think. Possibly only four."

            "Six, I believe. Descriptions."

            "None, Boss, I was too busy. Well, one. I had one sharp look at him just as I killed him. About a hundred and seventy-five tall, weight around seventy-five or -six. Age near thirty-five. Blondish, smooth-shaven. Slavic. But he was the only one my eye photographed. Because he held still. Involuntarily. As his neck snapped."

"You never do."      "Was the other one you killed blond or brunet?"

            'Belsen'? Brunet."

            "No, at the farm. Never mind. You killed two and injured three before they piled enough bodies on you to hold you down by sheer weight. A credit to your instructor, let me add. In escaping, we had not been able to thin them down enough to keep them from taking you. . . but, in my opinion, you won the battle in which we recaptured you by your having earlier taken out so many of their effectives. Even though you were chained up and unconscious at the time, you won the final fracas. Go on, please."

            "That about wraps it up, Boss. A gang rape next, followed by interrogation, direct, then under drugs, then under pain."

            "I'm sorry about the rape, Friday. The usual bonuses. You will find them enhanced as I judge the circumstances to have been unusually offensive."

            "Oh, not that bad. I'm hardly a twittering virgin. I can recall social occasions that were almost as unpleasant. Except one man. I don't know his face but I can identify him. I want him! I want him as badly as I want Uncle Jim. Worse, maybe, as I want to punish him a bit before I let him die."

            "I can only repeat what I said earlier. For us, personal grudges are a mistake. They reduce survival probability."

            "I'll risk it for this bucko. Boss, I don't hold the rape qua rape against him; they were ordered to rape me under the silly theory that it would soften me up for interrogation. But the scum should bathe and he should have his teeth fixed and he should brush them and use a mouthwash. And somebody must tell him that it is not polite to slap a woman with whom he is copulated. I don't know his face but I know his voice and his odor and his build and his nickname. Rocks or Rocky."

            "Jeremy Rockford."

            "Huh? You know him? Where is he?"

            "I once knew him and I recently had one clear look at him, enough to be sure. Requiescat in pace."

            "Really? Oh, hell. I hope he didn't die quietly."

            "He did not die quietly. Friday, I have not told you all that I know-"

            "-because I wanted your report first. Their assault on the farm succeeded because Jim Prufit had cut all power just before they hit us. This left us nothing but hand weapons for the few who wear arms at the farm, only bare hands for most of us. I ordered evacuation and most of us escaped through a tunnel prepared and concealed when the house was rebuilt. I am sorry and proud to say that three of our best, the three who were armed when we were hit, elected to play Horatius at the bridge. I know that they died as I kept the tunnel open until I could tell by the sounds that it had been entered by the raiders. Then I blasted it.

            "It took some hours to round up enough people and to mount our counterattack, especially in arranging for enough authorized power vehicles. While we conceivably could have attacked on foot, we had to have at least one APV as ambulance for you."

            "How did you know I was alive?"

            "The same way I knew that the escape tunnel had been entered and not by our rear guard. Remote pickups. Friday, everything that was done to you and by you, everything you said and was said to you, was monitored and recorded. I was unable to monitor in person-busy preparing the counterattack-but the essential parts were played for me as time permitted. Let me add that I am proud of you.

            "By knowing which pickups recorded what, we knew where they were holding you, the fact that you were cuffed, how many were in the house, where they were, when they settled down, and who stayed awake. By relay to the command APV I knew the situation in the house right to the moment of attack. We hit- They hit, I mean-our people hit. I don't lead attacks hobbling on these two sticks; I wield the baton. Our people hit the house, were inside, the designated four picked you up-one armed only with a bolt cutter- and all were out in three minutes eleven seconds. Then we set fire to it."

            "Boss! Your lovely farmhouse?"

            "When a ship is sinking, one does not worry about the diningroom linens. We can never use the farm again. Burning the house destroyed many awkward records and many secret and quasi-secret items of equipment. But, most compelling, burning the house gave us a quick cleanup of the parties who had compromised its secrets.

Our cordon was in place before we used incendiaries, then each one was shot as he attempted to come out.

            "That was when I saw your acquaintance Jeremy Rockford. He was burned in the leg as he came out the east door. He stumbled back in, changed his mind and tried again to escape, fell and was trapped. From the sounds he made I can assure you that he did not die quietly."

            "Ugh. Boss, when I said that I wanted to punish him before I killed him, I didn't mean anything as horrible as burning him to death."

            "Had he not behaved like a horse running back into a burning barn, he would have died as the others did . . . quickly, from laser beam. Shot on sight, for we took no prisoners."

            "Not even for interrogation?"

            "Not correct doctrine, I so stipulate. But, Friday my dear, you are unaware of the emotional atmosphere. All had heard the tapes, at least of the rape and of your third interrogation, the torture. Our lads and lassies would not have taken prisoners even if I had so ordered. But I did not attempt to. I want you to know that you are held in high esteem by your colleagues. Including the many who have never met you and whom you are unlikely ever to meet."

            Boss reached for his canes, struggled to his feet. "I'm seven minutes over the time your physician told me I could visit. We'll talk tomorrow. You are to rest now. A nurse will be in to put you to sleep. Sleep and get well."

            I had a few minutes to myself~ I spent them in a warm glow. "High esteem." When you have never belonged and can never really belong, words like that mean everything. They warmed me so much that I didn't mind not being human.

IV

Someday I'm going to win an argument with Boss. But don't hold your breath.

            There were days when I did not lose arguments with him-the days he did not visit me.

            It started with a difference of opinion over how long I was going to have to remain in therapy. I felt ready to go home or back to duty, either one, after four days. While I didn't want to get into a dockside fight just yet, I could take light duty-or a trip to New Zealand, my first choice. All my hurts were repairing.

            They hadn't been all that much: lots of burns, four broken ribs, simple fractures left tibia and fibula, multiple compound fractures of the bones of my right foot and three toes of my left, a hairline skull fracture without complications, and (messy but least disabling) somebody had sawed off my right nipple.

            The last item and the burns and the broken toes were all that I recalled; the others must have happened while I was distracted by other matters.

            Boss said, "Friday, you know that it will take at least six weeks to regenerate that missing nipple."

            "But plastic surgery for a simple cosmetic job would heal in a week. Dr. Krasny told me so."

            "Young woman, when anyone in this organization is maimed in line of duty, she will be restored as perfectly as therapeutic art can achieve. In addition to that our permanent policy, in your case

there is another reason, compelling and sufficient. We each have a moral obligation to conserve and preserve beauty in this world; there is none to waste. You have an unusually comely body~ damage to it is deplorable. It must be repaired."

            "Cosmetic surgery is all right, I said so. But I don't expect to have milk in these jugs. And anybody in bed with me won't care."

            "Friday, you may have convinced yourself that you will never have need to lactate. But esthetically a functional breast is very different from a surgery-shaped imitation. That hypothetical bedmate might not know . . . but you would know and I would know. No, my dear. You will be restored to your former perfection."

            "Hmm! When are you going to get that eye regenerated?"

            "Don't be rude, child. In my case, no esthetic issue obtains."

            So I got my tit back as good as ever or maybe better. The next argument was over the retraining I felt I needed to correct my hairtrigger kill reflex. When I brought up the matter again, Boss looked as if he had just bitten into something nasty. "Friday, I do not recall that you have ever made a kill that turned out to be a mistake. Have you made any kills of which I am unaware?"

            "No, no," I said hastily. "I never killed anybody until I went to work for you and I haven't made any that I didn't report to you."

            "In that case all of your killings have been in self-defense."

            "All but that 'Belsen' character. That wasn't self-defense; he never laid a finger on me."

            "Beaumont. At least that was the name he usually used. Self-defense sometimes must take the form of 'Do unto others what they would do unto you but do it first.' De Camp, I believe. Or some other of the twentieth-century school of pessimistic philosophers. I'll call up Beaumont's dossier so that you may see for yourself that he belonged on everyone's better-dead list."

            "Don't bother. Once I looked into his pouch, I knew that he wasn't following me to kiss me. But that was afterward."

            Boss took several seconds to answer, far beyond his wont. "Friday, do you want to change tracks and become a hatchet man?"

            My chin dropped and my eyes widened. That was all the answer I made.

            "I didn't intend to frighten you off the nest," Boss said dryly. "You will have deduced that this organization includes assassins. I don't want to lose you as a courier; you are my best. But we always need skilled assassins, as their attrition rate is high. However, there is this major difference between a courier and an assassin: A courier kills only in self-defense and often by reflex . . . and, I concede, always with some possibility of error . . . as not all couriers have your supreme talent for instantly integrating all factors and reaching a necessary conclusion."

            "Huh!"

            "You heard me correctly. Friday, one of your weaknesses is that you lack appropriate conceit. An honorable hatchet man does not kill by reflex; he kills by planned intent. If the plan goes so far wrong that he needs to use self-defense, he is almost certain to become a statistic. In his planned killings, he always knows why and agrees with the necessity . . . or I won't send him out."

            (Planned killing? Murder, by definition. Get up in the morning, eat a hearty breakfast, then keep rendezvous with your victim, cut him down in cold blood? Eat dinner and sleep soundly?) "Boss, I don't think it is my sort of work."

            "I'm not sure that you have the temperament for it. But, for the nonce, keep an open mind. I am not sanguine about the possibility of slowing down your defense reflex. Moreover I can assure you that, if we attempt to retrain you in the way that you ask, I will not again use you as a courier. No. Risking your life is your business

            when on your own time. But your missions are always critical; I won't use a courier whose fine edge has been deliberately blunted."

            Boss did not convince me but he made me unsure of myself. When I told him again that I was not interested in becoming a hatchet man, he did not appear to listen-just said something about getting me something to read.

            I expected it-whatever-to show up on the room's terminal. Instead, about twenty minutes after he left me, a youngster-well, younger than I am-showed up with a book, a bound book with paper pages. It had a serial number on it and was stamped "EYES ONLY" and "Need-to-Know Required" and "Top Secret SPECIAL BLUE Clearance."

            I looked at it, as anxious to handle it as a snake. "Is this for me? I think there has been a mistake."

            "The Old Man does not make mistakes. Just sign the receipt."

            I made him wait while I read the fine print. "This bit about 'never out of my sight.' I sleep now and then."

            "Call Archives, ask for the classified documents clerk-that's me-and I'll be here on the bounce. But try not to go to sleep until I get here. Try hard."

            "Okay." I signed the receipt, looked up and found him staring with bright-eyed interest. "What are you staring at?"

            "Uh- Miss Friday, you're pretty."

            I never know what to say to that sort of thing, since I'm not. I shape up all right, surely-but I was fully clothed. "How did you know my name?"

            "Why, everybody knows who you are. You know. Two weeks ago. At the farm. You were there."

            "Oh. Yes, I was there. But I don't remember it."

            "I sure do!" His eyes were shining. "It's the only time I've had a chance to be part of a combat operation. I'm glad I had a piece of it!"

            (What do you do?)

            I took his hand, pulled him closer to me, took his face in both my hands, kissed him carefully, about halfway between warm-sisterly and let's-do-it! Maybe protocol called for something stronger but he was on duty and I was still on the disabled list-not fair to make implied promises that can't be kept, especially to youngsters with stars in their eyes.

            "Thank you for rescuing me," I said to him soberly before letting go of his cheeks.

            The dear thing blushed. But he seemed very pleased.

            I stayed up so late reading that book that the night nurse scolded me. However, nurses need something to scold about now and then. I'm not going to quote from the incredible document. . . but listen to these subjects:

Title first: The Only Deadly Weapon. Then- Assassination as a Fine Art

            Assassination as a Political Tool

            Assassination for Profit

            Assassins Who Changed History

            The Society for Creative Euthanasia

            The Canons of the Professional Assassins Guild

            Amateur Assassins: Should They Be Exterminated?

            Honorable Hatchet Men-Some Case Histories

            "Extreme Prejudice"-"Wet Work"-Are Euphemisms Necessary?

            Seminar Working Papers: Techniques & Tools

            Whew! There was no good reason for my reading all of it. But I did. It had an unholy fascination. Dirty.

            I resolved never to mention the possibility of changing tracks and not to bring up retraining again. Let Boss bring it up himself if he wanted to discuss it. I punched the terminal, got Archives, and stated that I needed the classified documents clerk to accept custody of classified item number such-and-such and please bring my receipt. "Right away, Miss Friday," a woman answered.

Notoriety- I waited with considerable unease for that youngster to show up. I

am ashamed to say that this poisonous book had had a most unfortunate effect on me. It was the middle of the night, early morning; the place was dead quiet-and if the dear thing laid a hand on me, I was awfully likely to forget that I was technically an invalid. I needed a chastity girdle with a big padlock.

            But it was not he; the sweet youngster had gone off duty. The person who showed up with my receipt was the older woman who had answered me on the terminal. I felt both relief and disappointment-and chagrin that I felt disappointed. Does convalescence make everybody irresponsibly horny? Do hospitals have a discipline problem? I have not been ill often enough to know.

            The night clerk swapped my receipt for the book, then surprised me with: "Don't I get a kiss, too?"

            "Oh! Were you there?"

            "Any warm body, dear; we were awfully short of effectives that night. I'm not the world's greatest but I had basic training like anyone else. Yes, I was there. Wouldn't have missed it."

            I said, "Thank you for rescuing me," and kissed her. I tried to make this simply a symbol, but she took charge and controlled what sort of a buss it would be. Rough and rugged, namely. She was telling me clearer than words that anytime I wanted to work the other side of the street, she would be waiting.

            What do you do? There seem to be human situations for which there are no established protocols. I had just acknowledged that she had risked her life to save mine-precisely that, as that rescue raid was not the piece of cake that Boss's account made it appear to be. Boss's habitual understatement is such that he would describe the total destruction of Seattle as "a seismic disturbance." Having thanked her for my life how could I snub her?

            I could not. I let my half of the kiss answer her wordless message-with my fingers crossed that I would never have to keep the implied promise.

            Presently she broke the kiss but remained holding on to me. "Dearie," she said, "want to know something? Do you remember how you told off that slob they called the Major?"

            "I remember."

            "There is a bootleg piece of tape floating around of that one sequence. What you said to him and how you said it is highly admired by one and all. Especially me."

            "That's interesting. Are you the little gremlin who copied that piece of tape?"

            "Why, how could you think such a thing?" She grinned. "Do you mind?"

            I thought it over for all of three milliseconds. "No. If the people who rescued me enjoy hearing what I told that bastard, I don't mind their listening to it. But I don't talk that way ordinarily."

            "Nobody thinks you do." She gave me a quick peck. "But you did so when it was needed and you made every woman in the company proud of you. And our men, too."

            She didn't seem disposed to let go of me but the night nurse showed up then and told me firmly to go to bed and she was going to give me a sleepytime shot-I made only the usual formal protest. The clerk said, "Hi, Goldie. Night. Night, dear." She left.

            Goldie (not her name-bottle blonde) said, "Want it in your arm? Or in your leg? Don't mind Anna; she's harmless."

            "She's all right." It occurred to me that Goldie probably could monitor both sight and sound. Probably? Certainly! "Were you there? At the farm? When the house was burned?"

            "Not while the house was burning. I was in an APV, taking you here as fast as we could float it. You were a sad sight, Miss Friday."

            "I'll bet I was. Thanks. Goldie? Will you kiss me good-night?"

            Her kiss was warm and undemanding.

            I found out later that she was one of the four who made the run upstairs to grab me back-one man carrying big bolt cutters, two armed and firing. . . and Goldie carrying unassisted a stretcher basket. But she never mentioned it, then or later.

I remember that convalescence as the first time in my life-except for vacations in Christchurch-when I was quietly, warmly happy, every day, every night. Why? Because I belonged!

            Of course, as anyone could guess from this account, I had passed years earlier. I no longer carried an ID with a big "LA" (or even "AP") printed across it. I could walk into a washroom and not be told to use the end stall. But a phony ID and a fake family tree do not keep you warm; they just keep you from being hassled and discriminated against. You are still aware that there isn't any nation anywhere that considers your sort fit for citizenship and there are lots of places that would deport you or even kill you-or sell you-if your cover-up ever slipped.

            An artificial person misses not having a family tree much more than you might think. Where were you born? Well, I wasn't born, exactly; I was designed in Tri-University Life Engineering Laboratory, Detroit. Oh, really? My inception was formulated by Mendelian Associates, Zurich. Wonderful small talk, that! You'll never hear it; it does not stand up well against ancestors on the Mayflower or in the Domesday Book. My records (or one set) show that I was "born" in Seattle, a destroyed city being a swell place for missing records. A great place to lose your next of kin, too.

            Since I was never in Seattle I have studied very carefully all the records and pictures I could find; an honest-to-goodness native of Seattle can't trip me. I think. Or not yet.

            But what they gave me while I was recovering from that silly rape and the not-so-funny interrogation was not phony at all and I did not have to worry about keeping my lies straight. Not just Goldie and Anna and the youngster (Terence) but over two dozen more before Dr. Krasny discharged me. Those were just the ones I came into contact with. There were more on that raid; I don't know how many. Boss's standing doctrine kept members of his organization from meeting each other save when their duties necessarily brought them together. Just as he firmly snubbed questions. You cannot let slip secrets you do not know, and you cannot betray a person whose very existence is unknown to you.

            But Boss did not have rules just for the sake of rules. Once having met a colleague through duty one could continue the contact socially. Boss did not encourage such fraternizing but he was no fool and did not try to forbid it. In consequence Anna often called on me in the late evening just before she went on duty.

            She never did try to collect her pound of flesh. There wasn't much opportunity but we could have found one if we had tried. I didn't try to discourage her-hell, no; if she had ever presented the bill for collection, I would not only have paid cheerfully but would have tried to convince her that it was my idea in the first place.

            But she didn't. I think she was like the sensitive (and fairly rare) male who never paws a woman when she doesn't want to be pawed-he can sense it and doesn't start.

            One evening shortly before my discharge I was feeling especially happy-I had acquired two new friends that day; "kissing friends," persons who had fought in the raid that saved me-and I tried to explain to Anna why it meant so much to me and found that I was starting to tell her how I was not quite what I seemed to be.

            She stopped me. "Friday dear, listen to your big sister."

            "Huh? Did I goof?"

            "Maybe you were about to. 'Member the night we met, you returned through me a classified document? I have supreme top-secret clearance awarded to me by Mr. Two-Canes years back. That book you returned is where I can get at it anytime. But I have never opened it and never will. The cover says 'Need to Know' and I have never been told that I have need to know. You've read it but I don't know even the title or the subject-just its number.

            "Personnel matters are like that. There used to be an elite military outfit, a foreign legion, that boasted that a legionnaire had no history before the day of his enlistment. Mr. Two-Canes wants us to be like that. For example, if we were to recruit a living artifact, an artificial person, the personnel clerk would know it. I know, as I used to be personnel clerk. Records to forge, possibly some plastic surgery needed, in some cases laboratory identifications to excise and then regenerate the area. .

            "When we got through with him, he would never again have to worry about a tap on the shoulder or being elbowed out of a queue. He could even marry and have children without worrying that someday it might cause trouble for his kids. He wouldn't have to worry about me, either, as I have a trained forgettery. Now, dear, I don't know what you had on your mind. But, if it is something you don't ordinarily tell people, don't tell me. Or you'll hate yourself in the morning."

            "No, I wouldn't!"

            "All right. If you still want to tell me a week from now, I'll listen. A deal?"

            Anna was right; a week later I felt no need to tell her. I'm 99 percent certain that she knew. Either way, it's swell to be loved for yourself alone, by somebody who doesn't think that APs are monsters, subhuman.

            I don't know that any of the rest of my loving friends knew or guessed. (I don't mean Boss; he knew, of course. But he wasn't a friend; he was Boss.) It did not matter if my new friends learned that I wasn't human; because I had come to realize that they either didn't care or wouldn't care. All that mattered to them was whether or not you were part of Boss's outfit.

One evening Boss showed up, tapping his canes and whuffling, with Goldie trailing him. He settled heavily into the visitor's chair, said to Goldie, "I won't need you, nurse. Thank you"-then to me, "Take off your clothes."

            From any other man that would be either offensive or welcome, depending. From Boss it merely meant that he wanted my clothes off. Goldie took it that way, too, as she simply nodded and left-and Goldie is the sort of professional who would buck Siva the Destroyer if He attempted to interfere with one of her patients.

            I took my clothes off quickly and waited. He looked me up and down. "They again match."

            "Seems so to me."

            "Dr. Krasny says that he ran a test for lactation function. Positive.

            "Yes. He pulled some stunt with my hormone balance and both of them leaked a little. Felt funny. Then he rebalanced and I dried up.

            Boss grunted. "Turn around. Show me the sole of your right foot. Now your left. Enough. Burn scars seem to be gone."

            "All that I can see. Doctor tells me the others have regenerated, too. The itching has stopped, so they must be."

            "Put on your clothes. Dr. Krasny tells me that you are well."

            "If I were any weller, you would have to bleed me."

            "Well is an absolute; it has no comparative."

            "Okay, I'm wellest."

            "Impudence. Tomorrow morning you leave for refresher training. Be packed and ready by oh-nine hundred."

            "Since I arrived without even a happy smile, packing will take me eleven seconds. But I need a new ID, a new passport, a new credit card, and quite a bit of cash-"

            "All of which will be delivered to you before oh-nine hundred."

            "-because I'm not going for a refresher; I'm going to New Zealand. Boss, I've told you and told you. I'm overdue for R and R, and I figure that I rate some paid sick leave to compensate for time I've been laid up. You're a slave driver."

            "Friday, how many years will it take you to learn that when I thwart one of your whims, I always have your welfare in mind as well as the efficiency of the organization?"

            "Hully gee, Great White Father. I abase myself. And I'll send you a picture postcard from Wellington."

            "Of a pretty Maori, please; I've seen a geyser. Your refresher course will be tailored to fit your needs and you will decide when it is complete. Although you are 'wellest,' you need physical training of carefully increasing difficulty to get you back into that superb pitch of muscle tone and wind and reflex that is your birthright."

            " 'Birthright.' Don't make jokes, Boss; you have no talent for it. 'My mother was a test tube; my father was a knife.'

            "You are being foolishly self-conscious over an impediment that was removed years ago."

            "Am I? The courts say I can't be a citizen; the churches say I don't have a soul. I'm not 'man born of woman,' at least not in the eyes of the law."

            " 'The law is an ass.' The records concerning your origin have been removed from the production laboratory's files, and a dummy set concerning an enhanced male AP was substituted."

            "You never told me that!"

            "Until you displayed this neurotic weakness, I saw no need. But a deception of that nature should be made so airtight that it will utterly displace the truth. And so it has. If you attempted, tomorrow, to claim your true lineage, you would not be able to get any authority anywhere to agree with you. You may tell anyone; it doesn't matter. But, my dear, why are you defensive? You are not only as human as Mother Eve, you are an enhanced human, as near perfect as your designers could manage. Why do you think I went out of my way to recruit you when you had no experience and no conscious interest in this profession? Why did I spend a small fortune educating and training you? Because I knew. I waited some years to be sure that you were indeed developing as your architects intended . . . then almost lost you when you suddenly dived off the map." He made a grimace that I think means a smile. "You gave me trouble, girl. Now about your training. Are you willing to listen?"

            "Yes, sir." (I didn't try to tell him about the laboratory crèche; human people think all crèches are like those they've seen. I didn't tell him about the plastic spoon that was all I had to eat with until I was ten because I didn't want to tell how, the first time I tried to use a fork, I stabbed my lip and made it bleed and they laughed at me. It isn't any one thing; it's a million little things that are the difference between being reared as a human child and being raised as an animal.)

            "You'll be taking a bare-hands combat refresher but you are to work out only with your instructor; there are to be no blemishes on you when you visit your family in Chnistchurch. You will receive advanced training in hand weapons, including some you may never have heard of. If you change tracks, you will need this."

            "Boss, I am not going to become an assassin!"

            "You need it anyhow. There are times when a courier can carry weapons and she must have every edge possible. Friday, don't despise assassins indiscriminately. As with any tool, merit or demerit lies in how it is used. The decline and fall of the former United States of North America derived in part from assassinations. But only in small part as the killings had no pattern and were pointless. What can you tell me of the Prussian-Russian War?"

            "Not much. Mainly that the Prussians got their hides nailed to the barn when the smart money figured them for winners."

            "Suppose I tell you that twelve people won that war-seven men, five women-and that the heaviest weapon used was a six-millimeter pistol."

            "I don't think you have ever lied to me. Flow?"

            "Friday, brainpower is the scarcest commodity and the only one of real value. Any human organization can be rendered useless, impotent, a danger to itself, by selectively removing its best minds while carefully leaving the stupid ones in place. It took only a few careful 'accidents' to ruin utterly the great Prussian military machine and turn it into a blundering mob. But this did not show until the fighting was well under way, because stupid fools look just as good as military geniuses until the fighting starts."

            "Only a dozen people-Boss? Did we do that job?"

            "You know that is the sort of question I discourage. We did not. It was a contract job by an organization as small and as specialized as we are. But I do not willingly involve us in nationalistic wars; the side of the angels is seldom self-evident."

            "I still don't want to be an assassin."

            "I will not permit you to be an assassin and let us have no more discussion of it. Be ready to leave at nine tomorrow."

V

Nine weeks later I left for New Zealand.

            I'll say this for Boss: The supercilious bully always knows what he's talking about. When Dr. Krasny let me go, I wasn't "wellest." I was simply a recovered patient who rio longer needed sickbed nursing.

            Nine weeks later I could have taken prizes in the old Olympics without working up a sweat. As I boarded the SB Abel Tasman at Winnipeg freeport, the skipper gave me the eye. I knew I looked good and I added a waggle to my seat that I would never use on a mission-as a courier I usually try to blend into the scenery. But now I was on leave and it's kind of fun to advertise. Apparently I hadn't forgotten how as the skipper came back to my cradle while I was still belting in. Or it may have been the Superskin jump suit that I was wearing-new that season and the first one I had had; I bought the outfit at the freeport and changed into it in the shop. I'm sure that it is only a matter of time until the sects that think that sex has something to do with sin will class wearing Superskin as a mortal sin.

            He said, "Miss Baldwin, is it not? Do you have someone meeting you in Auckland? What with the war and all it is not a good idea for an unescorted woman to be alone in an international port."

            (I did not say, "Look, Bub, the last time I killed the bloke.") The captain stood a hundred and ninety-five, maybe, and would gross a hundred or more and none of it fat. Early thirties and the sort of blond you expect in SAS rather than ANZAC. If he wanted to be protective I was willing to stand short. I answered, "Nobody's meeting me but I'm just changing for the South Island shuttle. How do these buckles work? Uh, do those stripes mean you're the captain?"

            "Let me show you. Captain, yes-Captain Ian Tormey." He started belting me in; I let him.

            "Captain. Gollee! I've never met a captain before." A remark like that isn't even a fib when it's a ritual response in the ancient barnyard dance. He had said to me, "I'm on the prowl and you look good. Are you interested?" And I had answered, "You look acceptable but I'm sorry to have to tell you that I don't have time today."

            At that point he could adjourn it with no hurt feelings or he could elect to invest in goodwill against a possible future encounter. He chose the latter.

            As he finished belting me in-tight enough but not too tight and not using the chance to grab a feel-quite professional-he said, "The timing on that connection will be close today. If you'll hang back when we disembark and be last out, I'll be happy to put you aboard your Kiwi. That'll be faster than finding your way through the crowds by yourself."

            (The connection timing is twenty-seven minutes, Captain-leaving twenty minutes in which to talk me out of my comm signal. But keep on being sweet about it and I may give it to you.) "Why, thank you, Captain!-if it's really not too much trouble."

            "ANZAC service, Miss Baldwin. But my pleasure."

            I like to ride the semiballistics-the high-gee blastoff that always feels as if the cradle would rupture and spurt fluid all over the cabin, the breathless minutes in free fall that feel as if your guts were falling out, and then reentry and that long, long glide that beats any sky ride ever built. Where can you have more fun in forty minutes with your clothes on?

            Then comes the always interesting question: Is the runway clear? A semiballisfic doesn't make two passes; it can't.

            It says right here in the brochure that an SB never lifts until it receives clearance from the port of reentry. Sure, sure, and I believe in the Tooth Fairy just like Boss's parents. How about the dumb-john in the private APV who picks the wrong strip and parks? How about the time in Singapore when I sat in the Top Deck bar and watched three SBs land in nine minutes?-not, I concede, on the same strip, but on crossing strips! Russian roulette.

            I'll go on riding them; I like them and my profession often calls for me to use them. But I hold my breath from touchdown to full stop.

            This trip was fun as usual and a semiballistic ride is never long enough to be tiring. I hung back when we landed and, sure enough, my polite wolf was just coming out of the cockpit as I reached the exit. The flight attendant handed me my bag and Captain Tormey took it over my insincere protests.

            He took me to the shuttle gate, took charge of confirming my reservation and selecting my seat, then brushed past the Passengers Only sign and settled down beside me. "Too bad you're leaving so quickly-too bad for me, that is. Under the rules I have to take three days turnaround. . . and I happen to be at loose ends this trip. My sister and her husband used to live here-but they've moved to Sydney and I no longer have anyone to visit with."

            (I can just see you spending all your off time with your sister and your brother-in-law.) "Oh, what a shame! I know how you must feel. My family is in Christchurch and I'm always lonesome when I have to be away from them. A big, noisy, friendly family-I married into an S-group." (Always tell them at once.)

            "Oh, how jolly! How many husbands do you have?"

            "Captain, that is always the first thing men ask. It comes from misunderstanding the nature of an S-group. From thinking that S stands for 'sex.'

            "Doesn't it?"

            "Goodness, no! It stands for 'security' arid 'siblings' and 'sociability' and 'sanctuary' and 'succor' and 'safety' and lots of other things, all of them warm and sweet and comforting. Oh, it can stand for 'sex,' too. But sex is readily available everywhere. No need to form anything as complex as an S-group just for sex." (S stands for "synthetic family" because that is how it was designated in the legislation of the first territorial nation, the California Confederacy, to legalize

it. But it is ten-to-one that Captain Tormey knew this. We were simply running through standard variations of the Grand Salute.)

            "I don't find sex that readily available-"

            (I refused to answer his ploy. Captain, with your height and broad shoulders and pink, well-scrubbed look, and almost all of your time free for The Hunt. . . in Winnipeg and Auckland, fer Gossake, two places where the crop never fails. . . . Please, sir! Try again.)

            "-but I agree with you that it is not reason enough to marry. I'm not likely to marry, ever . . . because I go where the wild goose goes. But an S-group sounds like a fine deal to come back to."

            ''It is."

            "How big is it?"

            "Still interested in my husbands? I have three husbands, sir, and three group sisters to match . . . and I think you would like all three-especially Lispeth, our youngest and prettiest. Liz is a redheaded Scottish lassie and a bit of a flirt. Children? Of course. We try to count them every night, but they move pretty fast. And kittens and ducks and puppy dogs and a big rambling garden with roses all year round, almost. It's a busy happy place and always watch where you put your feet."

            "Sounds grand. Does the group need an associate husband who can't be home much but carries loads of life insurance? How much does it cost to buy in?"

            "I'll speak to Anita about it. But you don't sound serious."

            The chitchat continued, neither of us meaning a word of it, other than on a symbolic level. Shortly we declared it a draw while providing for a possible rematch by exchanging comm codes, that of my family in Christchurch in answer to his offer to me of the casual use of his flat in Auckland. He had taken over the lease, he said, when his sister had moved . . . but he needed it only six days out of the month, usually. "So if you find yourself in town and need a place for a wash-up and a nap, or overnight, just call."

            "But suppose one of your friends is using it, Ian"-he had asked me to drop calling him Captain-"or yourself."

            "Unlikely but, if so, the computer will know and tell you. If I'm in town or about to be in town, it will tell you that, too-and I certainly would not want to miss you."

            The pass direct, but in the politest terms. So I answered it by telling him, through giving him our Christchurch number, that he was welcome to try to get my pants off. . . if he had the guts to face my husbands, my co-wives, and a passel of noisy kids. I thought it most unlikely that he would call. Tall, handsome bachelors in glamorous, high-paying jobs don't have to carry the anvil that far.

            About then the loudspeaker that mumbles the arrivals and departures interrupted itself with: "It is with deep sorrow that we pause to announce the total destruction of Acapulco. This flash comes to you courtesy of Interworld Transport, Proprietary, the Triple-S Lines: Speed-Safety-Service."

            I gasped. Captain Ian said, "Oh, those idiots!"

            "Which idiots?"

            "The whole Mexican Revolutionary Kingdom. When are the territorial states going to learn that they cannot possibly win against corporate states? That's why I said they were idiots. And they are!"

            "Why do you say that, Captain?-Ian?"

            "Obvious. Any territorial state, even if it's Ell-Four or an asteroid, is a sitting duck. But fighting a multinational is like trying to slice a fog. Where's your target? You want to fight IBM? Where is IBM? Its registered home office is a P.O. box number in Delaware Free State. That's no target. IBM's offices and people and plants are scattered through four hundred-odd territorial states groundside and more in space; you can't hit any part of IBM without hurting somebody else as much or more. But can IBM defeat, say, Great Russia?"

            "I don't know," I admitted. "The Prussians weren't able to."

            "It would just depend on whether or not IBM could see a profit in

it. So far as I know, IBM doesn't own any guerrillas; she may not even have agents saboteurs. She might have to buy the bombs and missiles. But she could shop around and take her own sweet time getting set because Russia isn't going anywhere. It will still be there, a big fat target, a week from now or a year. But Interworld Transport just showed what the outcome would be. This war is all over. Mexico bet that Interworld wouldn't risk public condemnation by destroying a Mexican city. But those old-style politicians forgot that corporate nations aren't nearly as interested in public opinion as territorial nations have to be. The war's over."

            "Oh, I hope so! Acapulco is-was-a beautiful place."

            "Yes, and it would still be a beautiful place if the Montezuma's

Revolutionary Council wasn't rooted somewhere back in the twentieth century. But now there will be face-saving. Interworld will apologize and pay an indemnity, then, with no fanfare, the Montezuma will cede the land and the extraterritoriality for the new spaceport to a new corporation with a Mexicano name and a DF home office . . . and the public won't be told that the new corporation is owned sixty percent by Interworld and forty percent by the very politicians who stalled just a little too long and let Acapulco be destroyed." Captain Tormey looked sour and I suddenly saw that he was older than I had first guessed.

            I said, "Ian, isn't ANZAC a subsidiary of Interworld?"

            "Perhaps that's why I sound so cynical." He stood up. "Your shuttle is locking into the gate. Let me have your bag."

VI

Christchurch is the loveliest city on this globe.

            Make that "anywhere," as there is not yet a truly lovely city off Earth. Luna City is underground, Eli-Five looks like a junkyard from outside and has only one arc that looks good from inside. Martian cities are mere hives and most Earthside cities suffer from a misguided attempt to look like Los Angeles.

            Christchurch does not have the magnificence of Paris or the setting of San Francisco or the harbor of Rio. Instead it has things that make a city lovable rather than stunning: The gentle Avon winding through our downtown streets. The mellow beauty of Cathedral Square. The Ferrier fountain in front of Town Hall. The lush beauty of our world-famous botanic gardens smack in the middle of downtown.

            "The Greeks praise Athens." But I am not a native of Christchurch (if "native" could mean anything for my sort). I am not even an Ennzedd. I met Douglas in Ecuador (this was before the Quito Skyhook catastrophe), was delighted by a frantic love affair compounded of equal parts of pisco sours and sweaty sheets, then was frightened by his proposal, calmed down when he made me understand that he was not then proposing vows in front of some official but a trial visit to his S-group-find out if they liked me, find out if I liked them.

            That was different. I zipped back to the Imperium and reported, and told Boss that I was taking some accumulated leave-or would

he rather have my resignation? He growled something about go ahead and get my gonads cooled off, then report in when I was fit to work. So I rushed back to Quito and Douglas was still in bed.

            At that time there really wasn't any way to get from Ecuador to New Zealand . . . so we tubed to Lima and took an SB right over the South Pole to West Australia Port at Perth (with the oddest 5shaped track because of Coriolis)-tube to Sydney, bounce to Auckland, float to Christchurch, taking nearly twenty-four hours and the wildest of tracks just to cross the Pacific. Winnipeg and Quito are almost the same distance from Auckland-don't be fooled by a flat map; ask your computer-Winnipeg is only one-eighth farther.

            Forty minutes versus twenty-four hours. But I had not minded the longer trip; I was with Douglas and dizzy in love.

            In another twenty-four hours I was dizzy in love with his family.

            I hadn't expected that. I had looked forward to a lovely vacation with Douglas and he had promised me some skiing as well as sex- not that I insisted on skiing. I knew that I had an implied obligation to go to bed with his group brothers if asked. But that didn't worry me because an artificial person simply can't take copulation as seriously as most humans seem to take it. Most of the females of my crèche class had been trained as doxies from menarche on and then were signed up as company women with one or another of the construction multinationals. I myself had received basic doxy training before Boss showed up, bought my contract, and changed my track. (And I jumped the contract and was missing for several months- but that's another story.)

            But I wouldn't have been jumpy about friendly sex even if I had received no doxy training at all; such nonsense isn't tolerated in APs; we never learn it.

            But we never learn anything about being in a family. The very first day I was there I made us all late for tea by rolling on the floor with seven youngsters ranging from eleven down to a nappy-wetter

            plus two or three dogs and a young tomcat who had earned the name Mister Underfoot through his unusual talent for occupying all of a large floor.

            I had never experienced anything like that in all my life. I didn't want to stop.

            Brian, not Douglas, took me skiing. The ski lodges at Mount

Hutt are lovely but the bedrooms aren't heated after twenty-two and you have to snuggle up close to keep warm. Then Vickie took me out to see the family's sheep and I met socially an enhanced dog who could talk, a big collie called Lord Nelson. Lord had a low opinion of the good sense of sheep, in which he was, I think, fully justified.

            Bertie took me to Milford Sound via shuttle to Dunedin (the "Edinburgh of the South") and overnight there-Dunedin is swell but it's not Christchurch. We took a flubsy little steamer there around to the fjord country, one with tiny little cabins big enough for two only because it's cold down at the south end of the island and again I snuggled up close.

            There isn't any other fjord anywhere that can compare with Milford Sound. Yes, I've been on the Lofoten Islands trip. Very nice. But my mind's made up.

            If you think I am as blindly pigheaded about South Island as a mother is about her firstborn, that is simply because it's true; I am. North Island is a fine place, with its thermal displays and the world wonder of the Glowworm Caves. And the Bay of Islands looks like Fairyland. But North Island does not have the Southern Alps and it doesn't have Christchurch.

            Douglas took me to see their creamery and I saw huge tubs of beautiful butter being packed. Anita introduced me to the Altar Guild. I began to realize that, maybe, just possibly, I might be invited to make it permanent. And found that I had shifted from OhGod-what'll-I-do-if-they-ask-me to Oh-God-what'll-I-do-if-theydon't-ask-me and then simply to Oh-God-what'll-I-do?

            You see, I had never told Douglas that I am not human.

            I've heard humans boast that they can spot an artificial person every time. Nonsense. Of course anyone can pick out a living artifact that does not conform to human appearance-say a man creature with four arms or a kobold dwarf. But if the genetic designers have intentionally restricted themselves to human appearance (this being the technical definition of "artificial person" rather than "living artifact"), no human can tell the difference-no, not even another genetic engineer.

            I am immune to cancer and to most infections. But I don't wear a

sign saying so. I have unusual reflexes. But I won't show them off by picking a fly out of the air with thumb and forefinger. I never compete with other people in games of dexterity.

            I have unusual memory, unusual innate grasp of number and space and relationship, unusual skill at languages. But, if you think that defines a genius IQ, let me add that, in the school I was trained in, the object of an IQ test is to hit precisely a predetermined score-not to show off your smarts. In public nobody's going to catch me being smarter than those around me . . . unless it's an emergency involving either my mission or my neck or both.

            The complex of these enhancements and others is reliably reported to improve sexual performance but, fortunately, most males are inclined to regard any noticeable improvement in this area as simply a reflection of their own excellence. (Properly regarded, male vanity is a virtue, not a vice. Treated correctly, it makes him enormously pleasanter to deal with. The thing that makes Boss so infuriating is his total lack of vanity. No way to get a handle on him!)

            I was not afraid that I would be caught out. With all production laboratory identification removed from my body, even the tattoo that was on the roof of my mouth, there is simply no way to tell that I was designed rather than conceived through the bio roulette of a billion sperm competing blindly for one ovum.

            But a wife in the S-group was expected to add to that swarm of kids on the floor.

            Well, why not?

            Lots of reasons.

            I was a combat courier in a quasi-military organization. Picture me trying to cope with a sudden attack while pushing an eightmonths belly ahead of me.

            We AP females are released or marketed in a reversible sterile condition. To an artificial person the yen to have babies-grow them inside your body-doesn't seem "natural"; it seems ridiculous. In vitro seems so much more reasonable-and neater, and more convenient-than in vivo. I was as tall as I am now before I ever saw a pregnant woman near term-and I thought she was deathly ill. When I found out what was wrong with her, it made me sort of sick to my stomach. When I thought about it a long time later in Christchurch, it still made me queasy. Do it like a cat, with blood and pain fer Gossake? Why? And why do it at all? Despite the way we are filling up the sky, this giddy globe has far too many people on it-why make it worse?

            I decided, most sorrowfully, that I was going to have to duck the issue of marriage by telling them that I was sterile-no babies. True enough if not all the truth.

            I wasn't asked.

            Not about babies. For the next several days I reached out with both hands to enjoy family life as much as possible while I had it:

the warm pleasure of woman talk while washing up after tea; the rowdy fun of youngsters and pets; the quiet pleasure of gossip while gardening-these bathed every minute of my day in belonging.

            One morning Anita invited me out into the garden. I thanked her while pointing out that I was busy helping Vickie. Whereupon I was overruled and found myself seated at the far end of the garden with Anita, and children firmly shooed away.

            Anita said, "Marjorie dear"-I'm "Marjorie Baldwin" in Christchurch because that was my public name when I met Douglas in Quito-"we both know why Douglas invited you here. Are you happy with us?"

            "Terribly happy!"

            "Happy enough, do you think, to wish to make it permanent?"

            "Yes but-" I never had a chance to say Yes-but-I'm-sterile; Anita firmly cut me off.

            "Perhaps I had better say some things first, dear. We must discuss dowry. If I left it up to our men, money would never be mentioned; Albert and Brian are as dotty about you as Douglas is, and I quite understand it. But this group is a family business corporation as well as a marriage, and someone must keep an eye on the bookkeeping and that is why I am chairman of the board and chief executive; I never become so emotional that I fail to watch our businesses." She smiled and her knitting needles clicked. "Ask Brian-he calls me Ebenezer Scrooge-but he hasn't offered to take over the worries himself.

            "You can stay with us as a guest as long as you like. What's one more mouth to feed at a table as long as ours? Nothing. But if you want to join us formally and contractually, then I must become Ebenezer Scrooge and discover what contract we can write. For I won't let the family fortunes be watered down. Brian owns and votes three shares, Albert and I each own and vote two shares, Douglas and Victoria and Lispeth have one each and vote it. As you can see, I have only two votes out of ten . . . but for some years, if I threaten to resign, I suddenly receive a strong vote of confidence. Someday I'll be overruled and then I can quit and be Alice Sit-by-the-Fire." (And the funeral will be later that same day!)

"Meanwhile I cope. The children each have one nonvoting share and a child never does vote his share because it is paid to him or her in cash on leaving home, as dowry or as starting capital-or wasted although I like to think not. Such reductions in capital must be planned; were three of our girls to marry in the same year the situation could be embarrassing if not anticipated."

            I told her that it sounded like a very sensible and warm arrangement as I didn't think that most children were so carefully provided for. (In fact I didn't know anything at all about such things.)

            "We try to do right by them," she agreed. "After all, children are the purpose of a family. So I'm sure that you will see that an adult joining our group must buy a share, or the system won't work. Marriages are arranged in heaven but the bills must be paid here on earth."

            "Amen." (I could see that my problems were solved for me. Negatively. I could not estimate the wealth of the Davidson Group Family. Wealthy, that was certain, even though they lived with no servants in an old-fashioned unautomated house. Whatever it was, I could not buy a share.)

            "Douglas told us that he had no idea whether you had money or not. Money in capital amounts, I mean."

            "I don't."

            She never dropped a stitch. "Nor did I when I was your age. You are employed, are you not? Couldn't you work in Christchurch and buy your share out of your salary? I know that finding work can be a problem in a strange city . . . but I am not without connections. What do you do? You've never told us."