CONTENTS

The General Chairman paced across the soft carpeting of his office, hands clasped behind his slightly stooped back. He stopped at the wide sweep of windows that overlooked the city.

There was little of Old Messina to be seen. The original city of ancient churches and chalk-white houses bleaching in the fierce Sicilian sunlight had been all but swallowed up by the metal and glass towers of the world government—offices, assembly halls, hotels and residence buildings, shops and entertainment centers for the five million men and women who governed the world’s twenty-some billions.

In his air-conditioned, soundproofed office atop the tallest of all the towers, the General Chairman could not hear the shrill voices of the crowded streets below, nor the constant growl of cars and turbotrucks on the busy throughways.

At least we saved some of the old city, he thought. It had been one of his first successes in world politics. A small thing. But he had helped to stop the growth of the New Messina before it completely choked and killed the old city. The new city had remained the same size for nearly thirty years now.

Beyond the fishing boats at the city’s waterfront, the Straits sparkled invitingly under the sun. And beyond that, the tip of Italy’s boot, Calabria, where the peasants still prided themselves on their hard-headed stubbornness. And beyond the misty blue hills of Calabria, shimmering in the heat haze, the sterner blue of the sky was almost too bright to look at.

The old man knew it was impossible, but he thought he saw the glint of one of the big orbital stations hovering in that brilliant sky. He worked a forefinger and thumb against the bridge of his nose. It was one of those days when he felt his years.

He thought about his native Sao Paulo, how it spread like a festering sore all the way from the river to the sea, flattening hills, carving away the forest, bursting with so many people that not even the Population Control Center’s computers could keep track of them. No sane man would willingly enter the heart of Sao Paulo, or any large city on Earth. No human being could live in the teeming guts of a city and keep his sanity.

How hard they had worked to save the cities! How hard they had worked to make the world safe and stable.

And now this.

The desk top intercom chimed.

“Yes?” The Chairman automatically switched from the Portuguese of his thoughts to the English of the world government.

His secretary sensed his mood. Her face was somber instead of showing its usual cheerfulness. “They’re here, sir.”

Nodding, “Very well. Send them in.”

Six men and two women filed into the spacious office and took seats at the conference table. The women sat together up at the end closest to the windows, next to the head chair. They carried no papers, no briefcases. Each place at the table had a tiny intercom and viewscreen that linked with the central computer.

They are young and vital, thought the Chairman. They know what must be done and they have the strength to do it. As soon as all this is settled, I shall retire.

Reluctantly he took his place at the head of the glistening mahogany table. The others remained silent, waiting for him to speak. The only sound was the faintest whir of the computer’s recording spool.

He cleared his throat. “Good morning. Last Monday we discussed this situation and you made your recommendation. I asked you to consider possible alternatives. From the looks on your faces, it seems that no suitable alternative has been found.”

They all turned to the stocky, round-faced Minister of Security, Vassily Kobryn. He had the look of an athlete to him: tanned skin, short, wiry brown hair, big in the shoulders and arms.

Shifting in his chair self-consciously, Kobryn said, “I see I have-been elected the hatchet man.” His voice was deep and strong, with barely a trace of a Slavic accent. “All right... it was my idea, originally. We looked at all the possibilities and ran each case on the computers. The only safe way is to put them in exile. Permanently.”

“Siberia,” one of the women muttered.

“No, not Siberia.” Kobryn took her literally. “It’s too heavily populated. Too many cities and dome farms for an effective exile. No, the only place is the new space station. It’s large enough and it can be kept completely isolated.”

Rolf Bernard, the Minister of Finance, shook his head. “I still disagree. Two thousand of the world’s leading scientists...”

“Plus their wives and families,” the Chairman added.

“What would you prefer?” Kobryn snapped. “A bullet in each of their heads? Or would you leave them alone and let them smash everything that we have worked for?”

“Perhaps if we talked with them...”

“That won’t work,” said Eric Mottern, the taciturn Minister of Technology. “Even if they tried to cooperate with us, you can’t stop ideas from leaking out. And once this genetic engineering idea gets loose...”

“The world is turned upside down,” the Chairman said. He spoke softly, but everyone heard him. With a sigh, he confessed, “I have also been thinking about the problem. I have also tried to find alternatives. There are none. Exile is the only permissible answer.”

“Then it is agreed. Good!” said Kobryn.

“No, not good,” the General Chairman said. “Very far from good. When we do this thing, we admit failure. We admit fear—yes, terror. We are terrified of a new idea, a new scientific discovery. The government of the world, the protectors of peace and stability, must stoop to exiling some of the world’s finest minds. This is a horrible state of affairs. Truly horrible.”

2

Lou Christopher leaned back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk: his favorite position for thinking. In his lap he held a small tablet and a pen. Although he was both worried and puzzled, his face showed neither of these emotions. He was frowning and looked more angry than anything else.

Through the plastiglass partition that made up one wall of his small office, Lou could see Ramo, the Institute’s main computer, flashing its console lights as it worked.

“Come on, Ramo,” he muttered to himself, “get it right this time.”

Lou tapped the pen on the tablet and watched the little viewscreen on his desk. It was blank. Then...

“I’m sorry,” Ramo said in a warm baritone voice from the overhead speaker, “but the possible permutations are still three orders of magnitude beyond my programming instructions.”

“Three orders!”

“I can proceed with the existing matrix, or await further programming.” Ramo’s voice sounded neither worried nor puzzled. Not happy nor angry. He was simply stating facts.

Lou tossed the pen back onto the desk and slammed his feet to the floor. The tablet fell off his lap.

“Still three orders of magnitude to go. Lou shook his head, then glanced at his wristwatch. It was already nine A.M.

“I’m waiting for instructions,” Ramo said calmly. You and your instructions can both... Lou caught himself, realizing that the computer wasn’t at fault. There were millions upon millions of branching pathways in the human genetic code. It was simply going to take more time to get them all programmed properly.

Shrugging, he said, “Okay, Ramo, looks like we’ve got a full day ahead of us.”

Ramo said nothing, but somehow Lou felt that the computer nodded in agreement.

Lou got up and walked out of the office, past the computer’s humming, light-blinking main console, out into the hall. He got a cup of water from the cooler, gulped it down as he looked out the hallway window at the New Mexico morning outside. It had been barely dawn when Lou drove to the Institute. Now it was full daylight, bright and cloudless.

Half the gliders have already taken off, Lou thought glumly. I just won’t make this race. Better call Bonnie.

Tossing the plastic cup into the recycling slot in the wall, Lou went back to his office, plopped tiredly into his cushioned chair, and punched the phone button on the desk top.

“Bonnie Sterne,” he said. “She’s not at home, you’ll have to use her pocket phone.”

It took a few seconds, then Bonnie’s face appeared on the viewscreen. Behind her, Lou could see people bustling around in a crowded room. She must be in the Control Center, Lou thought. Sure enough, he heard the muted thunder of one of the big gliders’ takeoff rockets.

“Lou! When are you getting out here? I’ve asked the judges to postpone your takeoff time, but...”

He put up his hands. “Better tell them to scratch me. Can’t make it today. Probably not tomorrow, either.”

“Oh no.” Bonnie looked genuinely heartbroken. She was blonde and had light gray eyes, but the finely-etched bone structure of her face always reminded Lou faintly of an Indian’s. Maybe it was the high cheekbones, or the cast of her eyes. Maybe she had some Apache blood in her. Lou had always meant to ask but somehow never did.

“Isn’t there any way you can get out of it?” she asked. “Can’t some of the other programmers do it?”

Lou shook his head. “You know they can’t. I’m just as sorry as you are. I’ve been working toward this race all year. But Kaufman needs this stuff by Monday. The whole Institute’s depending on it.”

“I know,” Bonnie admitted, biting her lower lip. Lou knew that she was trying to figure some way—

“Listen!” she said, suddenly bright again. “Why don’t I come down and work with you? Maybe we can finish the programming in time for taking off tomorrow—”

“Thanks, but there’s not much you can do. It looks like I’ll have to work all night, at least. So I won’t be in much shape for flying tomorrow.”

Her expression dimmed once more. “It’s just not fair. You have to work all weekend... and this is the biggest race of the year.”

“I know. But genetics comes before racing,” Lou said. “You have a good weekend. See you Monday.”

“All right. But it’s really unfair.”

“Yeah. So long.”

“So... oh, wait! There was a man out here looking for you. Said he was a Federal marshal.”

Lou blinked at her. “A what?”

“A Federal marshal. He wanted to see you.”

“What for?”

Bonnie shook her head. “I thought marshals were only something in Western stories.”

With a grin, Lou said, “Well, we’re out in the West, you know.”

“But he said he was from New York.”

Shrugging, “Well, if he’s looking for me, I’ll be right here all day.”

“If he comes around again, I’ll tell him.”

“All right.” Suddenly curious, Lou asked, “Did he say what he wanted? Why does he want to see me?”

“I don’t know,” Bonnie replied.

After Bonnie signed off, Lou plunged back into work, doing intricate mathematics problems with Ramo’s help and then programming the results into the computer’s memory banks. When he looked at his watch again, it was well past noon. He walked down to the cafeteria and took a sandwich and a steaming cup of coffee from the automatic dispensers. The cafeteria was practically empty: only a few of the weekend clean-up crew at the tables.

The scientific staffs out enjoying the weekend,—Lou grumbled to himself. Well, guess they can’t do much until I finish programming Ramo.

He took the plastic-sealed sandwich and coffee back to his office. As he got there, he saw Greg Belsen standing by the computer’s main console, watching the big display viewscreen there as it flashed a series of colored drawings and graphs at eyeblink speed.

“What are you doing in here today?” Lou asked.

Greg turned and grinned at him. “Thought you might be lonesome, old buddy, How’s it going?”

Lou jabbed a finger toward the viewscreen. “See for yourself. We’re still three orders of magnitude off.”

Greg gave a low whistle. “That close?”

“Close? It sounds pretty blinking far to me.”

Greg laughed. He had an infectious giggle, like a ten-year-old boy’s, that was known throughout the Institute. “You’re just sore because there’s still more work to do. But if you stop to think of where we were six months ago, when you started this modeling program...”

“Yeah, maybe,” Lou admitted. “But there’s still a long way to go.”

They walked back into Lou’s office together. Greg Belsen was one of the Institute’s bright, aggressive young biochemists. He was just short of six feet tall, slightly bigger than Lou. He was lean and flat-gutted from playing tennis and handball, two of the favorite, socially useful sports. Like Lou, Greg had straight dark hair. But his face was roundish and his eyes brown. Lou had more angular features and blue eyes.

“Is there anything I can do to help out?” Greg asked, taking the extra straight-backed chair in Lou’s office. “I know you wanted to get to those glider races today—”

Lou sank into the desk chair. “No, there’s nobody around here who can program this stuff into Ramo as fast as I can. And Kaufman wants it for Monday morning.”

Nodding, Greg said, “I know.”

“Is it really that important?”

Greg smiled at him. “I’m not a geneticist, like Kaufman. But I know this—what you’re doing now, this zygote modeling, is a crucial step. Until we have it down cold, there’s no hope of genetic engineering in any practical sense. But once you’ve taught Ramo all the ins and outs of the human genetic code, the way is clear. We can be turning out supermen within a year.”

Lou leaned back in his chair. “Yeah... that’s what Kaufman said.”

“You’re the crucial man,” Greg said. “Everything depends on you... and your electronic partner.”

Not bad for a kid from a hick college, Lou thought to himself.

“Well,” Greg said, getting up, “if there’s nothing I can do to help, I can at least get out of your way. Guess I’ll go see how Big George’s doing.”

Lou nodded and started to sort through the papers on his desk.

With a grin, Greg added, “Maybe I’ll take Bonnie out to dinner... seeing’s how you’ve stood her up.”

“Hey! Hands off!”

He laughed. “Relax pal. Relax. I don’t go poaching. Got a few girls of my own, hidden under rocks here and there.”

“Hmph,” said Lou.

“But if you can tear yourself away from Ramo for an hour or so, might be a good idea for you to take Bonnie out for dinner. The kid’s worked just as hard as you have to get your glider ready for this race, you know. Be a shame to leave her alone all weekend.”

“Yeah,” Lou agreed. “Maybe I will.”

But as soon as Greg left, Lou went back to work. He didn’t think about Bonnie or flying or anything else except matching the myriad possible permutations of the human genetic code and storing the knowledge in Ramo’s magnetic core memory. It was late afternoon when he was startled out of his concentration by a hard rap on his office door.

Looking up from his paper-strewn desk, Lou saw the door open and a hard-looking, thick-bodied older man stepped in heavily.

“Louis Christopher, I have a Federal warrant for your arrest.”

3

With mounting anger, Lou asked a thousand questions as the marshal took him from the Institute in a black, unmarked turbocar. The marshal answered none of them, replying only:

“My orders are to bring you in. You’ll find out what it’s all about soon enough.”

They drove to a small private airfield as the fat red sun dipped toward the desert horizon. A sleek, twin-engined jet was waiting.

“Now wait a minute!” Lou shouted as the car pulled up beside the plane. “I know my rights. You can’t...”

But the marshal wasn’t listening to any arguments. He slid out from behind the steering wheel of the car and gestured impatiently toward the jet. Lou got out of the car and looked around. In the lengthening shadows of late afternoon, the airfield seemed deserted. There must be somebody in the control tower. But Lou could see no one around the plane, or the hangars, or the smaller planes lined UD neatly on the edge of the taxi apron.

“This is crazy,” he said.

The marshal hitched a thumb toward the jet again. Shrugging, Lou walked to the open hatch and climbed in. No one else was aboard the plane. The four plush seats in the passenger compartment were empty. The flight deck was closed off from view. As soon as the marshal locked the main hatch and they were both strapped into their seats, the jet engines whined to life and the plane took off.

They flew so high that the sun climbed well back into the afternoon sky. Lou watched the jet’s wings slide back for supersonic flight, and then they arrowed eastward with the red sun casting long shadows on the ground, far below. The marshal seemed to be sleeping, so Lou had nothing to do but watch the country slide beneath the plane. They crossed the Rockies, so far below them that they looked more like wrinkles than real mountains. The Mississippi was a tortured gray snake weaving from horizon to horizon. Still the plane streaked on, fast enough to race the sunset.

The sun was still slightly above the horizon when the plane touched down at JFK jetport. Lou had been there once before and recognized it from the air. But their jet taxied to a far corner of the sprawling field, and stopped in front of a waiting helicopter.

The marshal was awake now, and giving orders again. Lou glared at him, but followed his directions. They went out of the jet, across a few meters of cracked grass-invaded cement, and up into the plastic bubble of the copter. Lou sat down on the back bench behind the empty pilot’s seat. The marshal climbed in heavily and sat beside him, wheezing slightly.

Over the whir of the whizzing rotors and the nasal hum of the electric motor, Lou shouted:

“Just where are you taking me? What’s this all about?”

The marshal shook his head, slammed the canopy hatch shut, and reached between the two front seats to punch a button on the control panel. The motor hummed louder and the copter jerked up off the ground.

By the time the helicopter flashed over the skyline of Manhattan, Lou was furious.

“Why won’t you tell me anything?” he shouted at the marshal, sitting beside him on the back bench. He was leaning back with his burly arms folded across his chest and his sleepy eyes half closed.

“Listen, kid, the phone woke me up at four this morning. I had to race out to the jetport and fly to Albuquerque. I spent half the day waiting for you at that silly glider race. Then I drove to your apartment, and you didn’t show up there. Then I went to your lab. Know what my wife and kids are doing right now? They’re sitting home, wondering whether I’m dead or alive and why we’re not all out on the picnic we planned. Know how many picnics we can afford, on a marshal’s pay? Been planning this one all year—had a spot in the upstate park reserved months ago. Now it’s going to waste while I hotfoot all across the country after you. So don’t ask questions, understand?”

Then he added, “Besides, I don’t know what it’s all about. I just got the word to pick up you up, that’s all.”

In a softer voice, Lou said, “Well, look... I’m sorry about your picnic. I didn’t know— Never had a Federal marshal after me before. But why can’t I call anybody? My friends’ll be worried about me. My girl...”

“I told you, don’t ask questions.” The marshal closed his eyes altogether.

Lou frowned. He started to ask where they were going, then thought better of it. The copter was circling over the East River now, close to the old United Nations buildings. It started to descend toward a landing pad next to the tall graceful tower of marble and glass. In the last, blood-red light of the dying sun, Lou could see that the buildings were stained by nearly a century of soot and grime. The windows were caked with dirt, the once-beautiful marble was cracked and patched.

Two men were standing down on the landing pad, off to one side, away from the downwash of the rotors. As soon as the copter’s wheels touched the blacktop, the cabin hatch popped open.

“Out you go,” said the marshal.

Lou jumped out lightly. The marshal reached over and yanked the door shut before Lou could turn around. The copter’s motor whined, and off it lifted in a spray of dust and grit. Lou pulled his head down and squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them again, the copter was speeding down the river.

Sun’s down now, Lou thought. He’ll never make it in time for his picnic.

The two men were walking briskly toward Lou, their shoes scuffing the blacktop. One of them was small and slim, Latin-looking. Probably Puerto Rican. The breeze from the river flicked at his black hair. The other somehow looked like a foreigner. His suit wasn’t exactly odd, but it didn’t look exactly right, either. He was big, blond, Nordic-looking.

“Please come with us,” said the Norseman. And sure enough, he had the flat twang of a Scandinavian accent. “It is my duty to inform you that we are both armed, and escape is impossible.”

“Escape from what?” Lou started to feel exasperated again.

“Please,” said the Puerto Rican softly. “It is getting dark. We should not remain outside any longer. This way, please.”

Well, they’re polite enough, at least.

Inside, the UN building looked a little better. The corridor they walked down was clean, at least. But the carpeting was threadbare and faded with a century’s worth of footsteps. They took a spacious elevator car, paneled with peeling wood, up a dozen floors. Then another corridor, and finally into a small room.

“Dr. Kirby!”

Sitting on a sofa at the other side of the little room was Dr. John Kirby of Columbia-Brookhaven University. He was in his mid-fifties—white-haired, nervously thin, pinched face with a bent out-thrust nose that gave him the title “Hawk” behind his back.

“I’m sorry,” Kirby said. “I don’t seem to recall...”

“Louis Christopher,” said Lou, as his two escorts shut the door and left him alone with Dr. Kirby. “We met at the Colorado conference last spring, remember?”

Kirby made a vague gesture with his hands. “There are always so many people at these conferences—”

Lou sat on the sofa beside him. “I gave a paper oh computer modeling for forecasting genetic adjustments. You had a question from the floor about the accuracy of the forecasts. Afterward we had lunch together.”

“Oh yes. The computer fellow. You’re not a geneticist.” Kirby’s eyes still didn’t seem to really recognize Lou.

“Do you have any idea of what this is all about?” Lou asked.

Kirby shook his head. He seemed dazed, out of it. Lou looked around the room. It was comfortable enough: a sofa, two deep contour chairs, a bookshelf full of tape spools, a viewscreen set into the wall. No windows, though. Lou got up and went to the door. Locked.

Turning back to Kirby, he saw that the old man’s face was sunk in his hands. Did they drug him?

“Are you okay?” Lou asked.

“What... oh, yes... I’m all right. Merely... well, frankly, I’m frightened.”

“Of what?”

Kirby fluttered his hands again. “I... I don’t know. I don’t know why we’re here, or what they want to do with us. That’s what frightens me. They won’t let me call my wife or even a lawyer—”

Lou paced the room in a few strides. “They grabbed me at the Institute. They wouldn’t let me call anybody, either. Nobody knows I’m here.” Back to the door he paced. “Why are they doing this? What have we done? What’s it all about?”

Abruptly the door opened. The same two men stood in the corridor. “You will come with us, please.”

Kirby started to stand up. But Lou said, “No I won’t. Not until you tell us what this is all about. You can’t arrest us and push us around like this. I want to talk...”

The Norseman pulled a needle-thin gun from his tunic. It was so small that his hand hid all of it except the slim barrel. But the muzzle looked as big as a cannon to Lou, because it was pointed straight at him.

“Please, Mr. Christopher. We have no desire to use force. You are not technically under arrest, therefore you have no need for a lawyer. However, you are wanted for questioning at government headquarters in Messina. It would be best if you cooperate.”

“Messina? In Sicily?”

The blond nodded.

“But... my family,” Kirby said in a shaky voice.

“They have been informed,” said the Puerto Rican. “No harm will come if you cooperate with us.”

With a shrug, Lou headed into the corridor. The Norseman tucked his gun back inside his tunic. The four of them walked slowly down toward the elevator, their footsteps clicking on the bare plastic floors and echoing off the walls. When they got to the elevator, the Puerto Rican touched the DOWN button and instantly the elevator doors slid open.

This building’s empty except for us! Lou realized.

He stepped into the elevator, then whirled, grabbed the Puerto Rican and hurled him into the Norseman. They went down in a tangle of arms and legs, shouting. Lou punched the DOOR CLOSE button and yelled to Kirby:

“Come on!”

Kirby stood frozen, his jaw hanging open, as the doors started to slide shut. The Norseman was still on the floor, but he had pushed the Puerto Rican off and was reaching for his gun. The doors shut. Lou pushed the GROUND button and the elevator started down. He could hear somebody pounding on the metal doors at the floor above.

On the ground floor he tried to retrace his steps back to the corridor landing pad outside. He got lost in the corridors, finally saw an EXIT sign, and banged through the doors. It was full night outside, dark and damp-cool, with the ripe acrid smell of the garbage-choked river a sudden shock to Lou’s senses. The city was almost completely dark; only a few lights shone, mostly high up in skyscrapers where people had their own power generators and had barricaded themselves in for the night.

He heard footsteps and flattened himself into the deeper shadows along the wall.

“Shall we turn the lights on?” The Norseman’s voice.

“And attract every gang of pack rats on the East Side?” the Puerto Rican answered. “You don’t know this city very well. He’ll never live out the night alone. Either he’ll come begging at our doors inside an hour, or he’ll be dead. No one can get through a night on these streets alone.”

“My orders are to bring them to Messina unharmed,” said the Norseman.

“You want to search for him? Out there? You’ll be killed, too.”

They said no more. Lou could sense the Norseman shaking his head, not satisfied, but not willing to risk his own skin against the city streets. Lou heard a door click shut. He slid along the wall carefully and found the door he had come through. It was locked from the inside.

He turned away and looked at the city again with new understanding. He was alone in the city.

And the night had just begun.

4

Lou hunkered down on his heels, resting his back against the rough wall, and tried to think. He could bang on the door until they came and got him. Then he’d be safe enough. The Norseman might jab him with a sleeping drug, but probably nothing worse. Then they’d take him to Messina. But why.’ And where was Bonnie? Had they taken her, too?

And why should he let them pull him around by the nose, Lou asked himself with mounting anger. They had no right to take him here. Who do they think they’re pushing around, a frail old professor like Kirby?

But—out here alone in the city! Lou remembered his high school days in Maryland, when the best way to show you had guts was to sneak into the city at night. Of course, you always went with your friends, never less than a dozen guys. And now that he thought about it, Lou realized that despite their loud claims of bravery they never went deeper than a few blocks into the outskirts of Baltimore. Then back to the friendly hills of Hagerstown, as fast as their cars could take them. And still John Milford had been killed on that one trip. Lou remembered tripping over his mutilated body as he ran for his car that night. It still made him shiver.

And this was New York, the heart of it at that! The closest place to civilization and safety was the old JFK jetport, out on Long Island someplace.

If l can get to the jetport in one piece, Lou reasoned, I can get back to Albuquerque. Maybe Bonnie’s waiting for me there.

But how to get to the jetport?

As he sat there wondering, Lou heard the distant whisper of a turbocar. He paid no attention to it at first, but gradually it grew louder and louder. A car! In the city, at night. Can I get it to stop for me?

No doubt of it, the whine of the turbine was much closer, coming this way. Lou got up and walked across the blacktopped courtyard, heading for the sound. Far off to his left he saw a glimmer of light. Moving toward him! He ran to the railing that bordered the courtyard. There was a sunken roadway beyond the railing, and down below Lou could see the lights of the approaching car. The roadbed was patched and rough, but apparently some cars still used it.

Lou leaned over the railing and tried to wave at the speeding turbocar. It roared right past him, making his ears pop with the scream of its engine echoing off the walls of the sunken throughway. A puff of hot, grit-laden, kerosene-smelling air blew into his face.

Maybe if I get down to the road I can get somebody to stop and pick me up.

In the darkness left by the passing car, Lou could barely make out a pedestrian bridge spanning the road, down at the end of the courtyard. He trotted to it. A wire screen fence blocked access to it, but Lou scrambled over it like a kid sneaking into a playground after it had been closed for the night.

He crossed the bridge and found himself on the sidewalk of an empty city street. There’s got to be a stairway down to the road someplace along here, he told himself. He started walking along the street. In the darkness, he stumbled over a bottle and sent it clattering across the pavement. The noise made the city’s silence seem more ominous. Lou got up and went on, keeping his eyes on the roadway. The city seemed deserted. But Lou realized that there were people all around him, by the tens of millions. Most of them were barricaded in for the night, terrified of those who roamed the dark. And the rest...

Another car raced by, coming up the other way. Lou didn’t bother waving. The driver couldn’t see him from down on the road. Besides, Lou was beginning to understand that no driver in his right mind would stop to pick up anybody in the heart of the city. It was enough of a chance to drive through the East Side. If the car should break down or have an accident...

Maybe if they see I’m wearing a flight suit, Lou tried to convince himself, they’d stop for me.

“Goin’ somep’ace?”

The voice was like a knife through him. Lou jerked around, startled. A scrawny kid, dressed in rags, was grinning toothily at him.

“Coin’ somep’ace?” he repeated.

“Uh... I’m lost. I’m trying to find my way—”

Another voice called from the darkness across the street, “Whatcha got, Pimple?”

“Buck in a funny suit, sez he’s losted.”

A trio of kids stepped out of the shadows and crossed to where Lou stood, frozen.

“Funny suit,” said the one in the middle, the shortest of them all. None of them came up to Lou’s shoulder. They were all wearing rags, barefoot, gaunt, scrawny, with the hard, hungry look of starving old men set into the faces of children.

The one in the middle seemed to be the leader. He eyed Lou carefully, then asked, “Got a pass?”

“What?”

“Yer on Peeler turf. Got a pass t’go through?”

“Well... no....”

The leader broke into a cackling laugh. “Humpin” right you ain’t! Nobody gets a pass, ‘cept from me, and I don’t give ‘em!” All four of them laughed.

Then the leader asked, “How much skin on ya?”

“I don’t understand....”

“Skin, leaves, pages, paper, bread----”

“Oh, you mean money,” Lou realized. He shook his head. “Nothing. I don’t carry...”

Something exploded in the small of his back. Lou sagged down to his knees, pain screaming through him. The leader stepped up in front of him. Lou had to look up now to see into his hard, glittering eyes.

“I...”

Smiling, the leader rocked back deliberately and then swung his fist into Lou’s mouth. One of the other boys kicked Lou in the chest and he toppled over backward gasping for breath, his mouth suddenly filled with blood, tiny bright lights flashing in his eyes.

He felt their hands on him, ripping open the zips of his suit,

tearing at the fabric. They rolled him over, face down on the filthy sidewalk. They pulled off his boots.

They were talking among themselves now, muttering and giggling. Lou’s mouth felt numb and puffy. His back and ribs flamed with pain when he tried to move, but he forced his breathing back to normal, fought his way back up to a crouching position.

“Honest buck, ain’t cha?” the leader said, grinning. “No skin, tol’truth. But boots is somethin’ ta howl for. Big fer me, but I’ll stuff ‘em with paper or somethin’.”

Lou stayed in his crouch and rubbed at the fast-caking blood on his chin. The four boys were ranged in a half-circle around him, looking very big now as they stood over him.

“Okay,” said the leader. “How we gonna get rid of ‘im?” The kid on Lou’s left flicked a knife open and started giggling.

Lou uncoiled and slammed straight into the leader, bowling him over, and raced away. He pounded down the darkened street, rounded a corner, and ran as fast as he could, blindly, away from them. Something sharp bit into one bare foot but Lou kept going, heart pounding, sweat pouring all over him. “A hunt, a hunt!” he heard someone shouting from behind him.

And then the leader’s unmistakable voice, “Peelers! A hunt!” Other voices shouted up ahead, and from a side street too. Lou pulled up short. There was an alley to his right. Dead end, most likely. He walked, slowly and quietly now, past the alley and toward the corner of the street up ahead. He could feel himself trembling. The pain was buried now beneath the fear. From down the street he heard the scrabbling sounds of barefooted kids walking swiftly toward him.

“Try that alley,” somebody said, half a block behind him in the darkness.

Lou turned the corner and started running again. He lost track of time. Minutes and hours blurred together. Lou only knew that he was running, hunted like a rare gazelle—or more like a meat animal being chased by a pack of wolves. Whenever he stopped, he heard their voices behind him, off to the side, ahead, out of the shadows, everywhere.

He tried to get into the buildings, but the doors were locked.

Many of them sealed with heavy metal screens. Some were electrified, and Lou picked up a handful of burned fingers before he stopped trying the darkened doorways.

“Hey, head ‘im off... don’t let ‘im get across the avenya!”

Lou looked up ahead. There were lights glowing a few blocks up the street. One of the main avenues, still lighted? Lights meant civilization, and civilization meant safety. Lou started running toward the lights.

“Hey, there he goes! Get “im!”

Feet were pounding behind him, getting closer. From around a corner, two boys appeared, knives in hand. Lou swerved out into the middle of the street. When they raced to meet him, he cut back again in his best touch-football style. One of the boys slipped trying to reach him, and Lou planted a running kick on the other one’s midsection so hard that the kid bounced halfway across the street.

The lights, the lights. He had to get to the lights. They were right behind him. A knife whizzed past his head and clattered on the trash-strewn pavement. Lou’s lungs were in flames, his heartbeat a deafening roar in his ears. Something grabbed at his waist. He swung around and backhanded viciously. A little kid, no more than eight or nine, spurted blood from his nose as his head snapped back from Lou’s blow. He looked afraid and angry and surprised, all at once. Lou grabbed him by the hair and pulled him off, tossed him into the next teenager coming at him, and then sprinted out into the brightly lit avenue.

“Hold it!” roared the leader. “Stop. Don’ cross th’ line.”

Lou stood in the middle of the broad avenue, chest raw and heaving, ears bursting with the hot drumfire of his pulse, legs shaking with fatigue. The kids of the gang bunched together on the sidewalk.

“Good run, funnyman,” said the leader. “Lotsa luck.” Then he raised his hand.

Lou saw a knife in that hand, saw the leader snap it forward in a quick throw, saw the knife fly through the air toward him. He jumped back, toward the far side of the street. The knife hit point first on the blacktopped street and stuck there, quivering. Now the other boys were slowly reaching for their knives, getting ready to throw.

Stumbling, nearly unconscious from exertion, Lou backpedaled and then turned and staggered to the pavement on the other side of the avenue. Back away from the lights into the shadows of a doorway. The kids merely stood on the opposite sidewalk, laughing and standing there, as if waiting for something to happen.

A pair of hands grabbed Lou’s arms. “Whatcha want, pinkey?”

Lou never thought he would do it, but he fainted.

5

Lou woke up. He was in a room, on the floor. A single, naked bulb up in the ceiling glared at him. A half-dozen kids were standing around him. Black kids. Another gang.

He pulled himself up slowly to a sitting position. Every part of his body ached horribly.

The only furniture in the room was an antique wooden school desk and chair, battered and carved with hundreds of initials. On the wall behind the desk was some sort of old poster showing a huge lion leaping through a ring of fire. The top of the poster had been ripped away. Lou could make out the words...EST SHOW ON EARTH, APRIL I5 to 29. It didn’t make any sense to him.

And then he focused on the black man sitting at the desk. He was immense, the biggest man Lou had ever seen. He must have weighed three hundred pounds or more. And he wasn’t fat: just huge, giant muscles on a mountainous frame. He looked completely out of proportion to the rickety desk as he sat squeezed in behind it, looming over it and Lou. The only clothing Lou could see was an open vest. His black skin gleamed in the glare of the overhead lamp. It was hard to tell how old he was he could have been in his early twenties or ten years older.

He was talking to one of the other boys, ignoring Lou’s puzzled stare.

“... only way’s gonna be to give ‘im back. Otherwise the peace ‘tween us an’ the Peelers gonna get busted wide open.”

“He’s ours,” the other boy answered hotly. “They lost ‘im an’ we got ‘im. Makes ‘im ours, right?”

The boys muttered agreement.

“You want the Peelers comin’ up here after ‘im? Ready to fight the whole pack of ’em? Tonight? ‘Sides, he ain’t got nothin’ on ‘im, he ain’t worth keepin’!”

Lou realized they were talking about him. “Hey, wait a minute—”

“Shuddup, pinkey!” A toe nudged his tender back. Lou winced and closed his mouth.

“Naw, wait,” said the giant, looking down at Lou. “Know where you are, white man?”

Lou shook his head.

Smiling from the desk, “You’re in the secret headquarters of the Top Cats. I am N’Gai Felix Leo, president of the Top Cats, You may call me Felix, for short.” Felix spoke very slowly and carefully, in precise English, for Lou. The way a teacher would speak to a backward child.

“Apparently,” he went on, “you stumbled into our turf when the Peelers were chasing you a little while ago. We are now discussing whether we should give you back to the Peelers or deal with you ourselves.”

“Deal with me?” Lou echoed.

“Kill ya,” snapped a tall, lanky kid.

Felix shook his head and grasped the edges of the desk in his massive hands. “Zonk, whyn’t you keep shut?” he said to the kid who had spoken. Turning back to Lou, “You can’t stay here. You can’t join our gang, for obvious reasons. If we let you go free, the Peelers would take it as an unfriendly gesture and they might start a war with us.”

“Them whitesheets,” Zonk muttered.

“My friends don’t like to admit it,” Felix said, his voice rising ever so slightly, “but we are in no shape for a war against the Peelers. They outnumber us badly, and they can call in a half a dozen other gangs as allies.”

“An’ we c’n get all uptown to come on our side!” Zonk shouted.

“Yeah, an’ turn the whole city into a battleground?” Felix countered. “Been enough o’ that, you fool. We gotta work out somethin’ better... least, ‘til we’re strong enough t’stand up t’the Peelers.”

“Look,” said Lou, “all I want is to get to the jetport before the police block it off—”

“Police?" Zonk flashed. “Helmet heads? After your…”

“Not the tac brigades... Federal marshal... and some world government people—”

They all stared at him blankly; none of them had the vaguest idea of what Lou was talking about.

Except for Felix. “Why are they after you?”

Lou shrugged. “They won’t tell me.”

Zonk laughed. “Since when the helmet heads tell you why they crackin’ your skull? They jus’ do it, tha’sall! You find out later in the hospital... if you make it that far!”

“If I don’t get to the jetport before dawn, they’ll probably be waiting for me when I do arrive,” Lou said.

Felix shook his head again. “You’re not getting to JFK either before dawn or after it. We can’t let you go, the Peelers would get sore at us.”

“You’re just a kneeler!” Zonk yelled. “A chicken, scared o’ them damn Peelers!”

Felix’s face went unimaginably hard. His eyes slitted, like a cat’s. Slowly, ponderously, he rose from his chair and stepped out from behind the desk on legs the size of tree trunks. Zonk glanced around at the other boys, then backed away a step.

“We been friends,” Felix said as he advanced like a tide, engulfing the room. His voice was low, menacing. “So I’m gonna give you one chance t’take back that mouth. Now!”

“I... I... I’m sorry,” Zonk stammered. “I got sore—”

“Am I a kneeler?” Felix was towering over the skinny boy, scarcely a centimeter away from him. He seemed to surround Zonk.

“No... no, you ain’t.”

“Am I afraid of anything or anyone on this Earth?”

“No. Nothin’ or nobody.”

Before he could even think of what he was saying, Lou heard his own voice call out, “Then you’re not afraid of helping me get to JFK.”

Everybody froze. The room went absolutely silent. No one even breathed, it seemed to Lou. Least of all Lou himself. He sat there on the floor, the other boys ranged around him staring open-mouthed, with Felix off to one side, back turned as he confronted the petrified Zonk.

Very, very slowly, Felix turned toward Lou. The grimy floorboards squeaked under him. His face was still as flat and hard as the face on the lion in the poster.

“What did you say?”

I’m dead either way, Lou told himself. Aloud, he answered, “If you’re not afraid of anything or anybody, then you’re not afraid of helping me get to the jetport. Tonight. Now.”

Felix stared at Lou for a long moment, grim, unblinking. Then slowly his mouth opened and he began chuckling. The chuckle deepened into a laugh, a strong laugh that shook the room. The other kids started laughing, too.

“You’re something, white man... really something, calling me out like that.” Felix roared laughter and went back toward the desk. “You got guts... not much brains, maybe, but plenty guts.” He dropped back on the chair so hard that Lou felt sure it would crack under him.

Felix shook his head, still laughing. “So you’re trying to dare me into helping you. That’s a jolt, a real jolt.”

Lou got to his feet. “Okay, so it’s funny. Either help me or kill me or let me go. Take your pick.”

Waving a heavy hand, Felix said, “Man, you must have some black blood in you someplace. You got guts, all right. Look... if I let you go, you’ll get killed before daybreak, y’know? If I help you, it’ll start a war. But... shoot, baby it’s going to be hard to kill you when you got the guts to dare me.”

He turned to Zonk. “Go get us a car.”

“You gonna...”

“Mari wants t’see JFK,” Felix said to them. “I ain’t seen th’ place myself for years. You ever see it?”

Zonk, wide-eyed, shook his head.

“You ready to fight a war when we get back?”

Zonk nodded. So did the others.

“Okay... get a car. Maybe we’ll stop uptown on our way back, bring down some reinforcements. Show th’ Peelers they gotta think twice ‘fore they start a war.”

“Now you’re talkin’,” Zonk said, and he headed for the doorway.

The car was an ancient two-door, crumbling with rust, dented, upholstery ripped, automatic guidance long wrecked, lights defective, radio gone. But it ran. It shook and rattled and whined, but it ran.

They were sputtering down the throughway, air shrilling through ill-fitting windows. Zonk was curled up on the back seat, sleeping. Lou wanted to doze off, too. He ached from his scalp to his bare feet. One foot was throbbing from a cut he had picked up somewhere. But he couldn’t sleep. His insides were still as taut as a scream of terror.

They had gone across a bridge, and now the throughway was elevated. The horizon in front of them was just starting to turn gray. The buildings here seemed to be lower and not as closely bunched as back in Manhattan.

Felix was jammed in behind the wheel. He laughed softly. “Man, some people sure lucky. You got guts all right, but better than that, you got luck.”

Lou looked at him. Somehow, in this flat, cold gray of early morning, Felix seemed different.

“Still haven’t figured it out, have you?” Felix asked him.

“I don’t understand—”

He squirmed around in the too-small bucket seat and glanced over his shoulder at Zonk, who was still sound asleep.

Then he said to Lou, “You think you just talked your way out of being killed by a teen pack? Just like that?” He laughed.

6

Lou stared at Felix, who merely chuckled to himself and said no more. Then the towers and hangars of JFK became visible in the predawn glow. Felix pulled the car off the highway and onto an access road.

“What’s the matter?” Lou asked.

“Better get ourselves prettied up if we expect to get past the gates at the jetport.”

They pulled into the parking lot of an automated, all-night shopping center. Felix woke up Zonk and the three of them walked to the shoppers’ mall. Lou’s foot was throbbing painfully.

The mall doors were locked, but there was a tiny security unit set into the wall beside them. Lou told his credit number to the receiver grille and let the camera photograph him.

“This credit number is from Albuquerque, New Mexico,” said the shopping center computer, impassively. “It will require several moments to check it.”

Felix said, “We’ll wait.”

“If the police are really looking for me,” Lou worried out loud, “they’ll have my credit number and picture pulled from the file and ...”

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” the computer said without a trace of regret. “Your credit check is complete. You may enter and purchase whatever you wish, up to a limit of ten thousand dollars.”

Felix beamed. “Just what I’ve always wanted... a friend with a good credit rating.”

The mall and shops were deserted. Felix waved Zonk off to a men’s clothing store and, with his hand firmly on Lou’s arm, headed for a drugstore.

“You’re really limping. Need that foot taken care of.”

“Back in the car,” Lou said as they walked through the open doorway of the drugstore, “what’d you mean... about me talking my way out of being killed?”

Felix laughed again. “Oh that. Well... you’re lucky, but not the way you think. Never wonder why the Top Cats are being led by a guy my age? I’m over thirty, you know.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Sit down here,” Felix said, “while I get some stuff for that foot.”

Lou sat in the plastic chair and found himself facing a dispenser-wall of medical supplies. Felix walked slowly down the wall, finding what he wanted in the display windows and touching the buttons that sent the goods down into the receiving bin. He came back to Lou’s chair with his hands full of antibiotic sprays and plastic spray bandages.

“Listen,” he said as he squirted a disinfectant over Lou’s blood-crusted foot, “I’m a teacher. Work for the office of Rehabilitation. Trying to hammer some sense into these kids. Only way to do it is to join them, lead them, try to bring them around slowly. I been in there, in the city, for more than a year now. Got them to set up boundaries between turfs. Trying to get them to think of more than sex and wars. I figure it’ll take another ten to twelve years before they start acting as civilized as Stone Age tribes.”

“They don’t know...”

Felix laughed. “Shoot, man, if they knew, I’d be just as dead as you ought to be!” Then his face went grim. “Some of the other teachers have been found out. What happened to them isn’t pretty.”

“But why do you do it?”

Shrugging, “How should I know? Can’t just leave the kids in there by themselves. Too many generations have done that. Every year they get worse off and worse off until they’re where they are now. Somebody’s got to help them. We owe them something. They didn’t turn into savages by themselves. They were pushed. And unless somebody starts pushing from the other direction, those kids are going to keep on killing, keep on dying.”

Lou said, “It’ll take a hundred years before kids like that become civilized.”

“So we’ll work a hundred years,” Felix snapped. “Took more than a hundred years to let the cities fall apart like this. It’s worth a century to rebuild them. Because if we don’t—if we let those kids keep breeding and festering like they’ve been for the past century—pretty soon they’re going to burst out of the cities and overrun everything. The Mongol hordes will seem like a Chinese tea party compared to what they’ll do.”

Lou shuddered.

“But it’s more than that,” Felix went on. “Those kids deserve a chance. They never asked to be born into that jungle. They never got a chance for anything better. And they’ll never know anything better unless some of us get off our rumps and try to help ‘em. Those kids are the future, y’know. What good’s all our high and mighty civilization if we lose those kids? What use is all this technology and science if we’re breeding cavemen in the cores of the cities? If we can’t help those kids make their own future better, we don’t have much to look forward to, I can tell you that.”

“You ought to be a Congressman, or a minister,” Lou said.

Felix laughed.

“And all that talk about killing me—”

“Oh, that was real all right,” he said. “I was trying to figure out some way to get your white hide out of there. But I wasn’t coming up with any answers. Looked like I was going to let them take you out—”

“You’d’ve let them?”

Another shrug. “Couldn’t figure out what else to do, until you started talking tough. Gave me the out I needed.”

“Well... thanks, I guess.”

“Don’t mention it,” Felix replied, grinning.

Within half an hour, Lou was walking with hardly a limp. He showered, shaved, and put on a disposable summer suit and loafers that he picked out at the clothing store. Felix and Zonk had outfitted themselves, too. Felix went in for grander tastes, complete with cape and boots. Zonk leaned toward electric colors and the latest, form-fitted, sprayed-on styles.

“You look almost decent,” Felix said to Lou. “Mouth’s still swollen and you’ve got a nice blue lump coming along over your eye. But you’ll be okay.” •

Felix drove them through the main gates of JFK just as the sun showed itself over the distant skyline. The white-helmeted security guards at the gates eyed the battered old car, but let it pass. Up the sweeping ramp of the once-grand terminal building they went, with Felix steering carefully to avoid potholes.

He stopped in front of the terminal and Lou got out, then ducked his head back in and put his hand in Felix’s huge paw. “Thanks. For everything. And good luck.”

“Nothing to it,” Felix said, grinning. “Hope you make out okay.” Then he turned to Zonk and said, “C’mon up front. Le’see what jet planes look like up close.”

The clattering car drove off. Lou stood there for a moment in the growing light of dawn watching them disappear down the other side of the ramp. Then he turned and went inside the decaying terminal.

The first flight that connected with Albuquerque wasn’t until seven. An hour to wait. His insides fluttering from hunger as much as nerves, Lou went to the autocafeteria and had powdered eggs, reconstituted milk, and a man-made slice of something called protosteak. It tasted like plastic.

No one stopped him or even noticed him as he went to the flight departure lounge, verified his ticket on the jet, went aboard, and took his seat. The plane was ten minutes late getting away from the terminal, and Lou expected each second to see the same Federal marshal come up the aisle and clap a hand on his shoulder.

But finally they were airborne. As soon as Lou heard the wheels pull up, he fell asleep.

He woke up with a start when the flaps and wheels went down again. Out the window he could see the familiar flat greenery of the New Mexico irrigated farmlands. Off in the distance, Sandia Peak stuck its rocky brown mass up in the sky.

I wonder if Bonnie’s home. Maybe she never left for Charleston. Then another thought hit him. What if they’re waiting for me when I get off the plane?

The plane landed and taxied up to the terminal. Lou put himself in the middle of the ninety-some people who were getting off and tried to look invisible in the crowd. He stayed in the crowd until he was well into the terminal, then headed straight for the exit, looking over his shoulder a few times to see if anyone was following him. No one. Outside in the blazing sunlight, he wondered if his car was still in the parking lot. Better leave it alone. He waved for a cab, and-one pulled away from its parking stall and glided to the curb where he stood.

Inside, after he firmly shut the cab door, Lou told the autodriver, “Genetics Institute.”

If Bonnie wasn’t picked up by the police, she’ll be at the lab. And Dr. Kaufman and the others... they’ll help me.

The cab drove out away from the city, into the farmlands, along one of the main irrigation lines. For the thousandth time, Lou tried to puzzle out why the police wanted him. The Federal marshal said he was under arrest. The Norseman at the UN building said he wasn’t. But they were going to take him to Messina. Why? Better check with Greg at the Institute and see if he knows a good lawyer.

Finally, Lou could see the familiar white buildings of the Institute. Almost immediately, he could tell that something was wrong.

The place looked deserted. The parking lot was empty. Nobody was walking around outside. Nobody was visible in the big glass-fronted lobby. And as the cab pulled up to the outer fence, the gate did not slide open automatically.

Lou looked at his wristwatch. It was still on Albuquerque time; he hadn’t changed it. It said nine-thirty.

Why is it... wait a minute! What day is it? Sunday or Monday? I took off... it must be Sunday, got to be.

He thumbed the window button down and felt the heat of the outdoors invade the cab. To the gate control box he said, “Code one-five, Christopher. Open up.”

The gate rattled open. The cab drove smoothly up to the lobby door. Just to be safe, Lou gave a phony name and credit number to the cab’s simple-minded computer. It had no camera equipment and therefore no way to check on who its passenger really was.

As the cab drove away, Lou stood squinting in the brilliant sunshine. For a moment, a flash of fear knifed through him.

Even for a Sunday the Institute seemed utterly deserted. Usually there was somebody around.

“Well,” he said to himself in a deliberately loud, firm voice, “I can hide out here until some of the staff shows up tomorrow. Or maybe I’ll call Greg or one of the other guys—”

The main doors into the lobby were locked also, but Lou’s name and code symbol were enough to open them. He stepped into the quiet, cool darkness of the lobby; the sun’s glare was screened out by the polarized windows. He hesitated a moment, then walked through the open doorway and into the building’s main corridor. His footsteps against the plastic flooring and the whisper of the air conditioning were the only sounds he could hear.

First thing to do is call Bonnie, he thought, find out if she’s okay.

His own office was down at the end of the corridor, next to Ramo, the big computer. Suddenly Lou realized, Not even Ramo’s making any noise! Usually, the computer was humming and chattering electronically; it was almost always working on something, even on weekends and late at night.

Lou looked through the glass partition that surrounded Ramo. The computer was silent. No lights flashing on its main board.

“Ramo, you awake?” Lou called.

From a speaker in the ceiling overhead came Ramo’s baritone voice. “Yes, Lou. I’m fine. What can I do for you?” A single row of lights on the main board flickered to life.

Lou breathed a relieved sigh. “You were so quiet I thought somebody had shut you down.”

“All programs are completed at present.” Ramo answered.

“All programs? What about the zygote modeling calculations?”

“That program was temporarily shut down by Dr. Kaufman.”

“Shut down? Why?”

“I don’t know.”

Lou stood there watching the flickering row of lights, uncertain, feeling something like panic forming in the pit of his stomach. He fought it down. “Okay... uh, get Bonnie Sterne on the phone for me, will you? Her home phone.”

“Shall I place the call on your office phone?” Ramo asked.

“No... I’ll be in the cafeteria. Anybody been in today?”

“No one. Except for Big George, of course.”

Shaking his head in puzzlement, Lou went back up the corridor and turned down a side hall to the cafeteria. His head was throbbing with pain, and despite his nap on the plane he felt dead tired. And hungry.

Lou was surprised to see Big George sitting in the cafeteria, eating a huge plate of fruit salad.

Big George was an eight-year-old mountain gorilla, taller than Lou, even in his hunched-over, ground-knuckling posture. No one had weighed him for several months, since he playfully ripped the big scales they had used out of the wall of his special quarters. His face was all ferocity—fanged mouth, low beetling brow, black muzzle, and blacker hair. His arms could reach across the table without his ever getting up from the chair he was sitting on. The plastic chair itself was sagging dangerously under his weight. It was hard to believe that Big George was a gentle, even a timid, animal.

“Who let you in here?” Lou asked from the doorway.

“Let myself in. Uncle Lou,” George whispered. “Got hungry. Nobody here to feed me. Opened the pen gate and came in for food.”

Lou went over to the selector wall and punched buttons for a real steak dinner. “You mean nobody’s been around to feed you since yesterday?”

“Nobody, Uncle Lou.” George stuffed half a cantaloupe into his toothy mouth. Big George was one of the Institute’s great successes. The geneticists had managed to give the gorilla a large measure of intelligence. George tested out to the intelligence level of a human six-year-old. It seemed that he would not go any further. The surgical team that worked with the Institute had altered George’s vocal equipment so that he could speak in a harsh, labored whisper. It was the best they could do.

Lou carried his steaming tray to the end of the table where George was sitting. He was glad of some companionship, but it was best to give George plenty of room. Not that he was dangerous—just sloppy.

Looking up at the ceiling, Lou called, “Hey, where’s that phone call, Ramo?”

“There is no answer,” came the smooth reply.

“She’s not home?”

“Evidently not,” said Ramo.

“What’s her phone say?”

“Nothing. No reply whatsoever. No forwarding number, no request to leave a message.”

Lou stared down at his steak. Suddenly he wasn’t hungry anymore.

“Ramo!” he shouted. “Where is everybody?”

“All of the scientific staff has been taken into custody by Federal marshals,” Ramo said calmly. “Everyone else has been sent home.”

Before it could really register on Lou’s mind, George growled, “Somebody coming in the hallway, Uncle Lou. Strangers.”

“Federal marshals,” Ramo said. “I was programmed to call them when you returned to the Institute.”

7

Lou stood up, hot fear burning through him. “Federal marshals?”

“They have locked all the doors and are searching the building for you,” Ramo said without emotion.

“Uncle Lou, I’m afraid,” George whispered.

“How many of them are there?” Lou asked Ramo.

“Twelve.”

Big George pushed off his chair and shambled over to stand beside Lou, so close that Lou could feel the warmth from his great hairy body. George was terrified. But the marshals don’t know how timid he really is. They might shoot as soon as they see him.

“Is the door to the courtyard locked?”

“Yes,” Ramo answered. “All the doors are.”

There were footsteps in the hall now; Lou could hear them. He turned to George, snuffling fearfully beside him.

“Can you knock that door open, Georgy?”

“I can try, Uncle Lou.”

Lou patted his massive shoulder. “Come on, quick.”

George scampered toward the door, accidentally knocking a chair clattering out of his way. From out in the hall a voice called:

“Hey... hear that? In here, quick, unlock it!”

George was loping across the floor in full stride now, knuckles and big splayed feet slapping the tiles. Lou had to run to keep up with him. George didn’t stop or even slow down at the door. He simply crashed right through, his bulk and speed tearing the lock right apart and knocking both doors off their hinges with a blood-freezing shriek of ripping metal.

Lou was right behind him in the sudden glare of the sunshine.

“George... this way!”

Now Lou took the lead, through the courtyard and out the access tunnel toward the back lot. Stopping, he pointed to the stand of trees off behind the parking area.

“You...get back...to your pen,” he panted. “Safest place... for you. They won’t bother you... in there.”

“But Uncle Lou, I want to go with you,” George argued hoarsely. “All the nice people went away. These new people scare me.”

Lou took a deep breath and said, “They won’t hurt you. And you can’t come with me right now. But I’ll come back for you.”

“When?”

Lou could hear shouts out in the courtyard.

“As soon as I can, Georgy.”

“Promise?”

“I promise. Now get back to your pen and be a good boy. And don’t be afraid, they won’t hurt you.”

With a troubled look, the gorilla moved off toward the trees.

Lou sprinted for the parked cars. The lab’s electric wagons were lined up in the first row, and Lou knew their ignition locks were keyed to a simple voice code. He slid in behind the wheel of the first one in line.

“DNA-RNA,” he said as he pressed the starter switch.

The electric motor hummed to life. Never be able to outrun turbocars in this thing, Lou told himself. A man in a gray business suit ran out onto the parking lot. He had a gun in his hand. Lou grabbed the steering wheel, kicked off the brakes, and slammed the accelerator to the floor. The wagon lurched feebly, than started to gain momentum. Lou drove straight at the man. He jumped away and fired. Lou swung the wagon away and then cut back for the access tunnel, dived through its shadow, raced through the courtyard and past another handful of jumping, shouting men, into the front tunnel and out past the main lobby.

The front gate was rolling shut, but Lou knifed the wagon through it and sped down the highway in the curiously quiet acceleration of the electric motor. He picked up the car radio microphone and called:

“Ramo, this is Lou Christopher. Over.”

“I recognize your voice pattern, Lou. Over.”

“Basic program zero, Ramo. Suspend all housekeeping functions until further notice. Maintenance and repair mode only. Execute. Over.”

“Executed. Over.”

Lou grinned as he raced down the highway, one hand on the wheel. “Very good, Ramo. Now suspend all communications until my voice pattern orders resumption. Understood? Over.”

“Understood and prepared to execute,” Ramo said tonelessly. But somehow Lou felt the computer didn’t like to shut itself off.

“Execute. Over.”

No answer. The computer was completely shut down. All the doors that were locked would remain locked until some of the Institute maintenance men could be brought in to open them manually. The front gate would stay locked too, and it was strong enough to keep the police cars inside even if they tried ramming it. All the lights, the air conditioning, everything, was off. Have a pleasant day! Lou thought grimly.

He eased off the accelerator and coasted down the highway at the legal maximum speed. No sense getting picked up by a traffic patrol. His insides were fluttering, now that he had enough time to think.

How long can I keep running? Where to now? Not my apartment. Ramo said everybody on the scientific staff was arrested. Did they lake Bonnie, too? And why. why, for God’s sake? What’s going on?

He shook his head. It was like a nightmare. It couldn’t be real. Police don’t just march into a lab and arrest everybody. That was something out of the Dark Ages. People have rights, there are laws—

And then he remembered New York, and realized that in some places the Dark Ages still existed.

As he drove toward town, Lou switched on the radio and dialed to the police frequency. Plenty of chatter, but nothing about the Institute or himself. Why not? Why aren’t they calling for help? Or at least spreading an alert to pick me up?

As if in answer, Lou saw a highway patrol Cruiser gliding up behind him on the outside lane. He knew that the electric wagon could never outspeed a cruiser; the turbine-driven police car could even lift itself off the ground and literally fly on an air cushion for short distances, doing several hundred knots. But the cruiser zipped right past him, and the two white-helmeted officers in it never even looked at him.

Maybe the police aren’t after me, Lou said to himself.

Another part of his mind answered, Somebody is.

But not the police. Then who are they?

A few minutes later he found m’mself driving past Bonnie’s apartment building. Got to stop someplace. Got to have some time to figure this out. Even is she’s been picked up; I can still use her apartment. And if she’s free, I can find out what’s going on from her.

He drove the wagon halfway across town, parked it in a public garage, and then took a cab back to Bonnie’s. He gave the cab another false name and credit number. In the lobby of the apartment building, he told the door-computer:

“I’m a friend of Miss Sterne’s, apartment 27-T.”

“Name, please,” the computer’s flat voice replied.

“Roy Kendall,” Lou lied, naming a mutual friend who lived in Denver.

“Miss Sterne is not in at present. I am not programmed to admit anyone.”

“Miss Sterne has left special instructions under Code V for visitors.”

The computer hummed to itself for a second. Then, “Mr. Kendall, you may be admitted.” The door clicked open. Lou stepped through and went to the elevator.

He had to go through the same routine with the lock computer at Bonnie’s door, but here the code symbol was SF for special friends. Finally, the door popped open and Lou stepped into Bonnie’s apartment.

Shutting the door carefully behind him, Lou looked over the single room. Nothing seemed disturbed or moved. The closet next to the foldaway bed was open, and there were some clothes draped on a chair in front of it. Lou poked into the kitchenette alcove and found a pot of coffee still plugged in and warm. Bonnie was here this morning. Or at least, somebody was here.

He took a bottle of milk from the refrigerator and downed half of it. He was just putting it back when the front door opened.

Bonnie stood in the doorway, open-mouthed with surprise.

“Lou!”

She ran to him and threw herself into his arms. She felt warm and soft and safe.

“Baby, is it ever good to see you,” he murmured into her ear as he held her. “You even smell great.”

“Lou, what happened to you? Where’ve you been? We heard... Oh, Lou, your face!” She reached up and touched his swollen jaw. It hurt, but Lou didn’t mind at all.

“It’s a long story,” he said, still holding her tightly. “For a while there, I didn’t think I’d ever see you again.”

He kissed her, and then she gently pulled away. For the first time, Lou noticed she looked tired, strained.

“What’s been going on?” he asked. “Why’s the Institute been closed? Ramo said...”

“You’ve been at the Institute?” She looked startled.

Lou nodded. “Yep. Nearly got caught by a squad of guys who claimed to be Federal marshals.”

“They were marshals,” Bonnie said.

“But what’s this all about?”

Bonnie went toward the sofa, by the windows on the other side of the room. Lou followed her there.

Sitting, she told him, “The first I heard about it was yesterday, at the glider races. There was a Federal marshal looking for you. Then, when I got back to my apartment, there was another marshal waiting for me. I had to go with him to the Federal courthouse. Practically everybody in the Institute was there!”

Lou sank back in the sofa, realizing now why Bonnie looked strained.

“They let some of us out after a few hours,” she went on, her voice trembling a little. “But we were told not to go back to the Institute anymore. It’s been closed down.”

“Closed?”

Nodding, “Permanently, they said. I had to report to the employment center this morning. That’s where I’ve been all day. Lou,.. what are they doing?” Her voice was starting to rise now, her tiny fists clenched. “Why did they close the Institute? What is it? What?”

He took her by the shoulders. “Hey... ease off now,” he said softly. “Take it easy. You’re okay. Nobody’s going to hurt you.”

“But they brought in Dr. Kaufman, and Greg Belsen, and just about all the scientists. All the technicians, all the secretaries and clerks... everybody!”

“But why? Did they give you any reason?”

She shook her head. “Nothing. Nobody seemed to know anything. They were just following orders.” She reached out and touched his jaw again. “But what happened to you?”

“I got away.” Lou told her about his night in New York, and this morning’s visit to the deserted Institute.

“What are you going to do now?” Bonnie asked.

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’m about ready to cave in. Only had a couple hours’ sleep on the jet—”

Bonnie stood up. Brushing a blonde lock from her eyes, she said, “I’ll fix you some lunch and then you can take a nap.”

She went to the kitchenette alcove and started touching buttons on the control keyboard. Lou slouched on the sofa, already half asleep.

“Lou... it’s like the world’s coming apart, isn’t it?”

He looked up at her. “Whatever it is, it’s bigger than the Institute. They had Kirby from Columbia at the UN building. They were going to take us to Messina—”

“The world capital?”

Lou nodded. “I guess the world government’s behind this. And they’ve got the Federal people here on their side. But why? What’s it all about?”

Bonnie took a pair of steaming trays from the cooker and placed them on the low table next to the sofa. She sat on the floor, next to Lou’s feet.

“Lou... if the world government is after you—then there’s no place for you to hide!”

“Maybe,” he muttered, leaning over the trays and picking up a fork.

Bonnie said, very softly, “Maybe the only thing you can do is give yourself up. After all, if it’s the world government, it must be something terribly important, whatever it is.”

“But what are they up to?” Lou demanded. “Why yank us in like we’re criminals? Why haven’t they told us what’s going on? They haven’t called in the local police. And they’re sure not giving us any chances to exercise our constitutional rights.”

Bonnie didn’t answer.

They ate in silence, and then Lou stretched out on the sofa for a nap. He dreamed of being chased through the streets of New York by gangs of kids and uniformed policemen. Somehow the streets became Messina, but the gangs still pursued him. And from a balcony above him, Felix leaned heavily on a frail railing, huge and black, booming laughter at the chase.

He woke up shouting. Bonnie was beside him, her hands on him, stroking him. He sat up.

“They... I...”

“It’s all right,” she said soothingly, “it’s all right. You were dreaming. Look, you’re in a cold sweat.”

Lou ran a hand over his eyes.

“Bonnie...”

She looked away from him and said, “Lou, while you were sleeping, I was thinking hard about this whole thing. You can’t run away forever. You were lucky to getaway last night without being killed. Sooner or later, they’ll either catch you or you’ll get hurt or killed.”

“Yeah, I guess so. But what else...”

Bonnie’s hands were clenched together in white-knuckled tenseness. Her face looked bleak.

“Lou,” she said, “I don’t want you to get hurt. I.. .while you were asleep I called the courthouse. There are four marshals outside in the hall. They’ve come for you.”

“You what!” Lou sprang up from the sofa.

“There’s no other way out of here,” she said There were tears in her eyes now as she stood beside him. “Please, Lou... let them take you in. They promised that nobody’s going to hurt you. Please...”

Lou stared at her. “Federal marshals, the world government, the Institute closed...and now even you, even you, Bonnie. Nobody in the world is on my side. Nobody! In the whole world!”

“Lou, please...” She was crying now.

The door opened and they walked in. Four of them. Big-shouldered, tight-lipped. Wearing plain, dark business shorts and tunics. Armed, everybody knew, with needle guns and more.

“Louis Christopher. I have a Federal warrant for your arrest.”

“Nobody in the whole stupid world,” Lou muttered loudly enough for only Bonnie to hear.

8

In a way, Lou felt almost glad that his running was over. It was like the time he had an inflamed appendix, but didn’t know it. For weeks he nursed the sullen pain in his abdomen, worried over it, but told no one. Until he nearly collapsed at the Institute and some of the other computer engineers physically dragged him to the clinic. From then on he didn’t have to make any decisions. And he found that he didn’t worry, either. The doctors did the deciding, and the worrying.

Now Lou sat in the back of a car, surrounded by Federal marshals. All the decisions were out of his hands. He stopped worrying, almost without realizing it. He was far from being happy, but for the time being he had nothing to worry over.

They drove to the jetport, past the terminal building, out to a sleek, white, twin-engined executive jet parked well away from all the hangars and commercial planes. The sky-blue insignia of the world government was painted on its tail.

Standing beside the plane, next to the open hatch, was the Norseman Lou had narrowly escaped from at the UN building.

He looked Lou over carefully as the Federal marshals escorted him to the plane.

“I see you made it through New York and then some,” said the Norseman. “Congratulations. We were afraid you’d be killed.”

Lou said nothing.

“Please, Mr. Christopher, my job is to bring you safely to Messina. No more adventures, eh? We’ll only have to come and get you again.”

He gestured toward the hatch. With a shrug, Lou climbed into the plane. The Norseman followed him and locked the hatch shut, then went forward, into the control compartment. The jet was luxuriously furnished with big, deep swivel seats at the four forward windows. Back of them there was a couch on one side, and a full-sized desk on the other, complete with viewphones.

The Norseman re-emerged from the control compartment. “Pick any chair you like. This flight is exclusively for you.”

Within minutes they were airborne and streaking supersonically across the country. They landed briefly at New Washington for fuel, then headed out across the Atlantic with the setting sun at their back. Lou slept as the plane sped into the gathering night.

The Norseman woke him when they were ready to land. It was black and moonless outside, and the only lights Lou could see below outlined a landing strip. Once on the ground, Lou was taken to a waiting car and driven away from the airfield. The Norseman sat silently beside him while two swarthy men spoke Italian to each other up in the front seat. All Lou could see was the narrow strip of road lit by the car’s headlights, but he got the impression of hills and farmlands and wind-tossed trees swaying out there in the darkness. It was warm outside, and the night had that special softness that comes from the sea, very different from the desert of New Mexico.

Before long they drove past a gateway that was flanked by two live guards. After a few minutes more, the car pulled onto a driveway that swung up to an ornately decorated entrance, lit by antique lanterns. It even had an awning overhead to keep off the sun and rain. It was hard to tell how big the building was, but in the darkness it gave the impression of rambling on hugely. A villa, Lou guessed as the car stopped in front of the entrance.

The Norseman got out first and held the car door open as Lou slid along the seat and stepped out. From far off he could hear the sighing roar of the sea rolling in on a beach.

“This will be your home for the time being,” the Norseman said, pointing to the baroquely carved door. “I believe you’ll find many of your friends there.”

He stood there while Lou slowly, hesitantly, went up the stone walkway and tried the door. It opened at his touch. Lou looked back and saw the Norseman smiling and nodding at him.

“Your job’s done now, is that it?”

“Yes,” he answered. “You were the last one on the list.”

What list? Lou wanted to ask, but he knew that he wouldn’t get an answer. He stepped into the entryway of the villa and the door swung shut by itself behind him. Lou knew somehow that it locked automatically. He didn’t bother to try it.

He stood alone in a wide, long hall. At the far end a grand flight of stairs swept in a gentle curve to the next floor. There were heavy doors of real wood on both sides of the hall, and the walls were lined with paintings. Portraits, mostly. Old and original. A stately grandfather’s clock back by the stairs chimed once. One A.M.

Lou walked down the hall slowly, his footsteps echoing on the intricate geometry of the parqueted floor. No other sound—no, wait. Voices, muted, from behind a door. He went over and opened it.

A half-dozen men were sitting around a table in the middle of the room. It must have been a library or study; books lined the walls except for a pair of French doors that stood open at the far end of the room. Their filmy curtains billowed softly in the breeze coming in off the sea. The room was dimly lit and most of the men at the table had their backs to the door and to Lou. One of them looked up.

“Lou! They dragged you in finally.”

It was Greg Belsen.

Now the others turned to face him. They were all from the Institute: Ron Kurtz, Charles Sutherland, Jesse Maggio, Bob Richardson. And at the head of the table, Dr. Adrian Kaufman, Director of the Institute. Dr. Kaufman was a handsome, vigorous man, with strong leonine features topped by thick gray hair. But right now he looked very weary and unsure of himself.

“Christopher,” said Dr. Kaufman, frowning slightly. “What on earth are you doing here?”

Despite himself, Lou grinned, “It wasn’t my idea to come, believe me.”

Lou walked to the table. There were no more chairs in the room, so he remained standing.

“Why did they bring you here?” Dr. Kurtz asked. He was about Lou’s age, but his bushy brown beard made him look older. “So far the only people here are the scientists.”

By scientists, Lou understood, Kurtz meant geneticists and biochemists.

“That’s right,” Dr. Maggio agreed. “Only the technical staff has been brought here. They let the secretaries and others go free.”

“I am on the technical staff,” Lou reminded them.

“But as a computer engineer, not a geneticist,” said Dr. Kurtz.

“Or biochemist,” added Dr. Richardson, a biochemist.

“Maybe the people who arrested us don’t know the difference between computer engineers and geneticists,” Lou said, feeling anger simmering inside him. “Maybe they just had orders to bring in the whole technical staff. They sure didn’t stop and ask to see my diploma.”

“Well,” Greg Belsen said, “there goes the neighborhood. If they start letting computer people in, God knows what’ll happen next.”

The scientists all laughed. Lou realized that Greg was trying to smooth over the rift between the scientists and himself. It was an old wound, this caste system. Under ordinary circumstances at the Institute it hardly ever became noticeable. But here, in this strange place, it surfaced immediately. And it hurt.

Dr. Richardson changed the subject. “Does anyone have any idea of why we’re here?”

“You used the word ‘arrested,’“ Dr. Kaufman said to Lou. “As far as I know, no one has arrested us. We’ve been brought here against our will, true enough. But no one has charged us with a crime.”

“More like being kidnapped.”

“I was arrested by Federal marshals,” Lou said. “No charges, but they were ready to shoot if I tried to get away. And the Institute’s been closed permanently, I found out.”

“Permanently!” The word went around the table like a shock wave.

“I don’t get it,” Dr. Maggio said, frowning. “Who’s doing this? And why?”

“It’s pretty obviously the world government,” Richardson said.

“But why?”

“Because they’re frightened out of their wits over genetic engineering. They’re afraid of what might happen when we succeed.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Oh no? Well, take a look around you.”

Greg Belsen said, “The real question is, what are we going to do about it?”

“What can we do?”

Looking down at the polished tabletop, Dr. Kurtz mumbled in his beard, “Try to get out. Escape.”

“How?” Sutherland asked. “Where to?”

Lou said, “They chased me all across the country and back. It may be the world government that’s doing this, but they had plenty of Federal marshals helping them.”

Dr. Kaufman folded his hands over his midsection. “We’re several thousand miles from home, on an island where we’d be very quickly spotted as strangers. Even if we escaped from this villa we wouldn’t get very far.”

Lou had a sudden thought. “Maybe we don’t have to get far. Just to some newsmen. Whoever’s behind this, they’re trying to keep it quiet. They didn’t even notify the local police when they were chasing me. And I didn’t hear a word about the Institute’s closing on any newscasts.”

With a sarcastic grin, Sutherland answered, “So you volunteer to go over the wall and find us a newsman. And he’ll tell the world we’ve been kidnapped or something.”

“Something like that,” Lou snapped.

“So what?” Sutherland replied. “Suppose the newsman believes you. Suppose, even, he gets to broadcast the story and the world government doesn’t stop him. What happens? Some government officials say that he’s wrong, he’s sensation-mongering. They say that we’re a small group of scientists who’ve been brought here for a special project. End of story. The world doesn’t care about twenty-five scientists. We’re not news. We’re not important people—like Tri-V stars or soccer players.”

“Now wait, Charles,” Dr. Kaufman said, his eyes brightening. “Christopher may have something. After all, they have tried to do this quickly and quietly. Maybe some publicity would break up this whole affair—”

Sutherland made a sour face. “Look at it objectively. We’re just a handful of scientists—”

“Oh!” Lou remembered. “They got Dr. Kirby, too.”

“Kirby? From Columbia?”

Nodding, Lou answered, “They had him in New York. They were taking him here.”

“But he’s not here in this villa.”

Sutherland waved a finger at them. “You see? There’s more to it than just us. I thought so. We’re only a part of a bigger picture. And the world government is behind this, whatever it is. Publicity isn’t going to hurt them. Either they’ll clamp down on any news about this, or they’ve already figured out what to tell the newsmen.”

“Then what can we do?” Kaufman demanded.

“Nothing.” Sutherland shrugged. “We wait and see what happens. That’s all we can do.”

Dr. Richardson suddenly asked, “Say, what about Big George? Is he...”

“I saw him this morning... yesterday, that is,” Lou said. “He was scared, but I guess somebody’s taking care of him. I hope...”

“They can’t stick him in a zoo,” Greg said. “He’ll die of loneliness.”

“Or fright.”

“Maybe we can ask...”

The door from the hall opened and Lou turned to see Mrs. Kaufman standing there, her portly frame tightly wrapped in a nightrobe.

“I finally got the children to sleep,” she said to her husband. “Are you coming up soon?”

With a sigh, Dr. Kaufman answered, “In a few minutes, dear.”

She nodded and shut the door. Lou stood there by the table, open-mouthed.

Greg said, “Didn’t you know! The wives and children were brought here too. For every married member of the staff. It’s a family affair.”

9

Greg let Lou bunk in with him, in a spacious bedroom on the top floor of the villa. They left the air conditioning off and the balcony doors open. The murmur of the surf quickly lulled them to sleep.

The morning was bright and cloudless. Lou found some clothes in the bedroom closet that fit him: a gaudy disposable shirt and a pair of shorts. It was warm enough to go barefoot.

“There’s a Sicilian house staff that will get you more clothes. All you have to do is ask,” Greg told him as they went downstairs. “And, man, can they cook! We may not know why we’re here, but they’re sure treating us right.”

The morning was spent exchanging rumors. They were being drafted by the world government for some ultra-secret project. No, there was war brewing between the United States and China and the world government was pulling out the top scientists on both sides to save them from being killed. Nonsense, war is impossible with all nations disarmed; the world government wouldn’t allow a war to break out. The real story is that there’s an epidemic of unknown origin at the Mars base, and we’re going to be sent there to find a cure before it wipes out everybody on Mars. Nuts! My brother-in-law’s at Mars base and I just got a lasergram from him last week.

The rumors and speculations spiraled hotter and wilder as the sun climbed through the morning sky. But nobody mentioned the simplest explanation: that the government had decided to prevent the work on genetic engineering from being completed. That was too close to home, too plainly possible and painful to be mentioned.

Just before lunchtime, Lou was prowling along the patio that looked out to sea. Several of the older men and their wives were sunning themselves. Lou just couldn’t sit still. There had to be something he could do, something.

Greg came trotting up the stone stairway that led from the patio to the beach, down below.

“There you are,” he said to Lou. “Listen, I’ve been exploring. Down at the bottom of this picturesque cliff is a picturesque beach. And some of the younger wives and older daughters have found some very picturesque swimming suits and are frolicking on the beach. Beautiful scenery. Including the boss’ oldest daughter. How about it?”

The memory of Bonnie stabbed into Lou’s mind. “No... thanks. I don’t feel like it.”

Greg shrugged. “Okay, suit yourself. I’ll be down there chasing... uh, the waves. If anybody’s looking for me.”

“Sure.” Lou turned and started pacing the length of the patio again, trying to think of something useful to do. But he kept seeing Bonnie, crying, scared, and desperate, more afraid of Lou’s own anger than anything else, he realized now.

I ought to try to get in touch with her. Tell her it’s okay, I’m not sore at her.

He got up and went into the house, looking for one of the housekeeping staff. Instead he found Kaufman and Sutherland.

“Have you seen Greg Belsen?” Kaufman asked. “They’ve just told us there’s going to be a meeting to explain what this is all about, and we can bring three people. Where is he?”

Lou was about to answer when ‘he remembered that Kaufman’s daughter was on the beach. “Greg’s... uh, he was here a while ago. I don’t know where he is now.”

Sutherland made a sour face. “The car’s right outside, they want us now.”

“I’ll go,” Lou heard himself say.

“You?”

“I’ll sit in for Greg.”

“But...”

“Unless you want to look around for somebody else.”

Kaufman glanced unhappily at Sutherland, who was eyeing Lou’s vivid shirt and shorts. The two older men were also in sports clothes, but their colors were dark and conservative.

“I could change in two minutes,” Lou offered.

“No time to change,” Kaufman said. “The car’s waiting for us. Come on.”

With only a slight grin of satisfaction, Lou went with them to the car. There were two men in the front of the car, both wearing brown uniforms without markings of any kind. They both looked dark, swarthy. And they said nothing.

In the back seat, Sutherland frowned as the car pulled away from the villa. “What do you think this is all about?”

Dr. Kaufman shook his head. “Whatever it is, it will probably be more fantastic than any of the rumors that have been going around.”

They drove for nearly an hour down a winding dusty road. Most of the time the road threaded between hills, and there was little to see except the greenery whizzing by. But once in a while they would top a rise and view the sun-dazzled sea stretching off on one side of them, and rich fields of olives and citrus groves on the other side.

Thick clouds began to pile up as they drove on, and by the time they passed the gate of another old villa with its uniformed guards standing at attention, the clouds towered darkly overhead, grumbling and flickering with lightning. It seemed almost as dark as evening, although it was still early afternoon.

There were dozens of cars parked in front of the villa’s main entrance. And inside, the old house was filled with men and women, milling around aimlessly, buzzing with conversation.

Lou, Kaufman, and Sutherland stood just inside the front door, gaping at the unexpected crowd.

“That’s Margolin, from the Paris Academy,” Dr. Kaufman said. “What’s he doing here?”

“And Liu from Tokyo,” Sutherland added.

“Look ... Rosenzweig... and there’s Yossarian!”

“My God, all the top people in the field are here.”

Lou recognized some of them, the best-known geneticists and biochemists in the world. He saw no other computer engineers, though.

“Adrian!” called a frail, little man with wispy white hair. “I knew they would bring you here, too.”

Kaufman turned and recognized the old man. Both shocked and delighted, he went to him, hands outstretched.

Max... they brought you in on this.”

Then Lou realized who he was: Professor DeVreis, the elder statesmen of the world’s geneticists, the man who had taught the leaders of the field, like Kaufman, in their university days.

Dr. Sutherland joined them, and soon the three of them formed the nucleus of a growing, grave-faced, head-shaking crowd. Lou stood by the entrance, alone now.

“Do you know any of these people?”

Lou looked up to see a tall, gangly, lantern-jawed fellow his own age standing beside him. He was wearing a baggy suit with full trousers and the kind of shoes that you only found in northern hemisphere cities. At second glance, Lou could see that he was trying hard to look calm and unfrightened.

“I don’t know many of them personally,” Lou answered. Then he pointed out several of the scientists.

His new companion shook his head worriedly. “Geneticists? Biochemists? Why am I here? I’m a nuclear physicist!”

He spoke with a trace of an accent that Lou couldn’t pin down.

, Now Lou felt equally puzzled. “If it’s any consolation, I’m a computer engineer. Um... my name’s Lou Christopher.”

With a toothy grin, he took Lou’s offered hand. “I am Anton Kori. I’m from the University of Prague.”

“And I’m with the Watson Institute of Genetics... or was, that is.”

“American?”

Lou nodded. Then he saw that many of the people in the crowd had drinks and sandwiches in their hands. “Looks like lunch is being served someplace around here. Hungry?”

Kori shrugged. “Now that you mention it...”

They exchanged stories as they searched through the crowded rooms and finally found the luncheon buffet table.

“Nothing like this has happened in Czechoslovakia in thirty years,” Kori said, reaching for a sandwich. “Arrested in the middle of the night and carried off by the police... it’s like stories my grandfather used to tell us.”

Suddenly, his face brightened. “Ah! There are two men I know!”

Lou followed him as he rushed over to a pair of older men standing by the French doors, eating and talking quietly. One of the men was chunky, bald, very fair-skinned, dressed in shorts and pullover. The other looked Indian: dark, slim, and intense, slightly Oriental-looking. The plain-gray business suit he wore simply accentuated his exotic looks.

“Clark! Janda!” Kori called out as he rushed up to them.

“Anton,” said the chunky man. “What on earth are you doing here. Or for that matter, what are any of us doing here? Do you know?” His accent was unmistakably English.

Kori introduced Lou to Clark Frederick and Ramash Jandawarlu, rocket engineers.

“Rocket engineers?” Lou echoed.

They nodded.

“We were working together—by fax and phone, mostly,” said Frederick, “on an improved fusion rocket.”

“For interstellar ships,” Kori said.

“Interstellar... oh, like the probes that were sent out around the turn of the century?” In the back of his mind he was trying to remember whether it was Clark Frederick or Frederick Clark.

“Yes, like the probes, only much better,” said Jandawarlu in his reedy voice. “Rocket engines that could propel manned vessels, not merely small instrument probes.”

“Manned ships, to the stars?”

“Yes. It would have been something magnificent.”

Clark huffed at his co-worker, “You speak as if it’s all over for us.”

The Indian spread his hands. “We are here. We are not working. I don’t think they will allow us to work.”

“But who are they?” Kori demanded.

Lou said, “The world government. For some reason they’ve rounded up the world’s top geneticists and biochemists... and apparently a few rocket people, too,”

“But why?”

As if in answer, a voice came from a hidden loud speaker:

“Ladies and gentlemen, if you will kindly assemble in the main salon, we can begin the meeting.”

For a second or two the big room was completely silent, everyone stood frozen. There were no sounds from anywhere in the house, no sounds at all except the low grumble of far-off thunder. Then, everybody started talking and moving at once. The hubbub was terrific as more than a hundred men and women poured back into the hall and headed for the villa’s largest room.

It wasn’t difficult to find the main salon. It was at the end of the front hall, a huge room hung with blue and gold draperies. There were three ornate chandeliers and a half-dozen floor-to-ceiling mirrors set into the walls. The floor was polished wood, for dancing. But there were rows of folding chairs arranged across it now. The far end of the room was bare except for a blank viewscreen on the wall, big enough for a public theater.

Once everyone was inside the room, the doors swung shut and clicked softly. Nobody in sight, but they’re watching us just the same, Lou thought. And a shiver went through him.

Lou sat with Kori, Frederick, and Janda in one of the rear rows of folding chairs. He saw Kaufman and Sutherland up in the front row, next to Professor DeVreis.

The big viewscreen began to brighten and glow softly. A voice said:

“Gentlemen, you will be addressed by the Honorable Vassily Kobryn, Minister of Security.”

The image of Kobryn’s heavy, serious face took shape on the screen.

“Russian,” muttered Kori.

“Gentlemen,” Kobryn said slowly, “it is my unhappy duty to explain to you why you have been taken away from your work and your homes to this place. Believe me, the Council of Ministers has thought long and hard before going ahead with this drastic action.”

It’s going to be bad, Lou realized. He’s preparing us for something even worse than what’s happened so far.

“As you know,” Kobryn continued, his face utterly grave, “the government has worked for more than thirty years to make this planet a peaceful, habitable environment. Our efforts have been made extremely difficult by two factors: nationalism and population growth. We believe that we have been successful on both fronts. There are no more national armies and no possibility of a major war between nations. And world population growth has leveled off in the past ten years. Admittedly, twenty-some billions is a much higher figure than anyone would call optimum, but we are managing to provide a livable environment for this population.”

“What about the cities?” someone called out.

“Quiet!”

“Let him get to the point.”

Kobryn seemed almost glad of the interruption. He answered, “Yes, the cities. I admit that most of the larger cities of the world are completely savage... unlivable, by civilized standards. In plain terms, we lost the fight in the giant cities; actually, we started too late. But we have not given up. A considerable portion of our work is being devoted to long-range programs to gradually win the cities back to civilization.”

“Why are we here?” a strong voice demanded.

Nodding, Kobryn said, “I am coming to that. You see, we live in a world that is dangerously crowded. There are many who feel that we have passed the point of no return, that our population is too large. They feel that the barbarians of the cities will engulf us all, sooner or later. Even the optimists among us agree that our present population is too large, and we are constantly on the verge of a disaster. If the crops fail anywhere in the world, if a major earthquake or storm escapes our control... the repercussions could be tragic for the whole world.

“We have eliminated wars and prevented large-scale starvation. But just barely. We can handle twenty billions of population— but only if we keep the worldwide society absolutely stable.”

Kobryn’s voice took on a ring of steel at those words. “We must have stability. At any price. All our computer predictions and all our best social planners come to the same conclusion: unless we have stability, this crowded world of ours will crumble into chaos—starvation, disease, war, barbarism. Without stability, we will destroy ourselves and poison this planet completely.”

There was a long, silent moment while Kobryn stared at them from the viewscreen, letting his words sink in. No one in the audience spoke. The quiet was broken only by somebody’s cough and the nervous shuffling of feet.

“The price we must pay for stability is progress. You and your work are part of that price.”

Now everyone stirred. A sort of collective sigh went through the big room, almost a gasp but not strong enough. More worried and afraid than shocked or angry.

Kobryn went on, “Most of you are geneticists and biochemists. You have proven in recent experiments that you can alter the genetic material in a fertilized ovum, so that you can control the physical and mental characteristics of the baby that is ultimately born. Professor DeVreis, you yourself told me that within a few years, you could produce a superman—”

“Yes,” DeVreis agreed in his rickety, aged voice. “A superman... or a zombie, a slave with bulging muscles and just enough intelligence to follow orders.”

“Just so,” Kobryn said, his face expressionless. “In either case, the result would be a complete shattering of society’s stability. We cannot allow this to happen.”

“Can’t allow...”

“What does he mean?”

“You can’t stop science!”

“Gentlemen, please!” Kobryn raised his voice. “Think a moment! No matter how attractive the picture you have of raising a race of supermen, you must realize that it will never come to pass. Who will be the first superman? How will you select? Don’t you understand that twenty billions of people will bury you in their stampede to have their children made into godlings? Or worse still, they might slaughter the first few supermen you produce in an insane fit of fear and jealousy.”

“No, it wouldn’t happen that way—”

“We wouldn’t let...”

“No matter how you look at it, any large-scale tampering with mankind’s genetic heritage will destroy society as we know it. Believe me! We have spent a year and more examining this question. The best computers and social engineers in the world have labored on the problem. Our world needs stability. Genetic engineering is a de-stabilizing element, a wild card that will destroy society. The government cannot permit this.”

“But it will create a better society! A world of supermen!”

Kobryn shook his head. “No! It will create chaos. Look at what happened in the last century, when vast groups of peoples suddenly became aware that they could be free of the social systems that had enslaved them. When the last vestiges of the European empires were removed from Asia and Africa, when the American Negro and the world’s youth realized that they had political power, what happened? Was there a peaceful march toward a happy society? No, nothing of the sort. There were wars and revolutions, riots and assassinations—it took nearly the entire twentieth century before an equilibrium was reached. And for most of that time the world population was below five billions!

“Now, we have in our grasp this possibility of genetic engineering, the possibility of making our children into godlings—or slaves. Do you think the people of the world will stand patiently in line, waiting for you to work your miracle on them? Don’t you understand that many would-be tyrants would use your knowledge to produce the zombies Professor DeVreis spoke of? In a world of twenty billions, we would never recover from such a violent upset to the social order. There would be no new equilibrium, only chaos .Our world would come crashing down in anarchy and noting. Your laboratories would be destroyed, and you yourselves would be torn to pieces by the mobs.”

There were a few halfhearted protests from the audience.

Finally Kobryn said grimly, “The government has decided that all research in genetic engineering must be stopped. Therefore, we have brought the leaders in this work to this meeting. You and your colleagues—some two thousand scientists, in all—are to be exiled.”

“Exiled!”

“What?”

“But you can’t…”

“Permanently exiled, together with your immediate families, aboard an orbital satellite that has been set aside especially for you.”

Kaufman was on his feet “You can’t do that! We’re citizens and we have constitutional rights!”

“The world constitution specifically gives the Legislative Assembly the power to suspend constitutional guarantees in cases of extreme emergency,” Kobryn replied “Last week, the Assembly voted and approved your exile. The World Court has reviewed the situation and found that we are acting in a perfectly legal manner.”

Kaufman stood there for a moment, hand up as if there was another point he wanted to make. Then slowly, like an inflated doll collapsing from a leak, he crumpled back onto his chair.

“No one regrets this drastic action more that the Council of Ministers,” Kobryn said to the silent audience. “You men and women represent the world’s best scientists. But for the safety and stability of the world’s billions, a few thousand must be sacrificed. Your living conditions aboard the satellite, though rather crowded, will be as pleasant and even luxurious as they can be made to be. We do not wish to harm you. We have tried to find an alternate solution to the problem. There is none. And it is absolutely imperative that your work in genetic engineering is not allowed to affect mankind. We are trying to avert disaster. I hope you understand.”

“Filthy liar,” Kon muttered

Frederick stood up and called out, “My name is Clark Frederick. I’m neither a geneticist nor a biochemist, but a rocket engineer. A few of my colleagues are here too. Are we included in this exile? And if so, why?”

Kobryn glanced away, at something or somebody out of camera range. Then he looked down, as if quickly reading something.

“Ah Dr. Frederick, yes. You and several other scientists and engineers who have been working on interstellar rockets are also included—I regret to say. It was decided that your work could also upset the stability of society, and…” Kobryn shrugged, as if to say. You know the rest.

Frederick’s face turned red with anger. “How in blazes can rockets to Alpha Centari or Barnard’s Star upset the social equilibrium on Earth?”

“Let me explain,” said Kobryn “If the masses of people on Earth believed that starships could transport them to new worlds, new planets of other stars, there might be millions who would seek out this new frontier. As you know full well, only a pitiful handful could ever hope to travel in a starship. It’s much too expensive for true colonization.”

“Of course. Everyone knows that,” Frederick replied

“No, not everyone The great masses of people would expect your starships to transport them to new worlds, where they could begin new lives, free of Earth. And when we would tell them that this is impossible, they would not believe us. The result would be protests, riots, uprisings.” Kobryn shook his head “We cannot permit it. I am truly sorry.”

Frederick sat down.

“Besides,” Kori said to him, “they get to spend the money we were using on themselves.”

Professor DeVreis was up again. “Minister Kobryn, you have sentenced several thousand men, women and children to permanent exile. We naturally reject this decision in its entirety. It is completely antithetical to the spirit of the world government and the liberty of mankind. We demand a fair and open hearing before the Council of Ministers, the Assembly, and the World Court.”

Kobryn’s face hardened. His giant image loomed over the frail old man. “You do not understand. The decision has been made. It is final. There is no appeal. We will begin transporting you to the orbital station tomorrow.”

The viewscreen went blank, leaving them all sitting there stunned into silence.

10

By mid-afternoon the next day, a dozen men and their families had been taken from the villa by silent men in unmarked uniforms. The Kaufmans and the Sutherlands were the first to go.

Take the leaders first and the rest are easy to handle, Lou said to himself.

He wandered through the villa aimlessly. Everybody seemed to be in shock. People huddled in small groups, family groups mostly, talking in low and frightened tones. Lou was alone, a complete outsider. No family, not even his girl.

Again and again a shining black minibus would pull up the driveway and two men would get out. Unsmilingly, they would go through the rambling old house until they found the person they were looking for. A few moments of conversation, and then a family would follow the men out to the driveway, wide-eyed and shaken, to be bundled into the minibus and whisked away.

Lou stood on the balcony above the main entrance and watched one of the buses grind up the driveway, swaying top-heavily, and then swing out onto the road kicking up a plume of dust. It had showered the evening before, but the land was bone dry again this afternoon. Lou looked up. The sky was bright, but off on the sea horizon there were black clouds building up again.

A sleek little turbocar was coming down the road toward the villa, top down, two men in the front seat. It swung into the driveway in a flurry of dust and skid-screeching wheels, and pulled up to the entrance. Sitting next to the driver was the Norseman. He glanced up at the balcony and grinned.

“Very cooperative of you to be waiting for us,” he called to Lou. “Will you join us, please?”

Despite himself, Lou felt startled. It’s my turn already.

“Mr. Christopher,” the Norseman said, “you won’t try anything foolish, I hope.”

Lou glared at him. Without a word of answer he turned and went inside to find the stairs that led down to the front hall.

The sky was filling up with thunderheads and the late afternoon sunlight had that threatening, electrical yellow cast, with the damp sweet smell of an impending storm. It was cool and exhilarating in the back seat of the convertible, the wind clean and strong, tearing at your hair and clothes, making you squint your eyes and press your lips shut as the car roared along. They had come down the dusty coast road and turned onto a broad plastisteel throughway. For many miles the convertible was the only car on the road, but gradually the traffic built up. Now Lou could see the towers of a city off among the distant hills, and big trailer trucks were whizzing along beside them on air-cushion jets, streaking toward that city.

Lou knew better than to ask questions. Conversation from the back seat of the speeding car was next to impossible anyhow, even if they could or would answer. He simply sat there, enjoying the wind and watching the clouds blot out the sunshine and make the countryside look dark and gloomy.

Take a good look, he told himself. It’s probably the last time you’ll ever see any of this.

They barely beat the rain. The convertible, still top down, threaded through a maze of elevated highways at the city’s outskirts and then dove into a tunnel as the first big drops splattered on Lou’s bare legs. The tunnel must have had acoustic insulation of some sort, because even though the car didn’t slow down, the roar of its turbine didn’t echo and thunder the way it would have in a normal tunnel. They pulled into an underground garage and stopped in front of an unmarked doorway. The Norseman got out and held the door open for Lou. As soon as they were both out of the car, the driver revved the engine and drove off.

The Norseman led Lou into the building, down a hallway, and to an elevator that was waiting with its door open. He was watching Lou warily, and stayed slightly behind him, out of reach, as Lou stepped into the elevator cab. Then he walked in, flicked a finger at the topmost button on the control panel, and the doors swished shut.

As the elevator slid smoothly upward, the Norseman turned to Lou. “I understand that you people are being moved to a satellite.”

“We’re being exiled,” Lou said, feeling his anger returning.

“Yes, so I heard.”

“For life.”

The Norseman nodded.

“Whole families. Several thousand people.”

“I know... I’m sorry.”

“Did you know it when you brought me here from the States?”

He shook his head.

“Would it have made any difference to you if you had known what they were going to do with us?”

The Norseman looked at Lou. “I was only doing my job....”

“Would it have made any difference?” Lou insisted.

“Well... no, I don’t suppose it would have.”

“Then don’t tell me you’re sorry.”

“But...”

“Stuff it.”

The elevator stopped and the doors slid open. Lou had expected to see a hallway, a corridor. But instead he stepped directly into a huge, sumptuously furnished room. Thick red carpeting, a long conference table surrounded by tall comfortable chairs, all in the rich brown of real wood. Two of the walls were a smooth cream color, a third was splashed with an abstract mural. The far end of the room was plastiglass, but all Lou could see through the windows was mist and the streaks of raindrops. There was a massive desk near the windows, its black leather swivel chair unoccupied at the moment. The air felt cool and clean, the room even seemed to smell of authority and power.

“You will wait here,” the Norseman said.

Lou turned back and realized that his escort hadn’t gotten out of the elevator. The doors slid shut with a soft sigh.

Completely puzzled, Lou walked across the big room to the windows. His steps made no sound on the luxurious carpet. It was raining so hard now that the city was only a blurred gray outline. Then Lou heard a door open. He turned and saw a smiling middle-aged man enter. He was shorter than Lou, stocky but not yet turning soft. H is hair was still thick and dark, although his forehead had started to recede. He wore a light business suit.

“Mr. Christopher, a pleasure to meet you,” he said, gesturing toward one of the plush chairs by the desk.

He spoke with a European accent of some sort, Lou couldn’t place it. And Lou had the feeling that he had seen this man before, on Tri’-V newscasts, perhaps.

“My name is Rolf Bernard,” he said, taking the chair behind the desk. “That probably means nothing to you. The Finance Ministry is often behind the news, but seldom in it.”

“Of course,” Lou said. “The Minister of Finance.”

Bernard smiled. “You know my name? I am flattered.”

“I... uh...”

“Yes. You are wondering why you are here. It is very simple. Not everyone in the Council of Ministers is a monster, Mr. Christopher. The decision to exile you and your colleagues was not a unanimous one, I assure you.”

Lou felt more puzzled than ever.

“Mr. Christopher, I will come directly to the point. There is nothing I can do to save your friends from exile. Even as Minister of Finance, I am powerless to stop this cruel and degrading action.” He hesitated a moment, then added, “At this time.”

Lou felt his innards tighten. “What do you mean?”

“I am totally against this decision to exile the geneticists,” Bernard said, his voice firm. “There are a few others on the Council of Ministers who agree with me. We do not have sufficient power to reverse the decision of the Council, but we will not sit by idly and watch this happen without taking steps to correct the situation.”

“But, I don’t see...”

“How can you see? No one is certain of anything at this point in time. Except for this: I am certain that a few of my fellow Ministers will work together to free your comrades and bring justice out of this exilement.”

Lou nodded.

“Now then, as a more concrete action, I am prepared to offer you an escape from exile.”

“Escape?”

“Reprieve, parole, whatever word you wish to use.”

“What do you mean?”

Smiling broadly now, Bernard said, “There is no way for me to save any of the geneticists or biochemists. Not now, at any rate. But you are not a geneticist nor a biochemist. I can take... eh, certain action, that will remove your name from the list of those who are to be exiled.”

“What? How...”

Bernard stopped him with an upthrust hand. “Never mind how. Believe me when I say that it can be done. You need not be exiled to the satellite station. There are a few others, also, who I can slip out of the lists and save.”

“But the geneticists?”

Shaking his head sadly, “Nothing can be done to save them, at present. Rest assured, they will be comfortable enough in the satellite. Physically, at least. And also be assured that powerful men, myself included, will be working night and day to rescue them and return them to their rightful places here on Earth.”

Lou sank back in his chair. His head was starting to spin. Everything was happening so fast.

“Now then,” Bernard went on, “you realize of course that your Institute has been permanently closed, as have all the leading genetics laboratories around the world. There are still plenty of geneticists and biochemists, plenty of working laboratories, left on our planet. But the best people, the leaders, the elite —they have been exiled. In this manner, the government hopes to stifle the progress of your science.”

“In the name of stability,” Lou muttered.

“Yes. You understand, I trust, that the government will not allow you to begin work at any of the genetics laboratories that have been left open. If they learn that you are working in this field, they will take you again and exile you. Or perhaps kill you.”

“But...”

The big smile returned, and somehow it began to look slightly wolfish to Lou. “Hear me out. I have taken the liberty of starting a small genetics laboratory of my own—safely tucked away from prying eyes. You and several others whom I am able to save from exile can work there. I will try to bring some of the best geneticists and biochemists available to work with you. They will not be the leaders of their fields, of course, but they will be the best of those who have escaped exilement. Your work can go on while we try to end the exile of your friends.”

Lou could hardly believe what he was hearing. “After all that’s happened over the past few days... it’s... well, meeting a sane man in the government is a jolt.”

Bernard laughed. “It is not so much that I am sane; I am unafraid. The others on the Council fear your science. They seek safety in stability and order. I welcome change. I welcome your science. Without progress, the world will sink into barbarism.”

For the first time since the marshal had arrested him, Lou felt himself really relaxing. He grinned at the Minister of Finance. “You don’t know how important those words are.”

Nodding, Bernard added, “I have also taken the liberty of bringing some of the equipment and animal stock from various laboratories to my new location. I understand one of your animals is a gorilla that can talk! Absolutely marvelous!”

“Big George,” Lou murmured. “He’s okay.”

“Yes, the gorilla is healthy.” Bernard seemed amused, “Apparently he was asking for you.”

Lou nodded.

“Now you must realize,” Bernard went on, hunching forward at the desk, his face grown serious, “that my laboratory is a private, even a secret affair. None of the other Ministers know about this. It is located on an island, and once you are safely there, you will not be allowed to leave. Until, that is, the entire business of the exile is settled.”

“But why secret?” Lou asked. “Why don’t you tell the world about the exile? Why keep everything hushed up? That’s just what the government wants.”

“My dear young friend, this is a very complicated business, and the stakes we are playing for are extremely high. If we make the smallest mistake, we will lose everything. You must trust me to do what is best. At the proper time, the world will learn what has happened, I assure you.”

“Well,” Lou said. “Okay, I guess you know more about this than I do.”

“Fine!” Bernard started beaming again. “Now, is there anything else you will need to continue your work? We have already dismantled your computer and are bringing it to the new laboratory.”

Before he realized what he was saying, Lou blurted, ”There’s a computer programmer—her name’s Bonnie Sterne. She...”

“You want her at the new laboratory?”

“Yes, but she’s not one of the exiles. She’s in Albuquerque. And she might not want to come—”

Bernard waved his objections away. “She will come. I know women a little better than you do. If we tell her that you are safe and want her to be with you, she will come.”

Lou felt almost numb as he left Bernard’s office. The Norseman met him at the elevator again and guided him back to the waiting car. Lou felt as if his mind was somehow stuck in neutral gear. So much had happened. So much to absorb.

As he sat in the back seat of the car, driving through the chilling late afternoon rain, he tried to tell himself that he should feel happy. At least Bernard was on his side, on the side of justice and reason. Okay, so living on this island will be an exile of sorts, too. But at least you’ll be working, and Bonnie’ll be there. What more do you want?

But somehow it didn’t work. Lou didn’t feel happy at all, just vaguely uneasy, wary. And then he realized that he didn’t have the faintest idea of where they were driving him.

11

The new laboratory was on an island; all right A Pacific island, Lou guessed, from the number of Orientals around the place Most of the office people were Chinese or Malay Half the computer programmers were Japanese

Lou had been flown in the same day he had talked to Minister Bernard. They wasted no time. Anton Kon was on the plane with him, the only other passenger. Most of the trip was made at night, so neither Kori nor Lou could tell where they were going, except that they had been heading roughly southeastward when the sun set. The crew—two Arabic-looking pilots and a black engineer—said nothing to them.

Lou and Kon were separated at landing. A Chinese, about Lou’s own age, drove him in an open-topped turbowagon from the jet landing pad through a narrow dark road that seemed to be cut into a jungle. He pulled up at a plastic prefab dormitory building and showed Lou to a room on the ground floor. Not much furniture, but the bed was comfortable and Lou was asleep before he had even taken off his shoes.

The next morning, breakfast was brought to him by the same Chinese.

“The director of the laboratory asked me to convey his greetings to you,” he said “He requests that you enjoy yourself this morning in any way you desire. He will meet you here for lunch. At noon precisely.”

Lou glanced at his wristwatch.

“I took the liberty of setting it correctly for you.”

Looking up sharply at him, Lou asked, “While I was asleep?”

The Chinese nodded, with the faintest trace of a smile on his otherwise impassive face.

So Lou spent the morning walking around the island. It was small, no more than a half-dozen kilometers long, and half that wide. It was really nothing more than a pair of heavily-wooded hills poking out of the water. The trees were palms and other tropical species that Lou couldn’t identify.

The sun was hot, but the ocean breeze was beautiful. The place really was a tropical island paradise.

There were lovely white sand beaches all the way around the island, and a coral reef further out where the surf broke, except for a small inlet at one end. Lou saw a fair-sized, air-cushion ship resting in the gentle swells of the inlet. There was a dock there and a few plain white buildings. Slightly away from the buildings was the jet landing pad, a square of well-kept grass. The plane was gone now. There was no runway for bigger jets anywhere on the island, the vertical landing type were the only planes that could come down.

The dormitory building was at the opposite end of the island, connected to the inlet by the single road out through the trees. In the middle of the island, set into the fairly flat area between the two hills, were the laboratory buildings.

The labs were tucked away in the shade of tall trees. There were six buildings in all, filled with the bustling, nearly frantic action of men unpacking huge crates of equipment and working hard to set them up as quickly as possible. Their shouting and hammering drove Lou away very quickly. He only stayed long enough to make certain that they weren’t damaging the equipment that they were handling. They weren’t. They knew what they were doing.

And then, as he passed between two of the labs, Lou heard a scratchy hoarse voice calling.

“Uncle Lou!”

He looked and saw Big George standing erect, his huge arms upraised so that his hands rested on the top of the nine-foot wire screen fence that stood between them. The fence bulged dangerously under his weight

“Hey, Georgy!” Lou felt his face stretch into its biggest smile in days as he ran toward the fence.

The gorilla jumped up and down and slapped his sides with excitement “Uncle Lou! Uncle Lou!”

“Georgy, you okay?” Lou asked as he reached the fence

“Yes, yes. Strangers scared me at first, but they are very nice to me. It was lonesome, though, without you or any of my other friends.”

“Well, I’m here now. Everything’s going to be okay, Georgy. Come on down to that gate over there and I’ll get you out of this compound.”

Big George lumbered along the fence, knuckles on the ground. Lou saw that the gate had no lock on it, just a simple latch. With a shrug, he opened it.

George lurched out and grabbed Lou in his immense arms.

“Hey’ Careful!” Lou laughed as George lifted him off his feet, strong enough to crush him, gentle enough to handle an equal amount of nitroglycerin without danger.

Lou pounded the gorilla’s massive hairy shoulders happily. The warmth of his body, even his scent, carried the impression of huge jungle strength. And if the gorilla could have laughed or even smiled, he would have right then.

A pistol shot cracked nearby. Startled, George jerked and nearly let Lou fall. Lou saw sudden fear in the gorilla’s eyes, then turned to see some sort of uniformed guard pointing a pistol at them.

“Stop! Put that man down!” the guard yelled—from a safe distance away. He was wearing a khaki-colored shirt and shorts, with a little cap on his head and that big gun in his wavering hand.

“Shut up,” Lou snapped “And put that stupid gun away. We’re old friends. He’s not hurting me.”

The guard’s mouth dropped open

“Let me down,” Lou said softly to George. The gorilla stood him carefully on his feet.

Walking to the wide-eyed guard, Lou said, “Put that gun away and don’t let me catch you doing anything that hurts that gorilla or frightens him in any way. Do you understand?”

“I—I thought…”

“You thought wrong. Big George wouldn’t hurt anybody—unless they scared him so badly that he lashed out in fright.”

“I was only…”

“You were wrong. Now get out of here.”

“Yes sir.” The guard turned and walked away, fumbling the gun back into the holster strapped to his hip

Lou stayed with Big George until lunchtime—but inside the relative safety of the wire screen that marked off the gorilla’s compound. Too many people out there who’ve been frightened by bad movies And too many guns. The compound was wide and wild, Lou saw George had plenty of room, big trees, a stream, even the slope of one of the hills to climb

“You’d better stay inside,” Lou said as he left the gorilla at the gate, “until the people around here get to know you better. I wouldn’t want you to get into trouble.”

“I know,” George whispered “I’ll be good.”

Lou smiled at him “Sure you will. I’ll see you soon.”

Lou walked briskly back toward his quarters, knowing that George would spend the better part of the afternoon feeding himself. It took a huge supply of fruits and vegetables to keep a gorilla satisfied. By the time Lou approached the white prefab building, he felt sweaty and uncomfortable. It was beginning to get really hot, and the breeze had slackened.

The turbowagon was sitting in front of the dorm, with a driver wearing the same sort of khaki uniform that the gun-waving guard had worn. The driver also had a holster strapped on.

In the back seat an older man was reading some papers. His face was mild and milky white, with a high balding forehead and thin sandy hair that had started to turn gray. He looked slim to Lou, and was probably getting near-sighted, judging from the way he held the papers close to his nose. He wore a starched white shirt, short-sleeved, and full-length trousers.

He looked up as Lou’s sandals crunched on the gravel of the driveway.

“Ah Mr. Christopher.”

Lou nodded and put on a smile as he walked up to the wagon.

“I’m Donald Marcus, the head of the laboratory,” Marcus put his hand out and Lou shook it. The grip was limp, almost slippery.

“Get in and we’ll go down to the lab area. I want you to see the computer set-up before we have lunch.”

Lou climbed up into the wagon and sat beside his new boss.

“By the way,” Marcus said as they drove off, “did you know that you’re three minutes late?”

Without even blinking, Lou snapped back, “My guard must’ve set my watch wrong.”

Marcus looked a little startled, but said nothing.

The computer was housed in a building of its own, off to one side of the lab complex and not far from Big George’s compound.

Inside the one-story building was chaos. Workmen were uncrating bulky consoles, ripping off the protective plastic coverings, leaving huge gobs of spongy foam heaped all over the floor. Carpenters were putting up partitions with whirring drills and power saws. Someone was pounding on a wall someplace. Everyone was talking, calling back and forth, shouting orders or responses, mostly in sing-song Chinese. Lou was nearly run down by four men who, with backs bent and heads down, were wheeling in the massive main control desk at breakneck speed from the open double doors at one end of the building.

It was hot and sticky, and the room smelled of new plastic and machine oil. Lou felt perspiration trickling down his body.

“Most of these components,” Marcus yelled over the din, “come from your computer system at the Genetics Institute.”

Lou nodded but kept his eyes on the nearest workmen, who were busily laying a heavy cable across the floor.

“We brought the logic circuits and the whole memory bank.”

“What about the voice circuits and input software?” Lou shouted.

Marcus lowered his voice a notch. “Um, we didn’t bring the voice circuits or the vocal input units. You’ll have to type your inputs to the computer and get the replies on the viewscreen or printer, just like any ordinary machine.”

“What? How come?”

Marcus avoided Lou’s eyes. “Well, we didn’t have the time or the transportation capacity to take everything. Besides...” his voice lower, so that Lou had to bend down a bit to hear him, “with all these Chinks around as workmen and technicians, if they heard a computer talk they’d probably get scared out of their skulls. They’d think it was devils or something supernatural.”

Lou stared at him. “You’re kidding. Nobody’s...”

Marcus stopped him with an upraised hand. “No, I’m serious. Sure, we’ve got some good people on the technical staff, but the hired hands are straight from the hill country, believe me. My own driver—he’s a great mechanic, don’t get me wrong. But he keeps some powdered bones in a bag around his neck. Claims they keep evil spirits away.”

When they went outside and climbed back into the car, Lou took a careful look. Sure enough, the driver had a thin leather thong tied around the brown skin of his neck, with a tiny bag at the end of it.

They had lunch on the veranda of Marcus’ quarters, a house made of real stone and wood, with a red tile roof that overhung the walls by several feet and made welcome shade against the heat of the sun. The house was atop the hill that overlooked the little blue-water inlet, and the breeze from the ocean made it very pleasant on the veranda. Lou leaned back in a wicker chair, watching the moisture beading on the outside of his iced drink, listening to the songbirds in the flowering bushes that surrounded the house.

“A month ago,” Marcus was saying, “this was the only house on the island. By the end of this week, we’ll have more than a hundred people here—twenty of them scientists, like yourself.”

“I’m not a scientist,” Lou said automatically. “I’m a computer engineer.”

Marcus smiled wanly. “Yes, I know. But anybody who understands this genetics business looks like a scientist to me. I’m a civil engineer, by training. Right now, I guess I’m just a straw boss.”

The young Malay driver served them lunch on a round bamboo table, his little bag of magic dangling between Lou and Marcus whenever he bent over to put something on the table.

“Minister Bernard’s plan,” Marcus said as they ate, “is to carry on the work that was going on at the top genetics labs.”

Lou shook his head. “Twenty men can’t do the work of two thousand. Especially when those two thousand were the best men in their fields.”

Marcus chewed thoughtfully on a mouthful of food. He swallowed and then said, “I know it won’t be easy. We’ve brought some good people here, but you’re perfectly right, they’re not the best. And we couldn’t bring too many of them either, without the government catching on to what we’re trying to do.”

“Just what is it that you are trying to do?”

“Exactly what I told you,” Marcus said, concentrating his gaze on a leaf of salad that was eluding his fork. “We’re going to continue the work you were doing at the Institute. We’re going to complete it, and show the world that we can alter a human embryo deliberately, and safely. Once we’ve announced that news, and told the people that the government tried to prevent this work from being completed, the government will have to relent and allow your friends to return to their homes and their work.”

Lou felt an old excitement tingling through his body. “The next step in evolution,” he said so softly that it was almost a reverent whisper. “Man’s conscious improvement of his own mind and body.”

Marcus leaned back in his chair.

“It’s criminal,” Lou flared, “for the government to stop this work! In a generation or two we could be turning out people who are physically and mentally perfect!”

Smiling, Marcus said, “Yes, we can. And we will, if you can do your part in this job. You realize, don’t you, that you’re the most important human being on Earth?”