THE YOKEL
By WALTER M. MILLER, JR.

The time: 1987. The place: Florida. America is struggling back from the effects of World War III. It is a divided country now, with the big cities held by scientists and technicians, and with all rural sections overrun by ruthless gangs seeking plunder and the eventual conquest of the cities themselves. 
Into this maelstrom comes Sam Wuncie, cynical, hard-bitten and with but one ambition: to stay alive. Circumstance puts him deep in the hands of the deadly Colonel MacMahon and the unfathomable Zella Richmond. It is from this strange pair that Sam eventually learns there is far more to life than keeping death at a distance. 
No good science-fiction magazine should go to press without at least one exciting novelette crammed with action. Here's a pip! 

HE STOOD in front of the dimly lighted saloon idly rolling a half dollar across the back of his knuckles, a dark young man in dirty overalls, unshaven and unkempt. He gazed with dull eyes at the gloomy street, debris-littered, with clogged sewers and rusting, flat-tired automobiles, with shabby loiterers and tallow lamps burning atop the electric streetlight standards. The small city, once of 15,000 population, had only recently gotten the tallow lamps. Progress, real progress. 
A dame wandered past and he glanced at her indifferently—a frowsy tomato with glint-eyes and rag-hair. She saw the half dollar dancing across his skilled knuckles. She stopped. 
"Got a light, Mister?" Her purring tone offered a proposition. 
"Climb a light-pole, Sister. It's on the city." 
She eyed the coin. "I've got change." 
"Then use it to call a taxi. Scram." 
She laughed; evidently it was a good joke. She gazed hungrily into the saloon and moistened her lips. 
"Buy me a glass of swill, huh?" 
"I wouldn't blow you the foam off my beer. Beat it, Gertie. Your time's used up. I'm a busy man." 
She hissed an insult, spat at him, and darted away. He grumbled irritably and wiped the spittle out of his eyes. He dropped the half dollar in his pocket and shuffled into the bar. Customers were scarce. A rag-bag with a gray head was asleep on the floor; nobody bothered to pick it up. A gaunt young man with a festered neck and a blind eye was talking to himself at the bar. The sleazy wheezer who committed the drinks shuffled to meet the newcomer. 
"Hi, Wuncie. Got dough?" 
"Yeah, gimme a —" 
"Show me." 
Sam Wuncie cursed and jingled his pocket. "Wanna bite one to make sure?" 
"Nah, I trust ya. Who'd you roll for it?" 
"Picked beans for Gardland, Nosey. Gimme a drink." 
"What'll you have?" 
Wuncie glowered at him. "Frozen Daiquiri!" he snapped. 
The bartender shrugged. "Just thought I'd ask. Wait'll I get the siphon." 
There was a galvanized washtub set up on a box on the bar. Nosey dropped one end of a rubber hose in it and sucked on the other end. Then he pinched it off and stuck it in a glass. The glass filled slowly with a murky brown liquid. 
"What's in this batch, Nosey? Bird nests?" 
Nosey grinned reflectively. "Can't remember. Old Lady keeps six tubs working. Whatever she can get goes in." 
Wuncie took the glass with a shudder and tossed Nosey a dime. He peered at the murky fluid distastefully. "You suck the hose and still live. Guess I'll chance it." He gulped the drink and made a face. 
"Prunes. Damn rotten prunes." 
"Don't like it, don't drink it," Nosey muttered irritably. 
"I like it. It's a club." 
"Have another?" 
"Yeah." 
"You're a real patriot, Wuncie," the bartender said as he came back with the glass. "A smart boy like you could cross over and be drinking good liquor, eating good food, wearing decent clothes." 
"Yeah, everybody's a real patriot," he answered sourly. "Everybody that can't pass the test and be a traitor." 
"Nuts, you could pass, Wuncie. What'd you used to do before the war?" 
"Dropped earthworms down little girls' backs." 
"Just a kid, huh? Well — you could pass." 
"The only place left to pass is out. Gimme another." 
A man slipped quietly in the-door, looked around quickly, then sidled onto a seat at the end of the bar. He was panting slightly, and his eyes were nervous. One cheek was covered with a patch bandage. Nosey approached him with a deepening frown. The customer showed him a handful of coins. Nosey shook his head. 
"Lemme see under that patch first," he grunted. 'It's on a bad spot, Joe." 
The man looked stricken. "I — it's only a cut. Cut myself shaving." 
"Take it off. Let me look." 
The man licked his lips. "You got me wrong, Mister." 
"Show me." 
"Doc said not to lift it." 
" Doc? For a shaving cut?" 
The man slipped off the stool. Nosey reached for a butcher knife. The man backed toward the door. 
"You got me wrong. I'm no crosser." 
Nosey grasped the blade of the knife as if to throw it. The man yelped and fled. Nosey came back cursing. 
"Cheek was branded, bigawd! The sneaky bastard!" 
Wuncie's laugh was icy. "What were you saying about being tested?" 
"I said you could pass. I didn't say you should." 
"If I got tested and failed, would you run me off with a butcher knife?" 
"Yer damned right I'd get after you!" 
"That's what I meant. Everybody's a real patriot. Nobody wants to be tested. Patriotic reasons, of course." 
"If you're going to tell me what's wrong with the world," Nosey growled, "it'll cost you a dime a minute." 
"It'll only take a second. Brains — that's what's wrong with the world." 
"Huh? Whose — the committee' s?" Nosey frowned and scratched his uncombed thatch. 
"Nope, ours. We're freak animals, Nosey. We're like the goldfish with butterfly fins, or a saber-tooth tiger with fangs so long he can't open his mouth wide enough, or a deer with antlers so long they tangle in the brush. Nature overdid us, Nosey. A brain is a tool for survival, but she overdid it and we got all bogged down in our own gray matter." 
"You're getting tight, Wuncie." 
"Yeah. And that's why. I've got about as much use for an active cortex as a baboon has for a blue behind." He shoved his glass across the bar. "Here, gimme the deactivator." 
The bartender shrugged and reached for the siphon hose. He paused suddenly and glanced toward the door. There was a brief silence. 
"Come in," he offered gruffly. 
Three men stepped inside and stood peering around suspiciously in the dim lamplight. One of them carried a length of rope at his belt, and the rope was knotted into a noose. Another wore a long sheath-knife. The third carried a short joint of iron pipe. 
One man went to look behind the bar. A second made a slow circuit of the saloon, opening every door for a glance inside. The third rolled the rag-bag over with his foot for a glance at his face. The rag-bag groaned. 
"Go back to sleep, Pop." 
The inspection was finished in silence. The man with the rope approached Nosey. "You seen a man with a bandage on his cheek lately?" 
Nosey moistened his lips and glanced at Wuncie. Wuncie's smile was bitter, but cynically indifferent. The man with the rope frowned impatiently and glanced at his aides. 
"Reckon we should allow a blind barkeep to stay in business?" 
They grinned and shook their heads. 
"I think I saw him," Nosey sputtered hastily. 
"You think? The hustler that works this street saw him come in here." 
"Yeah, I saw him. I think it's the guy. Bandage on his cheek." 
"Clever lad!" the ropeman said sarcastically. "What did he say? What did he do?" 
"Tried to buy a drink. I saw the bandage and ran him off." 
The ropeman nodded at his colleagues. "Doesn't know we've spotted him yet," he muttered. 
They started outside, but the ropeman paused to look back at Wuncie. "Care to join us, Citizen?" 
Wuncie gave the man a fishy stare, then turned to inspecting his nails. 
"Citizen, I spoke to you." 
"Yeah? Damn polite of you, bud. Noblesse oblige, I guess." 
The ropeman hooked his thumbs in his belt and took two slow steps forward. "You sure are a smart boy! Maybe you're from the other side." 
"Go buy your brain back, Mister!" Wuncie snarled. "If your butt's for sale, you'll need it." 
The ropeman darkened. He glanced over his shoulder. "Hold it a minute, boys. I got a live one." 
The other men wandered back inside. They stood with hands on hips, watching with cold eyes. The ropeman leaned on the bar, staring hostilely at Sam. "What's your name, fellow?" 
"Thaddeus Twench!" Sam snapped. 
"Where you born?" 
"I wasn't born. The judge gave me this sentence." 
"You talk like an urban." 
"What if I am?" 
"Lots of urbans turn tech, go across." 
"You see a brand on my cheek?" 
"You might have passed the test and got in. You might be a double-crosser." 
"There's no such thing. Anybody bright enough to pass stays in." 
"Maybe you'd like to be bright enough." 
"Maybe." 
The man had been fiddling with the rope. His hand lashed out viciously, and the heavy knot clubbed Sam across the temple. The stool toppled and Wuncie crashed to the floor. 
"Teach him." 
Heavy boots stamped across the floor. Then they stamped on Wuncie. He howled until a hard heel jammed against his windpipe. Then his skull exploded. A moment later, he was being slapped awake; he roared and struck out blindly. He grabbed a handful of shirtfront. 
"Down, Rover! It's me!" barked Nosey's voice. 
He peered around at a foggy room. It was empty. 
"Where —?" 
"You been asleep awhile." 
"How long?" 
"Long enough to draw flies. Go home." 
Wuncie picked himself up weakly and staggered to lean on the bar. "Need a drink," he hissed, shaking his groggy head and exploring his bruises. 
"Show me your dough?" 
" Hell, you know — you saw . . ." He paused and felt in his pockets. He looked glum. 
"I told you — you been asleep." 
Wuncie called him an obscenity. 
"I didn't roll you." 
He stood waking up slowly. 
"Go home," said Nosey. "I want to close. And don't come back for a while. You picked that fight." 
"What fight?" Wuncie groaned, nursing his skull. "You call it a fight?" 
"You had it coming. I don't want my customers picking trouble with Border Guards. Just beat it." 
"Where'd those thugs go?" 
"Wherever the crosser went. Now, get out of here." 
As Wuncie's vision cleared, his rage returned. He reached across the bar, grabbed a fistful of Nosey, and battered it with his other hand. Nosey flailed back, cursing and screaming for his wife. Wuncie hauled him across the bar and dumped him on the floor. 
"I'm mad, Nosey. You gonna tell me where they went, or do I take my mad out on you?" 
"West End," muttered the cowed bartender. "Said they'd look for Bandage-face out there." 
"Thanks, friend." Wuncie let him up. 
"If I was your friend I wouldn't have told you," Nosey snapped. "Thanks anyway." 
Nosey laughed harshly. "Now they won't have to tie the rope to the tree. You're both about the same size." 
"Who?" 
"You and the crosser. Tie one on each end and throw it over a limb. You'll balance." 
"Pray for me," Wuncie snarled, and went out into the street. 
It was late, and the lamplighter had extinguished all but one tallow flame in each block. The street was empty; even the girl had gone home or found a customer. Black shadows fluttered, and stars were dimly visible through a mist-shroud. He stood listening to the wind for a moment, then walked west. 
The city was nearly depopulated. Cities, even small ones, were phenomena of technology or commerce, and with industry gone people sought a plot of land and a few chickens. This had been a railroad town, but the rails were rusty on top, and men were ripping them up to get iron for plows. 
A poster was nailed to a wall opposite a streetlamp, and he paused briefly to gaze at it: a sketch of Colonel MacMahon's grandly stern visage, with the inscription: "Men of Ruralland! Rally to me! The arrogant foes of mankind who call themselves the 'Restoration Committee' have excluded our people from the heritage that is rightfully ours. Their heresy is as old as Man, and the false classes they create on the pretense of testing aptitudes are devices of growing tyranny. Join my legions, and I shall sweep them from their usurper's throne, that all men may once again enjoy the fruits of decent civilization." 
Sam Wuncie spat thoughtfully on the poster and walked on. The three men who pursued the crosser were members in a division of MacMahon's legions — the Border Guard — who made certain that people in the rural areas stayed away from the testing booths that were set up at the barbed-wire enclosures around the industrial and urban sectors of the country. 
He wandered among the dark alleyways, pausing occasionally to listen. There was only the wind in the live oaks, and the rattle of loose tin on a garage roof. He moved on. 
Why bother? he wondered briefly. He didn't particularly care what they did to the crosser. He would live longer if he just forgot about it. 
But he had a red mad burning deep in his belly. The boys had kicked him around. In a world like this it was boot for boot, and double damages. When nobody could enforce the peace, each man had to enforce his own—but there weren't any sixguns to make all men equal. There were wits and lead pipes and the fast-burning fuse of hate. If you broke the legs of the man who kicked you, you accomplished social justice. If you failed to do so, you neglected your duty to the next man he might decide to kick. A hard code, but it worked — and workability was the yardstick of rightness. 
He prowled through garages as he moved along, searching for a suitable weapon. Most of them had been cleaned out, but he found an archery target in the third place he searched. The house was deserted. He broke in through the back door and came out a few minutes later with a fifty-pound bow, a dozen target arrows, and a small meat cleaver. 
A muttering cry came to his ears from the north. It was brief and feeble. He paused to peer along the streets and saw the faint aura of a bonfire several blocks away. He turned toward it and broke into a quiet trot. Men were talking and laughing in low tones. Another feeble scream, then a brief snatch of song: 

"He floats through the air with the greatest of ease, 
0 the daring young man on the flying trapeze. 
His movements are graceful, 
all the girls he does please, 
And my love he has stolen away." 

Another low scream. 
Sam stole to the end of the block and peered around the corner of the house. A huge oak tree overhung the street. They had built a bonfire on the pavement. The crosser's feet were caught in the noose, and he hung head down from a high limb. The men were singing and laughing while one of them swung him back and forth across the flames. He was naked to the waist, and his scrawny back was criss-crossed by red stripes. 
One of the men was silhouetted. Eyes glittering in the firelight, Wuncie quietly fitted an arrow to the bow. He was no expert archer, but the man was only ten yards away and standing still. 
Their singing drowned the twang of the bow. The man screamed and clawed at the feathered shaft protruding from his back. He staggered and fell across the flames. Not realizing what had happened, the others darted to drag him out. The bow sang again. A man howled and fell across the curb. He rolled in the weeds and jerked a bloody arrow out of his rump. He stood up, but his hip gave way and he fell again. 
The third man scurried for the shadows. Sam unleashed two shafts after him, but he was gone. 
Wuncie advanced cautiously. The crosser was whimpering and trying to keep himself swinging. His hair caught fire. 
The man who had fallen in the weeds was the ropeman, and he tried to crawl away. Sam got in front of him. 
"Look up at me, Bub." 
The man looked up. 
Sam kicked his teeth out. He rested quietly. 
"Help . . . help . . ." It was the man with the arrow in his back. 
Sam went to the bonfire and caught the swinger's arms. The fellow was only half conscious. 
"Grab me around the neck. I'll get you down." 
The crosser seized him frantically, and Wuncie loosened the noose. He fell to his hands and knees. 
"Your back's in bad shape." 
The crosser looked unspoken gratitude at Sam, then glanced at the wounded man trying to drag himself out of the street. The crosser growled in his throat and crawled after him. Sam let them settle it between themselves. It was about an even match until the crosser jerked the arrow out and used it again. The Border Guard lay in the gutter, and the crosser sat panting on the curb. 
"Thanks, fellow," he grunted. 
"I didn't do you any favor, crossy. You're better off dead." 
"Then why — ?" 
"Thank your little playmates. They made an error. They tried to change my attitude." 
The crosser swayed dizzily and moaned. His hair was burned away, and his face was blackened. 
"Maybe you'll be better off now." 
"Why?" 
"If you're burned bad enough, you can't tell the brand from the scars." 
"Ugh —" 
Sam pitched the cleaver in the weeds beside him. "Go hack yourself off some oak bark. Boil it, let it cool, soak your head in it. Tannic acid." 
"Thanks." 
Sam started away, then paused. "Tell me something, Bud." 
"Huh?" 
"What made you try to cross? You're old enough to remember the war. You know what happened to one industrial age. You want to make another?" 

The crosser shook his head mournfully. "Three of us wanted to get inside. Sabotage. Let the rurals in." 
"But you flunked the tests?" 
"We figured we could pass. We were engineers before the war. Passed the I.Q.s and aptitudes okay. They gave us a Rorschach though. And they put us under pentothal hypnosis. Questioning. They figured what we wanted." 
"That was dumb of you. You should have known." 
"It might have worked. Zella had it planned." 
"Who's Zella?" 
"Psychologist. A tech. They gave her a bum deal in Jacksonville, and she double-crossed. She worked us over first before we tried it. Thought post-hypnotic suggestion might get us through. It didn't work. Now she knows how to do it. But they've got us spotted." 
Sam hesitated frowning "Where is this Zella?" 
The crosser shook his head. "The fire's still burning," Sam muttered darkly. "And the rope's still up." 
The crosser shuddered. "I can't squeal on her —" 
"Look, Bud. I did you a favor. Now do me one." 
"Why do you want to know?" 
"Maybe I'm interested in trying it myself." 
"Maybe you'd sic the B.G.s on her." 
"Your brain's scorched. There's your answer in the gutter. Try another maybe." 
The man paused. "South Jacksonville," he grunted. "About a mile south of the barrier. Find an old telephone directory and look up Zella Richmond." 
"Her own place, huh? Good hideout. I'll buy that. Take care of your head." 
He left the crosser sitting on the curb and went to find an empty bed. Up to now, life was picking beans and hoeing corn for a buck a day and a meal. An ambitious man could do better than that, he thought, and if he could get inside one of the industrial areas for awhile, he could collect enough stuff to buy a dozen MacMahons and half of Ruralland. 
It was a five-day northward hike to Jacksonville along the deserted, vine-covered highway. The roads and towns were unmarked by war, for the northern city was the only Florida town that had been neutralized by the enemy fleets, and the only one that had been seized by the Restoration Committee. 
Small farms along the way offered the hospitality of their tables by daylight, but no sane man would accommodate a stranger after dark. He slept on beaches and in deserted buildings of small towns. He had become a skilled nomad, for Sam Wuncie could never confine himself to a few acres of land and a plow. 
He had been fifteen when the Hemispheric Conflict began, and he had graduated from high school into the arms of selective service. He was sent to the air force, rushed through flight training, routed to jet-pilot school, then grounded for high susceptibility to aeroembolism. They made him a yes-man to a colonel, but he said "no." So they made him a mess officer. But another colonel was chiseling on the mess fund, and Lieutenant Wuncie tried to dull the chisel. He spent the rest of the war in an Arctic weather station, sending up balloons and watching the guided missiles thunder both ways across the polar regions. When the guided missiles stopped coming, there was no way to get home except to walk, for the technology that supported transportation lay quiet in radioactive loneliness. The long trek south from Alaska had taken him a year and a half, and it satisfied him that he was fit to survive. That was six years ago. 
He might have tried to enter one of the Committee-controlled regions, but he resented the system that excluded the "technologically unfit" — judged according to the committee's standards. Before the committee allowed a yokel to take the tests, it made him agree to submit to the small "R" brand on his right cheek in the event that he failed — to make him recognizable as a "basically rural" personality if he tried to crash the gate again. Sam saw the branding as brutal irresponsibility, for the committee was surely aware of what the excluded population was likely to do to a man who had plainly tried to surpass them. 
The wind stiffened during the days of his journey, and low flying scud darted inland beneath dark overcast. The gulls followed the scud, and he noticed legions of ants migrating to higher ground. It was September, and the air smelled of hurricane. Somewhere in the Atlantic was a storm, but there was no weather bureau to predict its course. 
On the morning of the fifth day he heard aircraft engines droning from somewhere above the clouds — the first such sound he had heard since the end of the war. He stood frozen on the empty highway, listening until the plane was out of earshot. The Committee was making progress. But he was angry because of the nostalgic knot the sound tied in his stomach. 
When he came within grapevine distance of Jacksonville, he noticed that the farmers were boarding up their house windows. Evidently the city had a weather station, and the plane had been a hurricane reconnaissance ship. The farmers had probably seen the techs preparing for a storm, and had passed the word along the line. The daylight was gloomy-gray as he entered the south suburbs of the city. 
He chose side streets and alleyways, for he was nearing the barbed-wire barriers set up by the Committee, and getting closer to the half-mile quarantine zone declared by MacMahon and patrolled by his vicious Border Guard. 
He found an ancient telephone directory after searching through several old commercial buildings, and he looked for Zella Richmond. The name was listed, and the address was only a dozen blocks away. He was surprised that the crosser had been telling the truth. 
The wind was reaching gale force. He leaned against it as he moved along, watching the house numbers in passing. 
"Hey, you!" 
Sam stopped. A few steps away a man in a leather jacket stood in the entrance of an old drugstore. He carried what appeared to be a home-made crossbow, loaded with a sharp-tipped length of welding rod. Sam frowned bewilderment and started away. 
"I meant you, Curly." 
"Me?" He stopped again. 
The man came forward, holding his weapon casually aimed at Sam. "Where you think you're going?" 
"Down the street about two blocks." 
"This street." 
"Yeah. G'bye." 
"Hold it!" 
Sam held it. The man's eyes were narrowed suspiciously. 
"What address?" he grunted. 
"I should give you dames' addresses?" 
The interrogator cranked the crossbow a notch tighter. "Yeah. You should. Believe me. What house number you looking for?" 
"Thirty-six twenty-six." 
The crossbow took better aim. The man jerked his head. "That's the wrong answer. Back where you came from, boy." 
"Look! I'm goddam tired of being shoved around. I'm going to—" 
"Beat it!" the guard bawled. "G'wan back, or you'll get tired of being dead." 
"You mind telling me why?" 
"Yeah. There ain't no such address. Who you looking for?" 
"Zella Richmond." 
"Turn around," the man snapped coldly. 
"I thought you said to —" 
"I changed my mind. Walk straight ahead. I'm taking you in." 
"In where?" Sam began walking in the direction he had wanted to go, and the guard came behind him. 
"In trouble, Curly, in big trouble." 
"You Border Guard?" 
"Shut up." 
They walked for two blocks. "Turn in here," his captor ordered. 
Sam glanced at the address on the big, two-story, white-frame house set among live oaks. It was 3626. 
Sam paused on the porch to glance back at the man who herded him, The man wore a twisted grin. 
"Take a good look around before you go in," he grunted. 
"Why?" 
"You might not come out again." 
A man's footsteps were thudding down the hall toward the door. "Sergeant Quinn, is that you?" growled a deep voice. 
"Yes sir. I caught somebody looking for this address. He wanted to see Zella Richmond." 
A big man in uniform appeared in the doorway. Sam stared at his stern, proud face — and recognized it. 
"Inside," grunted Colonel MacMahon. 
"I guess I had the wrong place," Sam muttered, backing away. 
Something hit him a sharp blow in the small of the back. He arched and groaned. 
"Inside," the colonel repeated, then called over his shoulder: "Lieutenant Greeves, Corporal Sweltin — front hall!" 
Two other men appeared, glanced at the captive, looked questioningly at the colonel. 
"Put him in the basement." 
Sam's arms were wrenched behind his back. Handcuffs snapped around his wrists. They led him toward a stairway. 
"What is this?" he snarled. "I didn't do anything to you!" 
The corporal shoved him hard. "Nah, we're doing it to you. Downstairs!" 
The basement was gloomy and damp. One of the men looped a chain around a drainpipe, slipped it through the circle of Wuncie's fettered arms, and snapped a padlock on it. 
"Fix him up with what he'll need," ordered the lieutenant. He climbed the stairs and disappeared. 
The corporal rummaged through the basement, brought a gallon jug of water, a dirty blanket, a loaf of moldy bread, and a bucketful of withered root-vegetables from a bin. 
"Make yerself t'home, Chum. Just be quiet and don't bother anybody. If yuh need to go, don't use the floor. Dump the stuff out of the bucket and use it" 
"I want to see the colonel." 
"You saw him." 
The corporal trudged up the stairs and slammed the door, leaving him alone. The wind was howling about the house. Occasionally, quiet footsteps padded overhead. A rat scurried across the floor and scrambled into the potato bin. Sam tested the drainpipe. It was secure. He sat down on the blanket to think. 
The crosser had either lied to him, or Zella Richmond was teamed up with Colonel MacMahon, or perhaps something had occurred since the crosser had been here. Obviously, if Zella and MacMahon had been working together in trying to get the crosser into the city, MacMahon's boys wouldn't have been after the crosser when he failed. 
His irritation grew, but it was mostly directed against himself. He had hoped to worm his way into the city, steal as much as he could, and sell it outside to the yokels. But he had stupidly walked into the open jaws of somebody's trap. What did they want with him? Apparently the man with the crossbow had been willing to let him go until he mentioned the name Zella Richmond. Was there a Zella Richmond? Or had MacMahon merely adopted the former tenant's monicker as a code name? 
There was nothing to do but wait and see. After a time, he began to drowse. But quick footsteps on the stairway brought his head up with a jerk. 
It was a girl— a frowning girl with close-cropped black hair, olive skin, and hard green eyes that studied him like a specimen. She had nice calves, but they moved in a businesslike way, and she carried a sheaf of papers. 
"Hello!" he said. 
She dragged up an empty keg and sat on it — just beyond the radius of his chain. She plucked a pencil out of her hair and aimed it at a note-pad. 
"Name?" 
"Thaddeus Twench." 
The pencil hung motionless. She looked up slowly. "You want to get out of here alive?" 
"Sam Wuncie — W-U-N-C-I-E." This time the pencil moved. 
"What are you good for?" 
"Huh?" 
"What are you good for? What do you do best?" 
"Get in trouble." 
"You're proving it. Which do you want to be, cute or alive?" 
"Fly an airplane." 
Red rage colored her face. She turned to call for a thug. 
"I told you, damn it!" he bellowed. "I was a pilot!" 
She paused, peering at him. Her eyebrows lifted slowly. She got up and climbed the stairs. "He was a pilot, Mac!" she called into the house. 
"Then get the dope on him," came the faint answer. 
She came back down. "You're lucky, Wuncie. The colonel needs a pilot." 
He laughed. There wasn't a usable aircraft outside the tech sectors. "You Zella Richmond?" he asked. 
She nodded. "Who sent you here?" 
"A guy." 
"It's not important." She shuffled through her papers and brought out a handful. "I'm going to show you a series of cards. They'll have irregular blots of ink on them. Look at the card closely and try to find objects in them. Take your time, tell me what objects you see. Some people see one thing, some people see another. Use your imagination. See as many things as you can in each picture." 
"Rorschach?" he grunted, frowning. "Why in the name of —?" 
"First plate." 
He looked at it, saw nothing. "I see a team of mules, a fried banana, six little girls, and my grandmother's glass eyeball." 
She laid it aside calmly and turned toward the stairs. "Corporal Sweltin! Come and get me some cooperation!" she yelled.

Corporal Sweltin came and kicked Sam in the belly twice. Thereafter, Sam cooperated. They freed his right hand from the cuffs at her request. 
The girl finished the Rorschach and turned to association tests. Then came affective choice, aptitude, and I.Q. When she had finished, she left him alone and went upstairs to evaluate results. 
The rat sat on the edge of the vegetable bin and stared at him as if wondering about his protein content. He kicked an apple core at it and the rat darted away. 
The wind drove rain against the basement window and the water leaked down the wall to collect in a widening puddle. He stuffed the blanket in the bucket and sat on it. He counted his pulse to measure time. He had counted to three thousand when the door opened and two men creaked down the stairs. One was Colonel MacMahon. The other was a short, sleazy, chubby fellow with narrow eyes and unkempt hair. He wore an unpressed blue suit and a dirty white shirt. 
The colonel smiled at his prisoner magnanimously. 
"I understand you are a pilot, Wuncie." 
"So?" 
"Can you fly a very ancient four-engine transport?" 
"I can fly anything I want to fly. But I don't want to fly anything. Get your goddam flunkies to unlock this chain." 
"Tell me, Wuncie — how do you feel about my cause?" 
"I don't feel about it. I just feel about my own." 
"Which is?" 
"Sam Wuncie." 
"Your answers don't coincide with Miss Richmond's estimate of you." 
"That's easy," the girl called from the head of the stairs. "He just likes to play tough boy. It's only a defense." 
The colonel frowned. "Wuncie, I need you." 
"Then buy me." 
"What's your price?" 
"That depends on the deal. What do you want of me?" 
The colonel hesitated, then sat down on the keg and put on a confidential manner. "We're going to get a pilot inside the tech zone. He's going to steal a cargo plane and fly it out." 
"You're nuts." 

The colonel glowered. "It's all planned, Wuncie. And you're our man. Furthermore, now's the time to do it, while this storm has them off guard. The ships will be in the hangars. You'll slip inside, and stay aboard a ship until after the storm. When the ground crew comes to taxi the plane back to the flight line, you'll let them get the engines started, then force them out and take off. You'll fly the ship to the old Orlando Air Base." 
"What do you want with it?" 
"I have forty men waiting at Orlando. We've dug up forty parachutes and several cases of dynamite. You'll drop them over Jacksonville at night. That's all. Their tasks are already assigned." 
"Let's see," Sam grunted. "One man dynamites the main transformers at the power station. Half a dozen blow a breach in the barrier to let a pack of your boys in. Another batch grabs control of an arsenal. What else?" 
The colonel paused, then smiled. "I have no objection to telling you the plan. As soon as we secure weapons, a detail will go to intercept and kill the committee members as they leave their homes. There are a number of police boats in the harbor: Some of my men will seize them and put out to sea. The boats have machine-guns and ammunition aboard. They will be put in at Daytona." 
Sam thought about it a moment. "To be used for other raids on other coastal cities? What about fuel?" 
"There are several tankers in the harbor. We're going to try to get one of them out." 
"What about the coastal guns?" 
"We'll try to silence them beforehand, but we'll have to chance it. Our only real weapon is surprise." 
"The theft of the aircraft will disarm you, then. They'll be on guard." 
"I don't think so. I think the techs will expect a bombing raid rather than an air-commando attack. They underestimate us." 
"Tell me something, MacMahon." 
"Ask me," the colonel grunted. 
"Why don't you let well enough alone?" 
"What do you mean?"" The officer's frown was demanding. 
"Why don't you let the committee have what they've got, and forget about it? There aren't any governments any more, except for local ones — and the committee. Everything's peaceful except on a local level. The committee's managing to keep industry alive. Anybody who wants to join them can — if he's qualified. Their system'll break down in a few years — from the inside. If you tear it down, you'll probably tear the technology down as well." 

The colonel straightened and a fierce anger came into his eyes. "They have excluded the common man! They have said, ' We shall decide who is fit and who unfit.' They have made themselves God. They have taken what rightfully belongs to all men." 
"Did all men build it?" 
"They have created an artificial aristocracy; an amoral, godless, cynical pack of engineers. They call us yokels. And they exclude us from their house like dogs. Already they are instituting a program of selective breeding among themselves. Do you know what they did to Miss Richmond?" 
Sam glanced up irritably at the girl standing at the head of the stairs. She looked away. 
"Unlocked her chastity belt?" he asked. 
She stepped through the door and slammed it. 
"They insisted she marry at once. They gave her a choice of six men, three of whom were negroes!" 
Sam chuckled sourly. Evidently the colonel had some ideas of his own about what constituted a second-class citizen. 
"It's not funny, Wuncie!" 
"My mistake." 
"Will you assist us?" 
"What do I get out of it?" 
"If you do an efficient job, you may have whatever administrative position in my forces you desire. Within a few months we should have control of the Jacksonville sector. It's isolated, completely surrounded by rural areas, and supplied only by shipping from the northern sectors and by air. You may have command of the air installations if you wish. You are the only pilot I've been able to find. All others have crossed." 
Sam hesitated. The colonel's plan seemed to him a grandiose delusion. Nevertheless, they might be able to get him into the city. Once in the city, he would be out of their control. Then he could steal a truck, break into a commissary, load up with farm tools, weapons, or whatever was saleable, and crash out on a north highway. If the techs caught a yokel in the city, they did nothing more than throw him out after a good beating. It was worth a try. 
"I'll go along," he grunted. 
The colonel smiled tightly. "I can't trust you, of course. We'll have to find a way to insure your cooperation." He glanced at the chubby man who had been standing to one side, saying nothing, and watching Sam Wuncie with cold narrow eyes. 
"Well, Doctor Harlich, have you thought of a way to make him cooperate?" 
The doctor nodded slowly. "I believe so. Do you recall the dog we captured last week?" 
"The one that bit Manter? Of course, but . . ." The colonel paused. A puzzled expression changed slowly into a dry smile. " I see!" he purred. "Very clever, Doctor." 
"Shall I attend to it, sir?" 
"At once, please." 
Colonel MacMahon stood up, gave Wuncie an amused nod, and left the basement. Doctor Harlich followed close on his heels. From the top of the stairway he looked down at the captive and laughed a soundless, pink-gummed laugh. Wuncie shivered. There was something about the chubby man that suggested sadism. What was this talk about a dog? 
When the door closed, the rat scurried from under the stairs and returned to the vegetable bin. After a time, Wuncie heard sounds of argument from upstairs. The girl and the colonel debated angrily, but Sam couldn't make sense of it for the muffling sound of the rain and the wind. 
Darkness was beginning to fall. He ate a little of the bread and raw vegetables, and wrapped himself in the blanket against the damp chill of the cellar. 
A little later the door opened, and Doctor Harlich came down followed by four guards, one of whom carried an oil lantern. He hung the lantern on a nail, and the doctor approached Wuncie with a little smile. Something glittered in his hand — a hypodermic. His voice was soft with bedside solicitation. 
"Roll up your sleeve, please, Wuncie." 
"I don't need a shot right now, fat boy. Thanks just the same." 
"I ask you to cooperate, Wuncie. Colonel MacMahon's orders." 
"Get away from me with that thing or I'll shove it up your obscenity." He arose with a growl and backed against the wall. 
"Ask Wuncie to cooperate, men." 
The four guards approached him cautiously. Sam kicked at one. Another man caught the foot and spilled him with it. They sat on him. 
"Cooperate, Wuncie," another said sourly as he bared the captive's arm. 
"Glad to oblige," he mumbled. 
Harlich bent down chuckling. "It won't hurt much, Wuncie," he purred. "Just a mosquito bite. Hold still now." 
He squirmed. The needle bit his shoulder muscle. The plunger went home. 
"What's in it?" he muttered. 
"Just the saliva of a rabid dog," Harlich said as he jerked out the needle. 
He roared and fought, but it was too late. They released him and darted out of reach. Harlich's face was gleeful as he grinned at the victim. 
"Don't curse so, Wuncie," he said. "I have the serum." 
They went away and left him cursing in darkness. But hardly had they gone when the girl came back with the lantern. He turned the curses at her. 
"I brought you some light," she said calmly. "It'll keep the rats away." 
"I don't see you running from it." 
She hung the lantern on a nail and stood staring at him for a moment with the ice-green eyes. "I'm sorry for you, Yokel." 
"Said the schizo when he stabbed his mother. Break it off, Sister, and ram it!" 
She nodded. "I tried to talk them out of it, believe me. It destroys your usefulness later on. You'll work for them only until they finish giving you the Pasteur treatment." 
"What makes you think I'll stick around that long?" 
"You'll have to — if you want the treatment. Unless you think you can find another doctor with serum. I'm sure you can't." 
"In Jacksonville —" 
She shook her head. "No, they wouldn't have it, because they don't have the problem. No animals in the city except livestock. They're short of food, so they don't allow pets." 
Sam sat glaring at her in helpless defeat. 
"Tell me something," he grunted. "Does a yokel get worse treatment than this at the hands of the committee?" 
She flushed slowly. "I'm sorry, Wuncie, I don't always agree with MacMahon's methods. But if he'll break down the barrier, I'm with him." 
"You joined him recently, huh?" 
She nodded. "He convinced me that we should coordinate our efforts." 
"Why do you want the barrier down?" 
She reddened slowly, and among other things he sensed a woman jilted. 
"I don't believe in the committee's authoritarian methods," she said. 
"You prefer the colonel's brand, huh?" 
"I don't have time to argue with you, Wuncie," she said. "We're leaving in about an hour." 
"We?" 
"You and I." 
"Why you?" 
"I know where to go and how to get there. You'd fall into a nest of guards alone." 
When she was gone, he sat dejectedly trying to figure a way out. But he had seen a child die of rabies once; the convulsive spasms had torn muscle and fractured bone before death came. He shuddered. There was nothing to do but play along with the colonel and hope the sadistic Harlich really had the serum and would start the treatments in time. He promised himself a satisfying revenge, whether they gave him treatments or not. If they didn't, he resolved to bite all three of them. 
A lieutenant came downstairs with a small black bag and gave the prisoner a friendly smile. "The colonel tells me you're going to cooperate with us, Wuncie," he said. 
Sam nodded, deciding that the junior officer didn't know about the rabies shot. He stepped forward and produced a key. 
"Let me have your wrist. I'll unlock that chain." 
When he was free, Sam grunted his thanks and started for the stairs. 
"Just a minute. I brought my kit down here." 
Wuncie glanced at the black bag and waited. 
"What kit?" 
"Sit down. I've got to change your right thumbprint." 
"Change my what? Okay, this I'll see." 
The lieutenant handed him a bit of fine sandpaper. "Work your thumb over with it good. Get it fairly smooth. Don't sand till it bleeds, though. Stop when it hurts." 
Sam dragged his thumb across the paper until the whorls grew fainter and the thumb felt tender. The officer then painted it with a colorless solution, rolled it across a piece of ground glass, then waited for it to dry. 
"What's that stuff?" 
"It's a plastic filler. Seals up the remaining grooves. If they took your print now, it'd be a blank." 
He dipped into the bag again and brought out another bottle and a flat piece of metal wrapped in chamois. He held it up for Sam's inspection, and there was a dark spot on it. 
"Engraving of a different print," he said. "Ex-counterfeiter made it for us." 
"Fictitious? Or did it belong to somebody?" 
"It belonged to a tech. About a month ago two techs sneaked out of Jacksonville. They went up the St. John's River in a canoe. Wanted to make a deal with some farmers to ship food into the city. They're living out of hydroponic tanks, you know — plus some seafood. Anyway, these two techs got past MacMahon's guards okay, but the farmers caught them and turned them in. We got their identity plates and had a pair of engravings made from their prints." 
He painted the engraving carefully with the second solution. It crept out across the metal like oil, filling the impression with pinkish fluid. He flicked off the excess with a flat rubber blade, then took Wuncie's thumb and gingerly rolled it across the plate. 
"Don't blow it, just let it dry. Careful!" 
Sam stared at the new set of lines on his thumb. "Where'd you get this stuff?" 
"I was with Intelligence during the war. They used it quite a bit. Far as I know, this is the only bottle left. You'll have to be careful of that thumb. The plastic is tough, but you can scratch it off if you rub something rough." 
"Now that I got it, what do I do with it?" 
The lieutenant handed him a transparent disk with a dark thumbprint engraved in the plastic. A name was printed on it: Robert J. Klonish. There were two bubbles in the plastic, and they seemed to be filled with a dark powder. 
"You're Klonish now." 
"Why didn't you just change the thumbprint on this thing?" 
"Wouldn't work. They've got a system. A duplicate of this thing is filed in a central vault under the date of issue. See those two pockets of powder? They're slightly radioactive, with a known half-life. The techs stick this disk in a counter to get the date of issue. The central analyzer picks the duplicate out of the files for that name and date. It televises the print to the checking station together with the date. The dates have to check. The prints have to check. And your thumb has to check with them both." 
Sam stared at him curiously. "You a renegade tech?" 
The lieutenant shook his head. "We got the dope from the captives." 
"That's not what I meant. You just talk like a tech." 
The officer shrugged. "You could be one too, from the way Zella Richmond talks. Why didn't you cross?" 
"I don't like rigid systems." 
"Theirs isn't so rigid." 
"Why didn't you cross?" 
The lieutenant hesitated. He packed the things in the bag. "My son," he said. "I've got a little boy. He's feebleminded. Naturally, there's no use trying to get him in. A man can't leave his family." 
He turned away stiffly and marched up the stairs, leaving Sam to follow. Colonel MacMahon and Zella Richmond were waiting in the flickering lamplight when he entered the front room. The colonel pitched him a bundle of clothes. 
"Put these on," he grunted. "Techs don't wear overalls." 
Sam stepped into the next room to change. 
"You understand our terms, don't you, Wuncie?" MacMahon called. 
"I steal you an airplane," he said dully, "you give me the Pasteur treatment." 
"Right." 
"Just one thing. You try welshing, I can be a pretty mean little boy." 
"Your threat doesn't bother me, Wuncie. But don't worry, I have no reason to let you die if you do your job properly." 
"That's no good. What reason would you have to let me live?" 
"Why — you'd continue to be useful to me." 
Sam said nothing further. The colonel was lying. Zella Richmond had already told MacMahon her opinion of his future usefulness. He finished dressing and returned to the front room. 
"What's next?" he grunted. "Just follow Miss Richmond's very valuable instructions." "Okay, Miss Turncoat — where do we go from here?" 
The girl flushed angrily. "My name's Faye Alfer from now on. Don't forget it. What's yours? Remember?" 
"Bob Klonish." 
"Check. Let's go." 
"Good luck," said MacMahon. He made the mistake of extending his hand. Sam glanced at it coldly and walked away from it. 
The rain had stopped except for an occasional drop whipped along by the gale. The streets were in blackness, but they could see the bright lights of northern Jacksonville glowing on the underside of the clouds and silhouetting the buildings along the street ahead of them. 
"The checking station is in the center of the bridge across the St. John's River," she called. "Now, get this straight. We picked tonight because of the storm — made it easier for two techs to sneak through the rural guard lines. But they won't ask many questions if your identification is okay." 
Sam was carefully guarding the altered thumb. "Suppose the guys at the station happen to know Robert Klonish?" 
"There are over a million people in that tech sector. There are five men at the station. If each man has two thousand acquaintances, the odds are a hundred to one against their knowing Klonish, without even allowing for overlapping." 
"Yah, but let's don't do it a hundred times." 
"You'll do it a dozen times before we get outside again, so take care of that thumb. Don't wear it out." 
A few minutes later they stood at the river looking along the span of roadway that stood on concrete stilts above it. 
"Electric lights," he breathed. "Lord — I'd forgotten. . . ." 
The girl too was staring at the myriad glittering of the choppy water, at the flood of light along the opposite shore. The gale was whipping toward the city, but faintly they could hear the growl of traffic. 
She hardened suddenly. "Let's go," she snapped. "Run as if you had just gotten past the guard." 
They broke into a trot. 
"Not so fast!" barked a voice from the shadows. 
They stopped. A man with a crossbow advanced slowly out of darkness. 
"You fool!" the girl raged at him. "This is Klonish and Alfer. Get back before the techs see you. I'll get you court-martialed. I'll —" 
The guard retreated hastily. 
"Now run!" 
They ran toward the guard shack in the center of the span. After a hundred yards, a search light picked them up from the shack, then fell to make a pathway of glare on the bridge. The wind was worse over the open river, and a sudden gust sent the girl sprawling. 
"How's your thumb?" he grunted as he helped her up. 
"Okay, but watch your own." They ran ahead. A man in a khaki uniform came out of the shack, carrying a shotgun at port-arms. "What do you want, Yokels? Stop right there." 
They came to a halt. The spotlight again played over them. Zella laughed. "We look that crummy?" she called. "It's Klonish and Alfer, checking in after recon. Look at your check-sheet." 
The man called something to an aide in the shack. A few moments later another man emerged. 
"You're listed," he called. "But you're a week late, and Commissioner Jenkins wants you immediately." 
"Uh-oh," grunted Sam. 
"Is that on the check-sheet, or did you just call him?" she asked. 
"It's on the day-list. Okay, come on forward. Hands locked behind your heads. Walk straight and stop right here." He drew an imaginary line across the pavement with his boot, then stepped hack. 
Hands aloft, they moved forward until they stood in the glare of the floodlights around the shack. The man with the shotgun stood warily aside while the other frisked them from behind. 
"Okay, drop your hands. Let's step in the shack." 
Three guards were lounging in the building, and Sam held his breath lest one of them know Klonish or Alfer. But the men glanced up incuriously and returned to their card game. 
"Let's have the duckets, please," said their interrogator. "And leave your thumbprints on the scanner." 
After he had taken the plastic disks, Zella stepped to a metal table, rolled her phony thumb across an ink pad, and transferred the impression to a transparent slide that slid out of a vertically mounted scope that spilled bright slivers of light on the wall. 
"Hurry up, Klonish," grunted the interrogator. "You take the other one." 
Sam stepped to the table and imitated her procedure on a duplicate instrument. 
"You must be tired, brother," the man growled, reaching over his shoulder to turn the instrument on. 
"Oh — sorry." 
The guard inserted the identification disks in another rig, then jabbed a pair of studs. A boxful of electronic flickers came to life, and relays chattered. 
"Have any trouble with the yokel vigilantes?" the interrogator asked conversationally. 
"Got chased a couple of blocks. Lost them in the dark," Sam told him. 
"How was the mission? You went after a food contract, I understand." 
"No good. Farmers don't like us." 
The man grunted disgustedly. "They want manufactured products; we want farm products. Why don't they wise up?" 
"They don't like being locked out." 
"If they think they're qualified to fit in tech culture, let them come in here." He jerked his head toward a doorway marked Testing. 
"They don't like being branded if they fail." 
"Well, there's a damn good reason for that." 
Sam didn't ask what it was. He figured he was supposed to know. 
"Anything new happen while we're gone?" Zella asked. 
"Commission converted two more downtown buildings to hydropons. If the yokels keep being stubborn, we won't even need to buy their groceries. City's getting to look like a greenhouse. Vines dangling off from everything. Next thing they'll be stringing boxes of dirt on cables between the buildings. Tomatoes dropping on your head when you cross a street." 
A light flickered on the panel. The interrogator stiffened suspiciously and backed away from them. He unsnapped his holster and brought out a .45. 
The light winked orange. It said Delay. Sam swallowed uneasily and glanced at Zella. Her face was frozen watching the light. 
An inflectionless mechanical voice droned from a small loudspeaker. "Delay while Central accomplishes special instructions. Wait." 
"Oh," grunted the interrogator and put his gun away, grinning sheepishly. "I forgot that you're to see Jenkins. Central's probably trying to find him." 
He noticed that Zella was biting her lip nervously and staring at the light. Evidently an interview with Jenkins would sink them. A minute passed. The machine spoke again. 
"Message from Commissioner Jenkins to Klonish and Alfer. Quote: busy as hell at the weather office now. See me tomorrow at eight sharp. Unquote. Acknowledge, please." 
"Acknowledged." 
The light switched to green, and it said Identified. 
"What's wrong?" grunted the interrogator. "You look sick." He chuckled. "Jenkins isn't so tough." He moved to another panel and pressed a button, calling, "This is Slessinger. Cab to South Bridge guard shack. Klonish and Alfer, identified, going to quarters. Off." 
A musical chime sounded the deep-toned acknowledgement. 
He turned back grinning. "Guess you're pretty glad to be home. I'd hate to spend more than a day in that jungle. How'd you get on with the yokels?" 
Sam bristled, but made himself subside. An idea formed slowly. 
"Listen," he said. "I wonder if there's any hope of getting the Pasteur treatment at the dispensary. You heard of any rabies cases recently?" 
The girl nudged him viciously. Slessinger's eyebrows lifted slowly. "You were bitten?" 
"Yeah. Not sure the dog was mad, of course." 
The guard frowned. "Bad bite? Lemme see." 
"Damned if I'll take off my —" 
"Oh, sorry. Listen, lemme call Doc Terrell for you. He'll know. It'll be a minute before the cab gets here." 
"Sure, thanks. I'd appreciate it." 
He grinned at Zella while the man dialed. She stood quietly waiting for the results of his attempt, but the green eyes threatened mayhem. 
"He wants to talk to you," said the guard, handing him the phone. 
Sam grunted a nervous hello. 
"Bobbie boy !" shouted a jovial voice at the other end of the line. "When'd you get back from the sticks?" 
He swallowed a lump. The man knew Klonish. "Uh — just now," he muttered, touching his brow. There was a pause. "You sound funny, Bob." 
"Sore throat." 
"Uh-uh! Sless said you got dog-bit. When?" 
"Today." 
"Oh — well, that gives us plenty of time to dig up some serum — if there's any to be had." 
"None in town?" 
"No, but we'll contact other sectors." 
"How's chances?" 
There was a long silence, then: "Well, I won't kid you, Bob. Not good. But we've got at least four weeks to look. And you don't know that the dog was mad." 
He couldn't say what he knew, not unless he were certain the serum was available. "Well, do your best, will you?" 
"Certainly. Stop by tomorrow, Bob. I want to see the bite. And listen: don't worry. Even if the dog was rabid, lots of people are immune." 
"Thanks. See you tomorrow." He hung up. 
"Well?" asked the girl. 
"Tell you later." 
She smirked, realizing he had failed. 
"There's your cab," said the guard. "Good luck with Jenkins." 
The vehicle that waited outside was driverless, but the engine was purring quietly, and the door was open to admit them. Sam looked around. There was no one outside the shack except the interrogator. Then he saw the car had no place for a driver. A radar antenna was mounted on top. Bewildered, he slipped in beside Zella. 
She slipped her identity disk in a slot on the panel, and muttered for Sam to do the same. The machine clattered over them for a moment, then ejected them. 
"Destination, please," croaked a speaker. 
The girl whispered to him. "Klonish's quarters," he said, his bewilderment growing. 
The cab glided ahead, rocking slightly in the gale, and gathered speed. 
"MacMahon won't like it when I tell him how you tried to cross us," she told him. 
But Sam had eyes only for the cab which was, in the literal sense of the word, automotive. "How does this contraption work?" he grunted. 
"Look at the road. See that narrow strip of steel imbedded in the concrete? There are two magnetic pick-ups under the car. One 'looks' at one side of the strip, one looks at the other side. The steering mechanism just keeps them balanced." 
The cab left the bridge. Something clucked three times behind the panel. The cab slowed down, then turned right at an intersection. 
"How did it know to turn?" he grunted. 
"Three steel buttons back there in the street. That meant an intersection was coming up. So it slowed down, and followed the band that curved off to the right. It knows the way to your place, because when we inserted the disks it called Central for all data on you. It just counts intersection markers, then turns when the time comes." 
"Suppose another car had been stalled in the lane?" 
"The radar would have caught it. The car would stop. The cop would come from the corner to guide it around the obstacle." 
They swished through another intersection, and Sam got a glimpse of the "cop" — an automatic traffic-regulating device, mounted on tripods with wheels, like a desk-chair. It was barrel-shaped, with long mechanical arms for directing traffic, a head cast in the visage of an Irish policeman — for authoritative effect perhaps — and a radar antenna growing from the top of the head. Its eyes glowed red or green. 
He fell into silent awe at the sight of the city. The last years of the war he had spent in Alaska. He had, of course, heard of the changes that had taken place in urban life — of the application of electronic analyzers to routine tasks, of the coordination of the analyzers into complex net integrated computer networks under the name of "Central," and the marvelous advances in servomechanisms but he had never witnessed the change. The cities had been radiologically unsafe after his return, and then the Restoration Committee had seized them. He had heard stories about how the complex electronic networks, powered by atomic generators, had kept the cities running smoothly even after their populations had fled — but he had not believed. 
Traffic was thin on the streets, because of the gale, and only an occasional pedestrian scurried along the sidewalk, clutching his hat and bending against the wind. Nostalgia came over him, and longing as he looked around at signs of a healthy technology. Would this have come to pass if the committees had not acted, if the anarchical mobs had been allowed to mill back after the voice of the geigers had waned to a sleepy tick? Or would the leaderless mobs, in innocent but moronic vandalism, have torn the intricacies asunder for their own purposes? It was rumored that the burglary-prevention systems were still working when the committees came back. Suppose one of the mechanical cops had stood between a yokel and a grocery warehouse full of canned goods? 
Perhaps the committees had been justified in their original seizure of the cities, and in their restoration of order. But now the order was achieved and adequately policed. Why then did the committee still discriminate? Why not open the cities to anyone who wanted in? Employers operated their own systems of economic natural selection. If a man wasn't fit to hold a job, he got fired. The committee's haughty attitude seemed not only tyrannical, but pointless. 
Seeing the city, he was suddenly torn by doubts. What would MacMahon do if he eventually managed to seize control? There was much bitterness among the rural population. If the city were suddenly opened to them they might enter as a pack of vengeful wolves, bent only on getting what was "rightfully theirs" and punishing those who had excluded them. 
Maybe he should refuse to cooperate. But the itch in his shoulder muscle was a gun in his back. Sam Wuncie had always been primarily for Sam Wuncie — mostly because he had never found another goal that seemed worth the trouble. Now he felt restless in his pursuit of survival, sensing a vague guilt. But it was hard to decide which goal was more right: the committee's or the colonel's. Neither was a perfect answer, but there were never any perfect answers. 
"Why Klonish's quarters?" he suddenly asked the girl. 
"Closer to the airport." 
"Why don't we just have Lizzy here run us to the airport?" 
"It files our destination with Central, so that if someone wants to call us, Central knows where we are. I don't want her to know." 
Sam shot a sudden glance at the panel. "Can it hear us? " 
"It can, but it doesn't listen except when it asks destinations or relays calls." 
He watched her for a moment as they rode through the business district. Her face was strained and white. She stared straight ahead, not looking at the urban grandeur about them. Her eyes seemed to be glistening wetly, but her mouth was hard. He grinned wryly. 
"Just a country gal at heart." 
"Shut up!" 
"Why did you really double-cross?" 
She gave him a hard stare. "Listen, Wuncie. Keep your thumb out of my pie. I did you a favor once. But I can damn sure undo it." 
He recalled no favors, and told her so. She said nothing. 
"I could quote the old saw," he said, "about hell hath no fury —" 
Her hand arched in a vicious circle, popped him painfully across the mouth. 
"That answered my question," he muttered, blotting away a streak of blood from his lip. 
"It's not what you think," she snapped. "I worked as clinical psychologist in the eugenics section. The commissioner of eugenics is a woman. She hated my guts because I rated her brother class D. I was engaged to a guy in production. We applied for marriage permits. The files are secret, and you never know what class you fall into. But when you apply for a permit, you get a list of all permissible mates in the city. If your partner's name is on the list, you're okay. The lists include about a hundred thousand names for each class, and the classes are very broad. It's only very seldom somebody gets rejected." 
"You did, huh?" 
"No," she snapped. "We were okay. But the commissioner pulled a fast one. She marked the list 'no children' before she sent it to him. Accidentally, of course. He called her anonymously, asked for in formation on birth restrictions. She explained that the classes were divided according to basic genetic mental patterns, but some marriages had to remain childless on account of hereditary physical weaknesses. Herb got himself transferred to another industrial sector up north without even calling me. The commissioner's secretary told me about it later." 
Sam laughed gleefully, and slapped his thigh. 
"Funny as hell, isn't it!" she snapped, her eyes glinting fire 
"The horse laugh is for the system, Babe." 
She glared moodily out the window. 
The Restoration Committee hadn't found any utopian formulae, he thought. A commissioner misusing authority — a vengeful, catty female getting her underhanded blow below the belt. An egotistical young man fleeing from an entanglement that suddenly seemed beneath him. A jilted, angry woman running away to plan a mean revenge. Man remained a wolf, banding into packs to attain his limited goals, snarling jealously at his fellow, stealing away to prowl alone in sulky wrath when his fellow snarled back. Man the ambivalent — half social animal, half lonely predator — with the conflicting emotions of both. There were some things that technological planning would never solve. 
But he had to remain part predator in order to find any goal outside his own society. Otherwise, he would be like a herd of cattle clustered in a circle, all facing inward, seeing only one another, denying that there was a universe beyond the social microcosm, refusing to hear the howls of coyotes in the hills. No, there was no perfect social solution — nor should there be one! He wondered vaguely if the committee imagined itself as saviour, leading man toward perfection. The Zuni had achieved perfection — within the social microcosm — and the Kwakiutl, and the tribes of Dobu. But the microcosm had become an end in itself whereas technological society had tried, half-heartedly perhaps, to see culture as only a tool, revisable, correctable, discardable. 
The cab stopped suddenly at the curb. 
"Klonish's destination," croaked the speaker. 
He glanced outside. They were parked in front of an apartment building on a side street. 
"Alfer will get out here too," she told the auto-pilot. 
"Acknowledged. Watch your step please. Cab will depart when door is closed." 
They climbed out on the sidewalk, and she slammed the door. The car glided quietly away. The street was empty of pedestrians, and the wind was stiff out of the south. The pavement was littered with torn vines and leaves that the gale had tugged from the window-box gardens that covered the sides of the buildings. Here and there, a box itself had torn loose — a heap of black dirt and a crumbled sheet metal trough on the sidewalk. 
"Where now?" he asked. 
"Airport. The storm seems to be dying down. Worst part of it must have passed us by." 
They began walking along the dimly lighted side streets. As they approached an all-night cafe, a man emerged and stood on the steps, idly chewing a toothpick and looking up at the stormy sky. Zella clutched Sam's arm. 
"That man!" she hissed. "I know him, and he'll know me —as Zella Richmond. If he sees me, I'll have to pretend I came back. Play along." 
"Who am I?" 
"Pick a phony name. He might know Klonish too." 
"Sam Weston." 
They walked casually past the cafe. The man gathered a slow frown, then broke into a grin. 
"Zella — Zella Richmond!" He bounded off the steps, reaching for her. 
"Yes?" She turned, grinned, and caught his hand. "Ben Dorchett! You old dog!" 
"When'd you get back? This calls for celebration!" 
Sam stood dumbly aside, watching the mutual back-patting. He wondered if the safest course wouldn't be to get the guy in an alley and clobber him. But then, he would probably wake up howling for the cops before their plan was accomplished. Maybe it was best to play along and hope he wouldn't spread the word to the wrong ears that Zella was back. 
"I'd rather stay obscure for awhile," Ben," she was saying. "I've got a new job, and new friends. I'd rather you didn't tell the old gang I came back yet. Wait'll I get used to things again, huh?" 
"Oh, yeah, sure!" He glanced at Sam for the first time and stuck out his hand. "Ben Dorchett." 
"Sam Weston." 
"Nice knowin' ya." 
"Yeah." 
Ben looked back at Zella and replaced his grin. He caught her arm possessively. "You gotta have a drink with us both of you." 
"I don't know, Ben I'm tired. We —" 
"Awww!" He glanced over his shoulder. A couple was just approaching the doorway. "Hey Dan, Janie!" he called. "Look what just walked up!" 
The man and the girl peered through the screen at the three on the sidewalk. They broke out their best grins. They came outside. There was much auld tang syne while Sam stood glowering with pocketed hands. Moments later they were being herded inside the cafe. Zella hung back in the doorway to look around inside. He saw her sway slightly and touch one hand to her face. But the enthusiastic greeters led her firmly ahead. Sam, bringing up the rear, noticed that she kept her face abnormally averted to one side. 
The cafe was half full. He heard Zella suggest a booth in the rear, but the others claimed there wouldn't be room. They started shuffling chairs, then dragged two tables together and pressed her down in a place of honor. A party had evidently been in the process of breaking up, for two girls rejoined the group. One of them spotted Sam as a lone frowner; she assigned herself the charitable task of cheering him up. 
"Isn't it just wonderful that Zella's back?" she gushed, grinning. 
"Just wonderful," he agreed. 
"Where do you work, Sam — I mean, if I'm not too inquisitive? I'm on the tower myself." 
"I'm . . . uh . . . engineer," he grunted, then paused. "Tower, you said? Control tower? Airport?" 
She laughed a musical breath of gin at him. "Of course! Where else?" 
She began yammering about the niceties of her job while Sam stole cautious glances at Zella. She looked white and drawn, and she still kept her face averted from a certain sector of the room. Sam peered in the direction of aversion. Two tables were occupied, one by an elderly couple, the other by three men drinking beer. None were looking toward the party group. 
"You're not listening, Sam," pouted the control-tower operator, whose name seemed to be Loretta. 
"Of course I am. I think you're clever. It's a pleasure to meet a clever woman for a change." 
That should be good for a fifteen-minute lecture on female cleverness, he decided. It usually was. 
Zella excused herself for a moment and hurried toward a rest-room. She jostled him in passing, and he knew there was some kind of trouble. He waited, listening to Loretta with half an ear, and occasionally glancing toward the dangerous part of the room. The male half of the elderly couple seemed to be looking curiously in the direction of Zella's exit. 
When she came back, she jostled Sam's chair again. He felt something lodged in his collar and plucked it out: a tightly folded bit of paper, which he crammed in his pocket without looking at it. 
" . . .don't you think so, Sam?" Loretta challenged. 
"Yeah. I sure do. You're exactly right." 
She flushed slightly and looked at him admiringly. "I expected you to be bull-headed about it. I'm surprised." 
"You're dead right, Honey," he repeated. "Excuse me a minute, please?" 
He drifted to the men's room and unfolded the wadded note. Sam, it said, you'll have to go on alone. The commissioner is sure to spot me before I get out of here. He's sitting at the corner table. You're on your own. Stay away from servo-guards, don't go through an airport gate. Sneak in the best you can. I'll have to play repentant prodigal. Luck. 
He flushed the note and went back to the table. The commissioner was staring at her now, apparently trying to link a memory to a seeming impossibility. How to get out without making the others curious? 
Loretta was smiling at him affectionately, patted his hand as he resumed his seat, and opened her mouth to begin again. 
"Why don't we play some music?" he said quickly, looking around for a juke box. 
"Silly, they don't have any here!" 
He put on a desperate grin. "You like to dance?" 
"Love it." 
He leaned forward. "Let's go find a dance floor." 
"Well . . ." 
"I want to hear more about what you were saying. It's so noisy here." 
She giggled. "Won't Zella be mad?" 
"Oh no! We weren't really together." 
She giggled again. "It'll look awful, just walking out." 
"I'll show you how," he promised. "Come on." He took her arm and, blushing, she arose. "Excuse us, everybody," he said bluntly. "We'll be back in a few minutes." 
There was a snicker, and a low catcall, and a testing "Hurry back!" 
"I feel awful," she said as they went out into the wind. But she caught his hand, leaned against him, and looked up. 
"Let's walk out past the airport," he suggested. 
"Okay, there's a dance hall about six blocks down." 
He let her select the direction without seeming to lag. He meant to wait until she led him to the vicinity of the field, then become increasingly insulting until she stalked off and left him flat. 
"I bet Zella's glad her old boss got impeached. I bet that's why she decided to come back. Was that the reason?" 
"Huh? Her boss?" 
"Sure, Commissioner Ethel Robbins of Eugenics — didn't you know Zella used to work there? I thought you two were old friends." 
"Uh — not old. Robbins, you said, huh?" 
She jabbed him with her elbow. "Don't be dumb. You heard about the impeachment. Sam, I don't think you half-listen to me." 
"Sure I do, Sugar." 
So Zella's boss had been fired, he thought. That made things different. Maybe she'd change her mind about playing the colonel's game now. Maybe she'd even turn the coat twice and tell the colonel's plans to the committee. But that was of no concern to Sam Wuncie. He had to go on alone, take a chance that the colonel would keep his promise if he delivered the goods. Gloomily he thought of himself as king's pawn being offered for a gambit. 
Two blocks away he could see the high wire fence that surrounded the air-field. It was about time to get rid of the gushing, slightly tipsy Loretta. He took her arm firmly, but she leaned against him and purred. He pressed her into a dark entrance-way and kissed her rudely. Instead of belting him, she snuggled, hooked her arms around his neck, and kissed him back. For a moment, he was at a loss. 
"I like you, Sam," she whispered, giggling in his ear. 
Desperately, he tried a very blunt tactic. But she insisted on cooperating. 
"Not here," she whispered. "You have a roommate?" 
"Yeah." 
"Me too — darn it." 
He had a sudden hunch. "Let's take a walk on the airport. You can get inside." 
"You can't though, can you? —I mean —" She snickered again. "I know a way. Come on." 
There was a gate at the end of the street, and he could see a turnstile with an identity unit. The 'stile offered a continuous barrier from head to toe, and it was closed at the top. 
"I don't see —" 
"Just watch," she snickered as they approached it. She produced her identity disk and dropped it in the slot. The unit mused over it for a time, then croaked, "Pass Iggleby." The turnstile lock clicked, and a motor purred. 
"Bend over," she said to Sam. "What?" 
"Bend over. I'll ride you piggy back." 
Mystified, he obeyed. "Waiting," said the unit. 
"Now step on the platform." 
With Loretta clinging to his back, he stepped into the 'stile, and the platform was covered with metal studs that seemed to depress when he stepped on them. The platform began to revolve. 
"These gate-units are dumb, aren't they," she said in his ear. "All they can do is count feet." 
The turnstile stopped and they walked onto the airport. Across a narrow strip of grass was a concrete ramp, immersed in darkness. They crossed to it, and he kissed her again to keep her going. It was beginning to be fun, and he regretted the fact. He had more to do than make love to a plump and affable blonde. 
Floodlights spilled in front of several hangars, but they kept to the shadows in the rear. 
"Know where we're going?" she asked. 
"Uh . . ." He indicated a nearby hangar. "What's in there?" 
"Engine-changes, repairs." 
"How about the next one?" She paused. "I remember, because I was on duty this morning when they towed it in." 
"Well?" 
"Let me think. Uh . .. an old C-54." 
"In for repairs?" 
"No, just to get it out of the gale. Why?" 
"No reason. Come on." 
"In there? But that's restricted." 
"It's not guarded, is it?" 
"No, but —" 
"Then come on." 
"Sam, I'm scared!" She hung back, and her voice had a "what-am-I-doing-here?" note, as if her supply of gin was wearing thin. 
"Come here." He pulled her close. 
The rear entrance to the hangar was locked, but a window wasn't. He pried it open and they slipped into darkness. But a sliver of light from the floods in front of the building gradually made the gloom less impenetrable, and he peered at the dark shadow-shape of the old transport plane from two years ago. He paused, wondering if he should knock the girl senseless now, or wait awhile. But he would have to haul her aboard the plane, and he might as well lead the lamb to a convenient spot. 
She giggled as he opened the hatch. "This is awful, Sammm!" He gave her a little pat to help her in, then climbed up behind her and closed the hatch softly. Cool arms slipped around his neck. He unfurled his fist and decided to wait awhile. 
"Saaaam!"
The wind died slowly. The vibration of the great building ceased. Loretta yawned sleepily and stretched on the heap of kapok cushions. 
"We've gotta . . . leave before . . . daylight . . . Sam," she purred drowsily. 
"After a while — it's a long night." 
He remained motionless for a time, listening to her breathing. Soon she slept. He touched her face lightly. She remained asleep. He stole away quietly, trying to remember where a C-54 stowed its first-aid kits. He found one in the radio compartment, and two more on the flight deck. He extracted the morphine and the adhesive tape, then crept back to Loretta. 
She whimpered when the needle stung her thigh, scratched at it sleepily, tried to push it away. Then she woke up, still whimpering. 
"Sam! What are you doing?" She pawed at his hand. 
"Stop it!" he said evenly. "You rolled on a little piece of wire. I'll get it out." 
He fed her the entire contents of the tube, then jerked the needle free. 
"Sam! What did you do? What was that thing?" 
"A sharp bit of wire, I told you!" 
"It wasn't. It felt like a needle." He chuckled. "You woke up dreaming, Sugar." 
"Sam?" 
"Huh?" 
"Come here." 
He came. Moments later she was asleep. He waited for the drug to take effect, then trussed her securely with the tape and gagged her. Occasionally she moaned, half-awakening, then falling into a drowse again. He covered her with a tarp, then went up to the flight deck. He inspected the controls briefly and checked the service report. The ship was fully serviced. He paused, thinking. With Zella along, it would be safer to wait for morning. But Zella was probably being interrogated right now, and she might decide to pull another switch. That would end the game then and there. 
He climbed out of the pilot's compartment and lowered himself from the hatch. The hangar doors were motor-driven, folding upward. There would be a long delay between the time he opened the doors and the time he got the engines started. An even longer delay for taxiing to the end of the runway. If armed guards policed the field, there would be ample time for them to have a shot at him. Or more likely, they would simply block off the runway and try to make takeoff impossible. He needed a legitimate excuse for taxiing the ship out of the hangar. He went looking for one, prowling along the walls of the hangar, browsing through equipment and tools. He found two acetylene welders and dragged them to the locked door of a small tool room that appeared to have no windows to the outside. The door had a small glass window; he pressed a kapok cushion against it, then struck the cushion with his fist. The breaking was almost soundless. He shut off one pair of cylinders tightly, then chopped the torch-mounting from the hoses and fed them through the shattered window, tossing their severed ends toward the far side of the tool room. 
Pulling up the second rig, he cracked the acetylene line and lit a long yellow flame. He fed it just enough oxygen to take the brightness out of it, then hung the nozzle through the window, just inside the room. For the moment, he left the severed lines off, and went to find a box of waste, which he scattered in front of the door and soaked with oil. He cracked the valves on the severed lines then, and briefly watched the slight pressure drop. There might be very little time. 
He darted toward the front of the hangar, threw the switch to hoist the doors, started the alarm bell, and caught up the phone to scream a hasty call to the automatic switchboard: "Fire in hangar three! Fire in hangar three!" He left the phone dangling and sprinted for the ship. The hangar doors were rolling up as he clambered through the hatch, and the building was being searchlighted from the control tower. 
A loudspeaker was blaring across the field : " What's the trouble over there? Hangar three! Guard units, investigate —" 
The speaker stopped suddenly. Evidently the switchboard had relayed the fire-call. 
Scrambling into the cockpit, Sam kicked on the battery switches and started the inverter. Then he growled a low curse; he had forgotten to pull the props through. Unwilling to risk a locked cylinder, he nudged the starters on the outside engines, not firing them, but turning them through a few times. A siren was blaring from across the ramp. 
One engine coughed, then kicked to life. Then he tried the second. It coughed, but refused. He tried again. 
A sudden flare of light came from behind, and the blast of the explosion shuddered through the ship. The second engine started. If he still had a tail-assembly, he was all right. Releasing the brakes, he eased the ship ahead. Two men in mechanics' uniforms were racing across the ramp. One came front and center to signal him out. Sam grinned. The 54's ground crew probably, figuring some neighboring grease-monkey was rescuing their boat. A fire truck screeched to a halt on the ramp, and helmeted figures darted toward the inferno. 
Sam taxied a hundred yards ahead and looked back. Nobody was even watching the aircraft, although the tower occasionally threw a searchlight on him, evidently trying to tell him to cut on the command set for taxi instructions. A follow-me jeep was darting toward him, but he looked around for a runway, spotted the center of one, and headed for it across rough ground. The searchlight behaved frantically. The follow-me jeep skidded to a stop and took off after the ship. Out of curiosity, Sam switched on the command set. 
". . . the damn ship back on the strip! What's the damn crazy idea of —" 
He shut it off. The ship got on the runway after much rough maneuvering. He glanced at the windsock's outline of tiny glistening reflectors, then turned right, started the other engines, lowered the flaps, set the brakes, and eased the throttles forward. The follow-me jeep whirred up in a cloud of mud-particles, started in front of the poised aircraft, thought better of the idea, and backed up quickly. Far up ahead, a car's headlights were racing for the strip. 
He released the brakes and gave it full throttle. He had only half a runway, but a fairly strong headwind. The ship gathered speed. A truck roared onto the runway. A man leaped out and waved his arms wildly. Sam gritted his teeth and kept going. The man was waving a pistol. Guards with rifles scrambled out of the truck. 
Then they scrambled off the runway in a last-minute dive. The truck roared frantically for safety. Sam hit the ailerons, trying to bounce a wingtip over the fleeing vehicle. He narrowly missed a ground-loop and thundered on. Sharp ringing sounds told him rifle bullets were punching through the fuselage. 
Then he was airborne, with wheels and flaps folding beneath him, and he breathed quiet relief as he leveled off at low altitude and headed south along the coastline. A hint of dawn was graying in the east. 
Fearing fighter interception, he flew just below the overcast, ready at any moment to dart upward into the vapor shroud. But evidently the city's small airforce had been caught unprepared. 

After forty minutes, the sunrise revealed Merritt Island just ahead, and the cluster of buildings that was Titusville. He banked right and flew a heading of 270º until, nestled in the Florida lake country, Orlando lay beneath him. He circled the airport, waggling his wings until a group of men appeared near the runway and began waving. Then he came in for a landing. 
He could not of course expect the colonel, for the trip that had taken him less than an hour would involve several days on horseback. A man in paratrooper's boots, wearing no insignia, approached him as he climbed out of the ship, and introduced himself as Captain Parrin. He seemed to accept Wuncie with a certain amount of respect, which seemed to suggest that he had not yet heard that the pilot was a prisoner of circumstances, rather than a willing volunteer. 
"There's a girl tied up in the back of the ship," he told Parrin. "She's to be well treated, and not regarded as a prisoner." 
The captain assured him that she would be taken care of, and sent two men to get her out of the ship. 
"I had no word from Colonel Mac that you were coming, Wuncie. Unless you brought orders, we'll have to wait for a courier." 
Sam frowned at the northern sky. "They'll send out search planes to look for a ship. They'll find it, and strafe it on the ground. You want to wait?" 
"The colonel wouldn't like —" 
"Apparently the colonel isn't much of a strategist." 
The captain reddened slightly and coughed. "He was, I understand, a public relations officer during the war." 
Sam grinned sourly. "Yeah —well, we don't have to wait a week. Get your boys loaded up. I understand you've already got the plan of action. All you need is a time to start it, right?" 
"Yes, but —" 
"There are a few extra chutes in the plane. Carry an extra man. We'll drop him with a flare-pistol and a message for MacMahon over South Jacksonville. We'll set the time ourselves. If it's okay with the colonel, your boy can shoot a green flare while we're circling." 
Parrin hesitated. "Well, we're supposed to wait until dark." 
"Okay, we'll wait till tonight. But we've got to hide the ship." 
"That's no trouble. Just taxi it into the hangar." 
During the day Sam had a chance to observe the men that formed the small task-force. They were a rough-looking bunch, surly and grim — typical, he thought, of free-lance fighters of all generations. They were too restless and impatient to fit into a technological civilization or, rather, their restlessness took an overt physical form; but neither were they pastoral types that wanted security. He had a vague notion that if MacMahon's grandiose plan ever worked, it would not be the placid rural folk who triumphed. For the true rurals were not fighting their own battle. They tended their cabbage patches and grumbled about the system, but they adapted to it admirably. 
Several times during the day, aircraft droned overhead. One ship, a twin-engine bomber, made three passes over the field, evidently taking pictures. And the skid marks of Wuncie's landing were still black on the white concrete runway. 
Twilight came. The men were loaded aboard the ship. Half of them were carrying rifles; evidently they had scoured the peninsula for a few remaining rounds of ammunition. Several had grenades, and Sam knew that they had some dynamite. 
Parrin sat in the co-pilot's seat after they were airborne, and he went over the plan with Wuncie as they winged northward. 
"We're to drop three men as close as we can get them to the north end of St. John's bridge. They're to capture the bridge guard-shack while the colonel's ground forces keep the guards occupied from the south. All the men we could muster will drive across the bridge and disperse throughout the city. They're to steal weapons and assemble later at the water front. But their real purpose is their nuisance value. They'll keep the techs busy rounding them up until we can make a drop near the power station and another near the Central Coordinator vaults. Once we get them knocked out, the city's ripe for plucking." 

What then? Sam wondered, but nodded agreeably. 
"Better call your messenger, Parrin. South Jax is just ahead." 
The captain nodded and left the cockpit. A moment later he returned with a small heavy-set man who glanced questioningly at Wuncie. Sam handed him the ship's flare-pistol. 
"You know where to find Colonel Mac?" he called. 
The man nodded. 
"When I blink the warming light, hit the silk. We'll circle until you make contact." He glanced at Parrin. "You give him the message?" 
"He's got it written. I suggested eleven o'clock." 
Sam glanced at his watch. "It's nine now. That doesn't give him much time to get ready. We've got just about six hours' fuel." 
"Want to make it later?" 
He thought about it for a moment. Then he got a message from the courier and added a notation: Flare code as follows: Red-red, return to base; green-green, eleven o'clock; green-yellow, midnight: yellow-yellow, one o'clock; red-yellow, two o'clock; red-green, land at South fax for contact. 
He gave the courier a double handful of assorted flare-cartridges and showed the note to Parrin. The captain nodded. 
"That should keep Colonel Mac from blowing his top." 
"Time's right!" Sam called to the courier. "Get the hatch off and get ready." 
The man nodded and left the cockpit. Moments later, a dull roar announced that the hatch was open to the slip-stream. 
The bright lights of the tech city glowed across the river, but South Jax remained in blackness, and he could locate it only by estimating distance from the lighted river-bridge. He flew southwest at three thousand feet. When the bridge was on his right at a declination of about 45°, he hit a switch to blink the warning light. Parrin darted from the cockpit. Moments later, he returned with word that the courier had bailed out at the proper time. 
"Now to wait," Sam grunted. 
The captain was watching the lights of the city with hungry eyes. "Wonder if they've spotted us yet?" he muttered on the interphone. 
"Probably. I don't expect this crazy scheme to succeed." 
Parrin glanced at him sharply. "Then why are you in, on it?" 
He smiled bitterly. "MacMahon bought me." 
The captain nodded and returned, his gaze to the city. He neglected to ask Sam's purchase price; a man's price, after all, was his own business. 
The pilot went down to five-hundred feet, circling low to the southeast of the bridge, and hoping that he would escape detection by aircraft locator devices. But if they had bothered to re-rig the wartime radar, they had probably been tracking him for some time. 
Fifteen minutes passed. Still no bright signal appeared from the darkness below. They circled and waited. Parrin seemed to be growing restless. 
A yellow flash appeared suddenly at ten-o'clock-low, and then another. 
"There it is!" Parrin shouted. "Double-yellow flare." 
Sam cursed abruptly and banked hard right, jerking the ship into a tight spiraling climb. 
"What's wrong? There was the flare!" 
"Yeah! Hundred and fifty millimeter flares!" 
"What?" 
"Flak, Junior. You're too young to remember. Hold your hat. They might start throwing something worse." 
"What'll we do?" 
"Play clay pigeon!" he snapped, nosing her down again. "Wait for Caesar to make up his little mind." 
More bright bursts were blossoming about them. Parrin tugged his steel helmet down and slunk low in his seat. Sam went down to a hundred and fifty feet and hoped for no high buildings. 
Evidently the sound of the heavy guns spurred the colonel to decision. A pair of green fireballs appeared to their left and drifted earthward. 
"Eleven o'clock!" he shouted, and swung quickly around to a southeasterly heading. 
The barrage ceased as they left the vicinity of the city. Sam switched on the command set and listened to Jacksonville tower. 
"Leadnightflight from Control, stay in the vicinity of the city. Circle at your assigned altitudes. Do not pursue. I say again: do not pursue. Over." 
Sam swallowed hard. He could hear no answer to the message, for the aircraft transmitted on a different frequency from Control. But "Leadnightflight " meant "flight-leader, night-fighter flight." They had been in somebody's gunsights while circling over South Jax, and evidently the flak had only been a warning. He glanced at Parrin. The captain's jackbox was still on interphone; he had not heard the message. 
The tower spoke again. "Wuncie in C-54, this is Jacksonville Control, this is Jacksonville Control. We have been calling you. Are you listening yet? Over." 
Sam stiffened. They knew his name. That meant Zella had switched sides again. The techs knew MacMahon's plans, and the plot was ruined. He turned to Parrin, then paused. Wait awhile, he decided. 
He switched to interphone and spoke calmly. "They might have night-fighters after us, Parrin. Go back to the navigation blister, will you? Watch high and to the rear." 
Parrin started up, then paused. "There's no moon. How'll I see?" 
"You can see a twenty-millimeter cannon when it shoots at you. You can see a rocket burst, can't you? Keep your jackbox on interphone. Call me if you see anything." 
"Check." He slipped out and closed the compartment door. 
When he was gone, Sam switched to command again. The voice was fainter. 
". . . if you hear me, answer please. Wuncie from Jax Control, answer please. Over." 
He keyed the transmitter and spoke slowly. "Hello, Jax, this is Wuncie. I read you. Speak your piece. Over." 
The voice came back excited. "Listen, Wuncie — this is Commissioner Jenkins. We know the whole plan and your part in it. Believe me, you haven't a chance. We have the colonel's headquarters pinpointed, and we could drop a plutonium bomb down there if we wanted to. We still have a small stockpile. But we don't want trouble with the rurals. We never have wanted it. We need to cooperate. But if you try to make your drops over the city, we'll cut you down. We could have done so already. Pause for acknowledgement. Over." 
"Acknowledge your message. Are you aware of my situation? Over." 
"Wuncie from Jenkins. Understand your position. However, it seems possible that you were deluded. Zella Richmond claims that she pleaded with MacMahon to use distilled water, with only a pretense of rabid saliva. Whether or not this was done, she does not know. She believes Harlich actually wanted to infect you. On the other hand, she says that the dog in question had not definitely been proved rabid. They were holding it for observation. You may or may not be infected. On the other hand, if you attempt to make your drops, you will most certainly be shot down. Acknowledge, please..Over." 
"Wait," he said, and switched to interphone. "Parrin, you still there?" 
"Check," the captain called. "Nothing yet." 
"Okay. But stay there." 
He switched back to command, having assured himself that Parrin wasn't eavesdropping. 
"Okay, Jenkins, got your message. You have any suggestions?" 
There was a brief pause. "Are you under duress at the moment?" 
"Not at the moment. But I will be, if I try anything." 
"It's your problem. Just stay away from the city." 
Sam thought about it for a moment. He needed Jenkins' help to save his own skin, but the commissioner wasn't interested in charity. 
"Jenkins from Wuncie. How about the ship? Wouldn't you like to get it back? Over." 
Another pause. "Maybe, but that's not too important. Go on. What do you have in mind?" 
"Let me make my drops. You be ready for them. You know the schedule." 
Jenkins hesitated. "I don't know. I'll talk it over with the others. I don't think I trust you, Wuncie. You might change the schedule." 
If I did, you could have a night-fighter on my tail, couldn't you?" 
"I'll call you back." 
"Roger and out." 
Sam kept the ship out to sea, gradually gaining altitude, and keeping within command-set range of Jacksonville. He switched to interphone and called Parrin. The captain reported that he had seen nothing. 
"I might as well sit down," he said. "If they were after us, we'd have seen them by now." 
"Not necessarily. I wish you'd stick there for awhile. Otherwise, we wouldn't know until we got hit." 
Parrin grumbled, but agreed. Sam switched back to command and settled down to wait. He felt around on the floor of the compartment, hoping to find a used cigaret butt. His hand brushed something rubbery. He picked it up. An oxygen mask. Idly curious, he plugged it in and opened the valve, holding it against his cheek. It was working. He glanced at the oxygen pressure indicator and saw that it was well up. 
"Wuncie, this 'is Jenkins. Are you reading me? Over." 
"Read you loud and clear. Go ahead." 
"We can't do it. You'll have to worm out of it the best you can. We'd like to have the ship back, but we can't allow you over the city. If you make the drops, people would get killed—some of our people. We're going to make damn sure that if anybody gets killed, it'll be the occupants of that aircraft. That's all. I presume the others don't know your situation. Better tell them. They'll realize they have to call it off." 
"And I'll be their prisoner, and won't get the damn serum anyway." 
"That's your worry. You got yourself into it. I'm sorry." 
A woman's voice broke in, and he recognized it as Zella. "Do what he says, Sam. I don't believe Larwich really infected you. Of course — I know what you must think about me, but be sensible. You can't make the drops." 
"So I can't. Stick around the tower, will you? I may want to call back. Over." 
"Wilco. We'll wait half an hour." 
He cut off the set. He set the autopilot and stepped back to lock the compartment door. He found a second oxygen tank and cut the hose to make it useless. Then he returned to the cockpit and put the ship in a climb. At nine thousand feet, Parrin called him. 
"Why so high, Wuncie? What's the idea?" 
"I want to get up high enough to see the city's lights. We're pretty far out. Don't want to get lost. There aren't any beams, you know." 
Parrin grumbled and fell silent. At twelve thousand feet, Sam put on the oxygen mask. Ten minutes later, the altimeter read seventeen thousand. 
"Listen, Wuncie," said the interphone. "I'm getting dizzy. How high are we? I've got to sit down." 
"Fifteen thousand. What's the matter. You got a weak heart?" 
"Hell, no!" Parrin growled irritably. "But I don't see any reason for it. You can see Jacksonville now." 
"I'll level off in a minute." 
"Well, I'm sitting down." 
"Okay." 
He reduced his rate of climb, but continued upward to twenty-one thousand. He stayed there for a few minutes. 
"Listen, Wuncie," the interphone gasped suddenly. "Two of my boys passed out. Come down!" 
"I can take it," he jeered. "Why can't you?" 
"You come down — or I'm coming up there — and —" 
Sam nosed the ship sharply down until he felt weightless. Then he dragged back hard on the wheel. He judged two-and-a-half gees by the sag of his jaw — maybe enough jolt to knock Parrin down. 
"We went down a little, Parrin. How's that?" 
There was no immediate answer. Then a bullet crashed through the compartment door and punctured the fuselage over his head. He sank low in the seat and climbed as rapidly as possible. 
Someone began beating on the compartment door. He could hear faint shouting. At twenty-six thousand the sounds stopped. He leveled off and set the autopilot. He climbed out of the cockpit and opened the compartment door. A light was on in the back of the ship. One man was crawling slowly toward him, gasping for air. Most of them were out. 
Sam grabbed a walk-around bottle, plugged his mask into it, and started back through the ship, stepping over bodies in the aisle. The crawler collapsed. Parrin lay in a heap under the observation blister. Sam collected weapons and heaved all but one rifle out through the open hatch. He took the rifle and hurried back to the cockpit, lest he descend finally with forty dead men. 
He dove rapidly to ten thousand feet and set the autopilot again. He got the compartment door open as Parrin was staggering toward it. The captain saw the rifle and stopped, cursing fluently. Others were awake, and crowding angrily into the aisle. He suddenly doubted whether one rifle could cow forty men. Fortunately, only half were awake. 
"Start bailing out!" he bellowed. "In thirty seconds, I start shooting." 
Five men were gone before Parrin shouted, "Stay where you are, men! He won't shoot." 
They hesitated. Sam's finger tightened on the trigger. There was nothing else to do. The rifle crashed. Parrin went down screaming on a broken leg. 
"Get going!" Sam bawled. "We're over land." 
They crowded toward the hatch and went through it in rapid sequence. Others were coming awake to stare dumbly at the proceedings. One man woke up and evidently thought he was over Jacksonville. He blinked stupidly. 
"Hey, Corporal!" he shouted, "I'm on your team! Wait!" 
The corporal didn't wait. The man dove after him. 
A few minutes later, only the sleeping and the bewildered remained. 
"Get those guys awake!" he demanded. 
Still uncomprehending, they worked over their partners until only three sleepers remained. 
"I think this guy's dead, Wuncie." 
"Then let him alone. He might be hard to wake." 
But when he got the rest of them out, he stepped over the moaning, cursing Parrin and went back to check the allegedly dead. Two faces were tinted with Paris green, but everybody lived. He unsnapped their chute packs and took them with him, to insure that they stayed aboard. Then he went back to call Jacksonville Tower. Jenkins was still waiting. 
"Jenkins, I'm coming in to land at the airport." 
"Come over the city, we shoot you down," was the stern reply. 
He explained the situation, then asked: "Have you got my blip on the radar scope?" 
"Yes, we've been watching it." 
"I'm coming to the edge of the city and circle. You don't trust me, okay. Get one of your night-fighters on my tail. Have him ride me in at whatever range he shoots best. If a parachute pops out, he clobbers me. Is that fair?" 
The commissioner thought about it. "Maybe. How would you come in?" 
"Straight approach. No base leg. The hell with the wind. I'll pick a strip that won't carry me over the city. My God, Jenkins. What more do you want?" 
"A reason." 
"Didn't get you. Say again." 
"A reason why you want to land here. I think if I were in your boots, Wuncie, I'd run for some little airport in the sticks." 
"Why?" 
"We're a little irritated with you, to put it mildly." 
Sam chuckled. "Did you ever watch the colonel's men hang a guy feet down over a bonfire? I doubt if you're that irritated." 
"Well, come on in. We're glad to get the ship back. But we don't want you — unless, of course, you want to take our entrance tests and can pass them." 
He swung the ship northeast toward the pool of light. He thought about it a moment. 
"I want some information, Jenkins." 
"Shoot." 
"What are you testing for, anyway? And why? Just like to play king of the heap?" 
"We test for just two things, Wuncie. The basic, genetically fundamental attitude of the organism to his environment, and his general ability to analyze. We on1y screen out the extremes: the blindly aggressive and the completely passive. MacMahon is one extreme; a farmer who's completely happy hoeing corn is the other: We don't want the former. And the latter doesn't want in anyway. As far as analyzing ability is concerned, we don't want morons — but that's about all." 
"What about this branding business, man? That's ridiculous. You know what happens to those people, don't you?" 
"Yes, and we're sorry about it. You must remember, Wuncie, they agree to the condition before they take the test. The rural persecution of them will have to stop, because there are getting to be a lot of them. They're banding together. Eventually they'll run MacMahon's kind out. That's why we do it. We're giving him a minority group to bully, but we help the minority group. We dropped several cases of arms to a bunch over in Gainesville." 
"Aren't you afraid they'll use the arms on you?" 
"We're not worried about it. After all, Wuncie, if it weren't for fanatics like MacMahon, we could work out a cooperative solution. We're perfectly willing to trade industrial goods for foodstuffs and raw materials that the rurals raise. Some of the northern sectors have done it. Really, Wuncie—some men just aren't cut out for industrial civilization. The fact that they were in one, tried desperately to adjust to it, and failed — that's what caused wars and full asylums and such. They really don't want technology, but they try to want it, because it exists. We want to create two societies, mutually dependent, one pastoral, one technological — and let men go where their abilities send them. Then we won't have a potential engineer chopping cotton, or a yokel repairing a servo-mechanism with a sledge-hammer, or a paranoiac running for governor." 
"Sounds lovely," Sam grunted. "But it doesn't seem right." 
"Right? Who said it was? We think it's workable." 
"You've got all the answers?" 
"Uh-uh, Wuncie. We're lucky to have a few hints. What is an answer, anyway?" 
"Something that works, I guess." 
"The city's working, isn't it?" He stared at the glare of the lights as the ship dropped toward it. He nodded to his unseen host, eyed the night-fighter that buzzed low over him as a signal, then racked back to get on his tail. 
"Yeah, it's working," he grunted. "But where is it going?" 
"Look up, Wuncie." 
Jenkins probably meant to call his attention to the night-fighter. But he glanced upward anyway —and the stars glittered brightly, despite the city's glare.