Dydeetown World

If your sister were a clone, would you want her working in Dydeetown. (datastream graffito)

— 1-

Jean Harlow.

Or rather, Jean Harlow-c.

Couldn't place her face at once, but you don't hardly ever see white skin like that. Then it came to me. Seen her before in the flesh. The too-blond hair, the too-white skin, the puggish face. Hard to forget her even if, like me, you weren't particularly attracted to the look despite the way she filled out the dark blue clingsuit.

"You're Mr. Dreyer, aren't you?" she said in a tinny voice as the door slid closed a couple of centimeters behind her.

Suddenly became interested in my desktop where a few cockroach droppings adhered to the surface. Flicked one off as I told her, "You can find your way back out the way you came in."

"I want to hire you."

Held my temper and kept after the roach chips. Was tired from a long string of long days sitting here waiting for something to do.

"Don't work for clones."

Not completely true, but didn't advertise the truth.

Her breath made a raspy sound as she sucked it in.

"How-?"

"Never forget a face," I said, finally looking up at her.

Did a search for a Dydeetown girl a while back. Cued up the library for background and watched a vid on them and the history of Dydeetown. Got to know a lot of their faces and the stories behind them during the search. This Harlow was a big thing in her day, which was Way Back When. The clone before me wasn't a perfect match — they never are — but pretty damn close. Couldn't see what anyone saw in her, but maybe tastes were different then. Why anyone would want to hunt up her leftovers, steal a piece, and clone out a new Jean Harlow was beyond me.

But then, I don't waste my thumb in Dydeetown.

"You worked for Kushegi. She told me."

The roach dung became interesting again.

"That was a special case."

"What was so special about it?"

"None of your dregging business."

Truth was, I'd been more broke than usual then — my thumb was getting more red lights than Dydeetown's east wall. My stomach was used to at least one meal a day and the rest of me had other appetites. Briefly put, I was what you call desperate back then. Hadn't come a long way since.

"Hear me out," she said.

"I'll let you out." Still had my pride.

Something clunked heavily amid the poppyseed droppings on the desktop. Didn't even have to look up to see it. Rolled right under my nose — round, flat, and gold.

"Talk," I said.

She glanced back at my cubicle door as if to make sure it was closed good and tight, then sat in one of the pair of chairs on the other side of my desk.

"I thought you'd have a bigger office than this."

"Not a materialist," I said, picking up the coin and leaning back.

"It's Kyfhon."

Weighed it in my hand. Cool and heavy. Twenty-five grams heavy. Point nine-nine-nine fine if up to the usual Kyfhon standards. Illegal, of course, but who's going to tell those Eastern Sect toughos they can't mint their own coins? Not me, brother. Not me.

"Get many Kyfho-types as clients in Dydeetown?"

"Some."

Said nothing more, just sat there and worked a little crease into the surface of the coin with my thumbnail.

Finally, she went on, as I knew she would.

"Occasionally I'll do business with a Kyphon, but mostly I get coin from people who don't want to leave any thumbprints in Dydeetown."

"Nobody likes to leave a trail to Dydeetown."

"Yet they do," she said, lifting her chin and meeting me eye to eye. "Every night they come around with fat groins and fat thumbs-"

"— to find 'the most beautiful women and the handsomest men in all history,' " I said, mimicking the slogan.

"You are so right, Mr. Dreyer."

Not a trace of shame in her voice. But why should there have been? She was only a clone. She didn't know any better; it was her customers who should have been ashamed.

"So what can I do for you?"

Galled me to be sitting here talking business with her like she was a Realpeople, but this was real gold in my hand, and I needed it real bad.

"I need to find someone."

Oh, bloaty. Another missing Dydeetowner.

"Why come to me?"

"Kushegi said you were good."

Bristled at that. How could the clone of a Twenty-First Century holo sex star judge my work? By what-?

Doused it. Fruitless path. Waste of energy.

"She didn't get what she wanted," I said.

"True. Raquel was dead when you found her. But you did find her."

"And so I'm supposed to find your lover now?"

She nodded. Timidly.

Flipped the coin back onto the desk.

"No thanks."

"Please?"

If the plea in her voice was supposed to melt my heart, it failed by a lot of degrees.

"Whoever it is, let the owner go after him. Or her. Or let the owner hire me. Not you."

"This is a Realpeople I'm talking about."

"Oh."

Picked up the coin again and leaned back in my chair. Still didn't like the sound of this but I had nothing better to do.

"What's the name?"

"Kyle." Her voice quavered and her eyes glistened. "Kyle Bodine."

Thought she was going to cry, but she managed to hold it in, thank the Core.

"Look. If this guy hurt you or robbed or cheated you, get your owner on it."

"Nothing like that," she said through a sniff. "We were going to be married."

Almost went over backwards in my chair with that one.

"You were going to be what?"

Guess I must have shouted because she jumped back like I'd pulled a blaster on her.

"M-married. We were going to be married."

Couldn't help laughing. People talk about clones being dumb, but you never really appreciate how dumb until you talk to one. They know how to look good, how to smile real nice, how to give maximum pleasure to a human body, but something must happen when they're cultured out. Something must get lost along the way. Because they are dumb.

Her face reddened. "Why are you laughing?"

"No Realpeople's going to marry a clone!"

"Kyle is! He loves me!"

"He's lying."

"He isn't!" Her voice jumped a couple of notches as she rose from the chair and leaned over the desk. "I mean something to him! I'm somebody to him — not like the dirt I am to almost everybody else!"

"Hey…easy there," I said. Didn't want her burning out of here along with her gold coin. "Nobody's calling anybody names here. It's just that Realpeople don't marry clones. Not my fault it's that way — just a fact of life."

"And just the way you like it, right?"

"Don't hate clones, but I'm no oozer, either."

Gold or not, I wasn't going to lie to her. I don't like clones. Truth of the matter is I can't think of many Realpeople I like much either. But especially don't like collections of cells grown from a tissue culture parading around like real human beings.

"Bet your 'fiance-'" I said the word out of the corner of my mouth-"oozes real good, though. Probably one of those jogs clustering in the tubes shouting 'Free the clones' or 'Ban the Chlorcow' or 'Adopt an urchin!' or some other impossibility. Probably wants to marry you to use you as a bloaty trophy. Show how dregging sincere he is."

"I wasn't going to be his trophy — we were moving away."

"Where to?"

"The outworlds."

Leaned back in my chair again — slowly this time — and studied her. This was getting nasty. Like I said, I'm no clone-lover — matter of fact, I wish there were no such things as clones. But that doesn't mean I think they should be mistreated. Realpeople made them, that makes us responsible. And some dregger had been dealing this especially dumb one a dirty hand. Like them or not, I can't condone cruelty to clones.

"Look," I said slowly, hoping she'd be able to catch onto what I was going to tell her. "Don't know how to tell you this, but there are a few things you should know. Such as, there's no way you can get to the outworlds. Only Realpeople can go. You need a greencard, and clones don't get greencards. You're Unpeople. You're property. You belong to someone — either to a person or a corporation. Clones can't even have credit accounts, so it stands to reason that they can't just wander off to the stars when they please."

Watched her open her beltpurse as I tried to figure out how I was going to explain the workings of CenDat to her in terms she would understand.

"You see, when you were born…or hatched, or whatever-"

"Deincubated," she said, still working at the beltpurse.

"Whatever. They took a little piece of tissue and recorded your gene structure into the Central Data banks. Your genotype will remain on record there until you die. Just like mine. Just like everybody's."

She nodded. "I know. And they can't clone another of me until I'm dead — the One Person/One Genotype law."

"So you know about that." Puzzled me. "Then what made you think you could get off-planet?"

She looked around like I might be hiding someone behind the

desk or somewhere else in this shoebox-size cubicle.

"Is what we say here secret? Really secret?"

"The word is 'confidential.' And yes, everything's secret. What've you got in your hand there?"

She pulled something out of her beltpurse and laid it on my desk.

"This."

A greencard.

Speechless for a moment. Clones get redcards. Never get greencards. Never. It was impossible — but there it was on my desk.

"A fake. Got to be."

She shook her head. "No. It's real."

"You've tried it out?"

"I don't have to. I know it's real."

Picked it up. Sure looked real. This was getting stickier and stickier by the minute.

"You could wind up at the South Pole shoveling chlorcow manure for having this, you know."

She nodded. "I know. But it won't matter when we get Out Where All The Good Folks Go."

Always hated that expression. Everybody seemed to refer to the outworlds that way. Everybody but me. Didn't like what it implied about us who stayed behind on Earth, although I couldn't deny that it might be true.

But I stuck to the subject at hand: "You need more than a card, you know. Unless someone's changed your status in CenDat from clone to Realpeople, this is nothing but green plastic. When they stick it and a skin scraping into their little machine at the shuttleport it'll read out that there's no such Realpeople as you and you'll be arrested there and then for exporting stolen property — yourself."

She gave me a half-vacant smile. "I know. But that will never happen."

"How can you be so…?"

She shrugged and smiled. "Kyle fixed it. He took a skin sample and came back a few days later with the card. He loves me."

Looked at the greencard again. Seemed as real as my own. Couldn't figure it. A man who would go to this extreme for a clone must really…love her.

Nah.

But my face remained a picture of professional blandness.

"How long has this Kyle Bodine been missing?"

"Five days. We were supposed to meet at L–I Port by the shuttle dock Friday night. I haven't heard from him since Friday morning."

"Where do you think he is?"

"I don't know." Her eyes began to glisten again. "I don't know! And I'm worried about him!"

"Maybe he just changed his mind."

She shook her head. Violently. "No! Never!"

"Okay, okay. Don't get excited."

Got up and walked to the viddow behind my desk. Wished I could have looked out a real window instead of at this transmission from the outer wall, but I could barely keep up the rent on an inner cubicle let alone afford one on the perimeter. Kept turning the gold coin over and over in my right hand while the greencard lay cool and still in my left. Something wrong here. Something crazy.

"Can I have my card back?"

Turned and gave it to her. Real important to her, that card.

A cockroach — a big one — ran across my shoe then. Squashed it with a satisfying crunch when it got back to the floor. Ignatz was going to have to make another sweep of the place.

"All right. Let's find out what you know about this guy."

Turned out she didn't know all that much.

Was what you call a whirlwind romance. Kyle Bodine worked for an import-export firm. Had contracts in the outworlds who’d welcome him and his new wife. Anti-clone laws were big out there, but no one would have to know she was one. She said she'd last seen him in Dydeetown on Friday morning. He had a medium-size compartment in one of the high-rent districts in Manhattan. The door was keyed to her. She'd already been there after many unanswered calls. No Kyle. No sign of foul play.

That's where I'd start.

"Okay," I said. "The fee is 200 a day plus expenses."

"Filamentous with me," she said, nodding.

Held up the gold coin. "This thing's worth more than a week in advance."

"If you find him before that — even if it's tonight — it's all yours."

She really wanted this guy back.

Told her I had some errands to run and would meet her at Bodine's compartment in a tenth.

Waited a while after she left, then took the downchute to street level. Wanted to get rid of this gold before tubing over to Manhattan. Not only illegal to possess, but it might get stolen before I could turn it into credit.

Knew I could do that at the usual place, no questions asked.

— 2-

Never knew what Elmero's was going to look like week to week. Most businesses strove for a consistent exterior. Elmero strove for the opposite. Never knew when he was going to change the holographic front. Today it was suddenly the Bar-X Saloon in old Tucson, Arizona. Even had a couple of horses drinking from a trough in the bright noonday sun.

The sun never shone down here at ground level.

The usual crowd was holding up the bar inside, however. The usual mix of aimless chatter and straying vapors filled the air. And as usual, the datastream was playing in the near corner where I recognized Newsface Seven's features as she doled out the latest tidbits from CenDat. A howl came from the enclosure in the dimmest of the dim corners where someone was playing Procyon Patrol. Whoever he was — never saw him before — he spun out of the enclosure and rolled on the floor, all the while swatting at his left shoulder where the fabric of his jacket was burning. He got the fire out, stood up, shook himself, then re-entered the enclosure. People had been paying extra to play Procyon Patrol at Elmero's since he partially disabled the dampers on the enemy lasers. When those aliens shot back, they really shot back. You could get hurt real bad in that game. That's why altered machines were illegal.

Elmero's specialized in illegalities.

Doc waved at me from his table. Minn spotted me from behind the bar. She held up a vial of Dewar's green — my usual — and raised her eyebrows. Waved her off. Wasn't in the mood for a whiff right now. Needed to talk to the boss. Pointed toward the back room and she nodded.

"Busy, Elm?" I said, sliding the pocket door open a bit and poking my face through.

"Sig! Come in!"

Did, shutting the door behind me.

"You're looking unhealthier than usual, Sig."

He never passed up an opportunity to take a shot at my sallow complexion.

"Thanks, Elm. You're looking as roguey and robust as ever yourself"

Elmero pushed two meters heightwise and was as lean as he was long. His legs uncoiled from around each other as his polyform recliner straightened him up. Envied that recliner. Supposed to be the most comfortable chair in Occupied Space. Some day, if I ever got rich…

"What can I do for you?"

"Need an exchange on this," I said, tossing him the coin.

He rode his chair over to the corner console and dropped the coin in a little cup-like analyzer that weighed it, factored in the day's spot price for gold, and came up with a figure only he could see. Elm liked gold. He had lots of dealings outside the usual credit lanes and gold was universally accepted as barter.

"Give you sixteen hundred for it."

It was worth a good 2K and we both knew it but Elmero loved to haggle.

"Was figuring maybe seventeen or eighteen before taxes."

He smiled. Warned him about that — an ugly sight. He said, "Why don't we settle on a net of fifteen?"

"Filamentous," I said. That was what I'd wanted when I walked in.

He reached over to his employer's wageboard and punched in some data. He knew my ID number by heart.

"Okay, Sig," he said. "I just paid you eighteen hundred for a week's work. Which week you want it to be?"

Shrugged. "Last is as good as any."

He entered it. We waited a couple of seconds, then I went over to his credit terminal and stuck my thumb in the hole. A press of the status key rewarded me with a credit readout of 1522-post automatic deduction of the taxes. At least I wouldn't be getting any more red lights and could stop making up excuses about my thumb transponder acting up and needing replacement. Gets embarrassing after a while.

"Say, Elm…saw a phony greencard today."

"Phony how?" He seemed mildly interested.

"Well, it really didn't belong to this person."

"If the holder's genotype doesn't match the card’s, and if those two don't jibe with CenDat, what good is it? Only a real jog would carry it around."

He wasn't getting my meaning.

"I'm talking about CenDat — the change was made there."

Elm shrugged. "It can be done. Not on a routine basis, of course, but if you know the right people and have the right amount of barter, changes can be made — criminal records erased, credit histories altered. Don't tell me that's news to you."

"No, that's not news. But have you ever heard of a clone being recategorized as Realpeople?"

At last a reaction from Elm: his eyebrows lifted.

"That might be difficult. The people in position to make such a change might refuse, no matter what price offered." He smiled that smile again. "They'd refuse on the grounds of 'principle,' I'm sure."

"But it could be done?"

"Of course — as long as you had a tissue sample to identify the genotype and your middleman was someone devious and roguey and subtly ingenious."

"Like you, for instance?"

He leaned back and steepled his Fingers. Elmero liked to think of himself as an extralegal mastermind.

"It is not outside the realm of my capabilities."

Now the big question: "Ever had occasion to arrange something like that?"

"No," he said with a slow shake of his head, "but I wouldn't be averse to the opportunity."

Couldn't believe it.

"You'd help a dumb, walking tumor pass itself off as Realpeople?"

"Business is business. Besides, a clone’s as much a tumor as an identical twin. And as for dumb, if your education had been limited to self-grooming and sexual techniques and little else — which it obviously wasn't — you'd be duller company than you already are."

"Thank you, Elmero," I said with a laugh and headed for the door. "Didn't know you'd become an oozer."

"You're welcome, Sigmundo, and don't insult your elders."

— 3-

The complex's holographic envelope was that of a cliff-dweller's adobe village, complete with dwellers, dinner fires, ladders, and all. Great job. Could hardly tell it wasn't real.

Don't know why they named it the Central Park Complex, though. No park here. Except for moss, wasn't much of anything green left at groundlevel in the whole megalops — only on the rooftop gardens. Maybe there'd been a park here once. Gone now. And who cared anyway?

Don't know why I bother myself with these questions.

As we’d agreed, the clone was waiting at the ground level entrance on Fifth. I was dodging puddles on my way across the mossy street when I spotted her squatting beside a little boy who couldn't have been older than two or three. She was holding the kid's hand, smiling and talking to him. Her face was very animated and the kid must have thought she was funny because he was laughing like she was the best thing since Joey Jose.

Knew the kid wouldn't be alone. Looked around for his guards and found them — three ten-year-olds standing off to the side, eying the passers-by. The urchingangs liked to use the little ones for begging. Guess it was a kind of symbiosis. Illegal live births — those over and above the self-replacement quota — get left in the undergrounds. The urchingangs take them in, raise them, teach them begging, and train them in the care of the next infants to come along. A self-perpetuating cycle.

Wondered what the toddler's guardians would have done if they'd known he was holding hands with a clone. "The clones'll getcha!" was my mother's favorite threat when I'd act up as a kid. Scared me for a long time. It's common knowledge how all clones get sterilized as soon as they're deincubated. Mandatory. So it made sense for clones to steal children because they can't have any of their own. Never heard of a real case of child-stealing, but the myth persists.

The older kids spotted me crossing toward the clone and the toddler. Must have thought I looked like trouble because they swept the little guy from the clone's grasp and spirited him away before I got within ten meters.

The clone watched them run down the street, a look of such longing on her face that I stopped in my tracks. Maybe it's not a myth — maybe clones do want kids bad enough to steal them.

We entered the Park Complex together. Good to get out of the October chill and the groundlevel dampness. As we walked along the central mall, I noticed her face contorting, like spasms.

"What's wrong with you?"

Her expression immediately reverted to normal. "Nothing."

"Don't give me that. You had your face all twisted up."

She smiled — sheepishly, I thought. "Just a little game I play." She pointed ahead of her. "See this lady over on the left here? Look at her expression: like she just bit into a lemon."

Looked. True enough, the middler in question did have a puckered face. Glanced at the clone. Her face was set in an excellent lemon-sucking imitation of the lady's.

"You working at trying to pass as Realpeople?"

"No. It's just fun. What do you do for fun, Mr. Dreyer?"

Opened my mouth to speak, then closed it. None of her business. And realized with a spiky kind of disquiet that I couldn't think of an answer. Had to be something I did for fun.

"Don't go to Dydeetown, I can tell you that," I said finally. Sounded lame. Was glad we came to the upchute to Bodine's subsection then.

We got off at the twenty-seventh level and went to Bodine's door. The clone keyed it open with her palm. She stepped in but stopped dead so abruptly that I stumbled against her back.

Was ready to swear at her but a glimpse of the automatically lighted room cut me off.

The place had been torn apart.

"Well, isn't this bloaty," I said.

Left the clone at the door and wandered through the apartment. Lighting fixtures, cushions, furniture, the rug — any possible hiding place had been ripped open and gutted. Thorough job. Very thorough. Whatever the searchers wanted, they wanted bad.

"You said he was in the import-export business?"

Still mute, she nodded.

"Import-exporting what?"

"I–I don't know."

She was a rotten liar.

"Somebody else is looking for your friend."

"Why would they…?"

"You tell me."

She shook her head. "If I could, I would."

Didn't believe that, either.

"Let's get out of here," I said. "The folks who did this may come back. We don't want to be here when they do."

Hurried her out to the hall, letting the door slide closed behind us.

"You could handle them, couldn't you?"

"Of course, but it gets so messy explaining all the bodies."

Hoped that sounded sufficiently tough. Actually, I was more than a little uneasy about this whole affair. One look at that apartment and I knew there was more to this than a missing boyfriend. Didn't have a clue as to what else was going on, but wanted to a few quick klicks between myself and this complex and not run into anyone unfriendly in the process.

As usual, I was unarmed. Not that it would have made much difference if I was carrying — I'm not a great shot. Lousy, in fact. Lousy at hand-to-hand stuff, too. Haven't found what I'm really good at yet, but know it's not shooting and punching.

We stepped off the edge into the downchute and drifted dutifully to the center lane as the draft sank us toward the lobby. We were passing the 15th floor when two roguey types, big and burly in loose-fitting jumpsuits, caught up to us by pulling themselves down to our level using the hand rungs. Noticed a slight bulge in the left armpit area of each jump. The pair could have been brothers except that the fellow on the right had a big red nose and the one directly to my left was missing the little finger on his right hand. Takes a certain kind of person to refuse a transplant or a prosthesis for a missing piece. Not the kind of person I’d want to argue with.

Didn't like this at all. Touched the clone's arm and spoke in as conversational a tone as I could manage.

"Let's get off at the fifth and see if your mother's in."

She gave me a startled look but before she could reply, a meaty four-fingered hand clasped my left shoulder and a gravelly voice said in my ear: "Your next stop's Ground Level."

"Filamentous," I said. "Never did like your mother, anyway."

"What's wrong with you?" the clone said.

"Nothing. Just do what these nice men tell you."

She glanced right and left and suddenly looked frightened rather than curious. Which confirmed my suspicion that she knew a lot more than she was telling.

Duped by a clone! Set up, maybe. Bad enough to have to work for one, but to be fooled by one. What a jog I was.

As we swung out of the chute at mall level and gravity took hold again, I took her arm like she was Realpeople. Couldn't see how anyone knowing she was a clone would help me.

"Where we going?" I said to our new escorts.

"Not far," Fourfingers replied.

They guided us across the mall toward the express upchute to the roof parking lot. We glided up in silence for eighty floors. A luxury model Ortega Scarlet Breeze idled a half meter off the roof, waiting. A third fellow sat at the controls. We settled in and zoomed off toward where the late afternoon sun was sinking in the haze.

"Who wants to see us?" I said in a nice relaxed tone.

Fourfingers must have been the spokesman for the trio. He gave one of his involved, long-winded answers.

"Yokomata."

"Ah," I said through a suddenly tight throat. "Yokomata. How perfectly bloaty."

Yokomata. Big name in the Bosyorkington megalops underworld. Not superbig like Esterwin or Lutus, but she ran a glossy operation that was a long way from ground level.

Glanced pointedly at the clone as I spoke. "All this comes as a big dregging shock to you, I suppose."

The clone said nothing, but her frightened eyes spoke volumes.

— 4-

I gathered from the medium-size Tyrannosaurus rex running loose in her yard that Yokomata discouraged drop-in company.

The house itself was a miniature Taj Mahal — holographic, of course. Could see a slight shimmer around the edges. No telling what the actual building looked like. Probably a steel box.

As the pilot came in low and slow over the wall, the ten-meter-long dinosaur came for us, its powerful hind legs kicking up clumps of grass as it charged. When it was almost on us, its big red wet mouth open and salivating, six-inch teeth glinting in the reddening sun, the driver kicked up the altitude in a stomach-tugging lurch. The snap of those jaws closing on air was audible through the insulated walls of the flitter.

Rednose gave the driver a none-too-gentle tap on the back of his head.

"You're getting to be a real jog, y'know? One of these days you're gonna cut that too close!"

Looked out the rear window. The tyrannosaurus followed all the way to the house and watched us with its hard black eyes until we sank out of its line of sight onto the roof. From there we walked down a short stairway and into the presence of Yokomata herself, seated behind a desk.

She studied us with dark eyes no warmer than her pet carnivore’s. Big woman with a wide yellow face. Looked like a retired sumo wrestler who'd been on a soy-water diet for a while.

"I don't want to take up any more time with this than is necessary," she said in a silky, world-weary voice as she held up two printouts. "I know who you both are: Jean Harlow-c, a Dydeetown girl; and Sigmund Dreyer, a small time-very small time — investigator." She fixed on me. "I want to know what you were doing in Kel Barkham's apartment."

"'Kel Barkham?" the clone said. "That's Kyle Bodine's apartment."

Yokomata glanced at Fourfingers who nodded. "He rented it under that name a few months ago."

Yokomata kept her eyes on Fourfingers. "Ask her why she was in his apartment."

"Looking for him," the clone said before Fourfingers could open his mouth. "He was supposed to meet me Friday night but he never showed up."

"So she hired Dreyer here to find him?" Yokomata said to Fourfingers. "Is she that interested in all her customers?"

"Of course not," the clone replied in a huff, and I knew she was going to say it, but there was no way to stop her. "We're going to be married."

Utter silence in the room for a second or two. Then Rednose cracked — made a choking sound, then burst out laughing. Fourfingers and the driver followed. The clone reddened and set her jaw.

Only Yokomata remained impassive.

Which worried me most of all. Yokomata was interrogating us herself. That meant the whereabouts of Kyle Bodine/Kel Barkham were so important to her that she didn't trust any of her underlings with the job.

As the laughter finally died away, she turned her gaze on me and the knot in my stomach tightened. But I didn't squirm visibly; just stood there.

"And what is it that you've learned since this Dydeetown girl took you on as a client?"

Gave her a casual shrug. "Not too much, other than the fact that your men do sloppy searches — could've hidden a body in the mess they made — and that you're interested in finding this guy, too."

"Nothing more?"

"Only been on it since after lunch. I'm good, but I'm not that good."

Yokomata rose from behind her desk and came toward me. She was taller than I'd originally thought.

"You're not good, Mr. Dreyer. The few people who've heard of you say you used to be, but now you're strictly a third-rater living off other eyes' leavings. I wouldn't know what the clones think of you."

"They think he's honest," said the clone.

We both ignored her — Yokomata didn't recognize her presence and I wouldn't allow a clone to speak up for me.

"Over here," Yokomata said, gesturing me toward the wall. "I want to show you something."

The wall cleared as we approached, giving us a broad view of the backyard.

"Nice grass," I said. "Don't suppose you cut it yourself."

"Watch," she said. "It's almost time."

So I watched. Watched the grass, watched the trees and their long shadows sway in the breeze. Was about to turn away when something darted out of the bushes near the house — brown on top, light below, thin legs, graceful neck. Seen pictures of something like that before. A deer. Hornless. A doe.

It zigzagged out into the yard and then froze, remained statue-like for a few heartbeats, then broke into a frenzied dash. But it didn't have a chance. A gray-green juggernaut shot into view, overtook it, and bit its head off.

Heard the clone cry out behind me as twin jets of blood sprayed into the air from the neck stump. The body ran on. For a few steps it looked as if it might just run off without its head. Then the legs buckled and it collapsed to the grass. The tyrannosaurus grasped the front end of the carcass with its jaws and hoisted it free of the ground. A quick jutting move of its head, a convulsive swallow, and the doe was gone.

"Bloaty," I said.

"Makes one think, doesn't it," Yokomata whispered at my shoulder.

"And realize," I said with a slow nod, "that if that deer knew anything, it's not talking now. And never will."

Yokomata was silent a moment, then said, "Come with me."

We all trooped downstairs to another suite of rooms more sparsely furnished than the one above. She directed me to a cushioned recliner.

"Make yourself comfortable. I have some questions I want to ask you."

So I sat-

— and was trapped. Metal cuffs popped out of the fabric and snapped around my wrists and ankles.

In a voice that sounded like she was ordering breakfast Yokomata said, "Give him a dose of Truth."

Panic shot through me and I arched myself away from the chair, trying to break those cuffs. Knew they wouldn't give, but had to try.

"Already told you all I know!" I shouted. "This won't get you any more!"

Yokomata ignored me. She wanted to be sure I'd told her everything. If I could have come up with some other way to convince her-any way — I would have tried it. Anything to avoid a dose of Truth. But my mind was a blank.

"What about the clone?" Rednose said.

Yokomata smiled for the first time. Her voice dripped with disdain.

"Barkham gave her the wrong name and said he was going to marry her."

Enough said.

"What's happening?" the clone said.

Fourfingers popped a drawer out of a wall and pulled a dose gun from it. He came toward me. Off to my right side I heard the clone say: "What are you going to do?"

Didn't want this. More than anything in the world — maybe even death — I didn't want this. But not a damn thing I could do to stop it. Everything I had went into keeping my sphincters from letting go as he casually pressed the end of the barrel against the hollow of my shoulder and pulled the trigger. A phhht! and a sting as the drug shot through my shirt and skin.

And that was that. Slumped in the chair and tried to keep from crumbling. In a very short while everything I knew would be anyone's for the asking.

"Call me when he's ready," Yokomata said as she walked out.

The clone started toward me. "Are you all-?"

Rednose yanked her back by the arm. "Stay away from him!" Touching her seemed to give him an idea. He glanced at Fourfingers. "Isn't this perfect — time to kill and a Dydeetown girl to kill it with."

"Sounds good to me," Fourfingers said.

"I'm not open for business," the clone told them.

Rednose shoved her toward a back room. "You're gonna be."

"I'll tell my owner!" Her voice was shriller.

"Yokomata probably owns your owner!"

The three of them moved out of my field of vision. Didn't bother turning my head to watch them go. Just sat there and sweated and waited. Somewhere in the house the datastream was playing. Then some noise from the back room — sounds of protest, and maybe a meaty slap, a cry of pain. Wasn't really listening. All I could think of was soon they'd come back and start asking me questions, and no matter what they asked-no matter what-I'd tell them the truth.

Eventually, Yokomata returned. She glanced around the empty room and toward the back room with annoyance, then came toward me.

"Your full name?" she said.

The words came out on their own: "Sigmund Chando Merlandry Dreyer."

"Where do you live?"

Gave her my compartment number in Brooklyn followed immediately by my office address in the Verrazano Complex because I sometimes sleep there. Couldn't hold anything back!

The sound of our voices must have alerted Rednose and Fourfingers that their boss was back. As they hurried into the room, adjusting their clothing along the way, she rewarded them with an icy glare.

"Are you married?" Yokomata said to me.

Tried to protest, but the answer forced its way out first.

"Was — not anymore — and that has nothing to do with you!"

Yokomata smiled. "I think you're under enough. Now tell me: Are you withholding any information about Kel Barkham?"

"No."

"What about his aka, Kyle Bodine?

"Nothing."

"When was the first time you ever heard the name Kel Barkham?"

"A few minutes ago."

Yokomata gave a perfunctory nod to her men. "Good enough. Bring them upstairs. Directly upstairs."

Began to relax. That hadn't been so bad. None of the questions had been personal. All Yokomata was interested in was this Barkham/Bodine character. I was relieved enough to start wondering why.

"I'll get the clone," Fourfingers said after Yokomata was gone.

"And I'll free our friend here. But first…" He glanced at his partner's retreating form, then back to me. A nasty smile spread over his face like slime. "'Was' married? Where's your wife? She run off 'cause you're clone crazy?"

Tried to sing, to recite a poem, to scream and howl some gibberish, but my mouth ignored me and answered him without hesitation.

"Gone," I heard myself say. "Eight years ago. Out Where The Good Folks Go."

"Left you for some starfarmer, huh? Must be rough. So you just do it with clones now?"

"No."

"Who then?"

"No one."

"No one? Everyone does it with someone. Where do you get your jolts?"

Wanted to cry, wanted to shout, Don't do this to me! Couldn't, so I bit my upper lip until I thought my teeth were going to punch through it, but the word escaped — just as the clone ran up and shouted.

"Hey! That's not fair!"

Rednose's expression didn't change as he half turned and swung the back of his left hand hard against the clone's face. She staggered back and fell. Landed on the floor and sat there looking dazed. Blood began to trickle from the comer of her mouth. The blood was very red against her too-white skin.

Rednose turned back to me. "Repeat what you said." Helpless, I couldn't stop the word.

"Buttons."

His jaw dropped as his eyes lit with a kind of maniacal glee.

"He's a buttonhead!" he shouted. "A dreggin’ buttonhead!"

He leaped to my side and began to paw through my hair. Didn't take him long to reach the rear midline of my scalp and find what he was looking for.

"Here it is! He's a buttonhead, all right." He came around in front of me again. "Wifee find out and leave you? That it?"

"No!"

"Why'd she fly, then?"

Tried to vomit, anything to put a stop to this, but my voice ran on without me.

"Couldn't give Maggs what she needed emotionally or physically or any other way so she took Lynnie and left me eight years ago."

"So you got buttoned after, huh? What'sa matter? Can't get it from the real thing? Gotta get it from a button?"

"No!" Wasn't he ever going to stop?

"Then why, buttonhead?"

"Because it's easier and neater and more convenient and better and because there's no before and no after and nobody there but me and I don't have to be with anybody and I don't want to be with anybody ever again!"

Heard my voice saying things out loud to strangers that I'd never even said to myself. Would have killed Rednose there and then if I'd had the means. But my wrists and ankles were cuffed to a chair. Unable to look anyone in the eye, was using all my will to keep from blubbering with shame.

— 5-

Back before Yokomata's desk, only this time the clone was leaning on me. Guessed her legs were still a little wobbly from that clout in the face from Rednose. Let her lean and kept my eyes straight ahead. Wanted only one thing right now: out of here.

"…and so we're going to return you to the city," Yokomata was saying. "As far as I'm concerned, I've never heard of you and you've certainly never been here. If you wish, you may continue to search for the man you know as Kyle Bodine. I doubt there's much chance either of you will find him before I do."

"That's for sure!" Rednose said with a snorting laugh.

Her eyes narrowed. "But should you stumble across some useful information, you are to bring it directly to me, is that clear? If it leads me to him, you will collect the bounty on him. If you withhold anything…"

She glanced toward the now opaque wall that overlooked her yard, the place where the tyrannosaurus roamed.

We were led to the roof and prodded into the back seat of the Ortega. Fourfingers and Rednose stayed behind and left the driver to take us back by himself. No threat in a buttonhead and a Dydeetown girl, especially with a glassette partition between the front and rear sections.

As we lifted into the darkening sky and swung east, he asked where we wanted to be dropped. Told him the Verrazano Complex for me and Dydeetown for the clone.

"I'll get off with you," she said.

"No."

"I have to talk to you."

"No!"

"Why not?"

The Truth was still in my brain and the words tripped out in a rush. "Because you've lied to me enough today and because I want to be alone and don't want you looking at me and if you ask me another question I'll throw you out the door!" My voice took on an hysterical edge toward the end.

"I'm sorry," she said in a quavering voice that crumbled into a sob. She buried her face against my shoulder and began to cry. "Why me?" I heard her moan. "Why doesn't anything ever go right for me?"

"You're getting my jump all wet," I told her.

She pulled away. Could see tears glistening on her cheeks, running down and mixing with the blood from the comer of her mouth. She’d left a dark splotch of tears and blood on my front. Realized with a twinge that the blood was there because she'd tried to interfere with Rednose's peeping into my life. Much as I hated the idea, I owed her for that.

She dropped her head back down on my shoulder and I let it stay there. The jump was already a mess, anyway.

— 6-

Locked the compartment door behind me and slumped against it. Alone, thank the Core. Alone at last. This one room had never felt so good, so much like a home.

Had the Truth worn off? Didn't know. And it didn't matter now that I was alone. But felt so dirty. Had since I'd answered those questions Rednose put to me. Scummy, rotten thing to do. He got a look into places he had no right to look, exposed areas of me never meant for the light of day…areas even I never looked into. He…

Thought I was going to explode…

But didn't. And wouldn't. No percentage in that.

Tore off my bloodstained jumpsuit and got into the shower stall. Hot water and enzymes sprayed over me, but not long enough. My allotment ended and the fans came on, sucking up any moisture that hadn't gone down the drain, returning it to the recirc system.

Flopped onto the rumpled bed and listened to the gray background noises typical to any large complex. All quiet in my compartment until I heard a clawed and leathery scrabbling noise in the kitchen area followed by a brittle crack!

Lifted my head and saw Ignatz over in the corner contentedly chewing on a cockroach. Good old Ignatz — always on duty. Never lets me down. The roaches had learned to feed on the poisons, to turn a deaf ear to the ultrasonic repellers, but none had yet built up a tolerance to being chewed, swallowed, and digested by a hungry iguana.

Got up and used what little pacing room I had. Felt better but still felt rotten. Didn't want to go anywhere or be with anyone…not even me. Especially me.

The holo of Lynnie on the shelf to the left of the bed snagged me for a moment. Maggs had had it made for me before she ran off. A special holo, programmed to age the image with each passing year.

Lynnie had been five when Maggs took her away. She was thirteen now and probably looked almost exactly like that teenage girl on the shelf. I've spent years wondering if Maggs left it for me out of compassion or vindictiveness.

If only…

Found myself standing by the button drawer.

Somewhere during the trip back from Yokomata's I’d promised myself never to use a button again. Promised to get my head unbuttoned. Knew what they said: Once a buttonhead, always a buttonhead. That no matter what you did there would always be a part of your brain that would compare the real thing to the button and find the real thing wanting.

But I had to stop. Especially now that people like Yokomata and her men and the clone knew. Had to get unbuttoned. Couldn't face again the kind of humiliation I'd faced today. Had to stop — But not tonight.

More than any other time in the past few years, tonight I needed a button. Reached in the drawer, pulled out one at random and hurried toward the bed. As usual, I took the holo of Lynnie off the shelf and dropped it in a drawer — didn't want her watching — and flopped down on the mattress. Snapped the button into place on my scalp and lay back, waiting for the impulses to start running down the wire into my brain.

Slowly at first…light touches, little shudders of pleasure and anticipation, her on him, him on her, pleasure from both sides, building, building, encircling and encircled, searing ecstasy every place and in places where there was no place but which the brain found ways to interpret and pass on…building and building toward the inevitable that seemed so near and yet so elusive…building and bending the body into an arch with only heels and occiput touching the mattress…building forever until the final cataclysm…

…and then sleep.

— 7-

Was back in Elmero's before noon. Much of yesterday seemed far away, but parts lingered, clustering around the button at the back of my head. Got the usual nods from Doc and the crowd of regulars at the bar. No jeers or catcalls or cries of "Buttonhead!" Don't know what I'd been expecting. Because a few people knew, seemed like everyone must know.

Elmero smiled his awful smile as I came through the door. "More gold?"

"Soon maybe. Right now I'm looking for info on a guy named Kyle Bodine — ever heard of him?"

"Never."

"How about Kel Barkham?"

He laughed. "Don't I wish I could find him!"

"What y'mean?"

"At 50k dead and lOOk alive, everybody's looking for Barkham!"

Had forgotten about the bounty Yokomata had mentioned. Big bounty. Yokomata wanted him real bad.

"What did he do to Yokomata anyway?"

Elmero shrugged. "Nobody knows for sure, but I've heard it had something to do with a Zem deal."

Figured. Yokomata was reputedly big in the drug trade and Zemmelar was the latest rage.

Wanted to try Zem some day, but had enough problems for now. Already hooked on buttons, and Zem was the most potent, addictive, tightly controlled synthetic narcotic in Occupied Space. But when I was cashing in, that was the way I wanted to go.

After all, that was what it was made for — so the terminally ill could spend their last days and weeks in pain-free, euphoric hallucinations. No one was surprised, though, when Zem addicts popped up all over Occupied Space within a few standard years after its release. Zemmelar analogs were now manufactured on lots of planets, but Styx Corp. band name Zem from Earth was reputedly the best.

"Tell me what you know about Barkham."

That smile again. "It'll cost."

"If I find him, you get twenty-five percent of whatever I get. Consider it an investment."

"Make it fifty."

"Too much. Can find out whatever you can tell me in the tubes." Jerked a thumb over my shoulder. "Probably in the barroom."

"Don't count on it."

He was right. Shrugged. If I got to Barkham first, half of fifty or a hundred thousand Sol Credits was more than I'd ever seen at once in my entire life. The money wasn't my primary concern, anyway. Yokomata had called me a third-rater. She was going to eat those words.

"Deal."

"How do I know I'll ever see you again if you get the bounty?"

Offered him the only collateral I had: "My word."

He stretched his considerable length. "With anybody else I'd laugh. But you, Sig…deal."

We shook hands and then he leaned forward.

"Hear: Barkham came out of the tubes and up through the ranks of Yokomata's organization real quick. He's been Yokomata's right-hand man for the past two years. He's got a reputation for dealing dirty whenever he can, even when there's no good reason. He likes working that way. But if you try to deal him the same, nobody ever hears from you again."

"Real dregger."

"Too true. He was a perfect first-in-command for Yokomata, kept everything running smooth, kept everyone in line — until he doubled Yokomata."

This was the jog who got Harlow-c a greencard and was going to run off to the outworlds with her? Were we talking about the same guy?

"How'd he do that?"

Elmero sighed. "Been trying to find out. Not easy. Yokomata's clamped a tight lid on the affair — which means she'll probably look real bad if the details hit the tubes. What I do know is this: Yokomata's crew stole a hundred vials of Zem concentrate right off the production line."

Until now I had been leaning up against the front of his desk. Now I took a seat. A hundred vials of concentrate. It could be cut again and again before it hit the brains of the addicts.

"How much is that worth?"

"Mucho millions at user level, but word is that Yokomata was wholesaling it for a quick return. And Barkham was handling the sale."

"And he's gone."

Elmero nodded. "With the Zem. And the couple million payoff from the sale."

No wonder Yokomata had posted a big reward.

"No sign of him since?"

Elmero shook his head.

"How about CenDat?"

"I had a contact there trace his credit trail — something I'm sure Yokomata's already done — but Barkham hasn't used his thumb since Friday."

Which meant he was using barter to move around. Only a stellar-scale jog would use his thumb on the run. Anytime he bought or sold something, the transaction would be recorded in CenDat — where, when, how much, and with whom. One of the unsung benefits of Earth's cashless economy.

The only way around it was barter. And bartering would be easy if you had a hundred vials of Zem concentrate within reach. He could go anywhere. He could be anywhere by now.

So why the charade with the Dydeetown girl?

Maybe I'd never know.

"Anything else you can tell me?"

"That's it. Except there's a whisper about The Man From Mars being involved in the deal."

Laughed. "Sure! And I'm a Boedekker heir!"

Elmero shrugged. "You asked me what I'd heard, not what I thought was sensible."

Got up and headed for the door.

"Thanks, Elm."

"De nada — as long as you remember my cut."

— 8-

Was back in my office cubicle, whiffing some tay. Had just let Ignatz loose to start gobbling up the cockroaches and was watching Newsface Six doing this interesting interview with Joey Jose when some graffiti about inhumane treatment of chlorcows warped into the holochamber. Wondered if they had this much datastream graffiti in the Western Megalops or Chi-Kacy or Tex-Mex. Annoying at times, especially when the datastream was interviewing my favorite comedian.

Turned the set off when a stranger walked through the door. Short, strutting, roosterish creature, slightly older than me, with curly blondish hair banged in front, wearing a worn, dark green pseudovelv jump. Figured him for a client.

Luckily, I was wrong.

"You Dreyer?" he said in a nasal voice.

"That's me." Already didn't like him.

"Where's my clone?"

"Don't know. Never seen anyone who looks like you before."

"Not me, you jog! The Harlow clone!"

"Oh. Who are you?"

"Ned Spinner. Her owner."

Neither of us offered to shake hands.

"Never heard of her."

"Don't give me that dreg! She didn't work last night like she was supposed to. I found your name and address in her room."

Shrugged. "So?"

"So she's mine and she's missing and if you're trying to steal her, you're as good as dead!"

Getting mad now. Gave him one of my best glares.

"Going to say this once, then you can leave: The only thing I like less than clones are people who own them. Goodbye."

He opened his mouth to say something, then changed his mind. Seemed to believe me. He stalked out without another word.

Easy to see why he wanted Harlow-c back. He'd given up his right to have a child and invested a load of credit to buy a clone gestated from Jean Harlow's DNA, then he'd set her up in a Dydeetown cubicle and proceeded to live off her earnings. Without her he was broke.

My heart was breaking.

Wasn't too much later that Harlow-c herself walked into the office. Saw how the left side of her mouth was swollen and discolored and got a queasy tug inside.

"What did you tell Spinner?"

"That I never heard of you."

"You did? " She looked shocked. "Thanks."

"Why'd you miss work?"

"I can't work. I'm too worried about Kyle. I've got to talk to you!" she blurted, her words tumbling over each other. "It's important. It's about Kyle."

"Sure," I said. "Sit down."

She stood and stared at me, obviously taken aback. "I thought you'd throw me out."

"Now why would I do that? Just because you lied to me about your boyfriend? Don't be silly!"

Knowing what she knew about me made me want to crawl under the desk. But I couldn't let her see any of that. Had my position to maintain. Couldn't let myself feel lower than a clone. So I washed out yesterday. It never happened. That was the only way I could sit in front of her.

"I promised him I'd never tell anyone what I knew about him. But I'm going to tell you everything now."

"You mean that his real name's 'Kel' and that the 'exporting firm' he works for is really Yokomata?"

"His real name's Kyle Bodine — and he works for the R.A."

Almost choked on my tay. Kel Barkham working for the Rackets Authority — this I had to hear.

"Sit down and tell me all about it. All about it."

She sat and began doing just that.

"Kyle is an R.A. agent. He's been working his way up through the ranks of the Yokomata organization for years, waiting for the fight moment to run the whole gang in."

All I could do to keep from laughing in her face — clones are so dumb.

"Why didn't he?" I said. "Understand he's been Yokomata's right-hand man for years."

"He was waiting for the fight moment. And then an undreamed-of opportunity presented itself."

"He met you."

Never thought of myself as a subtle sort, but she flashed me a very genuine smile as the remark whooshed right by her left ear.

"Oh, how nice of you to say that! But the truth is that he had an opportunity to catch The Man From Mars."

Stiffened in my chair. The Man From Mars — second time in as many tenths that his name had come up. Didn't take to the idea of the most notorious smuggler in Occupied Space having a hand in this.

But it made a sort of sense. Earth-produced Zem had a premium value on the Sol worlds, and a triple premium on the outworlds — except on someplace like Tolive where I'd heard it was legal and could be bought over the counter.

Who better to get it off-planet than The Man From Mars?

Had a bad feeling that I was getting further and further out of my depth there. But I couldn't stop now.

"Where do you fit into all of this?"

"I told you: We were going to married and move-"

"— Out Where All The Good Folks Go. Bloaty. But didn't you play any part in the plot?"

"Why…yes. How did you know?"

"Lucky guess. What did you do for Barkham?"

"Bodine — Kyle Bodine."

"Whatever. Talk."

"I delivered a package to The Man From Mars for him."

"You saw him?"

Far as I knew, nobody had ever seen The Man From Mars.

"Not…not exactly. I heard a voice. It told me to put the package down and go. So I went."

"Where and when was this?"

"Friday morning. In a cave on the Maine Coastal Preserve."

"And when did you last see Bar — Bodine?"

"That morning."

"And he was supposed to meet you Friday night?"

She nodded. "We were supposed to leave for the outworlds right away. Kyle said his life in Sol System wouldn't be worth a soupbowl in freefall after he turned in The Man From Mars. We had tickets for the Friday night shuttle."

"How come you waited until Wednesday to come to me? Why didn't you go to the R.A. first?"

"I did. But they said they'd never heard of Kyle. Which was what I expected — Kyle told me his cover was so deep that only a privileged handful in the government even knew he existed."

"Fewer than that even, I'm sure," I said.

She nodded. "Probably. But I was getting so worried when there was no news release from the R.A. about the capture of The Man From Mars…I thought something might have gone wrong. And since he told me never to go to the Officials about him, I came to you."

"My lucky day. Can you find your way back to that cave?"

"Yes. I have the co-ords written down."

That startled me.

"Clones can't write."

Actually, most Realpeople can't read or write, either. But I'd never heard of a clone who could.

She drew herself up. "I'm teaching myself. For Kyle."

Felt a wave of disgust. Poor dumb thing. Led on and lied to by this dregger, teaching herself to read just for him, thinking he was going to take her to the outworlds. Realpeople shouldn't treat clones like that…

But on the other hand, what if he'd been straight with her? If he did work for the R.A., he'd have to get off-planet real fast after blowing his cover. And being with the R.A., he'd be in a position to wrangle a nice new greencard for anyone, even a clone.

Curiouser and curiouser.

"Please find him for me!"

"All right," I said. "I'll stick with this, but only on the condition that you've told me everything you know."

"I have."

"Everything?"

"Everything."

Believed her. But then, I'd believed her last time.

"Give me your greencard."

Her reaction was instantaneous: She clutched at her belt pouch. "No!"

"It may help me trace him."

"You think so?"

"Definitely."

Not definitely, really, but I had a feeling I could learn a lot about Kyle Bodine/Kel Barkham/Whoever when I learned a little more about Harlow-c's greencard.

"I don't know…"

"It might be important."

"It's already important to me. It's…" Her lower lip trembled. "It may be all I have left of him."

"And it may be the key to finding him."

She thought about that for a while, then: "All right."

She fished it out and handed it over to me like she was entrusting me with her only child.

"But take good care of it. It means a lot to me."

"Sure. Guard it with my life."

— 9-

"Check this out for me, will you?"

Elmero took Harlow-c's greencard and looked it over front and back.

"Check it out how?"

"Want to know if it's real."

"Easy enough."

He rode his chair over to his all-purpose console.

I’d used the excuse of renting a flitter to get away from Harlow-c. Told her I'd pick her up in half a twentieth on the roof of my office complex.

Instead I'd come to Elmero's.

"Fake," he said, pulling the card out of a slot and sailing it across the room at me.

"That bad, huh?"

Had a feeling Elmero saw more than his share of greencards, real and otherwise.

"Worst fake I ever saw. Too thick, for one thing, and they didn't even bother to encode it with a genotype."

No genotype on the card…and it figured that if Barkham hadn't bothered to make a decent fake of a card, he certainly hadn't made any changes in CenDat.

Poor Harlow-c — that dumb, trusting clone hadn't even bothered to give the card a try-out. She was walking around thinking she could pass for Realpeople, but was still a clone as far as CenDat was concerned.

"By the way," Elmero said. "Heard something new on Barkham. Word is he tried to sell ten vials of the Zem to Lutus on Friday. And Lutus, being a fond, trusting competitor, called Yokomata to ask her what was up. The bounty on Barkham's head hit the tubes a twentieth later."

Interesting. A lot of information was accumulating but none of it was piecing together. Barkham was looking more and more like tube slime, nothing like the clone pictured him. Figured I had nothing to lose by asking a stupid question.

"Say, Elm…any chance of Kel Barkham being an R.A. agent?"

If Elmero was merely ugly when he smiled, he was hideous when he laughed.

"That motherless dregger? If Barkham's R.A., so am I!"

Tucked the worthless greencard away and stood up.

"But about that card," he said, still smiling. "For what it's worth, there is something encoded on it. Nothing to do with greencard information, but there is something. I can find out what if you want."

"Maybe later. Right now I need some firepower."

"You? You couldn't hit the side of Boedekker North at fifty meters. You're better off running."

"Know that. But may not get the chance. Need an edge."

"This have anything to do with looking for Barkham?"

Nodded. "It might."

He rubbed a long-fingered hand along his jaw. "Guess I'd better protect my investment. Got just the thing for you. Strip to the waist…"

— 10-

Once we had settled into the cab of the rented flitter, Harlow-c wanted her greencard back right away but I told her I needed it just a little bit longer. She didn't like the idea but I didn't give her much choice.

The console asked for our destination and Harlow-c handed me the coordinates she'd written on a slip of paper. Thrust it back at her and told her to read them off, saying I probably couldn't read her handwriting.

Which was true. Also true that I couldn't read most writing unless the words were few and simple and block printed. Never learned. Great with numbers but reading was a useless skill. Like most people, had little need for it. But here I was with a clone who could read. Saw no reason to let her know I couldn't.

She read them off, the flitter rose, and we were on our way.

Except for my skin itching me under the wrist contacts that went along with the chest zapper Elm had fitted me with, it was a comfortable trip. We didn't say much, and when we did, I made sure we avoided the subject of yesterday's stay at Yokomata's. She talked about some of the books she had read recently. Wondered if she was showing off or just trying to make conversation. For a dumb clone she seemed to know a lot.

Less than two tenths after leaving Brooklyn, we were hovering over the Maine Coastal Preserve. Can't imagine why anyone would want to live in Maine. Cold rocks, cold wind, cold water. And trees, lots of trees. The megalops hasn't crept this far north and probably never will. The cave was below — a black hole in the coastal rocks, well above the tide line.

Settled the flitter down and turned to her.

"Once more: What did you do here?"

"I took the box Kyle gave me and carried it down to the cave."

"How big was the box?"

"About this big." She measured out a 25-by-10 centimeter space in the air — just the right size to hold a hundred amps of Zem. "I took it in and a voice from somewhere in the dark told me where to put it. I put it and left."

"And that was it? Nothing more?"

"Nothing. I got back into the flitter that brought me here and let it take me back to L–I Port where I was supposed to meet Kyle for the shuttle out."

"And he never showed."

She shook her head sadly. "No."

Beginning to get the picture now, but needed to explore the cave to confirm a suspicion that had been growing all day.

Left Harlow-c in the flitter — I'd brought a coat, she hadn't — and made my way to the cave mouth with the flit's utility lamp under my arm. The salt-stinking wind off the water was like a vibe blade against my face. Strange to think that everything I was looking at was really there. No holos. Found it disorienting in a way. Also, the wide-openness of the Maine coast left me feeling naked and unprotected. Was glad to get into the comfortable dark confines of the cave.

Didn't take me long to find him. Just followed the whimpers.

Not sure how they did it to him. Must be something the Martian colonists developed. I knew The Man From Mars was involved — he'd left his mark scratched in the dirt next to Barkham's remains: a big circle with four little circles lined up inside along the equator.

Only Barkham's head remained untouched. It sat upright, open mouthed and glassy eyed on a transparent box, blinking in the glare of my light.

Except for the spinal cord and major nerve trunks, his torso was completely gone: skin, muscles, bones, guts, all eaten away or chewed away or melted away, I don't know which. But gone. The lower halves of his arms and legs still had flesh on them but were connected to the rest of him by nerve bundles alone. All the nerves seemed to have been coated with something to keep them viable and then stretched to their limit over the rocks and debris on the cave floor. Where his chest had once been now sat a heart-lung machine, hissing softly as it drew air in and out of the tube jammed into the lower stump of his windpipe, chugging softly as it pumped bright red blood up through his arteries and drew the darker stuff down from his jugulars.

He yelped with every step I took toward him.

At first I thought he was afraid I was one of his torturers come to do more damage, but then realized he could feel every little vibration I made as I approached across the cave floor, and each and every one was translated into pain for him.

Came up and looked him in the eyes. Whatever kind of mind he'd had was pretty much gone. Having his entire nervous system laid bare to the chill Maine air had pushed him into mental subspace.

His pupils constricted as he looked up into the light.

"God?" he said in a voice so hoarse from screaming it was barely recognizable as human. "Is that…you, God?"

Realized he couldn't see me behind the light. He was talking to the light, timing his words with the exhalations of the machine sitting below the stump of his neck.

"Yeah. God. That's me."

"Can I die…now God?…I've had e…nough take me…God I'm ready."

"Not yet. First you answer a few questions."

His eyes squeezed shut. "After I'm…dead God after…I'm dead."

"Now." Didn't give him time to protest again. "You shorted The Man From Mars, didn't you?"

His voice keened, his eyes rolled, his face contorted in a spasm of horror at the mention of that name. Had to let it run its course.

"Didn't you?"

It looked like he was trying to nod but he couldn't, not with his neck muscles detached from the rest of him.

"Yes but on…ly a few…vials."

"So he came for the rest of it."

A sob: "Gave it…to him."

"But still he did this to you."

Another attempt at a nod, then a wail. "Lesson!"

Right. A good lesson.

The Man From Mars already had a ruthless reputation, and when word about this got out, no one would ever try to short him again.

"So he winds up with the Zem and his money."

"Not money…thinks Yoko…has it."

Which meant that as far as The Man From Mars was concerned, the deal was done. Yokomata's lieutenant had tried to short him — Barkham had probably slipped ten dummy vials into the case — but that had all been taken care of. The Man From Mars had all the Zem he had paid for, and was no doubt well on his way to Mars at this very moment.

But Yokomata didn't have the payment. She'd never received it. And she wanted it before word got out about her Number One Man doubling her. She'd lose lots of face if she got left with no Zem, no payment, and no Barkham.

"Where is the payment?"

"Don't you…know, God?"

"Of course. But it's good for you to confess these sins. Cleanses the soul."

"In L–I…Port locker…had it…routed there."

"And the key?"

A grunt — an attempt at a laugh?

"Hidden where…only you can…find it!"

"Where's that?"

"Not of…your making."

Then he began to gurgle and roll his eyes. The more I asked, the more he rolled and gurgled. Was tempted to flick a finger against one of his exposed nerves to get his attention but didn't want to touch him.

Changed the subject.

"What about the Dydeetown girl?"

The eyes widened. "Truly you…are God!"

"We've already established that. Where did she fit in?"

His upper lip curled into a sneer. "Meatbag clone…too stu…pid to know."

"Yeah. You used her to make the drop for you here while you were trying to sell the ten stolen vials to Lutus. Told her you were going to marry her. She loves you."

He made a noise like, "Glah!…stupid clone…going to…leave her stan…ding at the gate."

Said nothing.

"God can…I die…now?"

Turned and started walking back toward the cave mouth.

"Don't think so. You've still got some time coming to you."

His voice rose to a shrill squeak, see-sawing up and down with the in-and-out of the machine's respirations.

"Youuuuproooomiiiised!"

Stopped. Had promised, hadn't I. As he wailed and keened, I turned and walked back toward his set-up, careful to make sure every footstep landed as hard as it could. Was reaching for the power switch when I heard Harlow-c's voice cry out behind me.

"No — don't!"

So I didn't.

Watched the look of horror on her face as she stumbled forward. She had her fist crammed halfway into her mouth and her whole body was shuddering like a vaporbrain in withdrawal. Was afraid she was going to fall apart completely. But she held up until she reached the heart-lung machine, then crumpled to her knees in front of it. Her voice was a low moan.

"Kyle-Kyle-Kyle! What've they done to you? What've they done!"

But Barkham had finally gone over the mental edge. Maybe it was the sound of her voice that finally pushed him over. He said nothing, just rolled his eyes and made squeaky noises.

Heard her begin to retch and pulled her away.

"There's nothing you can do for him now."

"I can stop the machine!"

"Was just about to do that when you barged in. Stand over there while I-"

"No! I'll do it. It's the least I can do for him."

That was a laugh. "You don't owe him anything."

She turned on me like some sort of wild thing.

"I do! He's the only Realpeople who ever really cared for me and treated me decent. I owe him everything!"

Said nothing. Just stood there and bit my tongue as she went over and reverently pushed in the power switch. She was irrational on the subject and probably too dumb to see the truth even if I drew her a picture. So I dropped it. Watched her turn away as Barkham's face turned a dusky color and went through its final spasms.

"It's over," I said after a while.

She stuck her chin out and strode ahead of me, leading the way back to the flitter, seemingly oblivious to the cold and the wide open spaces.

After a long silence during which I told the console "Home" and we took to the air, she spoke without looking at me:

"Did you see what they did to him?"

Of course I'd seen. That wasn't what she wanted to know.

"Yeah. Too bad. Really tore me up."

She turned to me. "Don't you ever feel anything?"

"None of your business, but I'll tell you this: I don't feel anything for guys like Barkham."

"Because he was going to marry a clone?"

"He wasn't. And even if he was, that has nothing to do with it."

"How about for me, then? You know me. We've been together all afternoon and you know how I felt about him. How about feeling something for me?"

"As a rule, I tend not to feel too much for clones, either."

"How about for your wife, then? Ever feel much for her? Or your daughter? You ever feel anything for anyone?"

Did feel something then: anger. Wanted to hit her. She had no right even knowing about Maggs and Lynnie, let alone talking about them. But I bottled it up. Good at bottling. Dangerous to show what's going on inside. People get to know your weak spots, your vulnerabilities, they can get to you.

"That's me," I said lightly. "Feel-nothing Sig."

"Maybe that's why she left you behind when she went Out Where All The Good Folks Go. Maybe she wanted someone who's alive rather than a walking corpse."

"Maybe."

Knew the clone was trying to get a rise out of me. Just leaned back and looked straight ahead at the darkening landscape.

"Well, I'll tell you this, Feel-nothing Sig: I'm sneaking home and scraping up everything of value I can find and I'm getting a ticket on the first shuttle out tomorrow morning."

"Why sneak?"

"Ned Spinner. Remember?"

"Oh, right. Your classy owner."

"We clones have a saying: You can choose your friends, but you can't choose your owner. With luck, I'll be far into subspace before he misses me tomorrow night."

"You can't buy a ticket. Clones don't have credit."

Her smile was humorless. "How long do you think it'll take me to barter someone into buying me one?"

"No Realpeople will buy a shuttle ticket for a clone. It'd be like leaving your name and address at the scene of a felony."

"I have my-hey! You've still got my greencard." She stuck out her hand. "Give it back right now!"

"Don't have it with me."

"What?" If she hadn't been belted into her seat, I believe she would have leaped on me.

"Don't worry — it's safe. I told you" — thinking fast as I could now-"I left it with someone to see if it could lead us to Barkham. Didn't think we'd find him up here."

That seemed to mollify her a bit, but not much.

"I want that card back, Mr. Dreyer, and I want it soon."

"Don't worry. I'll get it back to you before the first shuttle tomorrow morning."

But I was going to put it to good use before then.

"You'd better. Because I don't intend to be anybody's property after tomorrow. I'll drop the — c from my name and be a free citizen of the outworlds. And nobody had better try to stop me."

She looked at me defiantly, as if daring me to protest.

"Fine with me," I told her. "Means one less clone on Earth."

She leaned back in her chair. "Maybe I'll run into your wife out there. Should I say hello for you?"

Didn't reply. Just stared straight ahead and whistled through my clenched teeth.

— 11-

Dropped her off in Dydeetown.

Don't know why they call it a town. It's just an old, old building on a short strip along the East River. Not a very imaginative building — big rectangular slab with lots of windows. Striking at night with all the red lights in the windows. Could have dressed it with a holo envelope, but people liked it the way it was. A landmark.

Learned a lot about Dydeetown during my last search. Found out it was named Aphrodite Village before my time. Guess that somehow degenerated into what we called it today. And long before that it had been called "the U.N," whatever that means.

Headed due east along the length of Long Island for the shuttleport that took up most of its eastern end. Glided into the third level of the short-term lot and went directly for the Safe Storage Service.

I’d done a lot of thinking during that long silent flight back, and had Barkham's scheme pretty well figured out now. A neat scheme, one he would have got away with if he hadn't been so greedy.

Or was it greed? Elmero had mentioned Barkham's reputation for burning everybody just for the fun of it. Almost a matter of principle with him. Maybe he hadn't been able to resist one burn too many.

Figured it ran something like this: As Yokomata's Number One Man and the guy in charge of the Zem sale, Barkham had free rein in setting up the deal. He took his time, allowing The Man From Mars to take possession of the Zem where the smuggler would be comfortably anonymous — the Maine coast, for instance. Meanwhile, Barkham had rented space in the Safe Storage Service at L–I Port and was pseudonymously courting a Dydeetown girl who could make the drop for him in Maine and then be forgotten. The Man From Mars would test the Zem concentrate, find out it was the real thing, then authorize transfer of payment to Barkham's unit in the shuttleport Safe Storage Service.

The only possible hitch after that would be picking up the payment from the Safe Storage Service — someone might be watching for him. My guess was that Barkham planned to have his Dydeetown girl pick it up and bring it to him. And then he'd leave her behind in the shuttleport holding her useless greencard as she was led away by the yellowjackets for trying to emigrate under a false identity.

And it would have worked too if he'd been satisfied with limiting his dirty doings to Yokomata and the clone. But no, he had to try and pull one off on The Man From Mars as well. The millions in gold — assumed it was gold — coming his way weren't enough. Had to spice it up by short-counting The Man From Mars. Were me trying something like that, I'd situate the blank vials in a circle around the center of the box, figuring anyone doing random sampling would select from the very center or the periphery.

Had to hand it to Barkham: He must have been either crazy or ultra-driven or the cojoniest dregger there ever was. On top of everything else, he had the audacity to try to sell the pilfered vials to Yokomata's biggest competitor — an added insult to his boss.

But somehow it went all wrong. The Man From Mars found out he'd been cheated; he caught up with Barkham, retrieved the missing vials, dealt with the cheater in his own inimitable way, and headed home. Why not? Had his Zem, and probably figured Yokomata had the payment.

But Yokomata didn't have the payment, and had no idea where to look.

I did. And I had the key to Barkham's unit — right inside Jean's phony, too-thick greencard. Why Barkham hid it there I'll never know. Maybe to keep it off his person and safe — he knew Jean would treasure it — or maybe the irony of it appealed to the same kinks in his synapses that made him want to cheat everybody he knew.

Didn't know and didn't care. The card was mine and that was all that mattered at the moment.

Stepped up to the counter of the Safe Storage Service. The card slipped easily into the slot. Waited for the contents of the designated storage unit to arrive. A standard packing case about the size of my head popped out of a chute a meter or so to my left. Anticipating the extraordinary weight, I picked it up without showing the strain, tucked it under my arm, and headed back to the short term lot.

The weight was pretty much what I'd expected: about 20 kilos. Just about the same weight Lynnie had been when Maggs took her away. Wondered if Maggs had carried her along this same path to the shuttle ramp, telling her about the exciting ride ahead and why her Daddy wasn't there.

Shifted the weight in my arms. Yeah, my five-year-old Lynnie had weighed just this much when she was taken from me. Started thinking of how it used to feel to hold her, and then thought of all the times I hadn't held her when I could have and should have, all the missed opportunities, all the too-busy, shouldered-aside chances to show her how much she was loved by and how much she meant to the emotionally inarticulate fool who pretended to be a father and a husband, chances that would never come again. Never, ever, never — Stopped and waited for my vision to dear. Didn't know what was wrong with me. Thought I'd shut Lynnie away in my mental closet, the one with the foolproof lock that only failed sometimes in the wee hours of the morning when it popped open and let out all the things I hide away to make everyday life bearable.

Tucked all the loose ends back in — I'm good at that — and hurried on.

Soon as I had the flitter airborne again, I opened the package. Lots of little black statuettes of Joey Jose, my favorite comedian, each about eight centimeters high, forty of them arranged in two double-decker rows of ten. By their weight I knew they were gold. Calculated that forty half-kilo pieces of gold came to a bit over two million Solar credits.

Swallowed hard. A lot of credit. More than I'd ever thought I'd hold in my lap.

Where to go? That was the question. Who did this belong to? By rights, the Styx Corporation had first call since it was the producer of the stolen Zem concentrate. But couldn't go to them — too many difficult questions to answer. Could play the old finders-keepers game but that didn't seem too smart. Yokomata would come calling if I suddenly got rich. Best to turn it over to her and have done with the whole affair. At least I'd collect the 50K bounty and maybe even a bonus for returning the gold too.

But I wanted to test the water first — see what sort of mood Yokomata was in before dropping by with my little present. My office was closest. Headed there.

The roof of the Verrazano Complex was after-hours quiet at this time of night. I’d carried the box halfway to the downchute when a too-familiar voice stopped me.

"What you got there, Buttonhead?"

Looked to my left and saw Rednose, Fourfingers, and Yokomata's driver standing shoulder to shoulder in front of a luxury Ortega. And sitting with her stumpy legs dangling out its right rear door was Yokomata herself.

Didn't like the looks on their faces — like groundlevel dogs coming upon a wounded cat. Hoped my voice wouldn't squeak.

"Just going to call you!" I said to Yokomata, ignoring Rednose.

"Really?" she said. "Whatever for?"

"Found Barkham. Wanted to collect my bounty." I hefted the box. "Found this, too. Figured you were looking for it."

"There wouldn't happen to be some statues of Joey Jose in there, would there? I'm terribly fond of his humor."

"So am I," I said, trying to keep the conversation light. "Was hoping you'd let me keep one of the statues as a reward for returning all forty of them — a total of twenty kilos of weight."

The heavies stirred at mention of the weight.

"Think of all the buttons you could buy with that, Buttonhead," Rednose said.

Yokomata continued: "And you were in the process of delivering it to me, weren't you?" Her tone was ominous.

"Of course."

"Strange. It appeared to me that you were going to your office."

"Going to call first."

Her smile would have looked at home on the face of her pet tyrannosaurus. "How polite. By the way, how was my trusted associate, Mr. Barkham, when you found him?"

Her smile broadened as I described his final circumstances.

Then she said, "Put the box down."

"And put your hands over your head," said Rednose.

Did as I was told and when I straightened up I saw the three of them had blasters out and pointed at my midsection.

"No sudden moves," Fourfingers said.

Rednose stepped forward, a smirk on his face. At first I thought he had a blaster in each hand, then I saw the one in his left was the dose gun, the one loaded with Truth.

"I don't think we have to worry about Buttonhead, here. He doesn't carry. Do you, Buttonhead?"

He did a quick frisk of my flanks and found nothing.

"Satisfied?"

"Not quite. First thing we do right now is make sure you're telling the truth about Kel. After that, maybe it'll be interesting to try what The Man From Mars did to Kel on you."

He raised the dose gun. Had to move now or maybe lose my chance forever, so I joined the two contacts on the outer aspect of each of my wrists. The front of my jumpsuit exploded as a staccato series of bluefire energy bolts sprayed out in a horizontal arc, riddling the three — Rednose first and then the pair behind him — sending them twisting, spinning, writhing to the roof surface.

Yanked my wrists apart — seemed they'd been joined for minutes but it had only been a matter of a heartbeat or two — and started toward Yokomata's Ortega. Couldn't see much, what with the dark, the meaty-smelling steam rising from the corpses, the smoke from my scorched jump front, and the blotchy afterimages of bolts from the chest zapper.

My foot struck something and it skittered in front of me with a metallic scrape. Without slowing I stooped and picked it up: somebody's blaster. Dimly saw Yokomata ahead of me, moving within the frame of her flitter door. She could have been trying to get away or reaching for a blaster of her own. Took no chances. Fired off a bolt into the air and shouted.

"Not another move, lady!"

She froze and glared at me as I came up to her. She was unarmed.

Had her.

Bloaty. What was I going to do with her?

— 12-

We were airborne, riding low over the sluggish surface of the East River. Dydeetown's rectangle of red lights sparkled on our left. The flitter was on slow autocruise which would keep it moving along the present traffic lane at a leisurely pace. Yokomata sat stiffly in the other front seat. Behind us the corpses of her three dead thugs lay in the rear section where I had forced her to toss them.

Felt strangely calm about killing them. Never killed before, but for the life of me I couldn't dredge up any remorse. Self defense and various other sorts of dreck, but to be frank, it seemed like the chest zapper had done it, not me. Felt removed from the whole incident. And if I wanted to dig way down into my gut, I was glad they were dead — especially Rednose.

Sat facing Yokomata now, blaster in hand, the Truth dose gun on my lap.

A bad situation all the way around. Wasn't sure how to get out of it, so I'd been talking to her in a matter-of-fact tone, playing it by ear, but to no avail. She hadn't uttered a word since I'd cut loose with my chest zapper. Had to break her down some if I was going to get anywhere. And then it occurred to me how.

"What's your procedure for unwanted bodies?"

No reply.

I shrugged and gestured toward the rear door with the barrel of my blaster.

"Then we'll improvise. Get back there and toss one of them into the river. Then we'll find a deserted spot in Brooklyn for the second, and in Manhattan for the third."

"Don't be an idiot!" she said.

Contact.

Figured the last thing she wanted — next to being blasted herself — was to have the bodies of her toughies all over Central Bosyorkington.

"Got a better idea?"

She gave me a level stare. "You saw a demonstration in my yard yesterday."

The dinosaur! Forgot all about that. The perfect garbage disposal.

Told the console, "Home at max."

The Ortega rose toward the upper lanes with a lurch and soon we were streaking northwest.

"Now," I said to her, "let's talk some business. I'm willing to forget your attempted doublecross back on the roof. You forget your three dead men, and we'll start off even again."

She said nothing, merely stared at me with those reptilian eyes.

Gestured to the sack of gold statuettes on the floor between us. "In return for finding your money and getting it to you, I expect a ten percent reward. Add that to what you owe me for finding Barkham dead, and we can round t off to five of the statuettes. We part friends, both of us richer."

She continued to stare at me and I began to get worried. Did not want Yokomata for an enemy. She had a reputation for holding a grudge. Would spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder, waiting for my head to get vaporized.

"Sounds reasonable," she said, finally.

Hid my relief. And my elation. Would have let her haggle me down to two statues

Stuck out my hand. She took and shook.

"Deal."

We made small talk the rest of the trip. She seemed particularly interested in the manner of Barkham's death. Had a feeling she’d’ve liked to have been there to see it herself. She seemed relaxed and affable, but I detected something ugly beneath the surface.

And then the flitter stopped: We were over the Yokomata estate, somewhere between the wall and the softly glowing Taj Mahal holo enveloping her house. All was dark below.

As Yokomata looked out the window on her left, I picked up the dose gun on my lap and gave her a good air-propelled shot of Truth in her upper arm, right through the fabric of her blouse.

She spun around and grabbed at the injection site.

"Wha…?"

Smiled at her. "Just getting even. After all, what's a little Truth between friends?"

Put the flitter on hold at ten meters and popped open the rear door on Yokomata's side. There came a breathy hissing from below, interrupted by loud clacking sounds: jaws with dozens of giant teeth snapping together with bone-crunching force. I made her push the bodies of her dead thugs out the door one by one.

She didn't seem to mind. And as the last tumbled down into that gnashing darkness I said to her:

"Yoko, old girl, tell me true: Did you really mean it when you said you'd let bygones be bygones?"

As her head swung around toward me her face became a mask of unfathomable rage. Spittle flew at me as she screamed.

"You putrid lump of street dung! Do you think I'd let you get away with killing my men and walking away with a percentage of my take? I'd rather sell my ass in Dydeetown! The first thing I'm going to do when I get inside is send a hit squad after you and that clone! You'll both be dead before sunrise!"

Pointed the blaster at her face.

"Jump."

Her eyes reflected the horror she felt. She could hide nothing.

"At least you've got a chance if you jump," I said. "That's more than you were going to give me."

She looked out the door into that hungry darkness, then looked back at me. If she hadn't had the Truth in her, she might have caught me off guard. But her face told the whole story.

Put a deep penetrating blast into her upper chest as she started to leap at me. She reeled back and fell out the door.

Didn't wait to hear the chomping from below. Hit the "All Secure" button, then told the console the coordinates of my compartment building. Had to get a clean intact jumper before I went to Elmero's to turn all this gold into more manageable credit.

— 13-

Scanned the L.I. Port mall near the shuttle ramp but saw no sign of Jean. Walked on, passing someone in a Suki Alvarez holosuit, when I heard a familiar voice say, "Hello, Mr. Dreyer."

Suki Alvarez flickered off and there stood Jean.

Didn't recognize her at first, what with her hair cut close to the scalp and all. She was standing by the chute to the shuttle ramp, all her belongings in a single bag on the floor beside her, her face a tight, anxious mask.

"Afraid I wouldn't show?"

"I knew you would," she said with conviction. "Just afraid you'd be late. I'm on the next shuttle."

"Where to?"

"The Bernardo de la Paz platform."

"Oh." That had been Maggs' first stop. It had taken me a while to trace her itinerary, but I finally learned-

"Have you got it?"

"What?" I came back to the present. "Oh, yeah. Here." Had the greencard in my hand. Passed it over.

She grabbed it away like a starving man grabs food, and sighed like he would with his first bite. "Thank you. Thank you, thank you."

"Means a lot, huh?"

A little-girl smile: "Oh, yes!"

"Like what?"

"Somebody believed in me enough to help me pass as Realpeople."

"How do you know it's not a fake? How do you know you won't get red-lighted when they check your genotype as you try to pass through Emigration?"

She looked insulted. "Stop it!"

"How do you know he wasn't going to go up to the screening area and leave you standing there with the alarms going off while he boarded the shuttle and headed out?"

"I just know!" she said in a shocked tone. Guess the thought had never occurred to her.

"He was a crook."

"No! He was an agent"…her face clouded…"and the R.A. will catch up with whoever did such a thing to one of their top men. He believed in me and I believe in this card. It's all I have left of him."

Dumb. Dumb! Had to tell her the truth, whether she believed me or not.

"He was a crook. That's how he got these."

Handed her a small sack containing ten of the little Joey Jose statues. After almost toppling over with the unexpected weight, she looked inside, then looked at me, questioning.

"They were Barkham's and-"

"Bodine — his real name was Kyle Bodine."

"Whatever. I took a share. Figure the rest belong to you. They're worth less on the outworlds than here, but it’s enough to set you up pretty, so take good care of them."

Knew she'd have no trouble getting them out — Earth restricted only the importing of gold.

Her eyes got sort of liquidy. "I don't know what to-"

"Not going to cry are you?" Didn't want a scene here.

She smiled faintly. "Nope. I'm trying to forget how to do that."

"It's easy. I forgot a long time ago."

She was silent for a time, looking around and biting her lip. Then she said: "Well, thanks anyway for giving this to me."

"Fair's fair," I told her. "Anyway, I came out way ahead. Won't have to work for clones again."

"You never ease up, do you?" she said as her face rearranged itself into harder lines. "I was almost hoping you'd…"

"What?"

She shrugged uncomfortably. "I don't know…change your mind about me…about clones…a little."

Looked away. "You've got about as much chance of seeing that as I have of changing yours about Barkham."

"Bodine," she said mechanically. "And why don't you just leave it alone?"

"Because he was a no-good dregger and that's the truth."

"It can't be. I won't let it be."

"The truth stinks sometimes. Lots of times."

"Not this time. Whatever you or anybody else thinks of Kyle — or whoever he was — I know he loved me and wanted me and no one can take that away."

"We'll see."

"No. You'll see. But in any event-" She smiled stiffly and stuck out her fight hand. "You did your job well and I thank you for it."

"Will you thank me when you find out that card's a fake?"

"Only one way to prove it to you, isn't there?"

Her eyes held mine. She was so sure. Maybe she had to be. Maybe she had to hold onto the belief that someone out of all the Realpeople in all the worlds would do right by her. Too bad she had such lousy judgment.

She picked up her bag and stepped into the upchute. As she rose toward the Emigration platform I moved back so I could watch her be processed. She walked to the counter and inserted her greencard in the slot, then slipped her arm into the tissue sampler.

Stood and watched, repeatedly rubbing my sweat slick palms on my jump while the processor checked the genetic makeup of Jean’s sampled cells against the data in the central bank.

And then with a smile that must have been blinding at close range, Jean was passing through, triumphantly waving the greencard in my direction, and heading for the shuttle.

Gave her an elaborate shrug and turned away.

— 14-

Stood at the edge of the platform for the Brooklyn tube and watched the shuttle rise blueward, a black dot against the rising sun. Someone who went in for that sort of thing would probably think it was beautiful.

Thought about that greencard…and the few tense moments I'd had there wondering whether it would work.

Don't ask me why I did it. Don't know. Haven't become an oozer or anything like that. Nothing's changed. Just happened that when I returned to my compartment for a fresh jumpsuit I came across the one with Jean's bloodstains on it and the idea hit me.

The challenge appealed to me. The challenge and nothing more. So after I gave the astonished Elmero twenty of the statuettes — his fifty-percent share of what I'd found — he was more than willing to arrange the fix as a favor for his dear good friend Sigmundo. Said the blood on the jumper would enable his contact in CenDat to locate Jean's genotype and change her status in no time. True to his word, he handed me a new, genuine greencard in a tenth.

Watched the shuttle disappear from view, well on its way to the first stop to Out Where All The Good Folks Go.

Pulled out the bogus card Barkham had given Jean and dropped it over the edge of the platform. It fluttered and see-sawed into the dimness below. Soon it too was out of sight.