Janet studied an exhibit of extinct flowers: poppies and lilies and gladioli and roses. "When are you going to tell Mrs. Frost?"

"I'll go over to her office tomorrow. She'll probably be expecting me... it's the last working day. Apparently she agrees with me on Blake-Moffet; this should please her. But that's another thing only time will tell."

The next morning he rented a little Getabout from a dealer and drove from his housing unit to the Committee building.

Myron Mavis, he reflected, would be giving up his within-walking-distance apartment. Protocol required that a man lease close to his job; in the next week or so it behooved him to ask for Mavis' setup. As Director of T-M he would need to live the role. There was slight latitude, and he was already resigned to the strictures. It was the price paid for public service in the higher brackets.

As soon as he entered the Committee building, the front secretary passed him through. There was no waiting, and, within five minutes, he was being ushered into Mrs. Frost's private office.

She rose graciously. "Mr. Purcell. How nice."

"You're looking well." They shook hands. "Is this a good time to talk to you?"

"Excellent," Mrs. Frost said, smiling. Today she wore a trim brown suit of some crisp fabric, unknown to him. "Sit down."

"Thank you." He seated himself facing her. "I see no point in waiting until the last moment."

"You've decided?"

Allen said: "I'll accept the job. And I apologize for stringing it out."

Waving her hand, Mrs. Frost dismissed his apology. "You should have time." And then her face glowed in a swift, beaming warmth of delight. "I'm so glad."

Touched, he said: "So am I." And he really meant it.

"When will you be ready to start?" She laughed and held up her hands. "Look at me; I'm as nervous as you."

"I want to start as soon as possible." He consulted with himself; it would take at least a week to wind up affairs at the Agency. "What about a week from Monday?"

She was disappointed, but she suppressed it. "Yes, you should have that much time for the transfer. And—perhaps we can get together socially. For dinner some evening. And for Juggle. I'm quite a demon; I play every chance I get. And I'd like very much to meet your wife."

"Fine," Allen said, sharing her enthusiasm. "We'll arrange that."

CHAPTER 11

The dream, large and gray, hanging like the tatters of a web, gathered itself around him and hugged him greedily. He screamed, but instead of sounds there drifted out of him stars. The stars rose until they reached the panoply of web, and there they struck fast, and were extinguished.

He screamed again, and this time the force of his voice rolled him downhill. Crashing through dripping vines he came to rest in a muddy trough, a furrow half-clogged with water. The water, brackish, stung his nostrils, choking him. He gasped, floundered, crept against roots.

It was a moist jungle of growing things in which he lay. The steaming hulks of plants pressed and shoved for water. They drank noisily, grew and expanded, split with a showering burst of particles. Around him the jungle altered through centuries of life. Moonlight, strained through bulging leaves, drizzled gummy and yellow around him, as thick as syrup.

And, in the midst of the creeping plant-pulp, was an artificial structure.

Toward it he struggled, reaching. The structure was flat, thin, with a brittle hardness. It was opaque. It was made of boards.

Joy submerged him as he touched its side. He screamed, and this time the sound carried his body upward. He floated, drifted, clutched at the wood surface. His nails scrabbled, and splinters pierced his flesh. With a metal wheel he sawed through the wood and stripped it away, husk-like, dropping it and stamping on it. The wood broke loudly, echoing in the dream-silence.

Behind the wood was stone.

Gazing at the stone he felt awe. It had endured; it had not been carried away or destroyed. The stone loomed as he remembered it. No change had occurred, and that was very good. He felt the emotion all through him.

He reached out, and, bracing himself, plucked from the stone a round part of itself. Weighed down, he staggered off, and plunged head-first into the oozing warmth of plant-pulp.

For a time he lay gasping, his face pressed against slime. Once, an insect walked across his cheek. Far off, something stirred mournfully. At last, with great effort, he roused himself and began searching. The round stone lay half-buried in silt, at the edge of water. He found the metal wheel and cut away the groping roots. Then, bracing his knees, he lifted the stone and dragged it away, across a grassy hill so vast that it faded into infinity.

At the end of the hill he dropped the stone crashing into a little parked Getabout. Nobody saw him. It was almost dawn. The sky, streaked with yellow, would soon be drained, would soon become a hazy gray through which the sun could beat.

Getting into the front seat, he started up the steam pressure and drove carefully up the lane. The lane stretched out ahead of him, faintly damp, faintly luminous. On both sides housing units were jutting lumps of coal: oddly hardened organic substances. No light showed within them and nothing stirred.

When he reached his own housing unit he parked the car—making no sound—and began lugging the stone up the rear ramp. It took a long time, and he was trembling and perspiring when he reached his own floor. And still nobody saw him. He unlocked his door and dragged the stone inside.

Unhinged with relief, he sank down on the edge of the bed. It was over: he had done it. In her bed his wife stirred fretfully, sighed, turned over on her face. Janet did not wake up; nobody woke up. The city, the society, slept.

Presently he removed his clothes and climbed into bed. He fell asleep almost at once, his mind and body free of all tension, every trouble.

Dreamless, like an amoeba, he, too, slept.

CHAPTER 12

Sunlight streamed through the bedroom, warm and pleasant. Beside Allen in the bed lay his wife, also warm and pleasant. Her hair had tumbled against his face and now he turned to kiss her.

"Uh," Janet murmured, blinking.

"It's morning. Time to get up." But he, himself, remained inert. He felt lazy. Contentment spread through him; instead of getting up he put his arm around Janet and hugged her.

"Did the—tape go off?" she asked drowsily.

"This is Saturday. We're in charge, today." Caressing Janet's shoulder he said: "The pulsing fullness of firm flesh."

"Thank you," she murmured, yawning and stretching. Then she became serious. "Allen, were you sick last night?" Sitting up quickly, she said: "Around three o'clock you got out of bed and went to the bathroom. You were gone a long time."

"How long?" He had no memory of it.

"I fell asleep. So I can't say. But a long time."

In any case he felt fine, now. "You're thinking of earlier this week. You've got everything confused."

"No, it was last night. Early this morning." Wide-awake, she slid from the bed and onto her feet. "You didn't go out, did you?"

He thought about it. There was some vague phantasmagoria in his mind, a confusion of dreamlike events. The taste of brackish water, the wet presence of plants. "I was on a distant jungle planet," he decided. "With torrid jungle priestesses whose breasts were like two cones of white marble." He tried to recall how the passage had read. "Bulging within the flimsy covering of her dress. Peeking through. Panting with hot need."

Exasperated, she caught hold of his arm and tugged. "Get up. I'm ashamed of you. You—adolescent."