the girl with sympathy but she seemed cheerfully unconcerned. She was, he thought, the kind to take that kind of treatment without a murmur of complaint, and without giving any overt recognition to it. And yet she was also the kind to feel it deep inside her.

When the car was unloaded, they sat down at the kitchen table to rest a moment. Tom sat back in his chair, eyes brooding. It was not for several minutes that he noticed that Sandy was watching him, her chin on her palms, her elbows on the table. And he knew that she knew he was troubled and was waiting to see if he wanted to talk about it. "Ricky thinks we ought to decide about Marcia, tonight," he said, his voice sounding blunt even to himself.

"You mean whether we should take her in or not?" she asked.

"Yeah," Tom answered. "He thinks we should, whether she fits or not—just so we can get the contract with Eltron Electric. Because otherwise we would have to pull up stakes and go take that thing at Universal."

"And you don't think we should?" she prompted.

"No, I don't," he said. "It seems to me like we'd be selling out if we did that. Maybe I'm being a purist about it, but damn it all...."

"But you can stop it easily," she said. "According to the charter, a vote of membership has to be unanimous. All you have to do is say no."

"Yeah—well, that's true," he said. "Only this is more than that. That rule is just about ordinary members, the idea being to keep feuds out. If somebody isn't going to be able to get along with a new member, why let's find it out at the start. And, since the old member is more important than the new one, let's block the new one.

"But this thing's different; this isn't just a case of whether she's compatible or not. I have nothing against Marcia, personally; I just don't like this way of doing business. But this ties up our whole future, economic and everything else. If I blackball her, I'm blackballing our contract with Eltron; and matters of contract, or economics, or whatall, are not supposed to be subject to veto. No ... I won't vote against her all by my lonesome. If the clan is pretty well split, maybe I will pull a technicality. But I won't just up and blackball her all by myself, just because I think I'm right."

Sandy was thoughtful. "What about this job at Eltron," she asked, finally. "Can we swing it? It's bigger than the job here at Midland, and bigger than the one at Universal. Is it too big?"

"No," Tom said. "We can handle it. Oh, we may have to hire a few private citizens, but we can do most of it ourselves. If we can average nine people a week, we'll be all right. And we can' do that if we leave two to take care of the kids, one to manage the house and cook and all, and one to fill in, taking care of other outside matters, having babies, and whatnot. But even if we can only average eight ourselves, it is still reasonable with a couple of private citizens. No, I'm not afraid of the job."

"It'll be funny working alongside of private citizens," Sandy said, musingly; "I hope we pick better ones than those guys at Sanford Radio."

TOM laughed. "We will," he said. "The trouble there was that we didn't hire them; the company did. And the guys were good enough—they just didn't like the clans."

"That's one way of putting it," Sandy said. "They just had some preconceived ideas as to what kind of woman would join a clan. Happens they were wrong, but it took a bit of jiujitsu to convince them."

"Well, that won't happen here," Tom said. "We'll be hiring them ourselves, and we'll probably be able to pick up all we want from the other assembly clans. Times are rough all over, and they're not too loaded with work, either. Of course, the rest of the plant is another matter; but I don't think there'll be any open trouble. Things have gotten a little better since those early days. People know a little more about the clans, even if they don't approve."

"So there is just the question of whether we want to do it, or not," she said. He nodded but said nothing. "And you would much rather we didn't want to.... Tell me, what's she like? I've only seen her the couple of times that Ricky's brought her to lunch."

"That's about all I have," Tom answered. "Oh, I've seen her out at her old man's place a couple of times, too, but then I was working on the old man. As far as I know, she is what she seems to be. Beautiful in a way. A bit of a mantrap. Probably spoiled. I don't know. What did you think of her?"

"That's a damning sketch if I ever heard one," Sandy said. "I wonder if that's all there is to her. Is she just a spoiled brat with a well-developed body? Is that all she is? What's her background like? I mean aside from money?"

"Background?" Tom hesitated. "Well, she went through college, somewheres or other. She's traveled in Europe a bit Generally circulated around. Cultured, I guess you'd call it.

"Certainly her old man knows what it's about. He's quite a character, you know. Very dignified, very polished. Fine oak paneling in his study. Lots of books, and he's probably read them, too. Quite a collection of classical music, and he knows his way around it too—at least he knows more about it than I do. The very picture of a cultured gentleman. And it is with a perfectly gentlemanly manner that he tears you apart into little pieces."

"Oh?" Sandy raised her eyebrow. "What happened?"

Tom smiled ruefully; "We had an argument." He shrugged. "The clans versus Free-Trading. He has a fine and delicate hand with sarcasm. No, I take that back. I don't know whether it was sarcasm or not; maybe he was just leading me out. Anyway, I came out of there feeling as if I'd been wrung dry."

He was silent a moment, and Sandy made no move to break his thoughts. "The logical question here, of course, is to what extent this makes me think the way I do. And maybe it does, I don't know. I'm afraid of the guy; I got the feeling he knows exactly what he's doing and why. And I think he may be too strong for us."

"You think we might end up as his puppets?" Sandy said, her voice neutral.

"Something like that," Tom admitted. "Oh, I know that's probably a foolish thought. In fact, now that I look at it, I know it is. The guy just impressed me; frankly I came out feeling somewhat awed by him. I'm not used to the feeling. I guess it's just that he comes from a background that I don't know anything about."

Sandy pursed her lips and nodded. There was a pixyish gleam to her eyes as she got up and started towards the door. As she left she asked him: "And Marcia, is she anything like her old man?" She was out the door and gone before he realized what her question meant.

He sat there, staring after her for five full minutes before he got up and started to put the food away.

3

HE HAD put the food away and prepared himself a cup of coffee, when he heard the clatter of the bus. That would be Betsy and Rita with the kids, he knew, back from the beach. By the noisy commotion, he gathered they had enjoyed themselves, with no more than the usual number of cuts and bruises and hurt feelings. Eleven kids, the oldest eight years, could not conceivably go to the beach for the afternoon without some crises; but, at least, they seemed to have gotten back in a happy condition.

Tom smiled as he thought of them, picturing the throng, but he made no move to join them. When Sue, aged four, stuck her head in the door and grinned to see him there, he just said "Hi." This she took as an invitation, and hopped on in to begin telling him in disconnected fragments, all about the day. He let her ramble for a moment until the first flush of her enthusiasm was over. Then, with a kiss on the forehead and a poke in the stomach, he sent her out, suggesting