"You can call a cab from the payfone in the lounge," the Customs agent said.

"We're free to go?" Herb Asher said.

The Customs agent nodded.

"Something is wrong," the doctor said; again she had re- moved her glasses and sat rubbing her eyes.

"There's this other matter," the Customs agent said to her, and bent down to present her with a stack of documents.

"Do you know where Tate is?" the Immigration official called after Herb Asher as he and Rybys made their way from the ex- amination room.

"No, I don't," Herb said, and found himself in the corridor; supporting Rybys he walked step by step back down the corridor to the lounge. "Sit down," he said to her, depositing her in a heap on a couch. Several waiting people gazed at them dully. "I'll fone. I'll be right back. Do you have any change'? I need a five-dollar piece." "Christ," Rybys murmured. "No. I don't have." "We got through," he said to her in a low voice. "OK!" she said angrily. "I'll fone for a cab." Going through his pockets, searching for a five-dollar piece, he felt elated. Yah had intervened, distantly and feebly, but it had been enough.

--------------------------------

Ten minutes later they and their luggage were aboard a Yellow flycab, rising up from the Washington, D.C. spaceport, heading in the direction of Bethesda-Chevy Chase.

"Where the hell is Elias?" Rybys managed to say.

"He drew their attention," Herb said. "He diverted them. Away from

"Great," she said. "So now he could be anywhere."

All at once a large commercial flycar came hurtling toward them at reckless speed.

The robot driver of the cab cried out in dismay. And then the massive flycar sideswiped them; it happened in an instant. Vio- lent waves of concussion hurled the cab in a downward spiral; Herb Asher clutched his wife against him-buildings bloomed into hugeness, and he knew, he knew absolutely and utterly, what had happened. The bastards, he thought in pain; he hurt physi- cally; he ached from the realization. Warning beepers in the cab had gone off-"