How would the machine react to his steady probing and questioning? It could operate and engage certain security machinery to protect itself. Would it ever use those against a human being? Himself, for example?

Finding that out was also his job. He would leave suitable clues to his colleagues along the electronic trail he was so delicately hiking.

Froelich wanted details. Dhurapati wanted Nirvana. Martin Oristano wanted salvation.

But not for himself.

VII

It seemed to Eric he had to wait a long time for a tubecar. He wasn’t used to traveling the tube off rush hour. Eventually one pulled into the station and he was able to relax a little. His only companions were two retired ladies down from Black Canyon City for some shopping. They sat at the front of the car, chattered incessantly, and ignored him.

A blast of superheated air greeted him as he exited at New River. Midday heat was something else he wasn’t accustomed to. A short jaunt on his waiting ATC took him home. Familiar, friendly surroundings helped him to relax further.

For a long time he just sat there, staring at the blank opto on the bedroom wall, thinking. Eventually he rose and stripped off his tattered, stained suit. He stayed deep in thought as he let the whirlpool bath massage his body. There were no aches and pains, no bruises visible, and that was odd. There should be aches and pains and bruises. Not even his left arm, which had been so cruelly bent up behind him, was sore.

Just lucky, he told himself. Might not be lucky a second time.

He slipped into a robe and poured himself a tall glass of iced mint tea from the fridge while he considered how to proceed.

An hour later he sat down at his terminal and plugged in the telephone. There was some machine-to-machine talk, then the screen cleared and a pleasant woman with glasses appeared on the screen.

“Why are you requesting this leave of absence from Selvern, Mr. Abbott?”

“Personal reasons. I haven’t been feeling well lately.” As an afterthought he added, “Family troubles.”

“I see.” She did something to a keyboard out of his range of vision, glanced curiously back up at him. “You are set to leave Phoenix this coming Monday for an overseas conference and product development seminar devoted to the new LEG 6744K subchip and ring opto applications.”

“I know that.” Eric chose his words carefully. “I’m afraid I wouldn’t be much help in my present condition. Shiraz can take my place, or Gonzalez.” Neither Shiraz nor Gonzalez would be as effective as he would be, but they wouldn’t hurt the conference, either.

“Death in the family?” asked the woman on screen. Eric said nothing, looked downcast. The woman checked something else, reacted to a hidden readout. “It says here, sir, that in your entire stay with Selvern you’ve never taken one day of sick leave until just recently.”

“That’s true.” He was suddenly thankful for his dedication and good health. Many times he’d been tempted to take off to go camping or to a ball game. Now he was glad he’d always refused the invitations.

The supervisor’s attitude certainly underwent an about-face. “Under the circumstances, even without knowing the exact nature of your problems, I think we can grant your leave, sir. How long will you need?” One hand poised to note his response.

“I’m not sure.” He couldn’t very well say “indefinite” but neither did he want to be too specific. “Not very long.”

“A week?” asked the supervisor. “Two weeks?”

“Really, I can’t say. You know how these personal problems can drag on.”

She nodded sympathetically, let him off the hook. “I’ll just put it down as indefinite, sir, and when you know, please notify this office.”

“Thank you,” Eric said gratefully. “I certainly will.” He wanted a job to come back to.

“That’s all there is, sir. As of now you’re on official leave. I hope you resolve your personal problems with a minimum of discomfort.”

“So do I,” he told her honestly.

The image disappeared from the screen. He swiveled his chair. He was free. It was better this way. If he’d taken off from work there might have been awkward questions. Certainly Charlie would start badgering him for reasons, and he didn’t feel like giving reasons just now. No, this way was better, let them guess what he was up to. Charlie might guess, and Gabriella might pout, but he wouldn’t have to listen to either of them.

As far as setting back his career, he’d worry about that later. Surely his heretofore spotless record would bail him out this one time. He wasn’t going to worry about it. It didn’t matter right now. Nothing mattered right now, except Lisa Tambor.

Her face encircled his mind, a necklace of stroboscopic memories. No need now to delay, and better not to. Go to Nueva York and find some way of meeting her. If he hurried he might even be able to get back in time to make the tail end of the Hong Kong conference. There was nothing to stop him.

Only … one man was dead and two had tried to kidnap him, and he still wasn’t sure why. Would they be waiting for him? He thought it unlikely. If they had followed up they might be waiting for him outside the Selvern Tower tomorrow. He grinned at the thought. They’d have a long wait.

Charlie’s opinion still haunted him. Any sane man considering today’s events would stay as far as possible away from Lisa Tambor. If that meant he was not sane, he was enjoying the feeling. Madness, like love, was positively exhilarating. Life was conventional. Only rarely did it dump genuine surprises in one’s lap, and he’d been saddled with a beautiful one. He had every intention of pursuing it to its conclusion, whatever that might entail. Even at the risk of ending up like Polikartos.

How to be in such love with a barely glimpsed face? Is that all it takes to make a man throw away his life? Of course, if he did manage to meet her she’d like as not spit in his eye and scream for the police. At least that would put an end to his obsession.

The world was full of celebrities, personalities, who were very different in person than from a distance. Makeup and surgery could do wonders. He might not like her. If he was lucky he would slip away, back to his mundane existence, without arousing the ire of her associates.

It promised to be a change, if nothing else. He was actually whistling as he packed his overnight bag and loaded his clean suit with potentially useful devices. It didn’t matter how long he’d be gone. Day or week or month, he always liked to travel light and optimistic.

He started to dial his travel service, hesitated. If he was being watched, his actions monitored, that might trigger a key somewhere. Better to take the tube to the airport and purchase his ticket in person. Money shouldn’t be a problem. Polikartos hadn’t had time to dent his accounts.

He shut down the terminal and closed up the little house. He thought of telling his neighbors of his departure, decided against it. No need to involve them. Let any visitors guess what he was up to.

He wished now that he’d read detective novels. Those were the skills he’d need in the days ahead. All he knew was that the faster he moved, the safer he’d be.

Leaving his ATC behind to further confuse the curious, he jogged down to the station. Soon he was aboard another near empty car, whistling down the tube toward Sky Harbor Airport. The tube was carrying him through a dream. He was merely an onlooker now, not a participant. The detached sensation muted his good humor.

A sudden thought made him get off the tube before it reached the airport. A detour via cab took him to a small electronics specialty house. The owner did not remember him, but upon presentation of his credentials, allowed him use of the hobby room and its services.

There he set to work with perfectly legal equipment doing something highly illegal. Only an expert could alter something as personal and secure as a credit card. It took considerable skill to imprint a different name and account number on the card without altering certain molecular structures so that the user of the card could still draw on the original account.

Five to ten years in prison, no matter how skillful the work, even though it was his own card. At this point it was all part of the adventure, and he could always change the card back when he was finished. It wasn’t something for an amateur to attempt, but Eric was no amateur.

Now let the people who’d confronted him try to track him! They’d find that as far as every hotel and restaurant was concerned, Eric Abbott had disappeared. Maybe he was being a little overcautious, but he had no desire to meet the two men who’d challenged him outside Polikartos’s office a second time. Adrenaline could not stop a pingun or tranquilizer dart.

He had no trouble at the airport and relaxed completely once the hypersonic transport was in the air. A window seat gave him the chance to study new green squares and circles from a hundred thousand feet up.

His first glimpse of Nueva York turned out to be something of an anticlimax. That was the trouble with the opto. It brought such sights into everyone’s home. There was no mystery to the reality.

The airport itself, however, was something of a shock. Jersey Flats Terminal made Sky Harbor in Phoenix look very provincial.

There were no lurking, hulking figures waiting to jump him when he emerged from the offloading ramp, overnight bag in hand. No one bothered him as he flowed with the crowd toward the transportation depot. In dramatic parlance, it appeared that he’d managed a clean getaway.

Why, he might be able to walk right up to Lisa Tambor and ask her out to lunch without anyone’s interfering! Poor

Polikartos hadn’t been careful enough, that was all. In fact, he still had no proof Polikartos’s death had anything to do with Lisa Tambor and the two men in the hallway.

His first thought was to go straight to the modeling agency whose address he’d found in the investigator’s file. But there seemed no reason to move so precipitously. Better to familiarize himself first with the strange city.

The tube shot him rapidly downtown. The agency was located on North 133rd street, Harlem Tower Complex Eight. He chose a modest hotel well away from his eventual destination, in upper midtown near Central Park. The prices were appalling.

The room had a clean bed, the omnipresent opto, a nice bathroom, and no view whatsoever. That didn’t bother him. He wasn’t on a vacation. The rest of the day he spent cruising the streets in a cab, letting the smooth synthesized voice fill him in on locales and sights, even gliding past Harlem Eight without stopping.