typed out the customs forms, took Hunter's thumbprint,and carefully checked his medical certificate.
"You had your last boosters in the Mars station, is that correct?"
"Yes, last January," Hunter replied.
"That gives you an eight months' clearance." The clerk smiled. "Plentyof time for a spaceman's furlough."
"I'm making a permanent separation," Hunter affirmed.
The clerk glanced at him sharply. "Then I'd better issue a temporaryhealth card." He ran a red-tinted, celluloid rectangle through astamping machine and Hunter pressed his thumbprint upon the signaturesquare. "Can you give me your home address, Captain?"
"I'll be staying at the Roost for a day or so. After that I'm gettingmarried."
"I'll assign your health file to the Los Angeles Clinic then," theclerk said. "You can apply for an official reassignment later, ifnecessary."
He made a photo-copy of the health card, pushed it into a pneumatictube and handed the original to Hunter. Then he rolled the customsform back into the typewriter.
"Since you're quitting the service, Captain, I'll have to haveadditional information for the municipal file. Do you have unionaffiliation?"
"No. Spacemen aren't required to join the U.F.W."
"If you want to give me a part payment on the initiation fee, I'll beglad to issue--"
"It'll be a long, hard winter before Eric Young gets any of mycredits," Hunter said, his eyes narrowing. Considering how Hunter feltabout the Union of Free Workers and the labor czar, Eric Young, hethought he had phrased his answer with remarkable restraint.
"Anti-labor," the clerk said, and typed the designation on the form.
"No," Hunter snapped, "and I won't be labeled that. As far as theindividual goes, I believe he has every right to organize. No one canstand up against the cartels in any other way. But this exploitationby Young--"
"You either join the U.F.W., or you're against us." The clerk shruggeddisinterestedly. "It's all one and the same thing to me, Captain.However, if you expect a job in the city, you'll have to get itthrough the union." He typed again on the customs form. "According toa new regulation, I'm obliged to classify you as unemployed, and thatrestricts you to limited areas of Los Angeles as well as--"
"When the hell did they put over a law like that?"
"Two weeks ago, sir. It gives the clinics a closer control over thepotentially maladjusted, and it should help ease the pressure--"
"There are no exceptions?"
"The executive classifications, naturally--professionals, andspacemen. That would have included you, Captain Hunter, but you sayyou've left the service."
Hunter gritted his teeth. It had been like this for as long as hecould remember. Whenever he returned from a long flight there wasalways a new form of regimentation to adjust to. And always for thesame reason--to stop the steadily rising incidence of psychoticmaladjustment.
"How does the law define an executive?" Hunter asked.
"Job bracket with one of the cartels," the clerk replied. "Or thetotal credits held on deposit with a recognized fund."
The captain flung his savings book on the counter. The clerk glancedat the balance and X'ed out the last word he had typed on the customsform.
"You qualify, sir--with a thousand credits to spare. I'll give you acity-wide clearance as an executive. But I can only make ittemporary. You'll have to check once each week with the U.F.W. office.If your balance drops below ninety-five thousand, you'll bereclassified."
The clerk ran another celluloid card--this time it was blue--throughthe stamping machine and passed it across to Hunter. Captain Hunterpicked up his bag and entered the customs booth, which by that timewas empty. The probe lights glowed from the walls and ceiling,efficiently X-raying his bag and his clothing for any prohibitedimports. Within seconds the alarm bell clanged and the metal doorsbanged shut, imprisoning Hunter in the booth.
Now what? he asked himself. What regulation had he violated this time?In his mind he inventoried the contents of his bag. It contained onlya handful of personal belongings, and the tools of trade which he hadneeded as a captain of a fighting ship. Everything was legitimate andabove-board. Hunter hadn't even brought Ann a souvenir from thefrontier.
* * * * *
After a time, the booth door swung open. A senior inspector, carryinga blaster, crowded into the cubicle.
"Open your bag!" The inspector commanded, motioning with his weapon.
Hunter saw that the blaster dial was set to fire the death charge, notthe weaker dispersal charge which produced only an hour's paralysis.
Hunter thumbed the photocell lock. It responded to the individualpattern of his thumbprint, and the bag fell open. The inspector pickedup the worn blaster which lay under Hunter's shipboard uniform.
"Smuggling firearms, Captain, is a violation of the city code. Thefine is--"
"Smuggling?" Hunter exploded. "That blaster was registered to me nineyears ago." He snapped open his wallet.
The inspector frowned over the registration form, biting indecisivelyat his lower lip.
"That was issued before my time," he alibied. "I'll have to check theregulations. It may take a while."
He left the booth. He was gone for a quarter of an hour. When hereturned, both metal doors snapped open. "Your permit is valid,Captain Hunter," the inspector admitted. "Unrestricted registrationslike yours have not been issued for the past five years. That's whythe probe was not adjusted to the special conditions which apply inyour case. Your permit is revocable if you are committed formaladjustment."
Hunter grinned. "I wouldn't count on that. My adjustment index iszero-zero."
"A paragon, Captain." The voice was dry and biting. "But you may findconditions on the Earth a little trying. You haven't had a chance toget really well-acquainted with your own world since you were a kid ofsixteen."
Hunter's customs clearance had taken more than an hour. Before he leftthe municipal building, he made a quick tour of the lobby, searchingagain for Ann Saymer. Satisfied that she had not come, he put in acall from a public tele-booth to Ann's apartment residence. After amoment, Mrs. Ames' face came into sharp focus on the screen, the lightcoalescing about her hair.
A warm, motherly widow of nearly eighty, Mrs. Ames had been theresidence's owner for a decade, and had taken a great deal ofvicarious pleasure in Ann's romance with the captain. "It's sodifferent," she said once to Hunter, "your faith in each other, theway you work together for a goal you both want. If the rest of uscould only learn to have some honest affection for each other. But,there, I'm an old woman, living too much in the past."
As soon as Hunter saw her face on the screen, he knew that somethingwas wrong. She was tense and nervous, tied in the emotional knots ofan anxiety neurosis. And Mrs. Ames was not the woman to fall easyvictim to mental illness. If Hunter had been guessing the odds, hewould have put her adjustment index on a par with his own.
"I haven't seen Ann for a month," she told him.
"Where is she? My last micropic from her said something about acommission-job--"
"She's all right, Max. Did you join the U.F.W.?"
"I'll be damned if I will."
Why had she asked him that? Her question seemed totally unrelated toher reassurance as to Ann--another clear symptom of her emotionalunbalance.
"About Ann, Mrs. Ames," he persisted. "Do you know what clinic gaveher the commission?"
Mrs. Ames stared at him in surprise. "Ann didn't tell you in hermicropic?"
"We use a personal code," he explained. "That makes a certain type ofcommunication extremely difficult."
"I didn't see her, Max. After she took the commission some men camefor her things. They brought me a note from Ann, but it didn't tell mewhere she was. It just authorized the men to move out her belongings."
"Is the work outside of Los Angeles? Do you know that much?"
"At first I guessed--" She broke off, biting her lip, and her facetwisted in an agony of intense feeling. "No, Max, an old w
oman'sguesses won't help. I can't tell you any more about it."
"I'll come out and see you this afternoon, Mrs. Ames," he promised,"after I check in at the Roost. I want to look at that note you hadfrom Ann."
III
Captain Hunter left the municipal building and stood on the transitplatform. It was blazing hot in the noon sun, and he consideredchartering an autojet to the city, as he always had before. But thougha jet was faster than the monorail it was also more expensive.