"Miss Penelope will have to come with me."
Mark was on his feet. "If she goes, I go," he said dramatically.
Conley looked at him. "If you feel that way about it, there won't be any
trouble at all. You did go over, so I can take you in too."
"In where?" Penelope demanded.
"A certain number of persons is required to keep Central going, as I
said--actually to be the government. But most of the population today is
so apathetic they wouldn't be of any use at all, so years ago some of us
who were in Central got an idea. We discovered that whenever any citizen
rebels against the monotony of life today, he or she eventually winds up
trying to gather a lot of points, because that is the only outlet for
energy and ambition. That is the kind of person we need, so when anybody
gets over a hundred thousand, the machine warns us. We go after them."
Conley picked up his type N hat. "Well, see you in the morning. Punch in
your cards at window 1000. We'll do the rest. And by the way--" He was
at the door. "We start work at eight o'clock."