"But how--?" She was bewildered. "What are you doing here? You're a
3-Dayman. You couldn't be here!"
Hendley laughed without humor. "No, I'm not a Freeman. I'm a visitor.
Therapy. It was supposed to be good for my morale. I'm learning all
about freedom." He stared at her deliberately. "You're one of the
special pleasures I didn't know about."
She turned away, trying to cover herself with her hands and arms.
The gesture was pathetic and appealing. His instinctive compassion
angered him. "Why are you so modest now?" he demanded. "You didn't mind
parading on that stage!"
"That was different. That's--part of my work."
"Work!"
She whirled. "Yes! What did you think it was? Fun? Maybe it's fun for
you--for the people out there watching. I don't know about them. I
don't even see them! It's just an assignment for me. It's what I have
to do."
"You know about the men who come to these rooms--you see them!"
"Yes," she said, her voice dull and flat. "I know about them. Not just
men. Some of the winners are women. And some of them are worse than the
men."
He stepped forward quickly. Seizing her by a bare shoulder, he swung
her around. His hand withdrew as if burned by the warm flesh. "Why do
you do it?" he cried, "In the name of the Organization, why?"
Her reply was caustic. "In the name of the Organization. Why else would
I do it?"
"What does that mean?"
"Did you have any choice about being an architect? No, of course
not!" Her voice gained strength as she saw the shot strike home. "You
were chosen. That's what you were suited for. It was all decided for
you, wasn't it? The tests when you were in school, isolation of your
aptitudes, more tests, special training--_they_ made you an architect.
Did you have anything at all to say about it? Did you ever wish you
were something else?"
"That's different!"
"What's different about it? It's all right for them to make you an
architect, but it's not all right for them to make me what I am. Is
that it? You have your aptitudes. I have these!" She threw her arms
back. The movement thrust her high, full breasts forward. She went on
defiantly. "I have long legs and I'm athletic and I can dance. And I
have a pretty face. I was picked out when I was ten years old. Every
day since then I've done the right exercises and eaten the right foods
and had the right skin creams massaged into me. Every day! Some of the
girls are lucky. They stop growing too soon, or they get dumpy or their
skin ages too quickly, or they just don't turn out to be as pretty as
they seemed in the beginning. They're transferred out of our section.
I wasn't." Her eyes met Hendley's directly. "I'm still a 5-Daygirl. Do
you know what we do on four of those days? We work at making ourselves
beautiful. That's all. That's what we're for. The fifth day we go
out--on assignment."
Her eyes and her voice were challenging, but her words demanded
understanding, even pity. Hendley wanted to give them to her, but his
own pain pushed and shoved him into a bitter accusation. "What were you
doing that day we were together in the sun--practicing? I thought that
meant as much to you as it did to me! I thought we'd found something
together. I should have known when I found you'd lied to me--when you
ran away--that it was all a pretense with you. But I couldn't have
guessed that it was just--exercise!"
"Oh, Hendley, Hendley!" Her eyes would no longer focus on his.
Their lashes were dark, heavy, and wet. "How could I expect you to
understand? Don't you know that day was different? To have someone
want me--me, not just a body that other men have gaped at, not just a
beautiful ornament, not a prize in a lottery! I never expected to have
that. It was wonderful. I'll never forget it--no matter what you think
or feel now. But I knew it couldn't go on. We're watched all the time.
It was just luck that I was able to sneak away and meet you that one
day in the museum. Even then I was late getting back, and I had to make
up a story. I got only two days' debit. But we would have been caught
if we'd done it again. You'd have been punished, and I was afraid you'd
wish you'd never seen me. I didn't want that. I wanted you to remember
the way it was that afternoon--"
Her voice broke. She pushed swiftly past Hendley, stumbling blindly
toward the bed. Her knees struck the edge of the plastifoam layer
and she fell forward face down onto the bed. Her body shook, and her
fingers dug into the covering. Her sobs were muffled.
Slowly Hendley's anger drained out of him. He felt dry, exhausted,
like eyes empty of their tears. Ann's slim figure seemed smaller lying
crumpled on the bed. Her nakedness made her seem merely vulnerable,
exposed to abuse and pain and shame. He could not shake out of his
mind the image of her on the stage--and especially the projection of
the audience's reaction on the huge thought-screen--but she was not to
blame. He should have known that, just as he should have known that the
honesty of her surrender on the warm sand of the surface outside the
museum could not have been simulated.
The rest didn't matter, he thought. She hadn't chosen a way of life for
herself. Only that afternoon had she chosen freely.
Crossing the room, he stood over the bed looking down at her. The
Organization! he thought savagely. The efficient world of machines,
coldly manipulating lives, juggling people as if they were no more than
the numbers in which the machines dealt.
He looked down at ABC-331. How much more than a set of numbers she was!
He sat beside her. His hand touched a smooth white shoulder. This time
he did not withdraw the touch, turning it into a caress. "I'm sorry,"
he said gently. "Can you forget what I said just now? It was the
surprise--the shock of seeing you on that stage. All that's over. Can
we go back?"
For a while she didn't move, but she ceased to cry. Her body no longer
trembled.
"You're beautiful," he said. "I know you don't like to hear that, but
you are. I've never seen anyone like you. You're not just beautiful the
way a statue is beautiful. It's a different quality--something soft and
warm inside you that shows through, that gives the other things"--he
smiled--"a special beauty. It makes them _mean_ something." With a
gentle pressure of his hand he rolled her onto her back. Her eyes, dark
with lingering tears, stared up at him, huge in her pale face. In the
dim light he could not see their color, but he remembered fans of brown
laced with green flecks. "You're lovely in the way a computer measures
loveliness, too. I can see why you were singled out to do--what you
have to do. But being beautiful isn't just having a certain shape
or size or texture...." His fingers brushed the swell of her breast
and moved down to trace the deep cut of her waist. Roughly, because
suddenly he wanted her, he said, "Your beauty is alive. It's real.
That's like the difference between a piece of plastic with wires woven
through it, and another that looks similar but has a live current that
makes it into a glowing light."
"Oh, Hendley," she whispered. Her hands reached up to pull him down
beside her. "I never wanted to be beautiful before! If only I didn't
have to--"
"Shhh!" He laid a finger across her lips. "Don't say it. We'll find a
way out for you--for us. We're going to be together."
"But you're here--you're free!"
"No. Only for tonight." Quickly he sketched the events that had brought
him to the camp after his day of rebellion. At the end he added, "So
you see, you're partly responsible for my being here. We have to stick
together."
"It's too dangerous!"
"Maybe it's dangerous. Nothing could be _too_ dangerous."
Impulsively she hugged him. "Careful," he warned her with a nervous
laugh, "Women have been attacked for less."
"Really?" She stretched herself luxuriously. "You're frightening me...."
With an effort he moved a few inches away from her. He spoke firmly.
"We have too much to talk about first. Tomorrow I'll be going back. We
have to decide what we're going to do."
"What can we do?" Her tone was wistful, but without real hope.
"Once you asked me what I thought about the Merger. I guess it
meant something to you. It doesn't to me. Whether there's one big
Organization, or two or twelve, doesn't make any difference. Nothing
changes."
Hendley sensed the conviction behind her words, but he wouldn't accept
their hopelessness. Stubbornly he insisted, "We have to do something.
Where can we meet? At your room? Mine?"
"No."
"The Historical Museum then. That will do for now. Maybe we can find a
better place later. If you're not sure when you can get away, I'll go
there every day I can--we'll have to be more careful now, I'll have to
report for work when scheduled--and I'll wait for you. Come when you
can. Four o'clock? Is that a good time?"
"It's no use, Hendley."
"Four o'clock?"
She could not fight him. "All right," she said. "But I don't know what
day--"
"Whenever you can," he said. "We'll work it out. And meanwhile I'll do
some thinking. There has to be a way to have your status changed or--or
something."
She did not answer, but one of her hands found his and squeezed. "It
doesn't really matter," she said softly. "Not now."
"Freedom isn't everything," he said, half to himself. "I've found that
out. When I had the chance to come here to the Freeman Camp, I thought
I'd find an answer that made the whole Organization worth while. Now
I'm not so sure."
ABC-331 smiled. It was a woman's smile at the man she loves--tender,
amused, indulgent. "Did you really believe that freedom was all?"
"It's what everyone works for, what everyone wants."
"Not everyone. Do you think the really top men want to come here? This
is for the rest of the world--for the workers, people like you and me.
This is to keep everyone happy, to make them think they have something
to work for." Ann spoke simply, directly, her vision unclouded, her
tone matter-of-fact. "The top men, the ones you never see or hear
about, don't come to Freeman Camps. They have all the freedom they want
outside. This isn't what they dream about."
"What _do_ they want?"