htly. "Never know when I might have
to run out to some other world. Wouldn't want one of my other wives to
catch me with stubble on my face."

It was a stale joke, a childish one, but it served to introduce the
topic foremost in his mind.

"This Eden problem. I can't plan on it, but I hope it's my solo to
qualify me for my big E. I'm due, you know."

Linda chose to avoid coming directly to grips with it.

"Yehudi is already at the door," she said, and made a face of
exasperation. "Someday I'm going to turn off the gadget that signals the
orderly room the minute you get out of bed, so I can have you all to
myself."

"It's better if you get used to him," Cal cautioned. "Turn off the
signal and that turns on an alarm. Instead of one Yehudi, you'd have
twenty rushing in to see what was wrong."

"Well, it seems to me a grown man ought to be able to take his morning
shower without an observer standing by to see that he doesn't drown
himself or swallow the soap," she commented with a touch of acid.

"Get used to it, woman," he commanded. "There's only one observer now.
When--if I get my Senior rating, there'll be three."

She didn't say anything. Instead she stepped over to him, pressed her
nude body against his, and tenderly nuzzled his arm.

"Maybe if we go back to bed, he'll go away," she said, and glittered her
eyes at him wickedly.

"He won't, but it's a good idea," Cal grinned at her.

"You could tell him to go away," she whispered with a little pout.

She was fighting. She was fighting with the only weapon she had to hold
him, to keep him from going away, to face an unknown. He knew it, and
the bitterness in her eyes, back of her teasing, showed she knew he knew
it.

He took her tenderly in his arms, held her close to him, stroked her
hair, kissed her mouth. She pulled her face away, buried it in his
chest. He felt her sobbing.

He picked her up, lightly, carried her back into the bedroom, laid her
gently on the bed, and, oblivious to the attendant who stood
expressionless inside the door, knelt down beside the bed and held her
head in his arms.

"Don't fight it," he said softly. "It isn't the first time a man has had
to go."

"It's the first time it ever happened to me," she sobbed.

"You knew when you married me.... You agreed...."

"It was easy to agree, then. There was the glamor of being known as the
wife of an E. Now that doesn't matter. There's just you, and the thought
of losing you, neve