d everywhere underneath. Did you remind
Smitty to put a new bulb in the elevator?"

"The Smiths moved out this morning," Daisy said tonelessly. "They went
underneath."

"Like cockroaches," Gusterson said. "Cockroaches leavin' a sinkin'
apartment building. Next the ghosts'll be retreatin' to the shelters."

"Anyhow, from now on we're our own janitors," Daisy said.

He nodded. "Just leaves three families besides us loyal to this glass
death trap. Not countin' ghosts." He sighed. Then, "You like to move
below, Daisy?" he asked softly, putting his arm lightly across her
shoulders. "Get a woozy eyeful of the bright lights and all for a
change? Be a rat for a while? Maybe we're getting too old to be bats.
I could scrounge me a company job and have a thinking closet all to
myself and two secretaries with stainless steel breasts. Life'd be
easier for you and a lot cleaner. And you'd sleep safer."

"That's true," she answered and paused. She ran her fingertip slowly
across the murky glass, its violet tint barely perceptible against a
cold dim light across the park. "But somehow," she said, snaking her
arm around his waist, "I don't think I'd sleep happier--or one bit
excited."

II

Three weeks later Fay, dropping in again, handed to Daisy the larger
of the two rather small packages he was carrying.

"It's a so-called beauty mask," he told her, "complete with wig,
eyelashes, and wettable velvet lips. It even breathes--pinholed
elastiskin with a static adherence-charge. But Micro Systems had
nothing to do with it, thank God. Beauty Trix put it on the market ten
days ago and it's already started a teen-age craze. Some boys are
wearing them too, and the police are yipping at Trix for encouraging
transvestism with psychic repercussions."

"Didn't I hear somewhere that Trix is a secret subsidiary of Micro?"
Gusterson demanded, rearing up from his ancient electric typewriter.
"No, you're not stopping me writing, Fay--it's the gut of evening. If
I do any more I won't have any juice to start with tomorrow. I got
another of my insanity thrillers moving. A real id-teaser. In this one
not only all the characters are crazy but the robot psychiatrist too."

"The vending machines are jumping with insanity novels," Fay
commented. "Odd they're so popular."

Gusterson chortled. "The only way you outer-directed moles will accept
individuality any more even in a fictional character, without your
superegos getting seasick, is f