hand upon his thigh felt the thin mesh that cloaked his body beneath
his clothing like a sheer stocking. His fingers went again to the tiny
switch. Again he hesitated.

Herbert Hyrel knew no more about the telporter suit he wore than he did
about the radio in the corner, the TV set against the wall, or the
personalized telovis his wife was wearing. You pressed one of the
buttons on the radio; music came out. You pressed a button and clicked a
dial on the TV; music and pictures came out. You pressed a button and
made an adjustment on the telovis; three-dimensional, emotion-colored
pictures leaped into the room. You pressed a tiny switch on the
telporter suit; you were whisked away to a receiving set you had
previously set up in secret.

He knew that the music and the images of the performers on the TV and
telovis were brought to his room by some form of electrical impulse
or wave while the actual musicians and performers remained in the
studio. He knew that when he pressed the switch on his thigh something
within him--his ectoplasm, higher self, the thing spirits use for
materialization, whatever its real name--streamed out of him along an
invisible channel, leaving his body behind in the chair in a conscious
but dream-like state. His other self materialized in a small cabin in a
hidden nook between a highway and a river where he had installed the
receiving set a month ago.

He thought once more of the girl who might be waiting for him, smiled,
and pressed the switch.

* * * * *

The dank air of the cabin was chill to Herbert Hyrel's naked flesh. He
fumbled through the darkness for the clothing he kept there, found his
shorts and trousers, got hurriedly into them, then flicked on a pocket
lighter and ignited a stub of candle upon the table. By the wavering
light, he finished dressing in the black satin clothing, the white
shirt, the flowing necktie and tam. He invoiced the contents of his
billfold. Not much. And his monthly pittance was still two weeks
away....

He had skimped for six months to salvage enough money from his allowance
to make a down payment on the telporter suit. Since then, his
expenses--monthly payments for the suit, cabin rent, costly liquor--had
forced him to place his nights of escape on strict ration. He could not
go on this way, he realized. Not now. Not since he had met the girl. He
had to have more money. Perhaps he could not afford the luxury of
leaving the