nts of
the Paratime Building loomed above the city in front of them, and
began slipping under the aircab. She felt like a prisoner recaptured
at the moment when attempted escape was about to succeed.

"I knew it," she said. "I knew he'd find something. He's trying to
break things up between us, the way he did twenty years ago.'"

Vall crushed out his cigarette and said nothing. That hadn't been
true, and she knew it as well as he did. There had been many other
factors involved in the disintegration of their previous marriage,
most of them of her own contribution. But that had been twenty years
ago, she told herself. This time it would be different, if only--

"Really, Vall, he's never liked me," she went on. "He's jealous of me,
I think. You're to be his successor, when he retires, and he thinks
I'm not a good influence--"

"Oh, rubbish, Dalla! The Chief has always liked you," Vall replied.
"If he didn't, do you think he'd always be inviting us to that farm of
his, on Fifth Level Sicily? It's just that this job of ours has no
end; something's always turning up, outtime."

The music that the cab had been playing died away. "Paratime Building,
just below," it said, in a light feminine voice. "Which landing stage,
please?" Vall leaned forward and punched at the buttons in front of
him. Something in the cab's electronic brain gave a rapid series of
clicks as it shifted from the general Paratime Building beam to the
beam of the Paratime Police landing stage, then it said, "Thank you."
The building below seemed to rotate upward toward them as it settled
down. Then the antigrav-field snapped off, the cab door popped open,
and the cab said: "Good-by, now. Ride with me again, sometime."

They crossed the landing stage, entered the antigrav shaft, and
floated downward; at the end of a hallway, below, Vall opened the door
of Tortha Karf's office and ushered her through ahead of him.

Tortha Karf, inside the semicircle of his desk, was speaking into a
recording phone as they approached. He shut off the machine and waved,
a cigarette in his hand.

"Come on back and sit down," he invited. "Be with you in a moment."
Then he switched on the phone again and went on talking--something
about prompter evaluation and transmission of reports and less
reliance on robot equipment. "Sign that up, my personal order, and see
it's transmitted to everybody down to and including Sector Regional
Subchief level," he finished, then hung up the