addressed to _Supreme Headquarters, United Nations
Police, 45th Street at Second Avenue_, were delivered without comment,
even though the IPO still firmly held that they were technically
misaddressed. And, privately, even the IPO officials admitted that the
numbers were easier to say and remember than the polyglot street names
that had been tagged on by the General Assembly.

So when David Houston signalled a taxi at Grand Central Station and
said, "Forty-fifth and Second," the driver simply set his automatic
controls, leaned back in his seat, and said, "Goin' to see the cops,
huh?"

When no answer was forthcoming, the driver turned around and took a good
look at his passenger. "Maybe you're a UN cop yourself, huh?"

Houston shook his head. "Nope. Some kids have been scribbling dirty
words on my sidewalk, and I'm going to report it to the authorities."

The driver turned back around and looked ahead again. "Jeez! That's
serious. Hadn't you better take it up with the Secretary General? I
wouldn't be satisfied with no underlings in a case like that."

"I'm thinking of taking it up with the Atomic Energy Control Board,"
Houston told him. "I think those kids are using radioactive chalk."

"That's one way for 'em to get blue jeans," said the driver cryptically.

There was silence for a moment as the taxi braked smoothly to a halt,
guided and controlled by the automatic machinery in the hood.

Then, suddenly, the driver said: "Ship up!" He pointed east, along 45th
Street, toward Long Island. Far in the distance was a rapidly rising
vapor trail, pointing vertically toward the sky, the unmistakable sign
of a spaceship takeoff. They didn't leave often, and it was still an
unusual sight.

Houston said nothing as he climbed out and paid the driver, tossing in
an extra tip.

"Thanks, buddy," said the driver. "Watch out for them kids."

Houston didn't answer. He was still watching the vapor trail as the cab
pulled away.

* * * * *

_There goes Harris_, he was thinking. _An innocent man, guilty of
nothing more than being born different. And because of that, he's
labelled as an inhuman monster, not even worthy of being executed.
Instead, he's taken into space, filled full of hibernene, and chained to
a floating piece of rock for the rest of his life._

Such was humanity's "humane" way of taking care of the bogey of
Controllers. Capital punishment had been outlawed all over Earth; it had