f Anderson were behind the attempt of the morning--and if
he were behind it, why? There could, he decided, be all sorts of
Machiavellian motives hidden beneath that smiling face. Then the match
got under way once more, and Lindsay concentrated on the play.

Once again O'Ryan seemed to be in command--just as the computer had
foretold. Games went to five-two in his favor. Then, as the players
changed courts once more, the tall Irishman paused to towel off--and
paid special attention to rubbing his eyes.

At that his string ran out. Four straight times his swiftest drives hit
the top of the net and bounced back into his own court. He blew his
service thanks to a pair of double-faults and three minutes later
Yamato-Rau had taken the set while the crowd sat in stunned silence.

The fourth set was pitiful. O'Ryan played like a blind man and the
Indonesian ran it out with the loss of exactly one point per game. The
red line on the computer-board yawed wildly toward the bottom instead of
following the white line as it should have.

"Keep your credits," Lindsay told Senator Anderson. "You were right. As
it turned out I did know something after all."

"It's impossible!" cried the senator. "But it's cheap at the
price--here!" He withdrew his wallet and began pulling out crisp
hundred-credit notes.

"Look out!" cried Lindsay. Around them the stands had erupted into
violence. While the players were shaking hands at the net, angry--and,
Lindsay suspected, frightened--bettors and spectators leaped the low
barriers and swarmed out onto the dark court. They hemmed the players
in, driving them toward the wall directly under the UW box in which
Lindsay and Anderson were sitting.

Someone threw something and Yamato-Rau stumbled and fell to his hands
and knees. Swinging his racquet like one of his ancestors' shillalehs,
O'Ryan charged to his rescue, pulled him to his feet, covered his
retreat to the wall. There Lindsay was able to pull first the
Indonesian, then the Irishman, up into the box.

"Damned fool!" said Anderson. "Getting us into a riot." But a moment
later Lindsay saw the senator swinging hard at an angry customer with a
fist in which his wallet was still clenched. The man made a grab for it
as someone else hit Anderson over the head with a plastic bottle. He
dropped across a contour-chair, letting his wallet fall from unconscious
fingers.

UW police formed a protective wall around them and Pat O'Ryan,
recognizing Lind