"I would so much like to swim," she said- "I have not swum since Tilara." He started to say go right ahead, and then saw what the problem was. Limila's padded bra wasn't made to fool anyone, under the current styles of swimsuits. Not that many of the swimmers had been wearing suits.

"Excuse me a minute," he said, and went to the man- ager's office. He noted on the way that the poolside sign quoted a ten-o'clock closing time, and that no one could see into the pool area if the gates were closed. He es- timated that by ten it would be getting chilly; they were still in plateau country.

For money in hand the manager was quite willing to close the pool two hours early and turn the gate key over to Barton for the rest of the evening. The expression on Limila's face when he told her (he didn't mention the cost) made it well worth wnile.

Waiting, Barton put his mental note about Eeshta into written form and mailed it off to Tarleton. Then he and Limila swam nude together until the chill chased them indoors, though they'd tried a little mutual warmth in the water. It was fun, but more under the heading of plea- surable gymnastics than true passion.

Three weeks together. Forests and mountains and the ocean; yes. Motels and hotels and ethnic restaurants and miniature $5 hamburgers at drive-ins. New Mexico, Arizona, California, a brief journey into Mexico. All the way up the California coast and further to Oregon and Washington. A quick visit to Canada. East into thf Rockies, and then south again, back toward the project Love in the morning, in the afternoon before dinner, and again late at night; nearly every day was like that. Bar- ton knew he was forty but he felt more like twenty. The;

spent their three weeks' expense money in the first twc and forgot to keep receipts; what the hell. Barton's

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checkbook had his "estate" and accumulated salary to draw on. And once he got off Earth again, he had no idea whether he could or would ever come back. Mean- while he was having the best three weeks he could re- member, eves.

Limila wasn't complaining, either. She liked what she saw of Earth, its people and its scenery. Some things must have been greatly different from Tilaran ways; they seemed to puzzle her mightily. Barton tried to explain;

she appeared satisfied, usually, with his attempts. Oc- casionally he asked her about equivalent TUaran cus- toms, but she shook her head. "You must see; I could not tell you so that you would know." OK; he'd settle for that.

Barton was surprised that no one seemed to notice that Umila's hands were each short a finger by Earth standards. He watched her a lot, the second and third day, and finally saw what she was doing. She had a way of using the fewest fingers possible when eating, say;

she'd tuck one or two under, out of sight. Barton didn't ask whether the action was deliberate or unconscious; it worked, didn't it? Barton was all for anything that worked; he always had been. He decided that Parr's cartilage graft, to eliminate the jog at the wrist, also helped conceal the difference.

The first week their free time had stretched endlessly ahead; the second week he put the deadline out of his mind; during the third it rushed upon him like a jugger- naut. He ignored it as much as he could. But the night they stopped at a little town in southern Colorado, he was right on schedule. They would reach the project site on the afternoon of Thursday, the 10th, as Tarleton had requested. Part of Barton's mind was damned good

at keeping schedules, he decided, even when he didn't want to.

After dinner Barton took the car down the street, to replenish its fuel cells. When he got back, Limila had maps spread across her bed. She looked up at him. "I have been looking to see all the places we have been.

May I keep these maps, please?"

"Sure; of course. Whatever you want. Why?"

"You have a lovely world. Barton. I would like these to remember it."

"Oh belli" he said. "I should have been taking color pies; we could have, easily enough. I didn't think of it.

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Hey, look: I can order up a bunch of tourist slides for you."

"For roe, no need. Barton. TUarans have full visual recall; we use photographs only to transmit information to one who has not seen personally. Some pictures to show other Tilarans would be nice, yes. I use the maps merely to focus memory on a given sight," Barton made a note to get the pies, anyway.

"Barton?"

"Yes?"

"I have liked Earth; it has been good to me. I wonder if you will like Tilara. It is beautiful, too, but differently.

And our ways are very different, you know." Barton didn't know much of anything, be felt, but he'd long since done a lot of guessing.

It was their last night of freedom, of total privacy.

Nostalgia for what they had had together made it sweet.

Just before sleep they held each other gently. Limila'

cried and Barton wanted to, and both knew why. For

now it was over.

It was a long drive next day but Barton pushed the car, driving faster than he usually did. They arrived at the project early m the afternoon. The mailbox had its quota of messages: Dr. Fox wanted to see Barton; Dr.

Parr wanted to see Limila for final routine checkups;

Tarleton wanted to see both of them. Somebody was obviously going to have to take'seconds.-

There was also a box from the wig shop. Limila set it

aside, for the time being.

They were unpacking. "Fox can wait," said Barton.

"In fact I'd like to dodge her completely, if I could get away with it Tell you what; let's run over to see Parr.

I'll wait; it shouldn't take long. Then we can go and chin

with Tarleton."

"No," Limila said, "you drop me at Dr. Parr's and go meet with Tarleton." Barton started to ask a question, but didn't. A special goodbye for lucky Dr. Parr. Well dammit, the man had earned anything she wanted to give him. And Limila was not of Earth, If that's what she wanted, so be it.

,"OK," he said, "I understand."

"Barton," she said, and kissed him. They didn't gel away just then, after alL

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So he caught Tarletoo at the midaftemoon coffee break. "Nice trip?"

"Great, Tarleton. Thanks for the vacation; I needed it. Now how do we stand?"

"I hope you're not superstitious. Barton, We've had to allow one day of slippage; Up-Day is Sunday the 13th.

It was two days for a while but we caught up one of them."

"Will all the ships come here first? I see only six out there now."

"Four more come here; there'll be four groups of ten each. I couldn't tell you before-it was Top Clam-but the groups are leaving from different bases: here, Seattle, Houston and someplace in Russia they won't tell us for sure."

"Russia? You're kidding me, Tarleton." But Tarleton wasn't Early in the game the Agency had realized that forty ships were more than the U-S.-Canadian complex could produce within any reasonable time limit. So under top secrecy,. Tarleton's superiors had gotten permission to deal quietly, behind the scenes, first with their coun- try's out-of-hemisphere allies, then with the "neutrals"

and finally with their nominal antagonists. The result, Barton was surprised to learn, was that the First Demu Expedition would consist of seventeen U.S. ships, seven from the USSR, three each from Britain and Western Germany, and two each from Japan, France, Australia, China and the Greater Central African Republic. Sev- eral other countries had pledged at least one ship to the second fleet, given the data and the additional time.

"How in hell did everybody manage that, Tarleton?"

"How in hell did you manage to get your ship from the Demu?"