someone touched cudyk's arm as he left chong yin's. he turned and saw that it was ferguson.

"i've got something to say to you, cudyk. i saw you were busy talking to father exarkos in there, so i didn't bother you. besides, it's private. come on down to my place."

the man was doing him an honor, cudyk realized, in approaching him personally instead of sending an underling. and now, as ferguson stood waiting for him to reply, cudyk saw that there was something curiously like appeal in his eyes.

"all right, if you wish," he said. "but i will have to go back to the shop within an hour—nick has not had his lunch."

"i won't keep you that long," ferguson said.

they turned at the corner and walked down washington, past town hall to the little bear. beyond this point, everything was ferguson's: the dance hall, the casino, the bawdy house, the two cafes and three bars, and the two huge warehouses at the end of the avenue. but it was the casino that ferguson meant when he said "my place".

a white-aproned boy got up hurriedly and opened the heavy doors when they approached. ferguson strode past without looking at him, and cudyk followed across the long, empty room. dust covers shrouded the roulette table, the chuck-a-luck layout, faro, chemin-de-fer, dice and poker tables. the bar was deserted, bottles and glasses neatly stacked.

ferguson led the way up a short flight of stairs to the overhanging balcony at the end of the room. he opened the door with a key—a rarity in the quarter, since cylinder locks were available only by scavenging on earth, and had to be imported, whereas a mechanism used by the niori as a mathematical toy could be readily adapted into an efficient combination lock.

the low-ceilinged room was furnished with a blond-wood desk and swivel chair, a long, pale green couch and two chairs upholstered in the same fabric: all earth imports, scavenged from stocks manufactured before the collapse. the carpet was a deeper green. there were three framed pictures on the walls: a blue-period picasso, a muted oyster-white and grey utrillo and a small roualt clown.

ferguson was watching him. "just like my place in chicago," he said. "you never saw it before, did you?"

"no," cudyk said. "i have never been in the casino until now."

"sit down," said ferguson, pointing to one of the upholstered chairs. he pulled out the swivel chair and leaned back in it. he nodded toward the glass which formed the entire front wall of the room. "sittin' up here, i can see everything that goes on downstairs. i got a phone—" he laid his hand on it—"that communicates with the cashier's booth in every room. i can handle the whole place from here, and i don't have to be bothered by the goofs if i don't want to. also, that glass is bullet proof. it's niori stuff, ten times better than anything we had back home. they tell me you couldn't get through it with a bazooka."

cudyk said nothing.

"what i wanted to talk to you about—" said ferguson, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "you understand, cudyk, this is confidential. strictly between us."

"i don't want any confidence that will be difficult to keep," said cudyk.

"what do you mean?"

"if it is something that touches the safety of the quarter—"

ferguson waved his hand impatiently. "no, it's nothing like that. i just don't want it to get around too early. all right, use your own judgment. here it is.

"rack's coming back in about three weeks with his transport, to pick up anybody that wants to go to new earth. i'm not going, and neither are any of my boys. on the other hand, i'm not going to stay here either. it isn't healthy any more.

"i don't know what rack's got, but i've got a pretty good idea he's got enough to raise a lot of hell. now you can figure the angles for yourself: maybe he won't bomb this planet because he thinks he can still make some use of the quarter—but that's a big maybe. even if he doesn't, it's a dead cinch there's going to be trouble. the niori know he comes here, even if they can't prove it, and when the war starts they're going to be sore."

"tell me something," said cudyk after a moment. "if you knew all this long ago—and you must have, since you have been so closely associated with rack—why did you help rack, and so force yourself to leave palumbar?"

ferguson grinned and shrugged. "i'm not complaining," he said. "rack never fooled me. i got mine, and he got his—it was a business arrangement. when you figure everything in, i can clear out now and i'm still ahead. see, you got to figure that nothing lasts forever. if i hadn't played along with rack, he would have taken his business somewhere else. maybe i could have stayed here a little longer, but then again, maybe i would have stayed too long. this way, i got my information in advance, and i got my profit from dealing with rack.

"as a matter of fact, he thinks i and all my outfit are going to be on that transport when it goes back to his base. he knows i wouldn't take a chance on staying here when the shooting starts. what he doesn't know is that i got someplace else to go, and a way to get there."

he sat back in his chair again. "i got a niori-built freighter hidden back in the hills. had it for eight years now. it'll carry five hundred people, and fuel and provisions for a year, on top of the cargo. and i got a planet picked out where nobody will bother me—not rack, and not the galactics."