tered sign above the
door. Maya's landlady, moon-faced Mrs. Chan, had pointed out Oxvane
Childress to her as he left the building one day: a big man,
comfortably stomached, with a heavy brown beard which, even at that
distance, she could see was shot with gray.

As innocent as you please. Childress came out and went in, the students
went in and came out. Still, it was the address she had been given.

Maya had to gain entrance to the building. She could learn nothing
watching it from outside. She was established here as a tourist from
Earth; besides, the position and activities of women were prescribed
rigidly by Martian colonial convention, and women did not study to
become barbers on Mars.

She would have to have help. She, thought at once of Nuwell, and as
immediately rejected him.

"Maya, I don't see why you insist on working alone," he had complained.
"I can set the whole machinery of government in motion to help you,
whenever you need it."

"Primarily because you're well known and your activities are observed,"
she had answered. "Your whole government machinery hasn't been effective
in tracking down the rebel headquarters yet, and it's reasonable to
assume that the rebels have a fairly effective intelligence network. My
job is to find that headquarters, and if I were seen very often with you
or tried to utilize your government machinery, they'd have me pinpointed
pretty soon."

She left the window, filled a tiny basin with precious water, shrugged
out of her negligee and sponged her small, perfect body. She donned
form-fitting tunic, briefs and short skirt, pulled on knee-length socks
and laced up Martian walking shoes. She spent some time preparing her
hair and face.

Then she left the room and the house and walked uptown. The walk was
about a kilometer, along sidewalks bordered by cubical, functional
houses and trim lawns of terrestrial grass and small trees. Above the
city, its dome was opalescent in the morning sun.

The small houses gave way to larger business buildings, also cubical,
and the lawns dwindled and vanished. Farther down, the buildings were
even larger and the streets were wider and busier; but she was not
going into the heart of Mars City.

She turned into an office building, and studied the directory in the
lobby. The offices were those of doctors and lawyers. On the directory
she found "Charlworth Scion, Attorney-at-Law, Room 207."

There was no elevator. Maya walked up the stairs