and down a corridor,
finding a door that had nothing on it but the number. She turned the
knob and went in.

The small outer office was uninhabited. It was carpeted and desked, with
two straight chairs against a wall, for clients. Through a door, she
could see part of the inner office, cluttered and stacked with papers
and books.

She stood there, hesitating. The outer door clicked shut behind her. At
the sound, a gray-haired, preoccupied man with spectacles and stooped
shoulders peered from the inner office.

"Oh!" he said. "I'm sorry, my secretary went to lunch a bit early today.
Can I help you, Miss?"

"I'm looking for Mr. Scion," she said.

"I'm Charlworth Scion."

"Terra outshines the Sun," said Maya.

Scion's eyes were suddenly wary behind the spectacles.

"Well, well," he murmured. "Come in, please."

She went into the cluttered inner office, and Scion closed and locked
the door.

"And you are ...?" said Scion behind his desk, his pale hands fumbling
aimlessly with papers.

"Maya Cara Nome," she said.

Scion found a paper and scanned it. He apparently found her name there.

"I'm surprised to see you here," he admitted. "Our information was that
you would be working entirely alone."

"I am," said Maya. "Or I was. I was told not to contact you unless I had
to, Mr. Scion, but it seems I'm going to need some help."

Scion inclined his head, but said nothing.

"As you may or may not know, my specific assignment is to locate the
nerve center of rebellious activity," said Maya. "It seems that the
rebels have an intelligence network about as effective as the
government's, and it was felt that a woman tourist from Earth might be
successful where any unusual probing by local agents might arouse
suspicion."

"That's true," conceded Scion. "I doubt that they're really sure of the
identity of more than a few of our agents, but sometimes I think they
have a card file on every person on Mars. We have to be very careful
that movements of our agents are consistent with their pretended
occupations."

"I have a reliable tip that their nerve center is the Childress Barber
College here," she said. "I can't find out anything, though, unless I
get into the building over a period of time. As a woman, I can't very
well apply to study barbering."

"No," said Scion. "I see your problem."

He turned to a filing cabinet, unlocked it and searched through it,
whistling tunelessly. He found a folder, pulled it out an