Three were faced with
an ultimate choice of slavery, or madness, for themselves and their
families.

Calhoun swerved behind a government building and out of the parking
area beyond. Obviously, he couldn't leave Government Center by the way
he'd entered it. If Lett hadn't ordered him stopped, he'd be ordering
it now. And Murgatroyd was an absolute identification.

Again he turned a corner, thrusting Murgatroyd down out of sight. He
turned again, and again.... Then he began concentratedly to remember
where the sunset-line had been upon the planet when he was waiting to
be landed by the grid. He could guess at an hour and a half, perhaps
two, since he touched ground. On the combined data, he made a guess at
the local time. It would be mid-afternoon. So shadows would lie to the
northeast of the objects casting them. Then--

He did not remain on any straight roadway for more than seconds. But
now when he had a choice of turnings, he had a reason for each choice.
He twisted and dodged about--once he almost ran into children playing
a ritual game--but the sum total of his movements was steadily
southward. Paras were turned out of the south gate. That gate, alone,
would be the one where someone could go out with a chance of being
unchallenged.

* * * * *

He found the gate. The usual tall buildings bordered it to left and
right. The actual exit was bare concrete walls slanting together to an
exit to the outer world; no more than a house-door wide. Well back
from the gate, there were four high-side trucks with armed police in
the truck-bodies. They were there to make sure that paras turned out,
or who went out of their own accord when they knew their state, would
not come back.

He stopped the ground car and tucked Murgatroyd under his coat. He
walked grimly toward the narrow exit. It was the most desperate of
gambles, but it was the only one he could make. He could be killed, of
course, if anybody suspected him of attempting exit at any gate.

He got out, unchallenged. The concrete walls rose higher and higher as
he walked away from the trucks and the police who would surely have
blasted him had they guessed. The way he could walk became narrowed.
It became a roofed-over passageway, with a turn in it so it could not
be looked through end to end. Then--he reached open air once more.

Nothing could be less dramatic than his actual escape. He simply
walked out. Nothing could be less remarka