to clean up such small elements of enemies?"

Kossuth said stuffily, "My dear major, please recall that we are
limited to the use of weapons pre-1900 in accord with the Universal
Disarmament Pact. To be blunt, it is quite evident that foreign
elements smuggle weapons into Tibet and other points where rebellion
flares, so that on some occasions our Pink Army is confronted with
enemies better armed than themselves. These bandits, of course, are
not under the jurisdiction of the International Commission and while
we are limited, they are not."

"Besides," one of the lieutenants said, "They don't want to clean them
up. If they did, the Sov equivalent of the fracas buff wouldn't be
able to spend his time at the Telly watching the progress of the
Glorious Pink Army against the reactionary foe."

Joe, under his breath, parroted the words of the Sov officer. "That,
sir, is simply not true."

Max, who had largely been staring bug-eyed out the window at the
passing scene, said, "Hey, the car's stopping. Is this it?"

XVI

Although in actuality working on a private mission for Philip Holland,
Frank Hodgson and the others high in government responsibility who
were planning fundamental changes in the West-world, Joseph Mauser was
ostensibly a military attache connected with the West-world Embassy to
Budapest. As such, he spent several days meeting embassy personnel,
his immediate superiors and his immediate inferiors in rank. He was,
as a newcomer from home, wined, dined, evaluated, found an apartment,
assigned a hovercar, and in general assimilated into the community.

Not ordinarily prone to the social life, Joe was able to find interest
in this due to its newness. The citizen of the West-world, when exiled
by duty to a foreign land, evidently did his utmost to take his native
soil with him. Even house furnishings had been brought from North
America. Sov food and drink were superlative, particularly for those
of Party rank, but for all practical purposes all such supplies were
flown in from the West. Hungarian potables, not to mention the
products of a dozen other Sov political divisions including Russia,
were of the best, but the denizens of the West-world Embassy drank
bourbon and Scotch, or at most the products of the vines of
California. The styles of Budapest rivaled those of Paris and Rome,
New York and Hollywood, but a feminine employee of the embassy
wouldn't have been caught dead in local fashions. It was a hom