had a lot to learn.

The little man blurted, "Come on, Joe. Let's go out on the town!"

"_Joe?_" Joe Mauser raised himself to one elbow and stared at the other.
"Leaving aside the merits of your suggestion for the moment, do you
think you should address an officer by his first name?"

Max Mainz came fully into the bedroom, his grin still wider. "You
forgot! It's election day!"

"Oh." Joe Mauser relaxed into his pillow. "So it is. No duty for today,
eh?"

"No duty for anybody," Max crowed. "What'd you say we go into town and
have a few drinks in one of the Upper bars?"

Joe grunted, but began to arise. "What'll that accomplish? On election
day, most of the Uppers get done up in their oldest clothes and go
slumming down in the Lower quarters."

Max wasn't to be put off so easily. "Well, wherever we go, let's get
going. Zen! I'll bet this town is full of fracas buffs from as far as
Philly. And on election day, to boot. Wouldn't it be something if I
found me a real fracas fan, some Upper-Upper dame?"

Joe laughed at him, even as he headed for the bathroom. As a matter of
fact, he rather liked the idea of going into town for the show. "Max,"
he said over his shoulder, "you're in for a big disappointment. They're
all the same. Upper, Lower, or Middle."

"Yeah?" Max grinned back at him. "Well, I'd like the pleasure of finding
out if that's true by personal experience."

VII

In a far away past, Kingston had once been the capital of the United
States. For a short time, when Washington's men were in flight after the
debacle of their defeat in New York City, the government of the United
Colonies had held session in this Hudson River town. It had been its one
moment of historic glory, and afterward Kingston had slipped back into
being a minor city on the edge of the Catskills, approximately halfway
between New York and Albany.

Of most recent years, it had become one of the two recruiting centers
which bordered the Catskill Military Reservation, which in turn was one
of the score or so population cleared areas throughout the continent
where rival corporations or unions could meet and settle their
differences in combat--given permission of the Military Category
Department of the government. And permission was becoming ever easier to
acquire.

It had slowly evolved, the resorting to trial by combat to settle
disputes between competing corporations, disputes between corporations
and unions, disputes between