MAID--TO ORDER! By HAL ANNAS Herb Cornith didn't really mind getting married as long as the girl answered his strict specifications which were simply--a superwoman! [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy February 1951 Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] Herb Cornith shook his dark head in disappointment. "Nope," he said, "she won't do. Lacks an ounce of being the right weight." The willowy blonde behind the desk blinked blue eyes and frowned. "But Mr. Cornith," she insisted, "you fit Miss Lucy Hollowell's specifications perfectly. She even specified that the man must be very exacting, meticulous and choosy. Certainly you are being all of that when you quibble over an ounce in her weight." Cornith picked up the specification sheet in his muscular right hand. He studied it out of thoughtful brown eyes. "This doesn't look right," he said. "I'll admit that I have strong features, but I'm not handsome." "To a woman, you are handsome, Mr. Cornith. In fact, magnetically so." "I'm only six feet tall, not seventy-three inches." "That is a typographical error, Mr. Cornith. It should read seventy-two inches. The corrected copy should be along soon. Something went wrong with the machine." "And my eyes are not particularly expressive. I generally conceal my thoughts." "That, Mr. Cornith, is merely your own opinion. You don't know what expression you might put into your eyes when you look into the eyes of your soul-mate." "The eyes of my what?" "Excuse me, Mr. Cornith. I know you're not the poetic type. You're the rugged type, but brainy, realistic. Still, you fit the specifications." "You said there was another sheet to the specifications?" "Yes. It won't be finished until tomorrow. But let me assure you that it fits you. In fact, it describes your every virtue and fault." Cornith glanced round the large room. His brown eyes came to rest on a model of an early Martian rocket ship. He studied it for a space, mentally seeing its interior and its outmoded atomic drive. It reminded him that he should get back to the laboratory and check on those ray-collector tests. This business of dickering over specifications for a wife was a nuisance. His requirements had been on file since he had taken the Levet test at the age of eighteen. Because of his exacting nature they had been hard to fill. Now at twenty-seven he was still unmarried. Not that he cared. But by reason of the fact that he was of the higher mental level, and physically fitted to survive in a complex and expanding civilization, he was urged by the Foundation to marry and beget children. * * * * *