The shower had stopped. He could hear Jane-Marie humming to herself in a nervous falsetto. He didn't know whether to get under the covers or not, and finally decided Jane-Marie would be more at ease if he did. He had already combed his hair and brushed his teeth. At last, she came. She was lovely, his wife, in a daring black negligee. She stood there in it for a long, wonderful moment, then plunged the room into darkness. You could be a newlywed over and over again, Simon thought happily. You could taste the joys of brand new parenthood not once but a hundred times. You could see the kids off to school on that memorable first day as often as you liked, see your grandchildren that first glorious time through the glass window also as often as you wished, or taste many times of an old, established relationship which was yet mysteriously new, despite the gray hairs and conditioned familiarity. It was a full life, but something was lacking. Did it make him a misfit? Probably, but he had his own life to lead, his own fulfillment to achieve, his own strange kinship with the early rebels who had blasted monogamy from the pages of social history. "You'll think this is silly," Jane-Marie whispered in the darkness. "What's that, dear? What will I think is silly?" "What I'm going to ask you." "No I won't. Honest." "Well--" "Go on, if it will make you happy." He could sense her presence near him. "Well, it isn't that I don't trust you, but there's so much of it going on lately that I thought--" "What did you think?" "The--the parting ritual. You know what it's for, darling. A safeguard." Simon plunged from zenith to nadir in seconds. He would never spend those three weeks with Jane-Marie. He would be running again, running until he could board the tubeways in anonymity from the basement of a Marriage Building in some other city. But it had never happened so quickly before. "Can't it wait for three weeks?" he asked, knowing the request was futile. "Then it's hardly a safeguard for me, just for--for the next one. It's just lately that all those misfits have started.... I guess some people will never be satisfied." Her hand touched his hand in darkness. There were finger movements. She began to chant meaningless syllables. This was it, Simon knew in despair. He could not respond. It was a simple thing, but people were sworn to absolute secrecy. It was changed every few months and he had never been able to learn it. A sob escaped Jane-Marie's lips. "Simon," she gasped. "Simon, you aren't ... you're not doing...." "No," he said wearily. He sat up quickly in the darkness, and dressed. He could hear her reaching for the phone. He stood up and went to her, but she turned away. "Don't you touch me. Go away, leave me alone. Of all the despicable ... and I thought ... I almost.... Hello, police? This is Mrs. Jane-Marie Paige on Maple Lane. I want to report...." "Goodbye," he whispered softly. "I hate you!"