He whirled and started to run noiselessly, and without hurry over the tabled clearing. Where the terrain sloped he did not brake his speed, and momentum carried him faster down among the slim white birches, and fragrant firs. He ran like a football player, in and out among the trees, leaping boulders and small streams, or plunging recklessly into crystal cold waters. Where else was there another such as he--to run and run, and never tire? To dodge and twist, and speed over rough stones with no pain lancing up through him? Was it his strength they feared? "They'll never catch me," he vowed. Then he went back up the sloping hill to his post at the crest. The helicar was no longer standing in the road, and the lights of his house had ceased to shine. Only the moon flushed out shadows of the trees, and his silent dwelling. _They are gone_, he thought. The easy victory surprised him, and he wanted to sing for the relief of it. More quickly now than he had run in his prideful ascent of the slope he turned his steps homeward. At the back door Amelia was waiting. In the night wind her skirt fluttered, and tendrils of blue-black hair whipped back. "Jim," her lips were black moonlight, and her eyes shone with bright anguish. "Jim. Why did you come back?" And then, behind her, he saw the armed men in their leather belted uniforms. Before he could retreat their searchbeams impaled him. "_Stand_, Jim Simson!" All hope of escape was gone. They came to either side of him, stun weapons levelled, and led him to the shadows of the house where they had hidden their helicar. He tried to turn to see Amelia as they forced him to walk between them to the back seat of the car. She was lovely, and lonely in the moonlight, a figure lost and bewildered. How he wished he could go back, and crush her in his arms again. Hours later, in the subdued glow of the office of United Medics, he cried: "Why can't you let me alone? Why can't you forget about me? I changed my name. I concealed myself--a farmer among farmers. Why did you hunt me down?" To the right of the door stood the two guards who had brought him. Their faces were impassive, as was the face of the man at the desk, the man named Dr. Crawsin. He asked Jim: "Why didn't you answer our letters requesting you to present yourself for this interview. Why did you make it necessary for us to use force?" "Did you really expect me to come here voluntarily--to be destroyed!" "_Destroy_ is, I think, an ill-chosen word, Roger--er--" he glanced at the record open on his desk, "Jim Simson, as you renamed yourself. We use a different term--reconverted." Jim's mouth twisted: "And," he added bitterly, "after you've 'reconverted' me, what will become of Amelia, my wife?" Again the doctor glanced at his record, "Ah, yes, your wife. You've been married--" "Twenty years." "Twenty years," the doctor mused. A flicker of interest came into his eyes, "And in these years did you ever tell her? Or hint?"