The Commander was fitted, puffing, into the capsule. He growled at the storekeeper: "You sure this was just unsealed? It feels sticky already." A brash jayee said: "I saw it unsealed myself three minutes ago, Commander. It'll get stickier if we spend any more time talking. You have"--he glanced at his chronometer--"seventeen minutes now. Let me snap you in." The Commander huddled down after a searching glance at the jayee's face which photographed it forever in his memory. The top snapped down. Some day--some happy day--that squirt would very much regret telling him off. He gave an okay sign to Van Dellen who waved back meagerly and managed a smile. Three crewmen fitted the capsule into its lock. Foomf! It was through the hatch and bobbing on the surface. Its color matched the water's automatically. Grinnel waggled the lever that aimed it inshore and began to turn the propellor crank. He turned fast; the capsule--rudders, crank, flywheel, shaft and all--would dissolve in approximately fifteen minutes. It was his job to be ashore when that happened. And ashore he'd be practically a free agent with the loosest sort of roving commission, until January 15th. Then his orders became most specific. III Charles Orsino squirmed in the chair. "Uncle--" he pleaded. "Yes," F. W. Taylor chuckled, "Old Amadeo and his colleagues were called criminals. They were called bootleggers when they got liquor to people without worrying about the public debt or excise taxes. They were called smugglers when they sold cheap butter in the south and cheap margerine in the north. They were called counterfeiters when they sold cheap cigarettes and transportation tickets. They were called high-jackers when they wrested goods from the normal inflation-ridden chain of middlemen and delivered them at a reasonable price to the consumers. "They were criminals. Bankers were pillars of society. "Yet these bankers who dominated society, who were considered the voice of eternal truth when they spoke, who thought it was insanity to challenge their beliefs, started somewhere and perhaps they were the best thing for their day and age that could be worked out...." * * * * * Father Ambrosius gnawed at a bit of salt herring, wiped his hands, dug through the litter in his chest and found a goose quill and a page of parchment. He scrubbed vigorously with a vinegar-soaked sponge, at the writing on the parchment and was pleased to see that it came off nicely, leaving him a clean surface to scribble his sermon notes on. He cut the quill and slit it while waiting for the parchment to dry, wondering idly what he had erased. (It happened to be the last surviving copy of Tacitus' _Annals_, VII. i-v.)