But the next day he went to Grizek and demanded his pay in full.
"Leaving?" Grizek muttered. "I don't understand. You've been with us
almost five years. Where you going, what you intend to do? What's got
into you all of a sudden?"
"Time for a change," Harry told him. "I've been saving my money."
"Don't I know it? Never touched a penny in all this time." Grizek ran
a hand across his chin. "Say, if it's a raise you're looking for, I
can--"
"No, thanks. It's not that. I've money enough."
"So you have. Around eighteen, twenty thousand, I reckon, what with
the bonuses." Emil Grizek sighed. "Well, if you insist, that's the way
it's got to be, I suppose. When you plan on taking off?"
"Just as soon as there's a 'copter available."
"Got one going up to Colorado Springs tomorrow morning for the mail. I
can get you aboard, give you a check--"
"I'll want my money in cash."
"Well, now, that isn't so easy. Have to send up for a special draft.
Take a week or so."
"I can wait."
"All right. And think it over. Maybe you'll decide to change your
mind."
But Harry didn't change his mind. And ten days later he rode a 'copter
into town, his money-belt strapped beneath his safety-belt.
From Colorado Springs he jetted to Kancity, and from Kancity to
Memphisee. As long as he had money, nobody asked any questions. He
holed up in cheap airtels and waited for developments.
It wasn't easy to accustom himself to urbanization again. He had been
away from cities for over seven years now, and it might well have been
seven centuries. The overpopulation problem was appalling. The
outlawing of private automotive vehicles had helped, and the clearing
of the airlanes served a purpose; the widespread increase in the use
of atomic power cut the smog somewhat. But the synthetic food was
frightful, the crowding intolerable, and the welter of rules and
regulations attending the performance of even the simplest human
activity past all his comprehension. Ration cards were in universal
use for almost everything; fortunately for Harry, the black market
accepted cash with no embarrassing inquiries. He found that he could
survive.
But Harry's interest was not in survival; he was bent upon
destruction. Surely the Naturalists would be organized and planning a
way!
Back in '98, of course, they'd been merely an articulate minority
without formal unity--an abstract, amorphous group akin to the
"Liberals" of previous generations. A Naturalist could be a Catholic
priest, a Unitarian layman, an atheist factory hand, a government
employee, a housewife with strong prejudices against governmental
controls, a wealthy man who deplored the dangers of growing
industrialization, an Ag Culture worker who dreaded the dwindling of
individual rights, an educator who feared widespread employment of
social psychology, or almost anyone who opposed the concept of Mass
Man, Mass-Motivated. Naturalists had never formed a single class, a
single political party.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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