I rolled the thing into the blanket and dragged it behind me to the capsule. It took ten minutes for me to force it through the hatch. Inside, we rolled the body under the galley sink, then washed our shoes and ourselves. We dogged the hatch shut and phoned topside, telling them to let the winds take hold again. As we made ready to go back into the cabin, the light of my lamp glinted off a bit of metal lying on the floor. It had fallen from our horrible package under the sink. Dr. Raimazan picked it up. He held it near the lamp, examining it. He was going to say something to me when the door to the cabin, which we'd unlocked, burst open. "What in hell's name are you doing?" the Bupo man demanded. "We've cleared the Tube," I said very softly, shoving before his face the card that showed with my face and fingerprints that I was a Tube Engineer. The Surgeon-General stared at the policeman as though he were something wet and stinking from a swamp. "Who was the man who jumped from your compartment?" the doctor asked. "State business!" the Bupo snapped. "Keep your mouth shut!" Too late, he recognized the Surgeon-General's uniform, and became silent. "Watch your long tongue," Dr. Raimazan growled. "I have an audience with the Leader: you may find yourself envying the poor devil under the sink his blanket." The Bupo, wavering between anger and apology, settled on an attitude of injured dignity. He turned and stalked down the aisle toward his private cabin up front. I followed him with my eyes, memorizing him. In case I should ever meet him again, I wanted to complete wrecking his face where the accident had left off. The capsule jumped onto its plunger of wind. Only the brilliance of the ceiling lights showed that we were again flashing toward the coast and the Capital. I sat beside the Surgeon-General. "What was it that you picked up back there?" I asked him. He handed me the thing. It was a Medal of Honor. Its ribbon was a scrap of silk, and the medal itself was bent as though it had been clamped in a vise and hammered. Turning it over, I read the engraved legend through a smear of blood. "To Doctor Noah Raimazan, for devotion to his profession, his people, and his Leader." A curt congratulation, I thought. After a moment I asked, "A brother?" "My oldest son. He saved hundreds in the ruins of Managua, in the plague that followed the Revolution there." Dr. Raimazan took the medal from me and sat rocking back and forth, staring at the laurel-garnished star in his hand. "Why did they kill him?" he asked. "It wasn't suicide?"