The shuttle from Nassau to Greater Miami was brief and uneventful. Both men were so deep in their thoughts that Roy Cos didn't even bother to stare out the heavy glass ports at the sea and islets below. Obviously, he was having second thoughts about this whole project. How had he ever allowed the damned newsman to talk him into it?
Forry Brown squinted over at him and tried to rise to the occasion. He knew very well what was in Roy's mind; he even had a twinge of guilt about it. But, the whole thing was now irreversible. He said, 'You know the trouble with you Utopians?'
Roy sighed and said, 'No.'
'You won't like Utopia.'
Roy sighed again and said, 'There is no such thing as Utopia. As soon as you get to your goal, there's a better one beckoning. No science is more in a condition of continual change than socioeconomics. Utopian? Our revolutionary forefathers in 1776 thought they were creating a Utopia. They didn't.'
'Fine,' Forry said. 'But whatever you call it, most of you won't like it.'
'Why?'
'Because you all have a different picture of it. Vegetarians will picture the future society as one in which no meat will be eaten. Prohibitionists expect the end of booze but a good Italian radical would be aghast at the idea that wine and good food, including meat, would be taboo. Nudists expect nudism, puritans expect purity—in petticoats, at that. Serious straight-laced Wobblies expect the world of the future to be very serious and very efficient, but the easygoing ones look forward to a frivolous, bang-up time for everybody. And the differences on the sex question are going to be wild! I'll bet the march toward complete promiscuity will continue but I've noted that most of the Wobblies I've met are on the conservative side.'
Roy sighed once again and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. 'Wobblies don't believe that establishing our social system will solve all problems. We only contend that it will solve a good many of the most pressing problems.'
Forry grunted and rubbed along his wisp of a mustache with a thumbnail. 'I wish I could smoke in this flying sardine can,' he said. 'What the hell ever happened to socialism? I don't believe I've even heard the word for years.'
'Scientific socialism stopped being scientific about a century and a half ago,' Roy told him. 'It got to the point where everybody was called socialist, from Roosevelt to Hitler. Sweden was socialist. So was Russia, not to speak of England, which still had a royal family left over from feudalism. It stopped making sense. The only group in the States that would have been called socialists are the Libertarians.'
'What do they want, as compared to you Wobblies?'
'To reform People's Capitalism, or Meritocracy. We want to end it and establish a new system. They want more GAS for everybody, better education, better everything. They're reformers, not revolutionaries.' He looked out the small porthole. 'Hey, we're coming in.' Then, in a lower voice: 'Did you notice that the man who was following us is on our shuttle?'
'I noticed.'
They walked down the shuttle's ladder, their small luggage in hand, and headed for the customs hall. Customs was the merest of formalities; the twelve packs of illegal cigarettes went through unseen.
Passed by customs, they headed for the exit and were immediately accosted by two young men, one in prole garments, the other in a fairly presentable sportsman's garb. The prole was big and square and on the rugged side, the other was trimmer. Both were in their early twenties and both wore grim expressions.
Forry looked at them warily but Roy said, smiling and extending his hand, 'Hi, Ron. Hi, Les. I knew you'd make it.' As usual, a smile worked wonders on the face of the
Wobbly organizer. 'Forry, these are the Wobblies I told you about. Ronald Ellison, Lester Bates, meet Forrest Brown.'
Forry nodded as he shook. 'Glad to see you fellas. We're being followed.'
'I spotted him,' the husky youth, Ron, said. 'I thought this contract thing didn't start until tomorrow morning.'
Forry said, 'It starts at midnight. But meanwhile they'll be wanting to know where Roy is going, where he'll be when the contract does go into effect. Did you get a car?'
Les, the better dressed one, nodded. 'Right.'
They left the administrative building and started out into the large parking area.
'Where's the car?' Forry said.
'Not in the parking lot,' Ron' told him. 'We thought there might be somebody waiting for you to land. Just follow me.'
Mystified, Roy and Forry let the other two lead the way. They walked to the far end of the shuttleport's administration building, then entered a narrow alley between it and a huge hangar. The drab narrowness gave the passage a sinister quality.
The little ex-newsman said in protest, 'What the hell?' He looked at their two guides suspiciously and then at Roy.
Roy said, 'It's all right. If they say it's okay, then it is. Lead on, Les.'
They hadn't gone fifty feet down the deserted alley before two others entered it. One of them was the unknown who had tailed them from the time they had left the c^ices of Oliver Brett-James in Nassau. The other was a stranger. They were pretending to be in deep discussion, as if unaware of the four ahead of them in the narrow alleyway.
Les, Ron, Roy, and Forry continued on their course, the newsman nervous about their followers.
And then two more huskies entered the alley behind those followers.
Ron said, with grim satisfaction, 'Here we go.' He and Les turned and watched expectantly as though ready to return.
The need didn't materialize. The action that took place was brutal and brief. One of the new arrivals had a short truncheon in his right hand; the other seemed to have something metallic over the knuckles of his right fist. With no prelimi-naries whatever, they attacked. In fifteen seconds, the two who had been following Roy Cos were down on the alley floor, arms over their heads in a futile attempt to protect themselves. The newcomers lashed into them with heavy shoes, kicking at ribs, stomachs, and kidneys.
'Jesus,' Ron said in admiration. 'If Billy doesn't look out he's going to kill those funkers.'
'Couldn't happen to nicer guys,' Les growled.
Forry looked over at Roy Cos. 'You
Roy said, 'I have my moments.'
Leaving their unconscious victims behind, the two additional guards came up, grinning as though embarrassed.
The first one said, 'If either of those bastards are out of the hospital in less than two weeks, I'll turn in my merit badge in mugging.'
Roy said, 'Forrest Brown, meet Richard Samuelson and Billy Tucker.'
Forry said, even as he shooF, 'You gentlemen take your work seriously, don't you?'
Dick Samuelson and Billy Tucker were in the same age group as Ron and Les, both six-footers, both around two hundred pounds. They greeted Roy Cos warmly after they shook hands with the little newsman.
'Holy smog,' Forry muttered. 'If all you Wobblies are like this, why didn't you put over your damned revolution years ago? Let's get out of here before somebody else shows up.'
The six of them hurried on up the alley.
'Glad I made it in time,' Billy said. 'I had to come all the way from Denver. Had a meet there.'
Forry looked at him. 'What kind of a meet?'
'Wrestling.'
The alley debouched on a small parking area. For all but a few, private cars were a luxury.
They came up to the limousine Ron indicated, and Forry began to get into the driver's seat, saying, 'I'm the only one who knows where we're going to ground.'
But Roy shook his head. 'Les is a racing driver,' he said simply.
The ex-newsman looked at Les Bates thoughtfully and then nodded. 'Fine,' he said, getting into the back seat instead. 'Get out on the highway and turn right, Les.' He said to Billy, 'I saw you give those two characters in the
