He had not done this because it was Susan's shift and he
had not expected Mary to break it. Now he knew that Helen
and Bill Walden had been quarrelling over the fact that
Clara was cheating on Helen's shifts, and their conversations
had directed the unhappy child's attention to the Manz cou-
ple. She had broken shift to meet them. . . looking for a loving
father, of course.
Stillthings would not have turned out so badly if Cap-
tain Thiel, Mary's school officer, had not attributed Susan
Shorrs' disappearance only to poor drug acclimatization. Cap-
tain Thiel had naturally known that Major Grey was in
town to prosecute Bill Walden, because the major had called
on him to discuss the case. Yet it had not occurred to
him, until eighteen hours after Susan's disappearance, that
Mary might have forced the shift for some reason associated
with her aberrant father.
By the time the captain advised him, Major Grey already
knew that Bill had forced the shift on Conrad under desperate
circumstances and he had decided to close in. He fully ex-
pected to find the father and daughter at the apartment, and
now... it sickened him to see the child's demented condi-
tion and realize that Bill had left her there.
Major Grey could see at a glance that Mary Walden would
not be accessible for days even with the best treatment. He
left it to the other two officers to hospitalize the child and set
out for the Manz apartment.
He used his master wristband to open the door there, and
found a woman standing in the middle of the room, wrapped
in a sheet. He knew that this must be Helen Walden. It was
odd how ill-fitting Clara Manz's softly sensual make-up
seemed, even to a stranger, on the more rigidly composed
face before him. He guessed that Helen would wear colour
higher on her cheeks and the mouth would be done in se-
vere lines. Certainly the present haughty face struggled with
its incongruous make-up as well as the indignity of her dress.
She pulled the sheet tighter about her and said icily, 'I will
not wear that woman's clothes.'
Major Grey introduced himself and asked, 'Where is Bill
Walden?'
'He shifted! He left me with... Oh, I'm so ashamed!'
Major Grey shared her loathing. There was no way to es-
cape the conditioning of childhoodsex relations between
hyperalter and hypoalter were more than outlawed, they were
in themselves disgusting. If they were allowed, they could
destroy this civilization. Those idealiststhey were almost all
hypoalters, of coursewho wanted the old terminology
changed didn't take that into account. Next thing they'd want
children to live with their actual parents!
Major Grey stepped into the bedroom. Through the bath-
room door beyond, he could see Conrad Manz changing his
