Hovannis's henchmen were something else again. That discreet individual on Hyperion, for instance, was really too effective to suit her. No, that wasn't quite right. The trouble was, he had been used too often. Anyone with the talent he obviously owned would draw the proper conclusions from his assignments. She did not like that.

The chatter of librarians changing shifts was low-voiced, but enough to wake Stavros. He groaned and stretched. His joints creaked, protesting the contorted position in which he'd slept.

The police had not nailed him yet. That was the only bit of cheer he could extract from the situation. He stood up and stretched again but still felt old and arthritic.

"Long night?" one of the new librarians asked sympathetically as Stavros shambled toward the exit.

"You have no idea."

The librarian laughed. Stavros did not.

His stomach growled. He started to head for a food machine, then stopped. He would have to go hungry a while longer. The more he used his credit card, the plainer the trail he'd leave. He'd need to use it one more time, but no help for that. He'd have to hope nobody had found Andrea by then.

The university was surrounded by a couple of kilometers of greenery on all sides. Shuttles into New Westwood ran regularly, but no one paid walking students any mind.

Once he was among the buildings, he had to wait; for reasons no one remembered, banks did not open till halfway through the morning. Stavros needed one of the two human tellers for what he wanted to do. "I'd like to turn my account to cash, sir."

The teller's eyebrows rose. "The entire sum?"

"Yes. I'm afraid there's an emergency in the family?"

The teller let out an audible sniff. People had been talking about phasing out cash since long before the Federacy began. It hadn't happened yet, and wouldn't any time soon. Anonymous money was too convenient to do away with. Yet if someone insisted on paying cash, the suspicion usually was that he had a good reason to.

Stavros had rarely handled cash before. Holding the crisp paper with its holographic designs sent an atavistic thrill through him, as if he were carrying gold coins. A credit card was mundane by comparison.

"Let me have your thumbprint and signature on the receipt, sir," the teller said sourly.

The discreet individual said a loud, indiscreet word. He had not been sure he would be able to monitor Monemvasios's bank account; banks were even more jealous of their privacy than newsnets, and worked harder to keep it. But for the moment, at least, his trapdoor program was working. He saw the account drop suddenly to zero.

He hadn't thought cashing out would occur to Stavros Monemvasios. In the phone calls he'd tapped, Monemvasios had seemed on the tentative side, while his woman friend had been brisk and forthright. Mistaking hesitance for stupidity, though, was evidently an error.

And now Monemvasios was going to be a real nuisance to keep track of. The discreet individual scratched his head. What would the wretch be up to?

He hadn't gone screaming to the police. The discreet individual would have known about that. He wasn't sure whether to be pleased or disappointed. Like Stavros, he thought there was a fair chance they wouldn't look past their noses. That would have dealt with that very nicely.

With a pocketful of cash, Monemvasios had to be on the run. Where would he go? All he knew of Hyperion was the university and its surroundings. He'd probably try to get offplanet, most likely to his home planet. Hyperion had two space ports, one of them halfway around the world. A stakeout of the local facility might prove productive.

The discreet individual gathered a few tools of his trade and headed for the spaceport. He left others behind with regret. The spaceport was too public for them. He would have to be more subtle than usual. That did not bother him for long. Minimalism was part of his art, too.

Stavros spent part of his wad at a small appliance store down the street from the bank. The clerk who took his money gave him a curious look with his change. "You don't seem to have much use for that," she said.

"It's for a friend," he answered. He was lying. He went into the restroom. When he came out a few minutes later, he was clean-shaven for the first time in a dozen years. His face felt naked. To his own eyes, he seemed quite different and five years younger. He hoped others would see as much change and not see him.

The next thing was to eat. The first place he happened into served the sort of bland, vaguely greasy fare that would annoy no one and excite no one very much either. At the moment, Stavros did not care. He wolfed it down. He gulped coffee, too; his fitful sleep in the library had not been nearly enough.

He never had learned to like the coffee they brewed on Hyperion?he found it a thin, bitter brew. New Thessaly coffee was almost strong enough to drink with a fork and was full of sugar and heavy cream. Now he did not even grimace at the stuff in the foam cup. He was drinking it for caffeine, not flavor.

He had never bothered?or needed?to notice whether the ground shuttle had a cash slot. If it didn't… He set his jaw. The spaceport was a dozen kilometers away, maybe more. Walking would take hours he might not have.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. He waited on a street corner until the spaceport shuttle came by. The scanner spotted his upraised thumb. The shuttle pulled to a stop. The doors hissed open. He sprang onto the step and looked anxiously at the control panel.

He sagged in relief. To the right of the credit card opening was another, smaller one marked currency. He fed in a bill. His change returned a moment later.

As the shuttle purred toward the spaceport, Stavros did some hard thinking. Getting offplanet was one thing; deciding where to go, something else again. His first impulse had been to run for home. Now he wondered how good an idea that was. If the police were already looking for him, that outbound line would be one of the first areas they'd cover.

What to do, then? Random flight held no appeal?it was too much like giving up. His fist clenched. He wanted to hit back if he could find a way. But how? If he went to the capital to beard Paulina Koch in her den, he knew the fate he could expect. Fogelman and the Clark County and now Andrea had taught him the same lesson they'd given Van Shui Pong. Unlike the newsman, though, he was too stubborn to be scared off.

If the capital was hopeless, Stavros had to find an alternative. By the time he snapped his fingers in sudden decision, he could see grounded starships in the distance. The J?ng Ho had sent its report from a world called Topanga. Maybe, just maybe, some of the crew had talked with the locals about it before they set out on the doomed Clark County.

Stavros had no idea where Topanga was. There were too many worlds in the Federacy to keep track of, unless one was Isaac Fogelman. And a fat lot of good his gift had done him in the end, Stavros thought.

The shuttle sighed to a stop outside a big terminal building. Stavros shouldered his tote and descended to the concrete. The terminal doors opened for him and the other passengers.

He went to an information outlet, and tapped in the name Topanga. It was, he found without surprise, not far from Carson Planet. It had no direct connection with Hyperion, but ships from both worlds touched on Enkidu. Stavros was in luck; a ship outbound for Enkidu lifted off tomorrow. He checked the fare column. Yes, he could afford it.

He walked over to the ticket line. The clerk processing orders frowned a little at the sight of so much cash. "May I see some identification, Mr., ah"?she looked down at her screen for the name Stavros had plucked out of the air?"Mr. Mesropinian?"