"You mean, you're still speaking to me?"

"Whaddya mean? Am I still speaking to you?" He frowned and then, seeing they were attracting attention, pulled her out of the walkway and into the angle of the building. "You mean, because of last night?"

She nodded, swallowing anxiously, watching the shift of expression on his mobile face. He was no Clas Heineman for looks, but she felt much more comfortable with Connor Clarke. He took her by both arms now and gave her a rough shake, his thin fingers biting into her flesh.

"Aw, Nora," he said in a cajoling tone, his eyes tender, "friends can get mad at each other, you know, without printing out a major disaster. Besides," and he recovered himself with a characteristic shrug, "I was right and you ought to know it today. Say, gal, have I been strutting for you since I heard. A d.h. and 500 Ic's? And you scored oS Clas Heineman and all those wire-brained plug-in artists…"

"The bonus was only three-hundred and Clas Heineman—"

"You watch that soft-soaper, Nora," and with one of his sudden switches, Con was in a sober phase again. "He may come trying to pick your brains 'cause he's got to maintain his—"

"He already has," Nora said, giggling. Now she knew what had disconcerted Clas Heineman in the food shop. He'd laid on the charm thick and figured he'd taken her in when he was pumping her about her files. Only it'd never occurred to her that that wasn't a fair exchange for the way she'd talked to him in class and for the meal he'd bought her. She did know more about people than programming.

"He has?" Con was nonplussed.

"He waylaid me after Siffert excused me and—"

"He didn't!"

"And," Nora giggled again, twirling on her toes to show off her cape and the tunic suit underneath, "he made me spend money on new clothes. D'you like 'em? The student issue j'ust tore right off me."

"Huh? Oh, yeah, nice– Tore right off you!" Con looked angry enough to take Clas Heineman apart bit by bit.

"Mind your thoughts, Con. Really, you're overreacting in a gross fashion. Besides which, you caused the first rip in my s.i. last night… All Clas wanted was to pump me and—well, after the way I rounded on him in front of the class…"

"Nora!" Con roared her name with a most reassuring possessiveness in his tone. "Nora…" Then he deflated with misery. "Nora, I was wrong last night. You don't have to gabble like me to relate to people. You know\"

"No, Con, you were right. And I am out of CompSci. Master Siffert is ordering me out," she said, patting Con's face to reassure him and grinning affectionately at his miserable expression.

"Well, then," and Con brightened immediately, putting his arm around her waist and drawing her over to the cross-campus walk, "since that's settled, let's go eat and you can tell me all about it. Mind you, I've heard some state-changing versions that don't sound like my Nora at all." He stopped in his tracks, so that she all but tripped over his feet. "That is, if you want to… after the way I treated you last night."

Nora smiled up at him. "Oh, go tell it to the computer. It has to listen to you!"

Claire glanced quickly at Roy again, her mind churning with astonishment, fury, and confusion. She simply had to persuade him to bring her back to City. Prenatal instructions blithely stated that the first birth was apt to take longer, but never how long. Claire knew that she had a wide pelvis, and she'd done all the strengthening exer– She concentrated on deepbreathing as the uterine muscles contracted strongly.

Good God, was this why Roy had been so faithful in attending the prenatal courses? She and Chess had thought that it was only because this baby was Roy's and, because of his sexuality, likely to be his only issue. Had Roy planned this all along?

She swallowed, for the nausea was acute.

"Roy, I'm going to be sick," she said, amazed that she could speak so calmly.

"Don't!"

The order was frightening, almost as frightening as the speed with which he skipped the uneven terrain, barely skimming the low ridges as the helicar climbed higher and higher into the Alleghenies.

He must be taking me somewhere, but where? Claire thought desperately. And why? Why?

A short, strong contraction pulled at her and she gasped inadvertently. Roy looked at her then, his almond-shaped eyes narrowing slightly.

"That's too soon. Are they increasing?"

"Yes, yes. You've got to take me back to City, Roy."

"No."

A flat-out, inarguable negative.

"For your baby's sake, Roy…" The soft entreaty, intense despite her quiet voice, caused the perfect curve of his wide mouth to flatten in anger.

Claire felt bereft of all courage. Roy was not going to be dissuaded from whatever insane course he had inaugurated. And that was very like Roy… and terribly unlike him. Why? Why? Where had she miscalculated with this brilliant, beautiful, complicated personality. What had she, after all, done wrong? Artificial insemination had solved his basic problem in the matter of becoming a father. Had he so little confidence in her after the years they'd lived so equably together? What maggot had got into his mind over this baby? He couldn't be jealous of Chess… or EUyot? That was the prime reason for her having Roy's child first.

Claire had to stop thinking to concentrate on breathing as the contractions renewed. As she checked the sweep second hand on the heli's panel, she realized that Roy, too, was timing the spasms.

Oh, God, what is the matter with him? Why is he acting this way? We thought we'd covered every possible reaction. But to kidnap me? At the onset of labor? Roy, Roy, what did I do wrong?

Claire fought back tears, which would infuriate Roy. She wanted to scream but such a distressingly female reaction would not serve. It was the calm, rational quality of their relationship, the experts had told her, that was so essential to Roy's stability. The fact that Claire was always serene, so much the antithesis of the flamboyant feminine emotionalism which was repugnant to Roy Beach, had sustained this unusual experiment in human relationships. Now, every instinct in her rebelled noisily against his actions. But every last shred of disciplined rationality she had cried caution, patience, containment.

What had possessed him that he was compelled to act in this fashion? Things could go wrong, even at the last minute, and if they were so far from the City's obstetrical help, what could she do? Then Claire remembered again that Roy had attended every prenatal lesson and had read more books than she had. She bit her lips to contain an hysterical sob. Now she knew that it had not been complacent acceptance that Roy had exhibited, but twisted planning.

No, not twisted planning, she hurriedly corrected her thoughts. Roy wasn't twisted: he just saw things from a different angle. A very different angle, since he regarded women as a different species, useless in his environment. Up to the present moment, she'd been the sole exception. And how could she have been so dense as to imagine that he would react in any normally predictable fashion at the moment of parturition of the one child he was likely to sire?

The groan that issued from Claire's throat was part despair, part pain.

Roy glanced at her again, his eyes sliding around, through, beyond her, without seeming to pause long enough to admit her existence. He did note the contractions that rippled across her swollen belly. He frowned slightly as he looked back across the hills. Judging, Claire realized, whether he had enough time to make his destination before the birth occurred.

Where could he be taking her? Did EUyot know? Or Chess? Ellyot surely, of the four of them, should have caught an inkling of Roy's plans. Roy barely noticed her these last few months, but he was constantly with EUyot and Chess. The grotesqueness of her once slender, perfect figure would be repugnant to him: she'd expected that. Her physical perfection had first attached Roy to her. So it was reasonable for him to be revolted by her gravid condition even though it was his child that warped her body. She had dressed as concealingly and fashionably as possible and then kept out of his way—to the point of ducking into closets whenever she heard his quick light step in the house.