Unnoticed and unregretted, the easy freedom of the frontier was discarded and lost. One by one, the rights enjoyed by the original settlers became regarded as privileges. One by one, the privileges were restricted, limited by license, eliminated as unsuitable or even dangerous to the new Kellonian culture.

Little by little, the large group became the individual of law and culture, with the single person becoming a mere cipher.

Members of groups--even members of the governing council itself--found themselves unable to make any but the most minor decisions. Precedent dictated each move. And precedent developed into iron-hard tradition.

In fact, Stan thought, the culture seemed now to be completely self-controlled--self-sustaining. The people were mere cells, who conformed--or were eliminated.

Again, he picked up the book, looking casually through its pages.

Detail was unimportant here. There was, he realized with a feeling of frustration, only a sort of dull pattern, with no significant detail apparent.

He awoke a little groggily, looked around the cell, then jumped hastily out of his bunk. Usually he was awake before the bell rang.

Pete Karzer was coming back from the washstand. He looked over.

"You up, Graham?" he said in his whispery voice. "Hey, you know I'm getting out this morning. Guess you'll want to swap blankets again, huh?"

"That's right, too. No use turning in a good blanket, is there?"

"Don't make sense." Pete ma.s.saged the back of his neck.

"Never could figure that swap," he said. "Don't get me wrong, it was real good, being able to sleep warm, but you caught me good when I tried to swipe that blanket of yours. Ain't never seen a guy move so quick. And I ain't so dumb I don't know when I'm licked." He grinned ruefully.

"So I'm down, like I been hit with a singlejack. Then you go and hand over a good blanket for that beat thing I been using. How come?"

Stan shrugged. "I told you," he said. "Where I come from, it's a lot colder than it is here, so I don't need a blanket. I'd have offered a swap sooner, but I didn't want to look like some greasy doormat."

"Wasn't no grease about that swap." Pete grinned and rubbed his neck again. "I found out real quick who was the big man. Where'd you learn that stuff anyway?"

"Oh, picked it up--here and there." Stan glanced down at the floor.

There would be no point in explaining the intensive close combat training he'd been put through at school. Such training would make no sense to his cellmates. To the good citizens of Kellonia, it would seem horrifyingly illegal. He glanced up again.

"You know how it is," he went on. "A guy learns as he goes."

Big Carl Marlo swung his legs over the side of his bunk.

"Looks like you learned real good," he said. He examined Stan.

"Pete tells me about this deal. I kinda miss the action this time, but Pete tells me he's got the blanket and he's all set to plug you good, you should maybe try a ha.s.sle.

"Only all at once, you're on him. He feels a couple quick ones, then he don't know nothing till next day. You can maybe do things like that any time?"

Stan shrugged. "Guy never knows what he can do till he tries. I know a few other tricks, if that's what you mean."

Marlo nodded. "Yeah. Know something, kid? Ain't no use you waste your time being no fabricator nurse. You got a good profesh already, know what I mean?"

Stan looked at him questioningly.

"Sure." Marlo nodded. "So you come here, like maybe you're a tourist, see. But the joes get you and they bring you up here. Going to teach you a trade--fabricator nurse, see. Only they don't know it but you're one guy they don't have to teach, 'counta you got something better.

All you gotta do is find your way around."

"I have? Do you really think...."

"Sure. Look, there's a lot of antique big-timers around, see. These old guys figure they need some guy can push the mugs. Pay real good, too, and they couldn't care less you're a graduate. Maybe makes it even better, see. You get in with one of those old guys, you got it made. All legit, too. Oughta look into that, you get out."

Stan smiled. "The first day I was on this planet, they went through my bags while I was out looking over the town. They found a paper knife and a couple of textbooks." He shrugged.

"So I came back to the hotel and someone hit me with a flasher. I came to in a cell." He glanced around.

"Somebody finally told me they'd given me two to five years for carrying a dangerous weapon and subversive literature. Now what would I get if I went out and really messed some guy up?"

Marlo waved a hand carelessly.

"Depends on who you work for," he declared. "You got the right boss, you get a bonus. Worse the guy's gaffed, the bigger the payoff, see?"

Stan reached for his bag of toilet articles.

"That's legitimate?"

"Sure." Mario smiled expansively. "Happens all the time. Even the big outfits need musclers. Staffmen, see? Sorta keep production up.

"Lot of guys get real big jobs that way. Start out, they're Staff a.s.sistance Specialists, like they roust the mugs when they got to.

Then pretty quick, they're all dressed up fancy, running things. Real good deal." He shrugged.

"Need a heavy man once in a while, even in my business. Like maybe some guy's got a good pad, he doesn't want a lot of prowlers shaking up the neighbors. You know, gets the law too close, and a guy can't work so good with a lot of joes hanging around. Might even decide to make a search, then where'd you be?" He spread his hands.

"But there's some Johnny Raw, keeps coming around. And maybe this is a pretty rough boy, you can't get on him personal, see. So the only answer, you get some good heavy guy to teach this ape some ethics.

Lotta staffmen pick up extra pins this way."

"I think I get the idea. But suppose the law gets into this deal?"

Marlo spread his hands. "Well, this is a civil case, see, so long as the chump don't turn in his ticket. So, anything comes up, you put an amba.s.sador on the job. He talks to the determinators and the joes don't worry you none. Just costs a little something, is all."

Pete looked up from his packing, a smile twisting his face.

"Only trouble, some of these big boys fall in love with their work.

This can get real troublesome, like I pick up this five to ten this way.

"See, they get this chump a couple too many. So, comes morning, he's still in the street. Real tough swinging a parole, too. I'm in here since five years, remember? So I'm real careful where I get muscle any more."

"Sounds interesting." Stan nodded thoughtfully.

"Great s.p.a.ce and all the little Nebulae," he said to himself. "What kind of a planet is this? Nothing in the histories about this sort of thing." He walked over to the washstand.

"Some day," he promised himself, "I'm going to get out of here. And when I do, I'll set up camp by Guard Headquarters. And I'll needle those big brains till they do something about this."

There was, he remembered, one organization that should be able to do more than a little in a case like this. He smiled to himself ruefully as he thought of the almost legendary stories he had heard about the Federation's Special Corps for Investigation.