He stood by a lake. The scene was like a three-dimensional photograph, the grass under him like rustling confetti. The big lake's surface was like smooth shining glass. Swans glided along the glass like clock-work. Huge water-lilies trembled with a strange regularity of motion in a slight breeze that was always the same.
Then he saw her—Glora Delar, walking along the shore, only a few feet away. A sudden weakness overcame him. His knees gave way and he dropped on a bench. He half rose, sank down. "Glora," he whispered. "Glora—"
She wasn't alone. A man walked with her. The favorite of millions of women who for some reason found Clifford Marlowe not quite perfect. Carl Brittain. In the People's Fan Magazine there had been hints that Glora Delar and Carl Brittain were more than just friends. Brooks had figured it as being more propaganda.
Jealousy and hate roiled to muddy fear, fear and self-inadequacy, and Brooks shrank down against the bench, hoping they wouldn't see him. He wanted to crawl into a dark corner, hide somewhere. There was no dark corner; everything was bright and white and blazing white light. Here no man could hide; no man could sleep where there was no night.
A sharp shrill whistle dug into his brain. He jerked around. Far across the expanse of park a black skycar came whirring, gliding, sliding toward him. The ultrasonic whistle sharpened painfully and he knew this was pursuit.
The pilot hadn't been so honest, maybe. But that made no difference now. It had never been anything anyway that would have gone on forever. No matter when the black skycar came for him there would never have been a place to hide. It didn't matter now, not after seeing Glora Delar and Brittain together like this.
But before the Guards picked him up—
He ran toward the lake. The skycar was an elongated shadow over the glassy water, over the glossy mechanically moving leaves of the huge water-lilies, over the backs of the clock-work swans. The whistle seemed to split his skull.
"Glora!" he shouted.