He took a deep breath. He withdrew his handkerchief and wiped perspiration from his forehead, his upper lip, the palms of his hands.
His mind caressed the hope: Maybe I've failed the tests. Maybe they won't give me a license.
He opened the door and stepped inside.
The metallic voice of a robot-receptionist hummed at him:
"Name?"
"T—Tom Rogers."
Click. "Have you an appointment?"
His gaze ran over the multitude of silver-boxed analyzers, computers, tabulators, over the white-clad technicians and attendants, over the endless streams of taped data fed from mouths in the dome-shaped ceiling.
"Have you an appointment?" repeated the robot.
"Oh. At 4:45 p. m."