Suddenly, he turned and ran back to the girl. "Do they know you?" he said, fiercely, frightened by his own daring.
"Wh—Who?" gasped the girl, startled by his reappearance. "Who know me?" Then, catching his meaning, "The goons, you mean?" Lloyd nodded impatiently. "No, they don't. But they don't have to. I—I have no Voteplate."
"Can't you girls hang onto anything?!" he muttered. "Don't tell me yours fell in the sea from a Tourgyro?"
"You say that as though you know somebody whose did," said the girl.
"My fiancee," he explained, adding, with an embarrassed grin, "I'll be twenty-five just after next Marriage Day. I found her in the phonebook listings."
"But—What'd she do?" the girl persisted. "Without a Voteplate, she could be picked up any time, in the first Goon inspection that arose."
"Take this," he urged, pressing something into her hand. "Your arcade is third over from mine. When you get outside, wait. I'll meet you there and get this back. Don't fail me, please."
He spun about and dashed toward his arcade, leaving her standing in the center of the floor, staring dumbfounded at the flat metal plate in her hand. Trembling, she turned toward the indicated arch, and followed swiftly after the stragglers entering it, her perspiring fingers clamped rigidly upon the engraved face of the Voteplate.