"I suppose," Porter mocked gently. "You with the highest genetic-desirability rating in the State, give or take a couple of counties."
Yes, there were a couple other males in Illinois with as high a genetic rating as Webb Fellow, and one of them was Clifford Ainsley.
The obvious question thrust itself upon Webb for the first time. Was that why Anne Tabor had seemed to concentrate her favors upon him and Clifford? Had she actually anticipated the eventuality of being chosen for motherhood, and had her criterion for male companionship been simply a high genetic rating?
It's a long life. Even with such unlikely odds against the contingency, he supposed any qualified female secretly nurtured the hope that someday—
With the inexplicable tension mounting in him he passed the vial along to an assistant with instructions for administering it. Anne would be in no condition to discuss the matter for another day or two.
But he must know. He must know whether she had already chosen Clifford.
He slipped into a light street-jacket, caught an express to top-side and engaged a taxi. His finger was poised over the destination dial before he realized with a start that he had forgotten the five-digit number for Clifford's address. It had been that long since he had called on his old friend.
Friend? The concept seemed suddenly strange. How long since their friendship had actually dissolved into an unacknowledged rivalry?
Nonsense. He and Clifford had both been uncommonly busy with their respective professions. And since Clifford had branched from medicine into robotics, their paths and interests had simply diverged. Alternating almost weekly between the two men, Anne Tabor had kept each more or less informed of the other's activities, but somehow he and Clifford had ceased looking each other up.
The directory gave him Clifford's number, and he dialed it. The small vehicle lifted quickly, slipped into the invisible traffic pattern and began applying the dialed code-address to the electronic grid that cross-hatched Chicago like a mammoth waffle. As traffic cluttered ahead on one particular striation, the taxi banked smoothly and right-angled to the next parallel course and proceeded.