At two-thirty he dissolved his remaining fealty connections at Oiseau-Lyre; they were mostly with himself as protector and somebody else as serf. By four o'clock he had liquidated his assets and had bought a first-class transport ticket. Before nightfall he was on his way out of Europe, heading for the Indonesian Empire.
In Batavia he rented a room and unpacked his case; the rest of his possessions were still in France. Curiously, his room overlooked the main Directorate building. Like tropical flies people crept in and out of its many doors. All roads, and all space-lanes, led to Batavia.
His funds didn't amount to much; he could stall only so long. From the Public Information Library he picked up armloads of tape and a basic scanner. As the days passed he built up information relating to all aspects of biochemistry, the subject on which his original classification had been won. As he scanned and crammed he kept one thought in mind: applications for positional-fealty oaths were processed only once; if he failed in the first try he was finished.
That first try was going to be successful. He was free of the Hill system, and he wasn't going back.
During the next five days he smoked endless cigarettes, paced his room, and finally got out the yellow section of the ipvic directory to look up the local girl agencies. His favourite agency had a nearby office; within an hour most of his psychological problems were solved. With the aid of the blonde sent by the agency and the cocktail bar down the street, he was able to last another twenty-four hours. But that was as far as he could string it out; the time to act had come.
A cold chill lay over him as he got out of bed. With Quizmaster Verrick employment oaths were apparently handed out haphazardly. It was impossible to deduce what factor, if any, determined successful application.