“Right!” Ed brought his hand down positively and the cards danced about on the portfolio-table. “Take my brother-in-law, Paul. Day and night, my wife is going Paul this, Paul that; it’s no wonder I know more about him than I do myself. Paul owns half of Mars-Earth Freighting Syndicate, so he’s in an eighteen-child bracket. His wife’s sort of lazy, she doesn’t care much for appearances, so they only have ten children, but—”

“Do they live in New Hampshire?” Frank asked. A moment before, Stewart Raley had noticed Frank glancing at him with real concern: he was evidently trying to change the subject, feeling that the direction the conversation had taken could only make Raley more miserable. It probably showed on his face.

He’d have to do something about his face: he’d be meeting Marian in a few minutes. If he wasn’t careful, she’d guess immediately.

“New Hampshire?” Ed demanded contemptuously. “My brother-in-law, Paul? With his money? No, sir! No backyard suburb for him! He lives in the real country, west of Hudson Bay, up in Canada. But, like I was saying, he and his wife don’t get along so good, the home life for the kids isn’t the best in the world, if you know what I mean. You think they have trouble getting a 36A okayed? Not on your life! They fill it out and it’s back the next morning with a big blue approved all over it. The way the FPB figures, what the hell, with their money they can afford to hire first-class nursemaids and child psychologists, and if the kids still have trouble when they grow up, they’ll get the best mental therapy that money can buy.”

Bruce Robertson shook his head. “That doesn’t sound right to me. After all, prospective parents are being turned down every day for negative heredity.”