Malloy pocketed them. Enough to keep him eating for a couple of months. After that, there was always the Salvation Army. He didn't have anything to worry about, really.

"Amery, what would you do if you were in my place?" he heard himself ask suddenly.

Amery steepled his fingers. "I hesitate to suggest a deception to anyone, but since you ask me what I would do if I didn't have a Rider, I will tell you the truth: I would pretend that I did not have a Rider."

"What are you talking about? I don't have a Rider. So far as I myself personally know, I'm the only person in the whole damned world that doesn't have one. I'd like to find out why, but I'm no scientist. So I just have to live with it. Or without it."

"There's a very, very fine difference," Amery pointed out with one finger. "Semantics is no longer a living science since the Coming, but I'll try to make myself clear. You must pretend to have to pretend that you don't have a Rider. Join the Jockey Set."

"Jockey Set," Malloy mumbled, massaging the back of his neck. "I've been put away for three and a half years. What's the Jockey Set?"

"Jockeys are characters who pretend that they don't have Riders, that they are self-sufficient human beings. Sometimes they use their Riders' powers and claim to be natural supermen. Sometimes they leave Rider power untapped and pretend to be natural, old-type human beings. But they are all fakes. The Rider in them comes out sooner or later."

"But if they have Riders, will I be able to fool them into thinking I'm only pretending to be without one?"

Amery lifted his shoulders and drew down the corners of his mouth. "Who knows? I will tell you this, though—you must be pretty much of a blank to a Rider. If they won't touch you, it must mean they can't."

Malloy started to ask him how he knew what Riders felt about him, then thought better of it.

"How would I fake trying to hide the fact that I didn't have a Rider? I suppose, maybe, by slipping up and letting myself predict the future or something...."

"That's it!" Amery beamed. "You see? It will be easy!"

"Of course," Malloy said dully.

 Prev. P 8/19 next