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heard of it.”
    “It’s possible that your father doesn’t know himself yet. The hospitals have an automatic data link with the Regents system, which in turn mailed you that letter automatically.”
    “But what does my father have to do with anything?”
    Over the years Birdie’s relationship with his father had been whittled down to a voice on the phone on holidays and a perfunctory visit to the federal flophouse on 16th Street an average of four times a year, on which occasions Mr. Ludd would be issued meal vouchers for an outside restaurant. Family life was the single greatest cohesive force in any society, and so, willy-nilly, the MODICUM people tried to keep families together, even families as tenuous as one father and one son eating lasagna at twelve-week intervals at The Sicilian Vespers. His father? Birdie almost had to laugh.
    Mr. Mack explained first of all that there was nothing to be ashamed of. A full 2 1/2 per cent of the population scored under 25, or over twelve million people. A low score didn’t make Birdie a freak, it didn’t debar him from any of his civil rights, it only meant, as of course he knew, that he would not be allowed to father children, either directly, through marriage, or indirectly, by artificial insemination. He wanted to make certain that Birdie understood this. Did Birdie understand this?
    Yes. He did.
    Brightening, Mr. Mack pointed out that it was still quite possible—probable even, considering he was right on the borderline—to be reclassified again: up. Patiently, point by point, he went over with Birdie the components of his Regents score, indicating the ways he could hope to add to his score as well as the ways he couldn’t.
    Diabetes was a hereditary disease. Treatment was costly and could continue for years. The original proposers of the Act had wanted to put diabetes on a par with hemophilia and the XYY gene. That was rather Draconian but surely Birdie could understand why a genetic drift towards diabetes had to be discouraged.
    Surely. He could.
    Then there was the other unfortunate matter concerning his father—that, during the past decade, he had been actively employed less than 50 per cent of the time. At first sight it might seem unfair to penalize Birdie for his father’s carefree life-style, but statistics showed this trait tended to be quite as heritable as, say, intelligence.
    The old antithesis of heredity versus environment! But before Birdie protested too strongly he should look at the next item on his sheet. Mr. Mack tapped it with his pencil. Now here was a curious illustration of history at work. The Revised Genetics Testing Act had finally gone through the Senate in 2011 as a result of the so-called Jim Crow Compromise, and here was that compromise virtually breathing down Birdie’s neck, for the five points he’d lost through his father’s unemployment pattern he’d gained back by being a Negro!
    On the physical scale Birdie had scored 9, which placed him at the modal point, or peak, of the normal curve. Mr. Mack made a little joke at his own expense concerning the score he would probably have got on the physical scale. Birdie could ask for a new physical but it was rare that anyone’s score on this scale went up, while only too often it sank. For instance, in Birdie’s case, the least tendency towards hypoglycemia might now, in view of his father’s diabetes, drop him altogether out of reach of the cutoff point.
    Didn’t it seem best, then, to leave well enough alone?
    It did seem best.
    Mr. Mack could feel more hopeful about the other two tests, the Stanford-Binet (Short Form) and the Skinner-Waxman Scale. Birdie had not done badly on these (7 and 6), but he had not done very well either. People often improved dramatically a second time around. A headache, anxiety, even indifference—there are so many things that can get in the way of a top mental performance. Four years was a long time, but did Birdie have any reason to believe he hadn’t