Podkayne of Mars

IX

I am now twenty-seven years old.

Venus years, of course, but it sounds so much better. All is relative.

Not that I would stay here on Venus even if guaranteed the Perfect Age for a thousand years. Venusberg is sort of an organized nervous breakdown and the country outside the city is even worse. What little I've seen of it. And I don't want to see much of it. Why they ever named this dreary, smog-ridden place for the Goddess of Love and Beauty I'll never know. This planet appears to have been put together from the scrap left over after the rest of the Solar System was finished.

I don't think I would go outside Venusberg at all except that I've just got to see fairies in Right. The only one I've seen so far is in the lobby of the hilton we are staying in and is stuffed.

Actually I'm just marking time until we shape for Earth, because Venus is a Grave Disappointment-

and now I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Earth will not be a G.D., too. But I don't see how it can be; there is something deliciously primitive about the very thought of a planet where one can go outdoors without any special preparations. Why, Uncle Tom tells me that there are places along the Mediterranean (that's an ocean in La Belle France) where the natives bathe in the ocean itself without any clothing of any sort, much less insulasuits or masks.

I wouldn't like that. Not that I'm body proud; I enjoy a good sauna sweat-out as well as the next Marsman. But it would scare me cross-eyed to bathe in an ocean; I don't ever intend to get wet all over in anything larger than a bathtub. I saw a man fished out of the Grand Canal once, in early spring. They had to thaw him before they could cremate him.

But it is alleged that, along the Mediterranean shore, the air in the summertime is often blood temperature and the water not much cooler. As may be. Podkayne is not going to take any silly chances.

Nevertheless I am terribly eager to see Earth, in all its fantastic unlikeliness. It occurs to me that my most vivid conceptions of Earth come from the Oz stories- and when you come right down to it, I suppose that isn't too reliable a source. I mean, Dorothy's conversations with the Wizard are instructive-but about what? When I was a child I believed every word of my Oz tapes; but now I am no longer a child and I do not truly suppose that a whirlwind is a reliable means of transportation, nor that one is likely to encounter a Tin Woodman on a road of yellow brick.

Tik-Tok, yes-because we have Tik-Toks in Marsopolis for the simpler and more tedious work. Not precisely like Tik-Tok of Oz, of course, and not called "Tik-Toks" by anyone but children, but near enough, near enough, quite sufficient to show that the Oz stories are founded on fact if not precisely historical.

And I believe in the Hungry Tiger, too, in the most practical way possible, because there was one in the municipal zoo when I was a child, a gift from the Calcutta Kiwanis KIub to Marsopolis Kiwanians. It always looked at me as if it were sizing me up as an appetizer. It died when I was about five and I didn't know whether to be sorry or glad. It was beautiful .

and so very Hungry.

But Earth is still many weeks away and, in the meantime, Venus does have some points of interest for the newcomer, such as I.

In traveling I strongly recommend traveling with my Uncle Tom. On arriving here, there were no silly waits in "Hospitality" (!) rooms; we were given the "courtesy of the port" at once-to the extreme chagrin of Mrs. Royer. "Courtesy of the port" means that your baggage isn't examined and that nobody bothers to look at that bulky mass of documents-passport and health record and security clearance and solvency proof and birth certificate and I.D.s, and nineteen other silly forms. Instead we were whisked from satellite station to spaceport in the private yacht of the Chairman of the Board and were met there by the Chairman himself!- and popped into his Rolls and wafted royally to Hilton Tannhäuser.

We were invited to stay at his official residence (his "cottage," that being the Venus word for a palace) but I don't think he really expected us to accept, because Uncle Tom just cocked his left or satirical eyebrow and, "Mr. Chairman, I don't think you would want me to appear to be bribed even if you manage it."

And the Chairman didn't seem offended at all; he just chuckled till his belly shook like Saint Nicholas' (whom he strongly resembles even to the beard and the red cheeks, although his eyes are cold even when he laughs, which is frequently).

"Senator," he said, "you know me better than that.

My attempt to bribe you will be much more subtle. Perhaps through this young lady. Miss Podkayne, are you fond of jewelry?"

I told him honestly that I wasn't, very, because I always lose it. So he blinked and said to Clark, "How about you, son?"

Clark said, "I prefer cash."

The Chairman blinked again and said nothing.

Nor had he said anything to his driver when Uncle Tom declined the offer of his roof nevertheless we flew straight to our hilton-which is why I don't think he ever expected us to stay with him.

But I am beginning to realize that this is not entirely a pleasure trip for Uncle Tom ... and to grasp emotionally a fact known only intellectually in the past, i.e., Uncle Tom is not merely the best pinochle player in Marsopolis, he sometimes plays other games for higher stakes. I must confess that the what or why lies outside my admittedly youthful horizon-save that everyone knows that the Three-Planets conference is coming up.

Query: Could U.T. conceivably be involved in this? As a consultant or something? I hope not, as it might keep him tied up for weeks on Luna and I have no wish to waste time on a dreary ball of slag while the Wonders of Terra await me-and Uncle Tom just might be difficult about letting me go down to Earth without him.

But I wish still more strongly that Clark had not answered the Chairman truthfully.

Still, Clark would not sell out his own uncle for mere money.

On the other hand, Clark does not regard money as "mere." I must think about this- But it is some comfort to realize that anyone who

handed Clark a bribe would find that Clark had not only taken the bribe but the hand as well.

Possibly our suite at the Tannhäuser is intended as a bribe, too. Are we paying for it? I'm almost afraid to ask Uncle Tom, but I do know this: the servants that come with it won't accept tips. Not any. Although I very carefully studied up on the subject of tipping, both for Venus and Earth, so that I would know what to do when the time came-and it had been my understanding that anyone on Venus always accepts tips, even ushers in churches and bank tellers.

But not the servants assigned to us. I have two tiny little amber dolls, identical twins, who shadow me and would bathe me if I let them. They speak Portuguese but not Ortho-and at present my Portuguese is limited to "gobble-gobble" (which means "Thank you") and I have trouble explaining to them that I can dress and undress myself and I'm not too sure about their names-they both answer to "Maria."

Or at least I don't think they speak. Ortho. I must think about this, too.

Venus is officially bilingual, Ortho and Portuguese, but I'll bet I heard at least twenty other languages the first hour we were down. German sounds like a man being choked to death, French sounds like a cat fight, while Spanish sounds like molasses gurgling gently out of a jug. Cantonese- Well, think of a man trying to vocalize Bach who doesn't like Bach very much to start with.

Fortunately almost everybody understands Ortho as well. Except Maria and Maria. If true.

I could live a long time without the luxury of personal maids but I must admit that this hilton suite is quite a treat to a plain-living, wholesome Mars girl, namely me. Especially as I am in it quite a lot of the time and will be for a while yet. The ship's Surgeon, Dr. Torland, gave me many of the special inoculations needed for Venus on the trip here-an unpleasant

subject I chose not to mention-but there still remain many more before it will be safe for me to go outside the city, or even very much into the city. As soon as we reached our suite a physician appeared and played chess on my back with scratches, red to move and mate in five moves-and three hours later I had several tens of welts, with something horrid that must be done about each of them.

Clark ducked out and didn't get his scratch tests until the next morning and I misdoubt he will die of Purple Itch or some such, were it not that his karma is so clearly reserving him for hanging. Uncle Tom refused the tests. He was through all this routine more than twenty years ago, and anyhow he claims that the too, too mortal flesh is merely a figment of the imagination.

So I am more or less limited for a few days to lavish living here in the Tannhäuser. If I got out, I must wear. gloves and a mask even in the city. But one whole wall of the suite's salon becomes a stereo stage simply by voice request, either taped or piped live from any theater or club in Venusberg-and some of the "entertainment" has widened my sophistication unbelievably, especially when Uncle Tom is not around. I am beginning to realize that Mars is an essentially puritanical culture. Of course Venus doesn't actually have laws, just company regulations, none of which seems to be concerned with personal conduct. But I had been brought up to believe that Mars Republic is a free society-and I suppose it is. However, there is "freedom" and "freedom."

Here the Venus Corporation owns everything worth owning and runs everything that shows a profit, all in a fashion that would make Marsmen swoon. But I guess Venusmen would swoon at how straitlaced we are. I know this Mars girl blushed for the first time in I don't

know when and switched off a show that I didn't really believe.

But the solly screen is far from being the only astonishing feature of this suite. It is so big that one should carry food and water when exploring it, and the salon is so huge that local storms appear distinctly possible. My private bath is a suite in itself, with so many gadgets in it that I ought to have an advanced degree in engineering before risking washing my hands. But I've learned how to use them all and purely love them! I had never dreamed that I had been limping along all my life without Utter Necessities.

Up to now my top ambition along these lines has been not to have to share a washstand with Clark, because it has never been safe to reach for my own Christmas-present cologne without checking to see that it is not nitric acid or worse! Clark regards a bathroom as an auxiliary chemistry lab; he's not much interested in staying clean.

But the most astonishing thing in our suite is the piano. No, no, dear, I don't mean a keyboard hooked into the sound system; I mean a real piano. Three legs. Made out of wood. Enormous. That odd awkwardgraceful curved shape that doesn't fit anything else and can't be put in a corner. A top that opens up and lets you see that it really does have a harp inside and very complex machinery for making it work.

I think that there are just four real pianos on all of Mars, the one in the Museum that nobody plays and probably doesn't work, the one in Lowell Academy that no longer has a harp inside it, just wiring connections that make it really the same as any other piano, the one in the Rose House (as if any President ever had time to play a piano!), and the one in the Beaux Arts Hall that actually is played sometimes by visiting artists although I've never heard it. I don't think there

can be another one, or it would have been bannerlined in the news, wouldn't you think?

This one was made by a man named Steinway and it must have taken him a lifetime. I played Chopsticks on it (that being the best opus in my limited repertoire) until Uncle asked me to stop. Then I closed it up, keyboard and top, because I had seen Clark eying the machinery inside, and warned him sweetly but firmly that if he touched one finger to it I would break all his fingers while he was asleep. He wasn't listening but he knows I mean it. That piano is Sacred to the Muses and is not to be taken apart by our Young Archimedes.

I don't care what the electronics engineers say; there is a vast difference between a "piano" and a real piano. No matter if their silly oscilloscopes "prove" that the sound is identical. It is like the difference between being warmly clothed-or climbing up in your Daddy's lap and getting really warm.

I haven't been under house arrest all the time; I've been to the casinos, with Girdle and with Dexter Cunha, Dexter being the son of Mr. Chairman of the Board Kurt Cunha. Girdie is leaving us here, going to stay on Venus, and it makes me sad.

I asked her, "Why?"

We were sitting alone in our palatial salon. Girdle is staying in this same hilton, in a room not very different nor much larger than her cabin in the Tricorn, and I guess I'm just mean enough that I wanted her to see the swank we were enjoying. But my excuse was to have her help me dress. For now I am wearing (Shudder!) support garments. Arch supports in my shoes and tight things here and there intended to keep me from spreading out like an amoeba-and I won't say what Clark calls them because Clark is rude, crude, unrefined, and barbaric.

I hate them. But at 84 percent of one standard gee,

I need them despite all that exercise I took aboard ship. This alone is reason enough not to live on Venus, or on Earth, even if they~were as delightful as Mars.

Girdle did help me-she had bought them for me in the first place-but she also made me change my makeup, one which I had most carefully copied out of the latest issue of Aphrodite. She looked at me and said, "Go wash your face, Poddy. Then we'll start over."

I pouted out my lip and said, "Won't!" The one thing I had noticed most and quickest was that every female on Venus wears paint like a Red Indian shooting at the Good Guys in the sollies-even Maria and Maria wear three times as much makeup just to work in as Mother wears to a formal reception-and Mother doesn't wear any when working.

"Poddy, Poddy! Be a good girl."

"I am being a good girl. I learned that when I was just a child. And look at yourself in the mirror!" Girdie was wearing as High-styled a Venusberg face-do as any in that magazine.

"I know what I look like. But I am more than twice your age and no one even suspects me of being young and sweet and innocent. Always be what you are, Poddy. Never pretend. Look at Mrs. Grew. She's a comfortable fat old woman. She isn't kittenish, she's just nice to be around."

"You want me to look like a hick tourist!"

"I want you to look like Poddy. Come, dear, we'll find a happy medium. I grant you that even the girls your age here wear more makeup than grown-up women do on Mars-so we'll compromise. Instead of painting you like a Venusberg trollop, we'll make you a young lady of good family and gentle breeding, one who is widely traveled and used to all sorts of customs and manners, and so calmly sure of herself that she

knows what is best for her-totally uninfluenced by local fads."

Girdle is an artist, I must admit. She started with a blank canvas and worked on me for more than an hour-and when she got through, you couldn't see that I was wearing any makeup at all.

But here is what you could see: I was at least two years older (real years, Mars years, or about six Venus years); my face was thinner and my nose not pug at all and I looked ever so slightly world-weary in a sweet and tolerant way. My eyes were enormous.

"Satisfied?" she asked.

"I'm beautiful!"

"Yes, you are. Because you are still Poddy. All I've done is make a picture of Poddy the way she is going to be. Before long."

My eyes filled with tears and we had to blot them up very hastily and she repaired the damage. "Now," she said briskly, "all we need is a club. And your mask."

"What's the club for? And I won't wear a mask, not on top of this."

"The club is to beat off wealthy stockholders who will throw themselves at your feet. And you will wear your mask, or else we won't go."

We compromised. I wore the mask until we got there and Girdle promised to repair any damage to my face-and promised that she would coach me as many times as necessary until I could put on that lovely, lying face myself. The casinos are safe, or supposed to be-the air not merely filtered and conditioned but freshly regenerated, free of any trace of pollen, virus, colloidal suspension or whatever. This is because lots of tourists don't like to take all the long list of immunizations necessary actually to live on Venus; but the Corporation wouldn't think of letting a tourist get away unbled. So the hiltons are safe and

the casinos are safe and a tourist can buy a health insurance policy from the corporation fbr a very modest premium. Then he finds that he can cash his policy back in for gambling chips any time he wants to. I understand that the Corporation hasn't had to pay off on one of these policies very often.

Venusberg assaults the eye and ear even from inside a taxi. I believe in free enterprise; all Marsmen do, it's an article of faith and the main reason we won't federate with Earth (and be outvoted five hundred to one). But free enterprise is not enough excuse to blare in your ears and glare in your eyes every time you leave your own roof. The shops never close (I don't think anything ever closes in Venusberg) and full color and stereo ads climb right inside your taxi and sit in your lap and shout in your ear.

Don't ask me how this horrid illusion is produced. The engineer who invented it probably flew off on his own broom. This red devil about a meter high appeared between us and the partition separating us from the driver (there wasn't a sign of a solly receiver) and started jabbing at us with a pitchfork. "Get the Hi-Ho Habit!" it shrieked. "Everybody drinks Hi-Ho! Soothing, Habit-Forming. Deelishus! Get High with Hi-Ho!"

I shrank back against the cushions.

Girdie phoned the driver. "Please shut that thing off."

It faded down to just a pink ghost and the commercial dropped to a whisper while the driver answered, "Can't, madam. They rent the concession." Devil and noise came back on full blast.

And I learned something about tipping. Girdie took money from her purse, displayed one note. Nothing happened and she added a second; noise and image faded down again. She passed them through a slot to the driver and we weren't bothered any more. Oh, the

transparent ghost of the red devil remained and a nagging whisper of his voice, until both were replaced by another and just as faint~-but we could talk. The giant ads in the street outside were noisier and more dazzling; I didn't see how the driver could see or hear to drive, especially as traffic was unbelievably thick and heart-stoppingly fast and frantic and he kept cutting in and out of lanes and up and down in levels as if he were trying utmostly to beat Death to a hospital.

By the time we slammed to a stop on the roof of Dom Pedro Casino I figure Death wasn't more than half a lap behind.

I learned later why they drive like that. The hackle is an employee of the Corporation, like most everybody-but he is an "enterprise-employee," not on wages. Each day he has to take in a certain amount in fares to "make his nut"-the Corporation gets all of this. After he has rolled up that fixed number of paid kilometers, he splits the take with the Corporation on all other fares the rest of the day. So he drives like mad to pay off the nut as fast as possible and start making some money himself-then keeps on driving fast because he's got to get his while the getting is good.

Uncle Tom says that most people on Earth have much the same deal, except it's done by the year and they call it income tax.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure dome decree- Dom Pedro Casino is like that. Lavish. Beautiful.

Exotic. The arch over the entrance proclaims EVERY

DIVERSION IN THE KNOWN UNIVERSE, and

from what I hear this may well be true. However, all

Girdie and I visited were the gaming rooms. I never saw so much money in my whole life!

A sign outside the gambling sector read:

HELLO, SUCKER!

All Games Are Honest

All Games Have a House Percentage

You CAN'T WIN!

So Come On In and Have Fun-

(While We Prove It)

Checks Accepted. All Credit

Cards Honored. Free Breakfast

and a Ride to Your Hilton When

You Go Broke. Your Host,

DOM PEDRO

I said, "Girdie, there really is somebody named Dom Pedro?"

She shrugged. "He's an employee and that's not his real name. But he does look like an emperor. I'll point him out. You can meet him if you like and he'll kiss your hand. If you like that sort of thing. Come on."

She headed for the roulette tables while I tried to see everything at once. It was like being on the inside of a kaleidoscope. People beautifully dressed (employees mostly), people dressed every sort of way, from formal evening wear to sports shorts (tourists mostly), bright lights, staccato music, click and tinkle and shuffle and snap, rich hangings, armed guards in comicopera uniforms, trays of drinks and food, nervous excitement, and money everywhere- I stopped suddenly, so Girdle stopped. My brother

Clark. Seated at a crescent-shaped table at which a beautiful lady was dealing cards. In front of him several tall stacks of chips and an imposing pile of paper money.

I should not have been startled. If you think that a six-year-old boy (or eighteen-year-old boy if you use their years) wouldn't be allowed to gamble in Venusberg, then

you haven't been to Venus. Never mind what we do in Marsopolis, here there are just two requirements to gamble: a) you have to be alive; b) you have to have money. You don't have to be able to talk Portuguese or Ortho, nor any known language; as long as you can nod, wink, grunt, or flip a tendril, they'll take your bet. And your shirt.

No, I shouldn't have been surprised. Clark heads straight for money the way ions head for an electrode. Now I knew where he had ducked out to the first night and where he had been most of the time since.

I went up and tapped him on the shoulder. He didn't look around at once but a man popped up out of the rug like a genie from a lamp and had me by the arm. Clark said to the dealer, "Hit me," and looked around. "Hi, Sis. It's all right, Joe, she's my sister."

"Okay?" the man said doubtfully, still holding my arm.

"Sure, sure. She's harmless. Sis, this is Josie Mendoza, company cop, on lease to me for tonight. Hi, Girdle!" Clark's voice was suddenly enthusiastic. But he remembered to say, "Joe, slip into my seat and watch the stuff. Girdie, this is swell! You gonna play black jack? You can have my seat."

(It must be love, dears. Or a high fever.)

She explained that she was about to play roulette. "Want me to come help?" he said eagerly. "I'm pretty good on the wheel, too."

She explained to him gently that she did not want help because she was working on a system, and promised to see him later in the evening. Girdle is unbelievably patient with Clark. I would have- Come to think of it, she's unbelievably patient with me.

If Girdie has a system for roulette, it didn't show.

We found two stools together and she tried to give me a few chips. I didn't want to gamble and told her so, and she explained that I would have to stand up if I didn't. Considering what 84 percent gee does to my poor feet I bought a few chips of my own and did just what she did, which was to place minimum bets on the colors, or on odd or even. This way you don't win, you don't lose-except that once in a long while the little ball lands on zero and you lose a chip permanently (that "house percentage" the sign warned

against). -/

The croupier could see what we were doing but we actually were gambling and inside the rules; he didn't object. I discovered almost at once that the trays of food circulating and the drinks were absolutely free-to anyone who was gambling. Girdie had a glass of wine. I don't touch alcoholic drinks even on birthdays-and I certainly wasn't going to drink Hi-Ho, after that obnoxious ad!-but I ate two or three sandwiches and asked for, and got-they had to go get it-a glass of milk. I tipped the amount I saw Girdie tip.

We had been there over an hour and I was maybe three or four chips ahead when I happened to sit up straight-and knocked a glass out of the hand of a man standing behind me, all over him, some over me.

"Oh, dear!" I said, jumping down from my stool and trying to dab off the wet spots on him with my kerchief. "I'm terribly sorry!"

He bowed. "No harm done to me. Merely soda water. But I fear my clumsiness has ruined milady's gown."

Out of one corner of her mouth Girdle said, "Watch it, kid!" but I answered, "This dress? Huh uh! If that was just water, there won't be a wrinkle or a spot in ten minutes. Travel clothes."

"You are a visitor to our city? Then permit me to introduce myself less informally than by soaking you to the skin." He whipped out a card. Girdle was looking grim but I rather liked his looks. Actually not impossibly older than I am (I guessed at twelve Mars years, or say thirty-six of his own-and it turned out he was only thirty-two). He was dressed in the very elegant Venus evening wear, with cape and stick and

formal ruff... and the cutest little waxed mustaches. The card read:

DEXTER KURT CUNHA, STK.

I read it, then reread it, then said, "Dexter Kurt Cunha- Are you any relation to-"

"My father."

"Why, I know your father!"-and put out my hand. Ever had your hand kissed? It makes chill bumps that race up your arm, across your shoulders, and down the other arm-and of course nobody would ever do it on Mars. This is a distinct shortcoming in our planet and one I intend to correct, even if I have to bribe Clark to institute the custom.

By the time we had names straight, Dexter was urging us to share a bite of supper and some dancing with him in the roof garden. But Girdle was balky. "Mr. Cunha," she said, "that is a very handsome calling card. But I am responsible for Podkayne to her uncle-and I would rather see your I.D."

For a split second he looked chilly. Then he smiled warmly at her and said, "I can do better," and held up one hand.

The most imposing old gentleman I have ever seen hurried over. From the medals on his chest I would say that he had won every spelling contest from first grade on. His bearing was kingly and his costume unbelievable. "Yes, Stockholder?"

"Dom Pedro, will you please identify me to these ladies?"

"With pleasure, sir." 56 Dexter was really Dexter and I got my hand kissed again. Dom Pedro does it with great flourish but it didn't have quite the same effect- I don't think he puts his heart into it the way Dexter does.

Girdle insisted on stopping to collect Clark-and Clark suffered an awful /moment of spontaneous schizophrenia, for he was still winning. But love won out and Girdle went up on Clark's arm, with Josie trailing us with the loot. I must say I admire my brother in some ways; spending cash money to protect his winnings must have caused even deeper conflict in his soui, if any, than leaving the game while he was winning.

The roof garden is the Brasilia Room and is even more magnificent than the casino proper, with a nightsky roof to match its name, stars and the Milky Way and the Southern Cross such as nobody ever in history actually saw from anywhere on Venus. Tourists were lined up behind a velvet rope waiting to get in-but not us. It was, "This way, if you please, Stockholder," to an elevated table right by the floor and across from the orchestra and a perfect view of the floor show.

We danced and we ate foods I've never heard of and I let a glass of champagne be poured for me but didn't try to drink it because the bubbles go up my nose-and wished for a glass of milk or at least a glass of water because some of the food was quite spicy, but didn't ask for it.

But Dexter leaned over me and said, "Poddy, my spies tell me that you like milk."

"I do!"

"So do I. But I'm too shy to order it unless I have somebody to back me up." He raised a finger and two glasses of milk appeared instantly.

But I noticed that he hardly touched his.

However, I did not realize I had been hoaxed until later. A singer, part of the floor show, a tall handsome dark girl dressed as a gypsy-if gypsies did ever dress that way, which I doubt, but she was billed as "Romany Rose"-toured the ringside tables singing topical verses to a popular song.

She stopped in front of us, looked right at me and smiled, struck a couple of chords and sang:

"Poddy Fries-uh came to town, Pretty, winsome Poddy- Silver shoes and sky blue gown, Lovely darling Podkayne- "She has sailed the starry sea, Pour another toddy! Lucky Dexter, lucky we! Drink a toast to Poddy!"

And everybody clapped and Clark pounded on the table and Romany Rose curtsied to me and I started to cry and covered my face with my hands and suddenly remembered that I mustn't cry because of my makeup and dabbed at my eyes with my napkin and hoped I hadn't ruined it, and suddenly silver buckets with champagne appeared all over that big room and everybody did drink a toast to me, standing up when Dexter stood up in a sudden silence brought on by a roll of drums and a crashing chord from the orchestra.

I was speechless and just barely knew enough to stay seated myself and nod and try to smile when he looked at me-

-and he broke his glass, just like story tapes, and everybody imitated him and for a while there was crash and tinkle all over the room, and I felt like Ozma just

after she stops being Tip and is Ozma again and I had to remember my makeup very hard indeed!

Later on, after I had gulped my stomach back into place and could stand up without trembling, I danced with Dexter again. He is a dreamy dancer-a firm, sure lead without ever turning it into a wrestling match. During a slow waltz I said, "Dexter? You spilled that glass of soda water. On purpose."

"Yes. How dld~ you know?"

"Because it is a sky-blue dress-or the color that is called 'sky-blue,' for Earth, although I've never seen a sky this color. And my shoes are silvered. So it couldn't have been an accident. Any of it."

He just grinned, not a bit ashamed. "Only a little of it. I went first to your hilton-and it took almost half an hour to find out who had taken you where and I was furious, because Papa would have been most vexed. But I found you."

I chewed that over and didn't like the taste. "Then you did it because your daddy told you to. Told you to entertain me because I'm Uncle Tom's niece."

"No, Poddy."

"Huh? Better check through the circuits again. That's how the numbers read."

"No, Poddy. Papa would never order me to entertain a lady-other than formally, at our cottage-lady on my arm at dinner, that sort of thing. What he did do was show me a picture of you and ask me if I wanted to. And I decided I did want to. But it wasn't a very good picture of you, didn't do you justice-just one snapped by one of the servants of the Tannhäuser when you didn't know it."

(I decided I had to find some way to get rid of Maria and Maria, a girl needs privacy. Although this hadn't turned out too dry.)

But he was still talking. "... and when I did find you I almost didn't recognize you, you were so much

more dazzling than the photograph. I almost shied off from introducing myself. Then I got the wonderful idea of turning it into an accident. I stood behind you with that glass of soda water almost against your elbow for so long the bubbles all went out of it-and when you did move, you bumped me so gently I had to slop it over myself to make it enough of an accident to let me be properly apologetic." He grinned most disarmingly.

"I see," I said. "But look, Dexter, the photograph was probably a very good one. This isn't my own face." I explained what Girdle had done.

He shrugged. "Then someday wash it for me and let me look at the real Poddy. I'll bet I'll recognize her. Look, dear, the accident was only half fake, too. We're even."

"What do you mean?"

"They named me 'Dexter' for my maternal grandfather, before they found out I was left-handed. Then it was a case of either renaming me 'Sinister,' which doesn't sound too well-or changing me over to righthanded. But that didn't work out either; it just made me the clumsiest man on three planets." (This while twirling me through a figure eight!)

"I'm always spilling things, knocking things over. You can follow me by the sound of fractured frangibles. The problem was not to cause an accident, but to keep from spilling that water until the right instant." He grinned that impish grin. "I feel very triumphant about it. But forcing me out of left-handedness did something else to me too. It's made me a rebel-and I think you are one, too."

"Uh ... maybe."

"I certainly am. I am expected to be Chairman oc the Board someday, like my papa and my grandpapa. But I shan't. I'm going to space!"

"Oh! So am I!" We stopped dancing and chattered

about spacing. Dexter intends to be an explorer captain, just like me-only I didn't quite. admit that my plans for spacing included pilot and master; it is never well in dealing with a male to let him know that you think you can do whatever it is he can do best or wants to do most. But Dexter intends to go to Cambridge and study paramagnetics and Davis mechanics and be ready when the first true starships are ready. Goodness!

"Poddy, maybe we'll even do it together. Lots of billets for women in starships."

I agreed that that was so.

"But let's talk about you. Poddy, it wasn't that you looked so much better than your picture."

"No?" (I felt vaguely disappointed.)

"No. Look. I know your background, I know you've lived all your life in Marsopolis. Me, I've been everywhere. Sent to Earth for school, took the Grand Tour while I was there, been to Luna, of course, and all over Venus-and to Mars. When you were a little girl and I wish I had met you then."

"Thank you." (I was beginning to feel like a poor relation.)

"So I know exactly what a honky-tonk town Venusberg is ... and what a shock it is to people the first time. Especially anyone reared in a gentle and civilized place like Marsopolis. Oh, I love my hometown but I know what it is- I've been other places. Poddy? Look at me, Poddy. The thing that impressed me about you was your aplomb."

"Me?"

"Your amazing and perfect savoir-faire ... under conditions I knew were strange to you. Your uncle has been everywhere-and Girdie, I take it, has been, too. But lots of strangers here, older women, become quite giddy when first exposed to the fleshpots of Venusberg

and behave frightfully. But you carry yourself like a queen. Savoir-falre."

(This man I liked! Definitely. After years and years of "Beat it, runt!" it does something to a woman to be told she has savoir-faire. I didn't even stop to wonder if he told all the girls that- I didn't want to!)

We dldn't stay much longer; Girdle made it plain that I had to get my "beauty sleep." So Clark went back to his game (Josie appeared out of nowhere at the right time-and I thought of telling Clark he had better git fer home too, but I decided that wasn't "savoir-faire" and anyhow he wouldn't have listened) and Dexter took us to the Tannhäuser in his papa's Rolls (or maybe his own, I don't know) and bowed over our hands and kissed them as he left us.

I was wondering if he would try to kiss me good night and had made up my mind to be cooperative about it. But he didn't try. Maybe it's not a Venusberg custom, I don't know.

Girdle went up with me because I wanted to chatter. I bounced myself on a couch and said, "Oh, Girdle, it's been the most wonderful night of my life!"

"It hasn't been a bad night for me," she said quietly. "It certainly can't hurt me to have met the son of the Chairman of the Board." It was then that she told me that she was staying on Venus.

"But, Girdle-why?"

"Because I'm broke, dear. I need a job."

"You? But you're rich. Everybody knows that."

She smiled. "I was rich, dear. But my last husband went through it all. He was an optimistic man and excellent company. But not nearly the businessman he thought he was. So now Girdle must gird her loins and get to work. Venusberg is better than Earth for that. Back home I could either be a parasite on my old friends until they got sick of me-the chronic house guest-or get one of them to give me a job that

would really be charity, since I don't know anything. Or disappear into the lower depths and change my name. Here, nobody cares and there is always work for anyone who wants to work. I don't drink and I don't gamble-Venusberg is made to order for me."

"But what will you do?" It was hard to imagine her as anything but the rich society girl whose parties and pranks were known even on Mars.

"Croupier, I hope. They make the highest wages... and I've been studying it. But I've been practicing dealing, too-for black jack, or faro, or chemin de fer. But I'll probably have to start as a change girl."

"Change girl? Girdie-would you dress that way?"

She shrugged. "My figure is still good ... and I'm quite quick at counting money. It's honest work, Poddy-it has to be. Those change girls often have as much as ten thousand on their trays."

I decided I had fubbed and shut up. I guess you can take the girl out of Marsopolis but you can't quite take Marsopolis out of the girl. Those change girls practically don't wear anything but the trays they carry money on-but it certainly was honest work and Girdle has a figure that had all the junior officers in the Tricorn running in circles and dropping one wing. I'm sure she could have married any of the bachelors and insured her old age thereby with no effort.

Isn't it more honest to work? And, if so, why shouldn't she capitalize her assets?

She kissed me good night soon after and ordered me to go right to bed and to sleep. Which I did-all but the sleep. Well, she wouldn't be a change girl long; she'd be a croupier in a beautiful evening gown

and saving her wages and her tips ... and. someday she would be a stockholder, one share anyway, which is all anybody needs for old age in the Venus Corporation. And I would come back and visit her when I was famous.

I wondered if I could ask Dexter to put in a word for her to Dom Pedro?

Then I thought about Dexter- I know that can't be love; I was in love once and it feels entirely different. It hurts.

This just feels grand.