The Spheres of Heaven

8: RECRUITING AT THE VULCAN NEXUS

Salamander Row sits on the sunward side of the Vulcan Nexus. Shielded by four hundred million square kilometers of solar collectors, there is no visible evidence on the Row that the flaming disk of the Sun’s photosphere lies less than two million kilometers away. Other than the Salamanders, the residents of the Row need never see the Sun and can remain oblivious of the solar presence.

The Salamanders themselves are a different matter. As monitors and custodians of the great array they ride their refrigerated spacecraft hair-raisingly close to the solar furnace, skimming low above vast hydrogen flares and across the Earth-sized whirlpools of sunspots. Occasionally a cooling unit fails. Vehicle recovery is performed — always — but never the bodies of the crew members. Those are burned, what remains of them, out in space by their Salamander brethren. On Salamander Row, by convention, the names of the dead are recorded but they are not talked about. The Salamanders refuse to admit the power of King Sun. Other residents of the Row often seem determined to deny his existence.

That is their privilege. It is, however, a privilege denied to the occasional visitor. Before an arriving ship can reach the Nexus and the Row, it must first drive inward until the eye of the Sun fills half the sky. Although the temperature inside the ship never rises past a comfort level, the psychological heat mounts by the minute.

Danny Casement had shed his jacket before they crossed the orbit of Mercury. Now he mopped at his wrinkled forehead, stared at the port where the photo-glass turned the solar disk to an opaque circle of dark gray, and wondered how many more minutes to Nexus rendezvous.

And he, believe it or not, had chosen this. Chan Dalton, worried about schedule, had offered him a choice: did he want Europa, or the Vulcan Nexus?

“You out of your mind?” Danny, packing the things he would need on the Hero’s Return and sending everything else to sealed storage, stared at Chan. “If you think I’m going to invite Deb Bisson on a trip with you as leader, you can think again. Anyone says your name to her, he’d better be ready to go home with teeth marks in his ass. You dumped her. You go to Europa.”

It made sense at the time. Chan would go to Europa, find Tully O’Toole, and face Deb; but there was a trade-off: Danny had to go to Salamander Row and look for the Bun.

The ship was smart enough to fly itself and the only other person on board was a woman. Expensively dressed, clearly a lady, striking in appearance although no longer young, Alice Tannenbaum was big-bosomed and strongly built. Casement prime choice, under normal circumstances. She had also shown interest in Danny. Almost as soon as they had introduced themselves, Alice was saying, “If you have never been to the Vulcan Nexus before, I would love to serve as your personal tour guide.” A little smile and a sideways glance. “The Nexus offers pastimes that most visitors never see.”

“Ah — er — well.” Danny did his own sideways glance, to where the occluded disk of the Sun loomed ever larger. Soon it would fill the whole port. “I — er — I — um.” After a few replies of that caliber, she apparently decided that she was dealing with a half-wit and retreated to the rear of the passenger cabin.

Well, maybe she was. If the known dangers of the Vulcan Nexus gave you fits, how would you manage the unknown ones of the Geyser Swirl? You wouldn’t, unless you took a better hold of yourself. And if she knew the Nexus, she might be able to save him some time.

Danny made a mighty effort, stood up from his seat, and wandered toward the back of the cabin. He smiled at his fellow passenger.

“I’m sorry I was rude a few minutes ago. This is quite an overwhelming experience, flying so close to the Sun.”

“That’s understandable. You’ll get used to it after a while.” She moved along the seat, making room for him. “Where are you from, Jack?”

He had assumed a false name and identity for this journey as a matter of course, without ever expecting it to come in useful. Danny, who for the moment was Jack Eckart and had better not forget it, made a more detailed inspection of Alice Tannenbaum. She had to be close to his age, but she was far better preserved. The skin of her face and hands was smooth and unlined. And she must be rich. Those epidermal rebuilders cost real money.

“I’d say that I’m from pretty much all over.” He sat down next to her. “Born out among the Saturnian moons, spent a while on Mars, a while on Earth, a while on Ganymede. If it hadn’t been for the quarantine, I might be somewhere out among the stars by now.”

“That’s so exciting.” She turned as though to glance out of the port, but actually to display her profile, which she must know showed her to advantage. “You make me feel like I’ve been nowhere and done nothing. Never to Mars or Ceres, never to the Jovian moons. I wanted to, but my family wouldn’t allow it.”

“But you’ve been to the Vulcan Nexus before.”

“A hundred times. That’s different. Coming here is a family tradition. We were one of the Nexus first families, involved from day one.”

The Vulcan Nexus was a major supplier of power for the whole system, drinking in solar energy through the giant arrays and sending it out to destinations as far away as Persephone in tightly collimated microwave beams. Abundant energy — at a price. Anyone with a piece of the Vulcan Nexus revenue stream had money to throw away.

Danny was here to see if he could find the Bun, not to pursue personal business interests. But the urge to play the game a little was irresistible, particularly when the target was as tempting as Alice Tannenbaum. He justified his next words with the thought that he would need help if he was to explore the Nexus in a day or less. He said casually, “I suppose I’ve been a user of your service and never realized it. The past few years I’ve been on one of the Saturnian moons, and we have a big receiver for energy from the Vulcan Nexus.”

“Really.” She turned to stare at him with wide hazel eyes. “What were you doing out there, Jack?”

“My family’s business.” Danny glanced carefully around the cabin, though the nearest human other than Alice Tannenbaum was a million kilometers away. “I was on Hyperion, busy with diamond mining operations.”

He watched closely. Her reaction would decide what came next. Everyone in the system knew about Raxon Yang and his five-centuries-old discovery on Hyperion. Early explorers of the solar system had more or less ignored the lumpy, uneven hunk of rock that formed the seventh major satellite of Saturn. Old Yang, with nothing better to do, had landed on Hyperion and followed a surface fissure down and down and down. Seven kilometers below the surface he came to the upper face of the Yang diamond.

Even after the claim was filed, it took a while to learn exactly what he had. The Yang diamond had the shape of a forty-legged octopus. Its head, seven kilometers below the surface, was almost spherical and fourteen kilometers across. The legs ran out and down, each one half a kilometer wide and thirty to forty kilometers long.

Mining the Yang diamond had created the Vault of Hyperion, home to a polyglot melange of industries. Now no diamond was exported — because there was none left to export.

The first question was, did Alice Tannenbaum know that?

She did. She was frowning at Danny. “But Jack, I thought that the diamond was all—”

Danny was ahead of her. “Not the original one, of course. That’s long gone. But a few years ago we had seismic hints that there might be another one. We organized a private offering, formed a new stable of investors, and began prospecting. The exploration was very difficult. We were about ready to give up when a month ago we struck lucky. Actually, that’s why I’ve come to the Vulcan Nexus. We have been unable to reach one of our larger investors, and I’ve been sent to find him. If you are a regular visitor to the Nexus, maybe you’ve run across him. His name is Bonifant Rombelle. Some people know him as Senor Bonifant, others as Bunnyfat Ramble; but his close friends call him Bun or the Bun.”

“I never heard of him.” Alice’s face showed her utter lack of interest in hearing more about the lost investor. “You say you `struck lucky.’ Do you mean you found another Yang Diamond?”

“Oh, nothing nearly so big. The new one is smaller, and much deeper. On the other hand, this diamond seems wonderfully pure and without flaws. So yes, it’s a very significant find. It will make many people very rich.”

If Alice Tannenbaum owned part of the Vulcan Nexus power stream, she was already very rich. But one thing that Danny had learned, early in life, was this: people, no matter how much money they had, never felt that it was enough.

Sure enough, Alice was leaning toward him. “I suppose that your original private offering was fully subscribed.”

“It was indeed.”

“Oh, phooey. How long will it be before you know for sure the quality of the new stones?”

“Oh, we know that already. The new mine will be every bit as good as the original Yang diamond, possibly even better. As a matter of fact … excuse me for just a moment.”

Danny went forward, retrieved his jacket, and returned to Alice. He reached into one of the pockets and took out a black pouch. “A small sample, something I intended to leave with Bonifant Rombelle when I find him. But it will give you some idea …”

Twelve hours later, Danny was beginning to change his mind about a number of things. First, the Nexus itself was not a well-lit or a hot place. The collector array sucked in every last erg of solar power so that, nestled in behind and sheltered by it, Salamander Row was one of the coldest places of the system, as dark and chilly as interstellar space. Danny was comfortable with that. He didn’t find space at all terrifying. Second, this was, as Alice Tannenbaum had suggested, a place where with the right companion you could have a whooping good time. The residents of the Row didn’t seem to believe in moderation in anything. Finally, there were hints that Alice herself, in spite of her regal appearance, might be anything but a lady.

For one thing, she seemed to know every low-life pit stop in the five-kilometer sprawl of tunnels and chambers that made up Salamander Row, and she apparently had it in mind to dance in all of them before she considered sleeping. She had incredible energy, and when Danny pleaded fatigue and unfamiliarity with zero-gee dance technique she was quite ready to cavort alone, or with anyone else in the place. Danny was happy to go along with that. While Alice enjoyed herself he could have a quiet word with the regulars. There was no better way of making discreet enquiries about Bunnyfat Ramble.

On the other hand, with all his questions he was getting nowhere fast. No one had heard of the Bun, under that or any other of his preferred names. It wasn’t until the sixth port of call that Danny had even a sniff of something promising.

“I never heard of your friend.” The speaker was a tall black man with a face almost invisible behind a tangled beard. He was swaying on his feet and within minutes of final collapse. The cloud of secondhand intoxicants diffusing from him was enough to make Danny dizzy himself. The man stood frowning, as if making a mighty effort to think. At last he said, “D’you say he was good at making gadgets?”

“The best.”

“Then you ought to go find Fireside Elsie. I heard talk of a fancy data tap with a top gadgeteer involved. It came through Fireside Elsie, but I don’t think it was her game. If it was, you can be sure she didn’t do the work herself.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because she’s a bleeding Salamander, that’s why. No Sally would do gadgeting, it’s beneath them.”

“Can you tell me how to find her?”

“I could, but I’m not going to.” The man sat down suddenly. “I’m going to sit here and pass out. Get your friend Leaping Lizzy to take you. She’ll take you all right! Just look at her.”

Danny turned to find Alice beckoning him from the tiny dance area. Her face was aglow, the top fastening of her dress was undone, and her body swayed and undulated to some inaudible rhythm.

The things you did for your friends. I ought to have gone to Europa and let Chan come here . But Danny waved back to her and moved forward. As he crossed the threshold of the dance area the music and the thumping rhythm, focused on the dance floor and inaudible everywhere else, filled his ears.

If you could use the word music for such a cacophony. Danny’s tastes went back to a far earlier era of minuets and waltzes. He came up to Alice, was grabbed, swung around like a feather, and pulled close. He shouted into her ear, “Do you know how to find Fireside Elsie?”

“Now why would you be interested in a Sally woman?” Alice put her arms around his waist and squeezed him until he couldn’t breathe. “Looking for something hot. Too cool for you, am I?”

“The investor I was telling you about. Fireside Elsie may know him.”

“Phooey. You told me I could keep that diamond.”

“You can.” God, she was strong. It was Danny’s misfortune to find physical strength highly attractive in a woman. He struggled to take a breath and gasped, “But I need to talk to her.”

“Next stop but one you’ll see Fireside Elsie — provided you treat me nice, I’ll show you where. Come on, Jack, let yourself go. Have some fun.”

Her breasts pushed into his chest. Her perfume filled his nostrils. As Danny put his arms around her, he thought, What the hell, you only die once. It might as well be tonight.

An hour later that prospect no longer seemed so fanciful.

Danny had heard the usual rumors about the Salamanders. They were said to be Artefacts, a prize creation of the Needler lab run by the late Margrave of Fujitsu. The DNA mix in a Salamander was unknown. What was known was that they bred true, unlike any other Artefact, and the body of a dead Salamander was always burned to ashes. Self-immolation was the standard act for any Salamander threatened with capture and inspection.

Danny knew all this, and he had seen pictures; but the real thing was a different matter.

Alice had dropped him off at a dark and airless cavern with a casual, “Here you are. This is the Fireside. I’ll collect you in half an hour. Will that be enough time?”

“Should be. But what are you going to do?”

“Make sure we have a place to sleep.”

“I already made a reservation at the Crystal Gate.”

“Forget it. That’s for old people.”

Keep this up, and that’ll be me. “But Alice, don’t you think you ought to come in with me? I don’t know anyone in there.”

“Phooey. You’ve got a tongue.” She stuck hers out at Danny. “One like this. Use it.”

And she skipped away.

Danny stepped forward into the gloom. There were lights, he realized, but they were down close to the floor. They were also weak, red, and flickering. They couldn’t possibly be actual fires, flames wouldn’t burn right without a bigger gravity gradient to encourage convection; but they were highly plausible imitations.

A woman was approaching out of the shadows. Not a woman, a something. No, he had been right the first time. It was a woman.

“Sallies only in the Fireside,” she said in a husky, musical voice. She was close to naked, wearing nothing but wisps of black cloth across her chest and hips. They emphasized her powerful build and the ribbed muscles of her abdomen, but that was not the thing that puzzled Danny.

It was her skin. It displayed a granular texture, like a layer of silver paint over a pattern of fine scales. Nobody had skin like that. “Sallies only,” she said again when he did not move or speak. “Out.”

“I don’t want service. My name is Jack Eckart. I’m looking for Fireside Elsie.”

“You found her. This is my place.” She held out a hand. Her grip was strong but the fingers were ice-cold, like the hand of a corpse. She went on, “Who gave you my name?”

“I don’t know. He was a tall black man, back at the Golden Goose. He seemed about ready to pass out.”

“Louie Lucas. Why’d he tell you about me?”

“I’m looking for a friend of mine, Bunnyfat Ramble. He was an expert in … certain kinds of equipment. Last time we heard from Bun he was on the Vulcan Nexus. Louie Lucas thought you might be able to help me.”

They examined each other closely. Her face had a thin, prominent nose and a near-lipless mouth. Danny could see her eyes now. They were black and lifeless.

At last she said, “Can you pay for information?”

“Some. I have trade crystals. How much do you want?”

“Not for me. You make your own deal. Come this way.”

She led him into the smoky interior of the Fireside, along an aisle bordered by a dozen small tables at which silver-skinned Salamanders sat cross-legged. The air held a curious aroma, like burning cinnamon and sulfur.

At the far end a little cubicle sat tucked away out of sight of the main room. The light was much brighter inside. She gestured to one of the cubicle’s benches with an arm that bent and flexed as though it had no bone within, and said, “You wait right there. You can’t get service, so don’t ask.”

“Where are you going?”

“Nowhere. But I have to make a call.”

She walked away with an oddly sinuous grace. Danny thought of a snake, then changed his mind. The Salamanders were more complicated than a simple human/snake splice. For one thing, the eyes were wrong. The limbs also had that curious flexibility, as though the skeleton was not bone but cartilage.

Could it be a human/snake/shark triplet? The Margrave had been a genius, and Danny had heard of stranger combinations.

Fireside Elsie was coming back, weaving her way past the tables. She was holding two tall beakers of black volcanic glass.

“He’s on the way,” she said. “Don’t ask his name. And here’s a Fireside special. You can’t ask for service and get it, but I can give it.”

She handed him one of the beakers and drank deeply from the other. Danny could not see what was inside, but as he took a first sip he comforted himself with the thought that she had no particular reason to poison him. He needed that thought, because the thick liquid coursed down his throat like a train of fire. He could feel it as the drink reached each separate inch of his oesophagus. His eyes began to water. He saw a blurred image of Fireside Elsie as she turned and walked away.

He wiped at the tears with the sleeve of his jacket. A Salamander who found it necessary to undertake self-immolation wouldn’t need rehearsals, not with drinks like this available as practice.

But he was no Salamander. Danny placed the beaker carefully on the low table in front of him. He peered into the dimlit room, wondering when Anonymous would arrive and where he was coming from. After ten minutes he was considering taking a second sip from the beaker out of sheer boredom when a bulky figure appeared from the shadows and slid onto the bench opposite.

“You looking for somebody?”

Apparently they would dispense with introductions. That was fine with Danny. He said, “A friend of mine, Bunnyfat Ramble. Do you know him?”

Dead eyes stared into Danny’s. Fireside Elsie was a model of geniality compared with the newcomer. “Depends. You say you’re a friend of his. Who are you?”

“My name’s Jack Eckart.”

“Never heard of you.” The Salamander rose and was leaving the cubicle in one lithe movement.

“Wait a minute.” Danny had to make an instant decision. “I’m using that name at the moment, but it’s not the one he knew me by. If he talked of me at all, it would be as Dapper Dan, or Danny Casement.”

The Salamander had turned and was back in the cubicle. “I’ve heard of Dan Casement. But anybody could say that was his name. Give me proof.”

“What kind of proof? I don’t have any identification on me.”

The wide, thin-lipped mouth opened, to show a multiple array of sharp triangular teeth. “If you’re really Diamond Dan Casement, you have something else. Show me a sample.”

Alice Tannenbaum had laid claim to the last wrapped stone, but Danny always allowed for emergencies. He removed his jacket. It took a couple of minutes to work the quarter-carat specimen out from the lining of his coat. He didn’t want to touch the Salamander, so he laid the stone on the table in front of them. “There you are. Take a look. It’s genuine.”

“I don’t care if it’s genuine or not. The fact that you have it with you is the important thing. What’s your question?”

“What was Bun doing, and what happened to him?”

“I can answer the first, but not the second. You ever hear of Flare-out?”

“Never.”

“It’s one of the big games on Salamander Row — there’s a betting board right here at the Fireside. Solar flares can happen any time, so the managers of the Nexus run a pool on flare times and sizes. Now, computer models can’t make a perfect prediction, but they can increase the odds. Of course, they rely on good inputs. You follow?”

“I do.” Danny had run his own gambling operations; he knew the importance of inside information.

“Now, the managers don’t want anybody beating the odds. So they make a law. The law says, it’s all right to have any computer model you like, but the input data stays locked up. A gambling group didn’t think that was fair — to them.”

“Who were they?”

“You don’t want to know. Do you?”

Danny looked into those deep-set, lifeless eyes. “You’re right. I don’t want to know. Definitely I don’t want to know.”

“So this group wanted to put a tap on the input data in a way that would never be noticed. People here tried and tried, and they couldn’t do it. Not until somebody you and I both know came along, and he was smart enough to crack all the ciphers. The inputs rolled in smooth and regular and everything was fine. Until somebody talked. You don’t need to know who he was, either” — Danny noted the past tense — “but one day the group was in big legal trouble. And so was your friend. Bun could have stayed and maybe bluffed it through and been all right, but although he was smart he was nervous.

“He ran. Borrowed a ship, left the Nexus, dropped into a low skimmer orbit intending to ride past and off to the outer system. But he never made it. The drive misfired and he went right into the Sun. Sent messages once he realized what was happening. Said good-bye to everybody. Salamander’s finish. End of story.”

Danny recalled the outsized solar disk, flaming outside the port. It was an awful prospect and a terrible way to die; but something was missing.

“You said you could answer one of my questions and not the other. But now you’re saying he’s dead.”

“Smart Danny.” The Sally gave a dry laugh like a chesty wheeze. “Logically, our friend is dead. But Bun was smart, too. I’ve wondered for the past few months. Suppose he wasn’t on that ship? If anyone could rig a skimmer’s communication system so it seemed he was there when he wasn’t, the Bun was the man for that.”

It was wishful thinking, playing the wrong side of the odds. The Sally didn’t seem to realize what was involved. There would have had to be more than the faking of a death. There would have to be an escape plan, a total disappearance, an opportunity elsewhere.

“If he’s not dead, then where do you think he might be?”

“I can’t begin to guess.” The Salamander was standing up. “But I know he’s nowhere on the Nexus.”

Danny stood up, too. “As far as paying you is concerned, I’ll be glad—”

“Forget it. And forget we talked. I’m not doing this for you, and I’m not doing it for me. I’m doing it for him. I liked Bun, as much as you can like a human. If he’s not dead, and if you ever do see him again, say hello from me.”

“I don’t know your name.”

“You’re right.” The silver countenance was split by another sword-toothed smile. “You don’t know my name. You also don’t need to know it, and you don’t want to know it. You’ll have to go with a description. Now get out of here. Do you want the rest of that drink?”

Danny shook his head. As the Sally lifted the black beaker and downed the contents in one long gulp, Danny turned and walked the length of the room. He could see little after the brightly lit cubicle, but he felt sure that the faces were all turned his way. Fireside Elsie nodded at him when he was close to the exit. She did not speak. Alice — how long had she been waiting? — stood just outside.

“Oh, dear.” She took his arm and the smile faded from her face. “It’s bad news, I can tell just by looking at you.”

“It seems that way.”

“Then it’s my job to do what I can to cheer you up. You found out about your friend. Is he here?”

Danny shook his head. Bun was not here, he was dead, a puff of incandescent gases on the surface of the Sun.

“So what do you want to do, Jack?”

He had done what he came to do, all that he could do. Now he wanted to collapse into bed with Alice. But he could not suggest that.

“I’d like to go some place where I can get a cold drink. I don’t think I was actually poisoned in there, but somebody wandered down my throat holding a lighted torch.”

“You were permitted to drink in the Fireside? Then you were honored. It’s for Sallies only. But I know just the place for us. Come on.”

Alice did indeed know just the place, cool and intimate and soothing. It had been a very long day. Sitting across from her, watching her bright eyes and the pink tongue that licked sugar from the side of her glass, Danny felt himself beginning to relax. If only he could get Bun out of his mind … they had not seen each other for years, but the idea of Bun diving to his death in the Sun … He felt Alice’s hand on his cheek. “Don’t think about it, whatever it is. There’s nothing you could have done. Unwind, Jack.”

Unwind. He was trying.

He peered at Alice, across the table from him, with weary eyes. Quite a woman. A fine woman, rich and classy and sexy. He felt almost sorry that he had set her up with a phony mining investment.

The second place she took him to was dark, close to free-fall, and so ringing with Colchester brass that speech was impossible. He didn’t recall ordering anything, but a bright blue potion mysteriously appeared in front of him. He and Alice sat in companionable silence, swaying together to the music.

Unwind.

There must have been a third place. He did not remember going to it, but suddenly it was darker yet. There was again a gravity field. He and Alice leaned close, speaking in whispers. And then they were sitting side by side, not talking at all but with Alice’s thigh pressed against his.

Unwind.

Was he unwound? Yes, he thought so. Now he could suggest what he had wanted to suggest to Alice in the first place.

Danny did not so much wake as wander slowly up toward consciousness through pink clouds of bliss. He was lying naked on soft cushions in a low-gravity setting, and never in his life had he felt so rested and full of well-being.

How wrong he had been to think badly of the Vulcan Nexus. It was one of the most delightful spots in the solar system. Ten more minutes of quiet peace, and Alice could perhaps go about ordering something to eat. But then, regrettably, after breakfast Jack Eckart would bid her a fond farewell and Danny would leave the Vulcan Nexus for a rendezvous with Chan Dalton.

Eyes still closed, he reached out to where Alice lay in the bed. His left hand wandered around over the downy surface and found nothing.

So she was up already. Maybe taking a shower, maybe in the other room making a breakfast selection. Danny yawned, stretched luxuriously, and opened his eyes. The bedchamber was large, with a high, vaulted ceiling. Alice was nowhere to be seen. He stood up slowly, with wobbly legs — it had been quite an evening, and quite a night — and wandered through to the living room. There was no sign of Alice.

He walked back to the bedroom and through into the bathroom. She was not there, either. As he relieved himself, he realized that he could see no sign of the clutter of toiletries with which his female companions ordinarily decorated the premises. Alice was indeed an unusual woman.

Still naked, he stepped back out into the bedroom. He found his underwear where he had abandoned it, on the floor along with his shoes. His suit? He looked around. He had dropped that on the floor, too, but it wasn’t there now. Alice must have hung it up in the closet. Good for her. In Danny’s experience, rich women seldom made good housewives.

He walked over to the closet, opened it, and peered inside.

No suit. Then where was it?

He walked back to the dimly lit living room. Still no suit, but a piece of paper sitting on the low table next to the couch.

A note. Danny turned on a light and picked it up.

Dear Jack (or may I call you Danny?),

What a wonderful evening, and a wonderful night! I will remember it always, but unfortunately I must now be on my way.

In picking up your suit from the floor, where in our delicious haste we had abandoned it, I noticed in two hidden compartments a substantial number of trade crystals. The lining also held several samples of “Yang diamond,” which I trust are genuine. I was obliged to take the crystals, samples, and the money that I found in your wallet, in order to defray certain incidental expenses of my own.

I also took the liberty of removing the suit itself. The color does not favor your complexion, and the cut makes you look much older than you are (or than you act!). Naturally, I needed the use of your travel bag in order to transport the suit, trade crystals, and wallet.

This suite is yours until midday. Unfortunately I was not able to make payment for it, or for my meal and a few other trifles that I purchased and charged this morning, so I leave you to settle the tab.

I do not think that we will meet again, Danny, so let me express once more my appreciation for a fabulous twenty-four hours. Believe me, had it been possible for me to stay longer I would have done so.

Yours in gratitude, Alice Tannenbaum.

P.S. In case you should feel an inclination to try to find me, I would not recommend it. It would surely be a waste of time. I feel confident that I left none of my possessions in the suite; also, as you may by this time have guessed, my name is not Alice Tannenbaum.

Danny read the note. Then he sat down on the couch and read it again. He had his underwear and his shoes. He lacked money, trade crystals, diamond samples, and outer garments. He owed whatever was the cost of this suite and Alice’s “few other trifles.” Considerable, he felt sure. Alice settled for nothing but the best.

Danny went back to the bedroom. He put on his underwear and shoes and looked at himself in the full-length mirror. It was no way to face the management, or anyone else in the known universe. He picked up the bed’s outer coverlet from the floor, wrapped it around himself, and sat down at the suite’s communications center.

He needed to do three things. Two of them could be done at once: arrange for a transfer of credit from Chan Dalton, to cover the bill here; and contact a local clothing outlet and have a suit delivered.

The third thing would have to wait until they returned from the Geyser Swirl. Then he would tackle the difficult problem of tracking down “Alice Tannenbaum.”

Suppose that it took a long time, and involved a considerable effort. Would he still do it?

Danny, already calling Chan Dalton’s personal ID, nodded to himself. He certainly would. A woman like Alice came along once in a lifetime, and any man would be insane to let her go.