“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.”
He peered at Alice, across the table from him, with weary eyes. Quite a woman. A fine woman, rich and classy
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.
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.
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.
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
