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This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any

resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

Some of these stories and essays appeared in the magazines GALAXY, DESTINIES, ANALOG

SCIENCE FACT/SCIENCE FICTION and OMNI; the original anthology TALES FROM THE

PLANET EARTH, or the newspaper THE TORONTO GLOBE AND MAIL; or were commissioned by

and read aloud on CBC Radio.

A Baen Books Original

Baen Publishing Enterprises P.O. Box 1403 Riverdale, NY 10471

ISBN: 0-671-87864-6

First Printing, February 1998

Distributed by Simon & Schuster 1230 Avenue of the Americas New York, NY 10020

Typeset by Windhaven Press, Auburn, NH Printed in the United States of America

TABLE OF CONTENTS

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The Magnificent Conspiracy

Mentors (essay)

Teddy the Fish (rap)

His Own Petard

Admiral Bob (rap)

When No Man Pursueth

Too Soon We Grow Old

Plus Ca Change (essay)

The Gifts of the Magistrate

Distraction

Orphans of Eden

Pandora's Last Gift (essay)

"—and Subsequent Construction"

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Not Fade Away

Seduction of the Ignorant (speech)

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When he saw the small, weatherbeaten sign which read, WELCOME TO CALAIS, MAINE, Sam

Waterford smiled. It hurt his mouth, so he stopped.

He was tired and wired and as stiff as IRS penalties; he had been driving for ... how long? He did not

really know. There had been at least one entire night; he vividly remembered a succession of headlight

beams coring his eyeballs at some time in the distant past. Another night was near, the sun low in the

sky. It did not matter. In a few more minutes he would have reached an important point in his journey:

the longest undefended border in the world. Once past it, he would start being safe again . . .

He retained enough of the man he had once been to stop when he saw the Duty-Free Store. Reflex

politeness: a guest, especially an unexpected one, brings a gift. But the store was closed. It occurred to

him distantly that in his half-dozen trips through these parts, no matter what time he arrived, that store

had always been closed. The one on the Canadian side, on the other hand, was almost always open. Too

weary to wonder why, he got back into his Imperial and drove on.

He had vaguely expected to find a long lineup at the border crossing, but there was none. The guards

on the American side ignored him as he drove across the short bridge, and the guards on the Canadian

side waved him through. He was too weary to wonder at that, too—and distracted by the mild surge of

elation that came from leaving American soil, leaving the danger zone.

It was purely subjective, of course. As he drove slowly through the streets of St. Stephen, New

Brunswick, the only external reminders that he was in Canada were the speed limit signs marked in

metric and the very occasional bilingual sign (French, rather than the Spanish he was used to in New

York.). Nonetheless, he felt as though the invisible band around his skull had been loosened a few

notches. He found a Liquor Commission outlet and bought a bottle of Old Bushmill's for Greg and

Alice. A Burger King next door reminded him that he had not eaten for . . . however long the trip had

lasted so far, so he bought something squishy and ate it and threw most of it up again a few miles later.

He drove all the rest of that evening, and long into the night, through endless miles of tree-lined

highway interrupted only seldomly by a village speed-trap, and once by the purely nominal border

between the provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, and he reached the city of Halifax as the sun

was coming up on his left. Dimly he realized that he would shortly be drinking Old Bushmill's and

talking, and he expected both to be equally devastating to his system, so he took the trouble to find the

only all-night restaurant in Halifax and tried eating again, and this time it worked. He'd had no chance to

change his money, but of course the waitress was more than happy to accept Yankee currency: even

allowing him a 130% exchange rate, she was making thirty-seven cents profit on each dollar. The food

lifted his spirits just enough that he was able to idly admire Halifax as he drove through it, straining to

remember his way. It had been many years since any city in America had looked this pleasant—the

smog was barely noticeable, and the worst wino he noticed had bathed this year. As he drove past

Citadel Hill he could see the harbor, see pleasure craft dancing on the water (along with a couple of

toothless Canadian Forces destroyers and a sleek black American nuclear sub), see birds riding the

morning updrafts and hear their raucous calls. He was not, of course, in a good mood as he parked in

front of Greg and Alice's house, but he was willing to concede, in theory, that the trick was possible.

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He was still quite groggy; for some reason it seemed tremendously important to knock on the precise

geometrical center of Greg's door, and maddeningly difficult to do so. When the door opened anyway it

startled him. His plans stopped here; he had no idea what to do or say next.

"Sammy!" His old college buddy grinned and frowned simultaneously. "Jesus, man, it's good to see you

—or it would be if you didn't look like death on a soda cracker! What the hell are you doing here, why

didn't you—"

"They got her, Greg. They took Marian. There's nothing I—"

Suddenly Greg and the front of his house were gone, replaced by a ceiling, and Sam discovered that he

was indoors and horizontal. "—can do," he finished reflexively, and then realized that he must have

fainted. He reached for his head, probed for soft places.

"It's okay, Sam. I caught you as you went down. Relax."

Sam had forgotten what the last word meant; it came through as noise. He sat up, worked his arms and

legs as if by remote control. The arms hurt worse than the legs. "Got a cigarette? I ran out—" He thought

for a moment. "— yesterday, I think."

Greg handed him a twenty-five pack of Export A. "Fill your boots. Have you eaten more recently than

that?"

"Yeah. Funny—I actually forgot I smoked. Now, that's weird." He fumbled the pack open and lit a

cigarette; his first puff turned half an inch to ash and stained the filter. "Did I drop the bottle?"

"You left it in the car." Greg left the room, returned with two glasses of Irish whiskey. "You don't have

to talk until you're ready."

Sam restrained the urge to gulp. If you got too drunk, you had less control of your thoughts sometimes.

"They took her. The aliens—you must have read about them up here. They appropriated her, like losing

your home to municipal construction. Sorry, railroad's coming through, we need your universe. No, not

even that polite—I didn't even get the usual ten percent of market value and a token apology."

"Christ, Sam, I'm sorrier than I know how to say. Is she ... I mean, how is she taking it?"

"Better than I would. She's still alive."

Greg's face took on the expression of a man who is not sure he should be saying what he is saying, but

feels compelled to anyway. "Knowing you, the way you feel about such things, I'm surprised you didn't

kill her yourself."

"I tried. I couldn't. You know, that may just be the worst part."

"Ah, Sam, Sam—"

"She begged me to. And I couldn't!"

They waited together until he could speak again. "Damn," he said finally, "it's good to see you." And it

would be even better to see Alice. She must be at work, designing new software to deadline.

Greg looked like he'd been missing some sleep himself. Novelists often did. "You might as well get it

all out," he said. "How did it happen?"

Sam nodded slowly, reluctantly. "Get it over with. Not a lot to tell. We were laying in bed together,

watching TV. We'd ... we'd just finished making love. Funny, it was better than usual. I was feeling

blessed. Maybe that should have warned me or something. All of a sudden, in the middle of David

Letterman's show—do you get him up here?"

"We get all the American shows; these days, it's about all we get. Go on."

"Right in the middle of Stupid Pet Tricks, she just got up and left the room. I asked her to bring me

back some ice water. She didn't say anything. A few moments later I heard the front door open and

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close. I didn't attach any significance to it. After five or ten minutes I called to her. I assumed she was

peeing or something. When she didn't answer I got up and went to make sure she was all right. I couldn't

find her.

"I could not figure it out. You know how it is when something just does not make sense? She wasn't

anywhere in the apartment. I'd heard the door, but she couldn't have gone out—she was naked, barefoot,

her coat and boots were still in the hall closet. I couldn't imagine her unlocking the door for anyone we

didn't know, certainly not for someone who could snatch her out the door in two seconds without the

slightest sound or struggle. I actually found myself looking under chairs for her.

"So eventually I phoned the police, and got all the satisfaction you'd expect, and called everyone we

knew with no success at all, and finally I fell asleep at four A.M. hoping to God it was some kind of

monstrous joke she was playing on me.

"Two government guys in suits came that night. They told me what had happened to her. `Sir, your

wife has been requisitioned by aliens. Quite a few people's husbands and wives have been. And we

wouldn't do anything about it if we could, which we can't.' They were good; I never laid a hand on them.

When I calmed down enough they took me to the hospital to see her. She was in pretty good shape, all

things considered. Her feet were a mess, of course, from walking the streets barefoot. Exposure, fatigue.

After the aliens turned her loose, she was raped by four or five people before the police found her. You

remember New York at night. But they didn't cut her up or anything, just raped her. She told me she

almost didn't mind that. She said it was a relief to be only physically raped. To be able to struggle if she

wanted, even if it didn't help. To at least have the power to protest." He stubbed his cigarette out and

finished his drink. "Strange. She was just as naked while she was possessed, but no human tried to touch

her until afterward Like, occupado, you know?"

Greg gave him his own, untouched drink. "Go on."

"Well, God, we talked. You know, tried to talk. Mostly we cried. And then in the middle of a snuffle

she chopped off short and got up out of the hospital bed and left the room. I was so mixed up it took me

a good five seconds to catch on. When I did I went nuts. I tried to chase after her and catch her, and the

two government guys stopped me. I broke the nose of one of them, and they wrestled me into

somebody's room and gave me a shot. As it was taking hold I turned and looked sideways out the

window, just in time to catch a glimpse of her, three flights down, walking through the parking lot. Silly

little hospital gown, open at the back, paper slippers. Nobody got in her way. A doctor was walking in

the same direction; he was a zombie too. Masked and gloved, blood on his gloves; I hope he finished his

operation first. . .”

"She came home the next day, and we had about six hours. Long enough to say everything there was to

say five times, and a bunch of other things that maybe should never have been said. This time when she

left, she left dressed, with an empty bladder and money to get home with when they let her go. We had

accepted it, taken the first step in starting to plan around it. Only practical, right?" He shook his head,

hearing his neck crack, and finished off the second drink. It had no more effect than had the first.

"What happened then?"

"I got in the car and drove here."

For the first time, Greg looked deeply shocked. "You left her there, to deal with it alone?"

Someone grasped Sam's heart in impersonal hands and wrung it out. Greg must have seen the pain, and

some of the accusatory tone left his voice. "Jesus wept, Sam! Look, I know you. You've written three

entire books on brain-washing and mind-control, `the ultimate obscenity,' you call it: I know how

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uniquely horrible the whole thing must be to you, and for you. But you've been married to Marian for

ten years, as long as I've been married to Alice—how could you possibly have left her?"

The words came out like projectile vomit. "I had to, God damn it: I was scared!"

"Scared? Of what?"

"Of them, for Christ's sake, what's the matter with you? Scared that the thing would look out of her

eyes and notice me—and decide that I looked ... Useable." He began to shudder, and found it extremely

hard to stop. He lit another cigarette with shaking hands.

"Sam, it doesn't work that way—"

"I know, I know, they told me. Who said fear has to be logical?"

Greg sat back and sighed deeply, a mournful sound. There was a silence, then, which lasted for ten

seconds or more. The worst was said, and there was nothing else to say.

Finally Sam tried to distract himself with mundane trivia. "Listen, I saw the `No Parking' sign where I

parked, I just didn't give a damn. If I give you my keys, will you move it for me? I don't think I can."

"Can't do it," Greg said absently. "I don't dare. They could fine me four hundred bucks if I get caught

behind the wheel of an American-registered car, you know that."

The subject had come up on Sam's last visit, back in 1982. Marian had been with him, then. "Sorry. I

forgot."

"Sam, what made you decide to come here?"

He discovered that he did not know. He tried to analyze it. "Well, part of it is that I needed to tell

somebody the whole thing, and you and Alice are the only people on earth that love me enough. But

there wasn't even that much logic to it. I was just terrified, and I needed to get to someplace safe, and

Canada was the nearest place."

Greg burst out laughing.

Sam stared at him, scandalized. "What's so funny?"

It took Greg quite a while to stop laughing, but when he did—despite the smile that remained on his

face—Sam could see that he was very angry.

“Americans, no kidding. You're amazing. I should be used to it by now, I guess."

"What are you talking about?"

"About you, you smug, arrogant bastard. There are nasty old aliens in the States, taking people over

and using them to walk around and talk with, for mysterious purposes of their own—so what do you do?

Take off for Canada, where it'll be safe. You just assume, totally unconsciously, that the aliens will think

like you. That they'd never bother with a quaint, backward, jerkwater country like Canada, The Retarded

Giant On Your Doorstep! Don't you read the papers?"

"I don't—"

"Excuse me. Stupid of me: it probably wouldn't make the Stateside papers, would it? You simple

jackass, there are three times more Canadians hagridden than Americans! Even though you've got ten

times the population. They came here first."

"First? No, that can't be, I'd have heard—"

"Why? We barely heard about it ourselves, with two out of the sixteen channels Canadian originated. It

ain't news unless and until it happens in the friggin' United Snakes of America!" He had more to say, but

suddenly he tilted his head as if he heard something. "Hell. Stay there." He got up and left the room

hastily, muttering to himself.

Sam sat there, stunned by his old friend's inexplicable anger. He finished his cigarette and lit another

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while he tried to understand it. He heard a murmur of voices elsewhere in the house, and recognized the

one that wasn't Greg's. Alice was home from work. Perhaps she would be more sympathetic. He got up

and followed the sound of the voices, and it wasn't until he actually saw her that he remembered. Alice

hadn't worked night shift in over a year—and she had a home terminal now anyway ...

She was in pretty fair shape. Face drawn with fatigue, of course, and her hair in rats. She was fully

dressed except for pants and panties; there was an oil or grease stain on the side of her blouse. She tried

to smile when she saw Sam.

"He caught me sitting on the john," she said. "Hi, Sam." She burst into tears, still trying to smile.

He thought for a crazy second that she meant her husband. But no, of course, the "he" she referred to

was not Greg, but her—her rider. Her User ...

"Oh, my dear God," he said softly, still not quite believing. He had been so sure, so unthinkingly

convinced that it would be safe here.

"Naturally the Users came here first," Greg said with cold, bitter anger, handing his wife the slacks she

had kicked off on her way out the door some hours before. "We were meant for each other, them and

Canadians. Strong, superior parasites from the sky? Who just move right in and take over without asking

or apologizing?" His voice began to rise in pitch and volume. "Arrogant puppetmasters who show up

and start pulling your strings for you, dump you like a stolen car when they're done with you, too

powerful to fight and indifferent to your rage and shame? And your own government breaks its neck to

help 'em do whatever they want, sells out without even stopping to ask the price in case it might offend

'em?" He was shouting at the top of his lungs. "Hell, man, we almost didn't even notice the Users. We

took 'em for Americans."

Alice was dressed again now. Her voice was soft and hoarse; someone had been doing a lot of talking

with her vocal cords recently. "Greg, shut up."

"Well, dammit all, he--"

She put a hand over his mouth. "Please, my very beloved, shut your face. I can't talk louder than you

this time, my throat hurts."

He shut up at once, put his own hand over hers and held it tightly against his face, screwing his eyes

shut. She leaned against him and they put their free arms around each other; the sight made Sam want to

weep like a child.

"Greg," she said huskily, "I love you. Part of me wants to cheer what you just said; many Canadians

would. But you're wrong to say it."

"I know, baby, I know exactly the pain Sam's going through, don't I? That's why I got mad at him,

thinking his pain was bigger 'cause it was American. I'm sorry, Sam—"

"That's only part of why you're wrong. This is more important than our friendship with Sam and

Marian, my love. Pay attention: you would never have said what you said if there'd been an Inuit in the

room. Or a MicMac, or a French Canadian, or a Pakistani. You'd never have said it if we were standing

in North Preston, talking to someone who used to live in Africville till they moved all the darkies out to

build a bridge approach. Don't you see, darling, everybody is a Canadian now. Everybody on Earth is

now a Native People; a Frog; a Wog; a Paid; a Nigger—gradations of Niggerhood just don't seem all

that important any more.

"Gregory, some of the Users wear a human body as though it ought to have flippers, or extra legs, or

wings—I saw one try to make an arm work like a tentacle, and break it. There are a lot of different races

and species and genuses of User—one of the things they seem to be using Earth for is a conference table

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at which to work out their own hierarchy of power and intelligence and wealth. I've heard a lot of the

palaver; they don't bother to turn my ears off because they don't care if I hear or not. Most of it I don't

understand even though they do use English a lot, but a few things I've noticed.

"If two neighboring races discover that one is vastly superior to the other in resources or wisdom or

aggressiveness, they don't spend a lot of time whining about the inequity of it all. They figure out where

it looks like the water is going to wind up when it's finished flowing downhill, and then they start

looking for ways to live with that.

"I've never heard a User say the words, `It's not fair.' Apparently, if you can form that thought, you

don't reach the stars. The whole universe is a hierarchy of Users and Used, from the race that developed

the long-distance telepathy that brought them all here, down to the cute little microorganisms that are

ruthlessly butchered every day by a baby seal. We're part of that chain, and if we can't live with that,

we'll die."

The three were silent for a time. Finally Sam cleared his throat. "If you two will excuse me," he said

softly, "I have to be getting back home to my wife now."

Alice turned to him, and gave him a smile so sad and so brave that he thought his heart might break.

"Sam," she said, "that's a storybook ending. I hope it works out that way for you. But don't blow your

brains out if it doesn't, okay? Or hers. You write about mind-control and the institution of slavery

because subversion of the human free will, loss of control, holds a special horror for you. You're the

kind that dies fighting instead. Marian isn't. I'm not. Most humans aren't, even though they like to feel

they would be if it came to it. Maybe that's why the Users came here.

"It may be that you and Marian can't live together any more; I don't know. I do know that you need

twelve hours' sleep and a couple of good meals before it's safe to let you back on the highway—and

Greg and I badly need someone to talk to. My User won't be back for another ten hours or so. What

would you say to some eggs and back bacon?"

Sam closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "I guess I'd say, `Hello there—do you mind if I use you for

twelve hours or so?'" And turn you into shit in the process, he thought, but he found that he was ashamed

of the thought, and that was something, at least. "Can I use your phone?"

"Only if you reverse the charges, you cheap Yankee son of a bitch," Greg said at once, and came and

hugged him hard.

I was singing along with John Lennon when she crowned me from behind: that's how the rape began.

I don't often sing along with jukeboxes; a fellow like me can get hurt that way. It's not just that I can't

carry a tune. I seem to have one of those faces that stevedores and bikers and truckers—and even the

odd minister in his cups—love to punch, just on general principles, I guess, so I tend to avoid drawing

attention to myself when I'm in a bar.

No, I'll be more honest than that. I can be honest, you see—because it's my choice. I'll metaphorically

strip myself for you, and then you'll see that it wasn't because she raped my body that I wanted to kill

her, or even my mind, but because she raped my soul.

So, being honest: it isn't just for fear of getting punched that I make myself inconspicuous in bars.

Contrary to what you may have heard, there aren't that many real bullies in the world; most men looking

for a fight will leave me alone, the way a hunter with an elephant gun will walk past a gerbil. What I'm

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really avoiding when I make myself inconspicuous is pity.

I mean, look at me. Most of the people who ever have, failed to see me at all—the eye tends to subtract

me—but those who do notice usually feel sorry for me. My chin and my Adam's apple are like twin

brothers in bunk beds. I got this nose. My dad used to say that my ears made me look like a taxicab

coming down the street with the doors open. My glasses weigh more than my shoes, and my shoes

weigh more than the rest of me.

I mean, I'll bet you think a prostitute will take anybody, that any man with enough money can get laid.

It may be true. I've never had enough money. Oh, once I got a woman to agree, for three times the going

rate ... but the way she went about it, I just couldn't do it—to her total lack of surprise. I've never really

given up hope since, in my adolescence, I first heard the term "mercy hump"—but so far, I haven't found

that much mercy in the world.

So when the jukebox clicked, and John Lennon began to tell me that he was a loser, I just naturally

chimed in on the second, "I'm a l-o-o-oser". And felt something circular and weighty being pressed

down over my head—and heard the most beautiful voice in the world, right behind my ear, sing the next

line of the song—and spun quickly around and saw her.

Oh my, it hurt to look at her. You're a normal man, friend, no doubt you've won some and lost some

but didn't you ever see one that you just knew on sight you'd trade your home and wife and children and

hope of immortality and twenty years of your mortal life for ten minutes in bed with—and knew just as

clearly that you'd never ever get her, even at that price? God, it's a sweet pain, that is, and I know a lot

more about it than you do. Every man has in his mind an ideal of the Perfectly Beautiful Woman—she

was better looking than that, and better dressed.

"Forgive me, sir," she said.

I guess I should remember that those were the fast words she said to me—if you don't count the song

lyric. At the time I remember thinking that I was prepared to forgive her anything whatsoever. It shows

you how wrong you can be.

To my gratified surprise, my voice worked. "Forgive you?"

"I just couldn't help myself."

With an effort I tore my attention from a close examination of her parts and perimeters, and tried to

imagine why she could possibly feel a need to apologize to me. Oh yes—she had put something heavy

on my head. I felt it with my fingertips. It felt like a crown. Reluctantly I took my eyes away from her

and looked in the mirror behind the bar.

Yep, that was a crown on my head, all right. A simple, inch-wide band of gold around my forehead,

elaborately chased but otherwise unadorned. It was so heavy, it had to be real gold or gilded lead.

Alongside the twin miracles of her existence and the fact that she was speaking to me (and calling me

"sir"!), nothing was strange. "That's perfectly all right," I said, quite as though preternaturally beautiful

women put thousands of dollars worth of gold on my brow every third Thursday, and I were becoming

resigned to it. System crash of the brain.

She did something with her face that I don't have a word for. Deep in the shielded core of my heart,

graphite rods slid up out of the fuel mass, and the pile temperature began climbing toward meltdown

point. "It was unforgivable of me to intrude upon your privacy."

She had a faint, indefinable accent; I guessed Middle European of some kind. She was ... well, I'd say

she was beaming at me, but you'd think I only meant she was smiling. I mean she was beaming at me,

the way an airport beams at an approaching plane to guide it. I realized with a start that she was looking

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at me just exactly the same way I was looking at her. Captivated, wistful, yearning—no, outright

hungering and thirsting. I'd seen the look before, in movies starring Marilyn Chambers.

I ask you to believe that I am not a complete idiot. My first thought was that it had to be a mistake. But

the light in the bar wasn't bad enough. So my second thought was that it had to be a trick, a trap of some

kind.

That was absolutely fine with me. I tried to visualize the worst possible outcome. Say that, in exchange

for being allowed to touch her, to put my hand somewhere on her skin—her shoulder, say—I were to be

beaten, robbed and killed. Okay, fair enough; no problem there. A weird little phrase ran through my

head: I'll be her sucker if she'll be my succor. (I seem now to hear a phantom Kingfish saying, "Boy, you

is de suckee.") Male black widow spiders obviously think they have a good deal going for them.

"It's uncanny," she repeated, and touched my hand. With hers.

"It certainly is," I said, referring to the astonishing discovery that knuckles can be erogenous zones.

"Would you mind standing up, sir?"

That kicked off an ambiguous reaction. If I stood up, the bulge in my trousers would become visible.

Even more embarrassing, it might not become visible enough. Conflicting imperatives paralyzed me.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm being rude again. It's just that I dreamt about you last night. It was a very

pleasant dream."

"I've dreamed about you all my life," I said, "and it has always been pleasant. You're very beautiful." A

happy feeling was growing in me. First, because I had finally managed to say something intelligent and

gallant. And second, because she had just named a barely plausible reason why a woman like her could

be interested in a guy like me.

I mean, you have to understand that my father always insisted I wasn't his—until my sixteenth

birthday, when he gave up and apologized to my mother. "It has to be some kind of mutation," he

admitted. "You would never have cheated on me with someone who looked like that."

But anything can happen in a dream. Lord, who knows better than I? For the first time I was willing to

—tentatively—believe that her obvious attraction signals might just be genuine. The possibilities were

staggering.

"My mother was," she answered, dimpling, "the most beautiful Queen that Ragovia ever had."

"You're a princess." Well, of course. Dream logic.

"Only by courtesy. I'll never be queen—Ragovia became a democracy a few years ago."

"I'm terribly sorry to hear that."

"Oh, it was a bloodless coup. A telegram to our summer place in Barbados, and that was essentially it.

Father moped for a week."

"Well, naturally."

"I can't get over how much you look like the man in my dream. He was wearing Father's crown. That's

why I just had to put it on your head—to see if the resemblance could possibly be as complete as it

seemed."

I threw caution to the winds and stood up. "And is it?"

Her eyes went down and then up me. On the way down they paused just where I had hoped/feared they

would. When her eyes got back up to mine, she was smiling. "The resemblance is exact."

"Princess—uh—"

"Oh, forgive me again. My name is Marga."

"My name is Fleming, Princess Marga."

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"Please, Marga alone is sufficient." And without the slightest hesitation or change of voice or manner,

she went on, "Fleming, do you know of some quiet, private place nearby where we could be alone

together?"

A man next to me made an odd swallowing sound. I dug a finger into my ear. "Too much noise in here.

I could have sworn that you just asked me . . . " I could not repeat what I thought I had heard.

"I asked you if you have a place where we can be alone together. As we were in my dream last night."

I drew in a deep breath, and then could not remember what to do with it. "Why?" I croaked.

"So that I can screw you into a coma."

Exhale. That was what you did with deep breaths. No, too late now: I was paralyzed. That breath was

going to have to last me the rest of my life.

"—" I said.

"If you have no place near," she went on, "we could find an alley. Or we could lock ourselves in the

toilet here. But I am mad with lust for you and must have you as soon as possible."

People had been surreptitiously watching ever since Marga had sat down next to me, and now there

were two small, musical explosions as the customers on either side of us dropped their drinks.

I decided that, while this was a splendid moment to die, even better ones might lie in the future; with an

effort I got my breathing reflex started again.

"The feeling is mutual. That is, I hope it will be. That is—yes, I have a place near here."

"Let's hurry! In my dream we were wonderful together!"

A lot of people were watching now. I glanced around as I took her hand, the way I've seen it done in

movies, and nothing in my life had ever tasted as good as the sight of all those gaping faces.

Understand, I knew perfectly well that something was going to go wrong. I would never get her to my

place, or she'd change her mind, or I wouldn't get it up, or I wouldn't get it in, or I'd get in and it'd be

disappointing, or she'd have AIDS, or a bonebreaker boyfriend—the exact nature of the doom was as yet

unknown, but I knew in my heart that something was going to go wrong. (And of course, I was mistaken

about that.) But I didn't care. The thrill of seeing all those stunned faces watching her leave with me,

rubbing up against me like a cat who's just heard the can opener, was—I firmly believed—worth any

disappointment. (And you know, perhaps I was nearly right about that.) As we reached the door, she

opened it for me with her left hand, and her right hand settled firmly and unmistakably on my ass to

guide me out into the night. There was an audible collective gasp from behind us.

Once we were on the street I flung up my arm to hail a cab. Cabs never stop for me, even when I wave

large bills at them. I was operating on dream logic.

And a cab pulled up with a squeal of brakes, and the cabbie jumped out and opened the door for us.

It was her, of course, not me. I knew just how the cabbie felt. I could sense his astonishment that she

was with me, and I agreed with him, and gave him a smile that tried to say, "It's a dream, pal, go with it.

For God's sake, go with it!"

When he got back behind the wheel, he adjusted the rearview mirror and I met his baffled gaze. I gave

my address, Marga added "—and hurry!" in a voice thick with lust, and his eyes widened even further.

We started up with a roar and a lurch, and the moment we were up to speed she opened my fly.

The cab seemed to lock its brakes on ice, spin wildly and smash into a gasoline truck. She made a small

sound of contentment and continued what she was doing. The phantom flames roared ...

The cabdriver was so profoundly shocked he was actually driving at a safe legal speed, and took us to

my place by the shortest, most direct route. Marga appeared to be totally engrossed in what she was

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