Stranger in a Strange Land
Part 2

XXI

THE MEETING ADJOURNED. Jubal found his intention of getting his flock out of the Palace balked by the presence of the American President and of Senator Boone; both wanted to chat with Mike, both were practical politicians who realized fully the freshly enhanced value of being seen on intimate terms with the Man from Mars - and both were well aware that the eyes of the world, via stereovision, were still on them.
And other hungry politicos were closing in.
Jubal said quickly, "Mr. President, Senator - we're leaving at once to have lunch. Can you join us?" He reflected that two in private would be easier to handle than two dozen in public - and he had to get Mike out of there before anything came unstuck.
To his relief both had other duties elsewhere. Jubal found himself promising not only to fetch Mike to that obscene Fosterite service but also to bring him to the White House - oh, well, the boy could always get sick, if necessary. "Places, girls."
With his escort again around him Mike was convoyed to the roof, Anne leading the way since she would remember it - and creating quite a bow wave with her height, her Valkyrie blonde beauty, and her impressive cloak of a Fair Witness. Jubal, Ben, and the three officers from the Champion covered the rear. Larry and the Greyhound bus were waiting on the roof; a few minutes later the driver left them on the roof of the New Mayflower. Newsmen caught up with them there, of course, but the girls guarded Mike on down to the suite Duke had taken earlier. They were becoming quite good at it and were enjoying it; Miriam and Dorcas in particular displayed ferocity that reminded Jubal of a mother cat defending her young - only they made a game of it, keeping score against each other. A reporter that closed within three feet of either of them courted a spiked instep.
They found their corridor patrolled by S.S. troopers and an officer outside the door of their suite.
Jubal's back hair rose, but he realized (or "hoped," he corrected himself) that their presence meant that Douglas was carrying out his half of the bargain in full measure. The letter Jubal had sent to Douglas before the conference, explaining what he was going to do and say, and why, had included a plea to Douglas to use his power and influence to protect Mike's privacy from here on - so that the unfortunate lad could begin to lead a normal life. (If a "normal" life was possible for Mike, Jubal again corrected himself.)
So Jubal merely called out, "Jill! Keep Mike under control. It's okay."
"Right, Boss."
And so it was. The officer at the door simply saluted. Jubal glanced at him, "Well! Howdy, Major. Busted down any doors lately?"
Major Bloch turned red but kept his eyes forward and did not answer. Jubal wondered if the assignment was punishment? No, likely just coincidence; there probably wouldn't be more than a handful of S.S. officers of appropriate rank available for the chore in this area. Jubal considered rubbing it in by saying that a skunk had wandered in that door and ruined his living room furniture - and what was the major going to do about that? But he decided against it; it would not only be ungracious but untrue- Duke had rigged a temporary closure out of plywood before the party got too wet for such tasks.
Duke was waiting inside. Jubal said, "Sit down, gentlemen. How about it, Duke?"
Duke shrugged. "Who knows? Nobody has bugged this suite since I took it; I guarantee that. I turned down the first suite they offered me, just as you said to, and I picked this one because it's got a heavy ceiling - the ballroom is above us. And I've spent the time since searching the place. But, Boss, I've pushed enough electrons to know that any dump can be bugged, so that you can't find it without tearing the building down."
"Fine, fine - but I didn't mean that. They can't keep a hotel this big bugged throughout just on the chance that we might take a room in it - at least, I don't think they can. I mean, 'How about the supplies?' I'm hungry, boy, and very thirsty - and we've three more for lunch."
"Oh, that. That stuff was unloaded under my eyes, carried down the same way, placed just inside the door; I put it all in the pantry. You've got a suspicious nature, Boss."
"I sure have - and you'd better acquire one if you want to live as long as I have." Jubal had just trusted Douglas with a fortune equivalent to a medium-sized national debt - but he had not assumed that Douglas' overeager lieutenants would not tamper with food and drink. So to avoid the services of a food taster he had fetched all the way from the Poconos plenty of food, more than a plenty of liquor - and a little water. And, of course, ice cubes. He wondered how Caesar had licked the Gauls without ice cubes.
"I don't hanker to," Duke answered.
"Matter of taste. I've had a pretty good time, on the whole. Get crackin', girls. Anne, douse your cloak and get useful. First girl back in here with a drink for me skips her next turn at 'Front.' After our guests, I mean. Do please sit down, gentlemen. Sven, what's your favorite poison? Akvavit, I suppose - Larry, tear down, find a liquor store and fetch back a couple of bottles of akvavit. Fetch Bols gin for the captain, too."
"Hold it, Jubal," Nelson said firmly. "I won't touch akvavit unless it's chilled overnight - and I'd rather have Scotch."
"Me, too," agreed van Tromp.
"All right. Got enough of that to drown a horse. Dr. Mahmoud? If you prefer soft drinks, I'm pretty sure the girls tucked some in."
Mahmoud looked wistful. "I should not allow myself to be tempted by strong drink."
"No need to be. Let me prescribe for you, as a physician." Jubal looked him over. "Son, you look as if you had been under considerable nervous strain. Now we could alleviate that with meprobamate but since we don't have that at hand, I'm forced to substitute two ounces of ninety proof ethanol, repeat as needed. Any particular flavor you prefer to kill the medicinal taste? And with or without bubbles?"
Mahmoud smiled and suddenly did not look at all English. "Thank you, Doctor - but I'll sin my own sins, with my eyes open. Gin, please, with water on the side. Or vodka. Or whatever is available."
"Or medicinal alcohol," Nelson added. "Don't let him pull your leg, Jubal. Stinky drinks anything - and always regrets it."
"I do regret it," Mahmoud said earnestly, "because I know it is sinful."
"Then don't needle him about it, Sven," Jubal said brusquely. "If Stinky gets more mileage out of his sins by regretting them, that's his business. My own regretter burned out from overload during the market crash in '29 and I've never replaced it - and that's my business. To each his own. How about victuals, Stinky? Anne probably stuffed a ham into one of those hampers - and there might be other unclean items not as clearly recognizable. Shall I check?"
Mahmoud shook his head. "I'm not a traditionalist, Jubal. That legislation was given a long time ago, according to the needs of the time. The times are different now."
Jubal suddenly looked sad. "Yes. But for the better? Never mind, this too shall pass and leave not a rack of mutton behind. Eat what you will, my brother - God forgives necessity."
"Thank you. But, truthfully, I often do not eat in the middle of the day."
"Better eat, or the prescribed ethanol will do more than relax you. Besides, these kids who work for me may sometimes misspell words but they are all superb cooks."
Miriam had come up behind Jubal with a tray bearing four drinks, orders having been filled at once while Jubal ranted. "Boss," she broke in, "I heard that. Will you put it in writing?"
"What?" He whirled around and glared at her. "Snooping! You stay in after school and write one thousand times, 'I will not flap my ears at private conversations.' Stay until you finish it."
"Yes, Boss. This is for you, Captain� and for you, Dr. Nelson and this is yours, Dr. Mahmoud. Water on the side, you said?"
"Yes, Miriam. Thank you."
"Usual Harshaw service - sloppy but fast. Here's yours, Boss." "You put water in it!"
"Anne's orders. She says you're too tired to have it on the rocks."
Jubal looked long-suffering. "You see what I have to put up with, gentlemen? We should never have put shoes on 'em. Miriam, make that 'one thousand times' in Sanskrit."
"Yes, Boss. Just as soon as I find time to learn it." She patted him on the head. "You go right ahead and have your tizzy, dear; you've earned it. We're all proud of you."
"Back to the kitchen, woman. Hold it - has everybody else got a drink? Where's Ben's drink? Where's Ben?"
"They have by now. Ben is phoning in his column, His drink is at his elbow."
"Very well. You may back out quietly, without formality - and send Mike in. Gentlemen! Me ke aloha pau ole! - for there are fewer of us every year." He drank, they joined him.
"Mike's helping. He loves to help - I think he's going to be a butler when he grows up."
"I thought you had left. Send him in anyhow; Dr. Nelson wants to give him a physical examination."
"No hurry," put in the ship's surgeon. "Jubal, this is excellent Scotch - but what was the toast?"
"Sorry. Polynesian. 'May our friendship be everlasting.' Call it a footnote to the water ceremony this morning. By the way, gentlemen, both Larry and Duke are water brothers to Mike, too, but don't let it fret you. They can't cook� but they're the sort to have at your back in a dark alley."
"If you vouch for them, Jubal," van Tromp assured him, "admit them and tyle the door. But let's drink to the girls while we're alone. Sven, what's that toast of yours to the flickas?"
"You mean the one to all pretty girls everywhere? Let's drink just to the four who are here. Skim!!" They drank to their female water brothers and Nelson continued, "Jubal, where do you find them?"
"Raise 'em in my own cellar. Then just when I've got 'em trained and some use to me, some city slicker always comes along and marries them. It's a losing game."
"I can see how you suffer," Nelson said sympathetically.
"I do. I trust all of you gentlemen are married?"
Two were. Mahmoud was not. Jubal looked at him bleakly. "Would you have the grace to discorporate yourself? After lunch, of course - I wouldn't want you to do it on an empty stomach."
"I'm no threat, I'm a permanent bachelor."
"Come, come, sir! I saw Dorcas making eyes at you� and you were purring."
"I'm safe, I assure you." Mahmoud thought of telling Jubal that he would never marry out of his faith, decided that a gentile would take it amiss - even a rare exception like Jubal. He changed the subject. "But, Jubal, don't make a suggestion like that to Mike. He wouldn't grok that you were joking - and you might have a corpse on your hands. I don't know� I don't know that Mike can actually think himself dead. But he would try� and if he were truly a Martian, it would work."
"I'm sure he can," Nelson said firmly. "Doctor - 'Jubal,' I mean - have you noticed anything odd about Mike's metabolism?"
"Uh, let me put it this way. There isn't anything about his metabolism which I have noticed that is not odd. Very."
"Exactly."
Jubal turned to Mahmoud. "But don't worry that I might invite Mike to suicide. I've learned not to joke with him, not ever. I grok that he doesn't grok joking." Jubal blinked thoughtfully. "But I don't grok 'grok' - not really. Stinky, you speak Martian."
"A little."
"You speak it fluently, I heard you. Do you grok 'grok'?"
Mahmoud looked very thoughtful. "No. Not really. 'Grok' is the most important word in the Martian language - and I expect to spend the next forty years trying to understand it and perhaps use some millions of printed words trying to explain it. But I don't expect to be successful. You need to think in Martian to grok the word 'grok.' Which Mike does and I don't. Perhaps you have noticed that Mike takes a rather veering approach to some of the simplest human ideas?"
"Have I! My throbbing head!"
"Mine, too."
"Food," announced Jubal. "Lunch, and about time, too. Girls, put it down where we can reach it and maintain a respectful silence. Go on talking, Doctor, if you will. Or does Mike's presence make it better to postpone it?"
"Not at all." Mahmoud spoke briefly in Martian to Mike. Mike answered him, smiled sunnily; his expression became blank again and he applied himself to food, quite content to be allowed to eat in silence. "I told him what I was trying to do and he told me that I would speak rightly; this was not his opinion but a simple statement of fact, a necessity. I hope that if I fail to, he will notice and tell me. But I doubt if he will. You see, Mike thinks in Martian - and this gives him an entirely different 'map' of the universe from that which you and I use. You follow me?"
"I grok it," agreed Jubal. "Language itself shapes a man's basic ideas."
"Yes, but - Doctor, you speak Arabic, do you not?"
"Eh? I used to, badly, many years ago," admitted Jubal. "Put in a while as a surgeon with the American Field Service, in Palestine. But I don't now. I still read it a little� because I prefer to read the words of the Prophet in the original."
"Proper. Since the Koran cannot be translated - the 'map' changes on translation no matter how carefully one tries. You will understand, then, how difficult I found English. It was not alone that my native language has much simpler inflections and more limited tenses; the whole 'map' changed. English is the largest of the human tongues, with several times the vocabulary of the second largest language - this alone made it inevitable that English would eventually become, as it did, the lingua franca of this planet, for it is thereby the richest and the most flexible - despite its barbaric accretions� or, I should say, because of its barbaric accretions. English swallows up anything that comes its way, makes English out of it. Nobody tried to stop this process, the way some languages are policed and have official limits� probably because there never has been, truly, such a thing as 'the King's English' - for 'the King's English' was French. English was in truth a bastard tongue and nobody cared how it grew� and it did! - enormously. Until no one could hope to be an educated man unless he did his best to embrace this monster.
"Its very variety, subtlety, and utterly irrational, idiomatic complexity makes it possible to say things in English which simply cannot be said in any other language. It almost drove me crazy� until I learned to think in it - and that put a new 'map' of the world on top of the one I grew up with. A better one, in many ways - certainly a more detailed one.
"But nevertheless there are things which can be said in the simple Arabic tongue that cannot be said in English."
Jubal nodded agreement. "Quite true. That's why I've kept up my reading of it, a little."
"Yes. But the Martian language is so much more complex than is English - and so wildly different in the fashion in which it abstracts its picture of the universe - that English and Arabic might as well be considered one and the same language, by comparison. An Englishman and an Arab can learn to think each other's thoughts, in the other's language. But I'm not certain that it will ever be possible for us to think in Martian (other than by the unique fashion Mike learned it) - oh, we can learn a sort of a 'pidgin' Martian, yes - that is what I speak.
"Now take this one word: 'grok.' Its literal meaning, one which I suspect goes back to the origin of the Martian race as thinking, speaking creatures - and which throws light on their whole 'map' - is quite easy. 'Grok' means 'to drink.'"
"Huh?" said Jubal. "But Mike never says 'grok' when he's just talking about drinking. He-"
"Just a moment." Mahmoud spoke to Mike in Martian.
Mike looked faintly surprised and said, "'Grok' is drink," and dropped the matter.
"But Mike would also have agreed," Mahmoud went on, "if I had named a hundred other English words, words which represent what we think of as different concepts, even pairs of antithetical concepts. And 'grok' means all of these, depending on how you use it. It means 'fear,' it means 'love,' it means 'hate' - proper hate, for by the Martian 'map' you cannot possibly hate anything unless you grok it completely, understand it so thoroughly that you merge with it and it merges with you - then and only then can you hate it. By hating yourself. But this also implies, by necessity, that you love it, too, and cherish it and would not have it otherwise. Then you can hate - and (I think) that Martian hate is an emotion so black that the nearest human equivalent could only be called a mild distaste."
Mahmoud screwed up his face. "It means 'identically equal' in the mathematical sense. The human clich, 'This hurts me worse than it does you' has a Martian flavor to it, if only a trace. The Martians seem to know instinctively what we learned painfully from modern physics, that the observer interacts with the observed simply through the process of observation. 'Grok' means to understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of the process being observed - to merge, to blend, to intermarry, to lose personal identity in group experience. It means almost everything that we mean by religion, philosophy, and science - and it means as little to us as color means to a blind man." Mahmoud paused. "Jubal, if I chopped you up and made a stew of you, you and the stew, whatever else was in it, would grok - and when I ate you, we would grok together and nothing would be lost and it would not matter which one of us did the chopping up and eating."
"It would to me!" Jubal said firmly.
"You aren't a Martian." Mahmoud stopped again to talk to Mike in Martian.
Mike nodded. "You spoke rightly, my brother Dr. Mahmoud. I am been saying so. Thou art God."
Mahmoud shrugged helplessly. "You see how hopeless it is? All I got was a blasphemy. We don't think in Martian. We can't"
"Thou art God," Mike said agreeably. "God groks."
"Hell, let's change the subject! Jubal, could I impose on my fraternal status for some more gin?"
"I'll get it," said Dorcas, and jumped up.
It was a pleasant family picnic, made easy by Jubal's gift for warm informality, a gift shared by his staff, plus the fact that the three newcomers were themselves the same easy sort of people - each learned, acclaimed, and with no need to strive. And all four men shared a foster-father interest in Mike. Even Dr. Mahmoud, rarely truly off guard with those who did not share with him the one true faith in submission to the Will of God, always beneficent, merciful, found himself relaxed and happy. It had pleased him very much to learn that Jubal read the words of the Prophet and, now that he stopped to notice it, the women of Jubal's household were really much plumper than he had thought at first glance. That dark one- But he put the thought out of his mind; he was a guest.
But it pleased him very much that these women did not chatter, did not intrude themselves into the sober talk of men, but were very quick with food and drink in warm hospitality. He had been shocked at Miriam's casual disrespect toward her master - then recognized it for what it was: liberty permitted cats and favorite children in the privacy of the home.
Jubal explained early that they were doing nothing but waiting on word from the Secretary General. "If he means business - and I think he's ready to deal - we may hear from him yet today. If not, we'll go home this evening� and come back if we have to. But if we had stayed in the Palace, he might have been tempted to dicker. Here, dug into our own hole, we can refuse to dicker."
"Dicker for what?" asked Captain van Tromp. "You gave him what he wanted."
"Not all that he wanted. Douglas would rather have that power of attorney be utterly irrevocable� instead of on his good behavior, with the power reverting to a man he despises and is afraid of - namely that scoundrel there with the innocent smile, our brother Ben, But there are others besides Douglas who are certain to want to dicker, too. That bland buddha Kung - hates my guts, I've just snatched the rug out from under him. But if he could figure a deal that might tempt us - before Douglas nails this down - he would offer it. So we stay out of his way, too. Kung is one reason why we are eating and drinking nothing that we did not fetch with us."
"You really feel that's something to worry about?" asked Nelson. "Truthfully, Jubal, I had assumed that you were a gourmet who insisted on his own cuisine even away from home. I can't imagine being poisoned, in a major hotel such as this."
Jubal shook his head sorrowfully. "Sven, you're the sort of honest man who thinks everybody else is honest - and you are usually right. No, nobody is going to try to poison you� but your wife might collect your insurance simply because you shared a dish with Mike."
"You really think that?"
"Sven, I'll order anything you want. But I won't touch it and I won't let Mike touch it. For I'll lay heavy odds that any waiter who comes to this suite will be on Kung's payroll� and maybe on two or three others'. I'm not seeing boogie men behind bushes; they know where we are - and they've had a couple of hours in which to act. Sven, in cold seriousness, my principal worry has been to keep this lad alive long enough to figure out a way to sterilize and stabilize the power he represents� so that it would be to no one's advantage to have him dead."
Jubal sighed. "Consider the black widow spider. It's a timid little beastie, useful and, for my taste, the prettiest of the arachnids, with its shiny, patent-leather finish and its red hourglass trademark. But the poor thing has the fatal misfortune of possessing enormously too much power for its size. So everybody kills it on sight.
"The black widow can't help it, it has no way to avoid its venomous power.
"Mike is in the same dilemma. He isn't as pretty as a black widow spider-"
"Why, Jubal!" Dorcas said indignantly. "What a mean thing to say! And how utterly untrue!"
"Sorry, child. I don't have your glandular bias in the matter. Pretty or not, Mike can't get rid of that money, nor is it safe for him to have it. And not just Kung. The High Court is not as 'non-political' as it might be although their methods would probably make a prisoner out of him rather than kill him - a fate which, for my taste, is worse. Not to mention a dozen other interested parties, in and out of public office� persons who might or might not kill him, but who have certainly turned over in their minds just how it would affect their fortunes if Mike were guest of honor at a funeral. I-"
"Telephone, Boss."
"Anne, you have just interrupted a profound thought. You hail from Porlock."
"No, Dallas."
"And I will not answer the phone for anyone."
"She said to tell you it was Becky."
"Why didn't you say so?" Jubal hurried out of the living room, found Madame Vesant's friendly face in the screen. "Becky! I'm glad to see you, girl!" He did not bother to ask how she had known where to call him.
"Hi, Doc. I caught your act - and I just had to call and tell you so."
"How'd it look?"
"The Professor would have been proud of you. I've never seen a tip turned more expertly. Then you spilled 'em before the marks knew what had hit 'em. Dot, the profession lost a great talker when you weren't born twins."
"That's high praise, coming from you, Becky." Jubal thought rapidly. "But you set up the act; I just cashed in on it - and there's plenty of cash. So name your fee, Becky, and don't be shy." He decided that, whatever figure she picked, he would double it. That drawing account he had demanded for Mike would never feel it� and it was better, far better, to pay Becky off lavishly than to let the obligation stay open.
Madame Vesant frowned. "Now you've hurt my feelings."
"Becky, Becky! You're a big girl now, dear. Anybody can clap and cheer - but applause worthwhile will be found in a pile of soft, green, folding money. Not my money. The Man from Mars picks up this tab and, believe me, he can afford it." He grinned. "But all you'll get from me is thanks, and a hug and a kiss that will crack your ribs the first time I see you."
She relaxed and smiled. "I'll hold you to it. I remember how you used to pat my fanny while you assured me that the Professor was sure to get well - you always could make a body feel better."
"I can't believe that I ever did anything so unprofessional."
"You did, you know you did. And you weren't very fatherly about it, either."
"Maybe so. Maybe I thought it was the treatment you needed. I've given up fanny-patting for Lent - but I'll make an exception in your case."
"You'd better."
"And you'd better figure out that fee. Don't forget the zeroes."
"Uh, I'll think about it. But, truthfully, Doc, there are more ways of collecting a fee than by making a fast count on the change. Have you been watching the market today?"
"No, and don't tell me about it. Come over and have a drink instead."
"Uh, I'd better not. I promised, well, a rather important client that I would be available for instant consultation."
"I see. Mmm� Becky do you suppose that the stars would show that this whole matter would turn out best for everybody if it were all wrapped up, signed, sealed, and notarized today? Maybe just after the stock market closes?"
She looked thoughtful. "I could look into it."
"You do that. And come stay with us when you aren't so busy. Stay as long as you like and never wear your hurtin' shoes the whole time. You'll like the boy. He's as weird as snake's suspenders but sweet as a stolen kiss, too."
"Uh� I will. As soon as I can. Thanks, Doc."
They said good-by and Jubal returned to find that Dr. Nelson had taken Mike into one of the bedrooms and was checking him over. He joined them to offer Nelson the use of his kit since Nelson had not had with him his professional bag.
Jubal found Mike stripped down and the ship's surgeon looking baffled. "Doctor," Nelson said, almost angrily, "I saw this patient only ten days ago. Tell me where he got those muscles?"
"Why, he sent in a coupon from the back cover of Rut: The Magazine for He-Men. You know, the ad that tells how a ninety-pound weakling can-"
"Doctor, please!"
"Why don't you ask him?" Jubal suggested.
Nelson did so. "I thinked them," Mike answered.
"That's right," Jubal agreed. "He 'thinked' 'em. When I got him, just over a week ago, he was a mess, slight, flabby, and pale. Looked as if he had been raised in a cave - which I gather he was, more or less. So I told him he had to grow strong. So he did."
"Exercises?" Nelson said doubtfully.
"Nothing systematic. Swimming, when and as he wished."
"A week of swimming won't make a man look as if he had been sweating over bar bells for years!" Nelson frowned. "I am aware that Mike has voluntary control over the so-called 'involuntary' muscles, But that is not entirely without precedent. This, on the other hand, requires one to assume that-"
"Doctor," Jubal said gently, "why don't you just admit that you don't grok it and save the wear and tear?"
Nelson sighed. "I might as well. Put your clothes on, Michael."
Somewhat later, Jubal, under the mellowing influence of congenial company and the grape, was unburdening to the three from the Champion his misgivings about his morning's work. "The financial end was simple enough: just tie up Mike's money so that a struggle over it couldn't take place. Not even if he dies, because I've let Douglas know privately that Mike's death ends his stewardship whereas a rumour from a usually reliable source - me, in this case - has reached Kung and several others to the effect that Mike's death will give Douglas permanent control. Of course, if I had had magical powers, I would have stripped the boy not only of all political significance but also of every penny of his inheritance. That-"
"Why would you have done that, Jubal?" the captain interrupted.
Harshaw looked surprised. "Are you wealthy, Skipper? I don't mean: 'Are your bills paid and enough in the sock to buy any follies your taste runs to?' I mean rich� so loaded that the floor sags when you walk around to take your place at the head of a board-room table."
"Me?" Van Tromp snorted. "I've got my monthly check, a pension eventually, a house with a mortgage and two girls in college. I'd like to try being wealthy for a while, I don't mind telling you!"
"You wouldn't like it."
"Huh! You wouldn't say that� if you had two daughters in school."
"For the record, I put four daughters through college, and I went in debt to my armpits to do it. One of them justified the investment; she's a leading light in her profession which she practices under her husband's name because I'm a disreputable old bum who makes money writing popular trash instead of having the grace to be only a revered memory in her paragraph in Who's Who. The other three are nice people who always remember my birthday and don't bother me otherwise I can't say that an education hurt them. But my offspring are not relevant save to show that I understand that a man often needs more than he's got. But you can fix that easily; you can resign from the service and take a job with some engineering firm that will pay you several times what you're getting just to put your name on their letterhead General Atomics. Several others, You've had offers, haven't you?"
"That's beside the point," Captain van Tromp answered stiffly. "I'm a professional man."
"Meaning there isn't enough money on this planet to tempt you into giving up note 1 space ships. I understand that."
"But I wouldn't mind having money, too."
"A little more money won't do you any good, because daughters can use up ten percent more than a man can make in any normal occupation regardless of the amount. That's a widely experienced but previously unformulated law of nature, to be known henceforth as 'Harshaw's Law.' But, Captain, real wealth, on the scale that causes its owner to hire a battery of finaglers to hold down his taxes, would ground you just as certainly as resigning would."
"Why should it? I would put it all in bonds and just clip coupons."
"Would you? Not if you were the sort of person who acquires great wealth in the first place. Big money isn't hard to come by. All it costs is a lifetime of singleminded devotion to acquiring it and making it grow into more money, to the utter exclusion of all other interests. They say that the age of opportunity has passed. Nonsense! Seven out of ten of the wealthiest men on this planet started life without a shilling - and there are plenty more such strivers on the way up. Such people are not stopped by high taxation nor even by socialism; they simply adapt themselves to new rules and presently they change the rules. But no premiere ballerina ever works harder, nor more narrowly, than a man who acquires riches. Captain, that's not your style; you don't want to make money, you simply want to have money - in order to spend it."
"Correct, sir! Which is why I can't see why you should want to take Mike's wealth away from him."
"Because Mike doesn't need it and it would cripple him worse than any physical handicap. Wealth - great wealth - is a curse� unless you are devoted to the money making game for its own sake. And even then it has serious drawbacks."
"Oh, nonsense, Jubal, you talk like a harem guard trying to convince a whole man of the advantages of being a eunuch. Pardon me."
"Very possibly." agreed Jubal, "and perhaps for the same reason; the human mind's ability to rationalize its own shortcomings into virtues is unlimited, and I am no exception. Since I, like yourself, sir, have no interest in money other than to spend it, there has never been the slightest chance that I would acquire any significant degree of wealth just enough for my vices. Nor any real danger that I would fail to scrounge that modest amount, since anyone with the savvy not to draw to a small pair can always manage to feed his vices, whether they be tithing or chewing betel nut. But great wealth? You saw that performance this morning. Now answer me truthfully. Do you think I could have revised it slightly so that I myself acquired all that plunder - become its sole manager and de facto owner while milking off for my own use any income I cared to name - and still have rigged the other issues so that Douglas would have supported the outcome? Could I have done that, sir? Mike trusts me; I am his water brother. Could I have stolen his fortune and so arranged it that the government in the person of Mr. Douglas would have condoned it?"
"Uh� damn you, Jubal, I suppose you could have."
"Most certainly I could have. Because our sometimes estimable Secretary General is no more a money-seeker than you are. His drive is political power - a drum whose beat I do not hear. Had I guaranteed to Douglas (oh, gracefully, of course - there is decorum even among thieves) that the Smith estate would continue to bulwark his administration, then I would have been left undisturbed to do as I liked with the income and had my acting guardianship made legal."
Jubal shuddered. "I thought that I was going to have to do exactly that, simply to protect Mike from the vultures gathered around him - and I was panic-stricken. Captain, you obviously don't know what an Old Man of the Sea great wealth is. It is not a fat purse and time to spend it. Its owner finds himself beset on every side, at every hour, wherever he goes, by persistent pleaders, like beggars in Bombay, each demanding that he invest or give away part of his wealth. He becomes suspicious of honest friendship - indeed honest friendship is rarely offered him; those who could have been his friends are too fastidious to be jostled by beggars, too proud to risk being mistaken for one.
"Worse yet, his life and the lives of his family are always in danger. Captain, have your daughters ever been threatened with kidnapping?"
"What? Good Lord, I should hope not!"
"If you possessed the wealth Mike had thrust on him, you would have those girls guarded night and day - and even then you would not rest, because you would never be sure that those very guards were not tempted. Look at the records of the last hundred or so kidnappings in this country and note how many of them involved a trusted employee - and note, too, how few victims escaped alive. Then ask yourself: is there any luxury wealth can buy which is worth having your daughters' pretty necks always in a noose?"
Van Tromp looked thoughtful. "No. I guess I'll keep my mortgaged house - it's more my speed. Those girls are all I've got, Jubal."
"Amen. I was appalled at the prospect. Wealth holds no charm for me. All I want is to live my own lazy, useless life, sleep in my own bed - and not be bothered! Yet I thought I was going to be forced to spend my last few years sitting in an office, barricaded by buffers, and working long hours as Mike's man of business.
"Then I had an inspiration. Douglas already lived behind such barricades, already had such a staff. Since I was forced to surrender the power of that money to Douglas merely to ensure Mike's continued health and freedom, why not make the beggar pay for it by assuming all the headaches, too? I was not afraid that Douglas would steal from Mike; only pipsqueak, second-rate politicians are money hungry - and Douglas, whatever his faults, is no pipsqueak. Quit scowling, Ben, and hope that he never dumps the load on you.
"So I dumped the whole load on Douglas - and now I can go back to my garden. But, as I have said, the money was relatively simple, once I figured it out. It was the Larkin Decision that fretted me."
Caxton said, "I thought you had lost your wits on that one, Jubal. That silly business of letting them give Mike sovereign 'honors.' Honors indeed! For God's sake, Jubal, you should simply have had Mike sign over all right, title, and interest, if any, under that ridiculous Larkin theory. You knew Douglas wanted him to - Jill told you."
"Ben m'boy," Jubal said gently, "as a reporter you are hard-working and sometimes readable."
"Gee, thanks! My fan."
"But your concepts of strategy are Neanderthal."
Caxton sighed. "I feel better, Jubal. For a moment there I thought you had become softly sentimental in your old age."
"When I do, please shoot me. Captain, how many men did you leave on Mars?"
"Twenty-three."
"And what is their status, under the Larkin Decision?"
Van Tromp looked troubled. "I'm not supposed to talk."
"Then don't," Jubal reassured him. "I can deduce it, and so can Ben."
Dr. Nelson said, "Skipper, both Stinky and I are civilians again. I shall talk where and how I please-"
"And shall I," agreed Mahmoud.
"-and if they want to make trouble for me, they know what they can do with my reserve commission. What business has the government, telling us we can't talk? Those chair-warmers didn't go to Mars. We did."
"Stow it, Sven. I intended to talk - these are our water brothers. But, Ben, I would rather not see this in your column. I would like to command a space ship again."
"Captain, I know the meaning of 'off the record.' But if you'll feel easier, I'll join Mike and the girls for a while - I want to see Jill anyhow."
"Please don't leave. But� this is among water brothers. The government is in a stew about that nominal colony we left behind. Every man in it joined in signing away his so-called Larkin rights - assigned them to the government - before we left Earth. Mike's presence when we got to Mars confused things enormously. I'm no lawyer, but I understood that, if Mike did waive his rights, whatever they might be, that would put the administration in the driver's seat when it came to parceling out things of value."
"What things of value?" demanded Caxton. "Other than pure science, I mean. Look, Skipper, I'm not running down your achievement, but from all I've seen and heard, Mars isn't exactly valuable real estate for human beings. Or are there assets that are still classified 'drop dead before reading'?"
Van Tromp shook his head. "No, the scientific and technical reports are all declassified, I believe. But, Ben, the Moon was a worthless hunk of rock when we first got it. Now look at it."
"Touch," Caxton admitted. "I wish my grandpappy had bought Lunar Enterprises instead of Canadian uranium. I don't have Jubal's objections to being rich." He added, "But, in any case, Mars is already inhabited."
Van Tromp looked unhappy. "Yes. But- Stinky, you tell him."
Mahmoud said, "Ben, there is plenty of room on Mars for human colonization� and, so far as I was ever able to find out, the Martians would not interfere. They did not object when we told them we intended to leave a colony behind. Nor did they seem pleased. Not even interested. We're flying our flag and claiming extraterritoriality right now. But our status may be more like that of one of those ant cities under glass one sometimes sees in school rooms. I was never able to grok it."
Jubal nodded. "Precisely. Myself, too. This morning I did not have the slightest idea of the true situation� except that I knew that the government was anxious to get those so-called Larkin rights from Mike. Beyond that I was ignorant. So I assumed that the government was equally ignorant and went boldly ahead. 'Audacity, always audacity' - soundest principle of strategy. In practicing medicine I learned that when you are most at loss is the time when you must appear confident. In law I had learned that, when your case seems hopeless, you must impress the jury with your relaxed certainty."
Jubal grinned. "Once, when I was a kid in high school, I won a debate on shipping subsidies by quoting an overwhelming argument from the files of the British Colonial Shipping Board. The opposition was totally unable to refute me - because there never was a 'British Colonial Shipping Board.' I had made it up, whole cloth.
"I was equally shameless this morning. The administration wanted Mike's 'Larkin rights' and was scared silly that we might make a deal with Kung or somebody. So I used their greed and worry to wring out of them that ultimate logical absurdity of their fantastic legal theory, a public acknowledgment in unmistakable diplomatic protocol that Mike was a sovereign equal of the Federation itself - and must be treated accordingly!" Jubal looked smug.
"Thereby," Ben said dryly, "putting yourself up the well-known creek without a paddle."
"Ben, Ben," Jubal said chidingly. "Wrong metaphor. Not a canoe, but a tiger. Or a throne. By their own logic they had publicly crowned Mike. Need I point out that, despite the old saw about uneasy heads and crowns, it is nevertheless safer to be publicly a king than it is to be a pretender in hiding? A king can usually abdicate to save his neck; a pretender may renounce his pretensions but it makes his neck no safer - less so, in fact; it leaves him naked to his enemies. No, Ben, Kung saw that Mike's position had been enormously strengthened by a few bars of music and an old sheet, even if you did not - and Kung did not like it a bit.
"But I acted through necessity, not choice, and, while Mike's position was improved, it was still not an easy one. Mike was, for the nonce, the acknowledged sovereign of Mars under the legalistic malarky of the Larkin precedent� and, as such, was empowered to hand out concessions, trading rights, enclaves, ad nauseam. He must either do these things himself� and thus be subjected to pressures even worse than those attendant on great wealth and for which he is even less fitted - or he must abdicate his titular position and allow his Larkin rights to devolve on those twenty-three men now on Mars, i.e., to Douglas."
Jubal looked pained. "I disliked these alternatives almost equally, since each was based on the detestable doctrine that the Larkin Decision could apply to inhabited planets. Gentlemen, I have never met any Martians, I have no vocation to be their champion - but I could not permit a client of mine to be trapped into such a farce. The Larkin Decision itself had to be rendered void, and all 'rights' under it, with respect to the planet Mars - while the matter was still in our hands and without giving the High Court a chance to rule."
Jubal grinned boyishly. "So I appealed to a higher court for a decision that would nullify the Larkin precedent - I cited a mythical 'British Colonial Shipping Board.' I lied myself blue in the face to create a new legal theory. Sovereign honors had been rendered Mike; that was fact, the world had seen it. But sovereign honors may be rendered to a sovereign� or to a sovereign's alter ego, his viceroy or ambassador. So I asserted that Mike was no cardboard sovereign under a silly human precedent not in point - but in awful fact the ambassador of the great Martian nation!"
Jubal sighed. "Sheer bluff� and I was scared silly that I would be required to prove my claims. But I was staking my bluff on my hope and strong belief that others - Douglas, and in particular, Kung - would be no more certain of the facts than was I." Jubal looked around him. "But I ventured to risk that bluff because you three were sitting with us, were Mike's water brethren. If you three sat by and did not challenge my lies, then Mike must be accepted as the Martian equivalent of ambassador - and the Larkin Decision was a dead issue."
"I hope it is," Captain van Tromp said soberly, "but I did not take your statements as lies, Jubal; I took them as simple truth."
"Eh? But I assure you they were not. I was spinning fancy words, extemporizing."
"No matter. Inspiration or deduction - I think you told the truth." The skipper of the Champion hesitated. "Except that I would not call Mike an ambassador - I think he's an expeditionary force."
Caxton's jaw dropped. Harshaw did not dispute him but answered with equal soberness. "In what way, sir?"
Van Tromp said, "I'll amend that. It would be better to say that I think he's a scout for an expeditionary force, reconnoitering us for his Martian masters. It is even possible that they are in telepathic contact with him at all times, that he doesn't even need to report back. I don't know - but I do know that, after visiting Mars, I find such ideas much easier to swallow� and I know this: everybody seems to take it for granted that, finding a human being on Mars, we would of course bring him home and that he would be anxious to come home. Nothing could be further from the truth. Eh, Sven?"
"Mike hated the idea," agreed Nelson. "We couldn't even get close to him at first; he was afraid of us. Then he was ordered to go back with us and from then on he did exactly what we told him to do. He behaved like a soldier carrying out with perfect discipline orders that scared him silly."
"Just a moment," Caxton protested. "Captain, even so - Mars attack us? Mars? You know more about these things than I do, but wouldn't that be about like us attacking Jupiter? I mean to say, we have about two and a half times the surface gravity that Mars has, just as Jupiter has about two and a half times our surface gravity. Somewhat analogous differences, each way, on pressure, temperature, atmosphere, and so forth. We couldn't stay alive on Jupiter� and I don't see how Martians could stand our conditions. Isn't that true?"
"Close enough," admitted van Tromp.
"Then tell me why we should attack Jupiter? Or Mars attack us?"
"Mmm� Ben, have you seen any of the proposals to attempt a beach head on Jupiter?"
"Yes, but- Well, nothing has ever gotten beyond the dream stage. It isn't practical."
"Space flight wasn't practical less than a century ago. Go back in the files and see what your own colleagues said about it - oh, say about 1940. These Jupiter proposals are, at best, no farther than drawing board - but the engineers working on them are quite serious. They think that, by using all that we've learned from deep ocean exploration, plus equipping men with powered suits in which to float, it should be possible to put human beings on Jupiter. And don't think for a moment that the Martians are any less clever than we are. You should see their cities."
"Uh-" said Caxton. "Okay, I'll shut up. I still don't see why they would bother."
"Captain?"
"Yes, Jubal?"
"I see another objection - a cultural one. You know the rough division of cultures into 'Apollonian' and 'Dionysian.'"
"I know in general what you mean."
"Well, it seems to me that even the Zuni culture would be called 'Dionysian' on Mars. Of course, you've been there and I haven't - but I've been talking steadily with Mike. That boy was raised in an extremely Apollonian culture - and such cultures are not aggressive."
"Mmm� I see your point - but I wouldn't count on it."
Mahmoud said suddenly, "Skipper, there's strong evidence to support Jubal's conclusion. You can analyse a culture from its language, every time - and there isn't any Martian word for 'war.'" He stopped and looked puzzled. "At least, I don't think there is. Nor any word for 'weapon' nor for 'fighting.' If a word for a concept isn't in a language, then its culture simply doesn't have the referent the missing word would symbolize."
"Oh, twaddle, Stinky! Animals fight - and ants even conduct wars. Are you trying to tell me they have to have words for it before they can do it?"
"I mean exactly that," Mahmoud insisted, "when it applies to any verbalizing race. Such as ourselves. Such as the Martians - even more highly verbalized than we are. A verbalizing race has words for every old concept� and creates new words or new definitions for old words whenever a new concept comes along. Always! A nervous system that is able to verbalize cannot avoid verbalizing; it's automatic. If the Martians know what 'war' is, then they have a word for it."
"There is a quick way to settle it," Jubal suggested. "Call in Mike.
"Just a moment, Jubal," van Tromp objected. "I learned years ago never to argue with a specialist; you can't win. But I also learned that the history of progress is a long, long list of specialists who were dead wrong when they were most certain - sorry, Stinky."
"You're quite right, Captain - only I'm not wrong this time."
"As may be, all Mike can settle is whether or not he knows a certain word� which might be like asking a two-year-old to define 'calculus.' Proves nothing. I'd like to stick to facts for a moment. Sven? About Agnew?"
Nelson answered, "It's up to you, Captain"
"Well� this is still private conversation among water brothers, gentlemen. Lieutenant Agnew was our junior medical officer. Quite brilliant in his line, Sven tells me, and I had no complaints about him otherwise; he was well-enough liked. But he had an unsuspected latent xenophobia. Not against humans. But he couldn't stand Martians. Now I had given orders against going armed outside the ship once it appeared that the Martians were peaceful - too much chance of an incident.
"Apparently young Agnew disobeyed me - at least we were never able to find his personal side arm later and the two men who last saw him alive say that he was wearing it. But all my log shows is: 'Missing and presumed dead.'
"Here is why. Two crewmen saw Agnew go into a sort of passage between two large rocks rather scarce on Mars; mostly it's monotonous. Then they saw a Martian enter the same way� whereupon they hurried, as Dr. Agnew's peculiarity was well known.
"Both say that they heard a shot. One says that he reached this opening in time to glimpse Agnew past the Martian, who pretty well filled the space between the rocks; they're so big. And then he didn't see him. The second man says that when he got there the Martian was just exiting, simply sailed on past them and went his way - which is characteristically Martian; if he has no business with you, he simply ignores you. With the Martian out of the way they could both see the space between the two rocks� and it was a dead end, empty.
"That's all, gentlemen� except to say that Agnew might have jumped that rock wall, under Mars' low surface gravity and the impetus of fear - but I could not and I tried - and to mention that these two crewmen were wearing breathing gear - have to, on Mars - and hypoxia can make a man's senses quite unreliable. I don't know that the first crewman was drunk through oxygen shortage; I just mention it because it is an explanation easier to believe than what he reported� which is that Agnew simply disappeared in the blink of an eye. In fact I suggested as much to him and ordered him to check the demand valve and the rest of his breather gear before he went outside again.
"You see, I thought Agnew would show up presently� and I was looking forward to chewing him out and slapping him under hack for going armed (if he was) and for going alone (which seemed certain), both being flagrant breaches of discipline.
"But he never returned, we never found him nor his body. I do not know what happened. But my own misgivings about Martians date to that incident. They never again seemed to me to be just big, gentle, harmless, rather comical creatures, even though we never had any trouble with them and they always gave us anything we wanted, once Stinky figured out how to ask for it. I played down the incident - can't let men panic when you're a hundred million miles from home. Oh, I couldn't play down the fact that Dr. Agnew was missing and the whole ship's company searched for him. But I squelched any suggestion that there had been anything mysterious about it - Agnew had gotten lost among those rocks. had eventually died, no doubt, when his oxygen ran out� and was buried under sand drift or something. You do get quite a breeze both at sunrise and sundown on Mars; it does cause the sand to drift. So I used it as a reason to clamp down ever harder on always traveling in company, always staying in radio contact with the ship, always checking breather gear� with Agnew as a horrible example. I did not tell that crewman to keep his mouth shut; I simply hinted that his story was unbelievable, especially as his mate was not able to back it up. I think the official version prevailed."
Mahmoud said slowly, "It did with me, Captain - this is the first time I've heard that there was any mystery about Agnew. And truthfully, I prefer your 'official' version - I'm not inclined to be superstitious."
Van Tromp nodded. "That's what I had hoped for. Only Sven and myself heard that crewman's wild tale - and we kept it to ourselves. But, just the same-" The space ship captain suddenly looked old. "-I still wake up in the night and ask myself: 'What became of Agnew?'"
Jubal listened to the story without comment. He was still wondering what he should add to it when it ended. He wondered, too, if Jill had told Ben about Berquist and that other fellow - Johnson. He knew that he had not. There hadn't been time the night Ben had been rescued� and in the sober light of the following dawn it had seemed better to let such things ride.
Had the kids told Ben about the battle of the swimming pool? And the two carloads of cops who were missing afterwards? Again, it seemed most unlikely; the kids knew that the "official" version was that the first task force had never showed up - they had all heard his phone call with Douglas. All Jubal's family were discreet; whether guests or employees, gossipy persons were quickly ousted - Jubal regarded gossip as his own prerogative, solely. But Jill might have told Ben. Well, if she had, she must have bound him to silence; Ben had not mentioned disappearances to Jubal� and he wasn't trying to catch Jubal's eye now.
Damn it, the only thing to do was to keep quiet and go on trying to impress on the boy that he simply must not go around making unpleasant strangers disappear!
Jubal was saved from further soul-searching (and the stag conversation was broken up) by Anne's arrival. "Boss, that Mr. Bradley is at the door. The one who called himself 'senior executive assistant to the Secretary General.'
"You didn't let him in?"
"No. I looked at him through the one-way and talked to him through the speakie. He says he has papers to deliver to you, personally, and that he will wait for an answer."
"Have him pass them through the flap. And you tell him that you are my 'senior executive assistant' and that you will fetch my receipt acknowledging personal delivery if that is what he wants. This is still the Martian Embassy - until I check what's in those papers."
"Just let him stand in the corridor?"
"I've no doubt that Major Bloch can find him a chair. Anne, I am aware that you were gently reared - but this is a situation in which rudeness pays off. We don't give an inch, nor a kind word, until we get exactly what we want."
"Yes, Boss."
The package was bulky because there were many copies; there was one document only. Jubal called in everyone and passed them around. "Girls, I am offering one lollipop for each loophole, boobytrap, or ambiguity - prizes of similar value to males. Now everybody keep quiet."
Presently Jubal broke the silence. "He's an honest politician - he stays bought."
"Looks that way," admitted Caxton.
"Anybody?" No one claimed a prize; Douglas had kept it simple and straightforward, merely implementing the agreement reached earlier. "Okay," said Jubal, "everybody is to witness every copy, after Mike signs it - especially you, Skipper, and Sven and Stinky. Get your seal, Miriam. Hell, let Bradley in now and have him witness, too - then give the poor guy a drink. Duke, call the desk and tell 'em to send up the bill; we're checking out. Then call Greyhound and tell 'em we want our go-buggy. Sven, Skipper, Stinky - we're getting out of here the way Lot left Sodom�why don't you three come up in the country with us, take off your shoes, and relax? Plenty of beds, home cooking, and no worries."
The two married men asked for, and received, rain checks; Dr. Mahmoud accepted. The signing took rather long, mostly because Mike enjoyed signing his name, drawing each letter with great care and artistic satisfaction. The salvageable remains of the picnic (mostly unopened bottles) had been sent up and loaded by the time all copies were signed and sealed, and the hotel bill had arrived.
Jubal glanced at the fat total and did not bother to add it. Instead he wrote on it: "Approved for payment - J. Harshaw for V. M. Smith," and handed it to Bradley.
"This is your boss's worry now," he told Bradley.
Bradley blinked. "Sir?"
"Oh, just to keep it 'via channels.' Mr. Douglas will doubtless turn it over to the Chief of Protocol. Isn't that the usual procedure? I'm rather green about these things."
Bradley accepted the bill. "Yes," he said slowly. "Yes, that's right. LaRue will voucher it - I'll give it to him."
"Thank you, Mr. Bradley. Thanks for everything!"

PART THREE: HIS ECCENTRIC EDUCATION
XXII

IN ONE LIMB OF A SPIRAL GALAXY, close to a star known as "Sol" to some of its dependents, another star of the same type underwent catastrophic readjustment and became nova. Its glory would be seen on Mars in another three-replenished (729) years, or 1370 Terran years. The Old Ones noted the coming event as being useful, shortly, for instruction of the young, while never ceasing the exciting and crucial discussion of esthetic problems concerning the new epic woven around the death of the Fifth Planet.
The departure of the spaceship Champion for its home planet was noted without comment and a watch was kept on the strange nestling sent back in it, but nothing more, since it would be some time yet before it would be fruitful to grok the outcome. The twenty-three humans left behind on Mars coped, successfully in most ways, with an environment lethal to naked humans but less difficult, on the whole, than that in the Free State of Antarctica. One of them discorporated through an undiagnosed illness sometimes called "heartbreak" and at other times "homesickness." The Old Ones cherished the wounded spirit and sent it back where it belonged for further healing; aside from that the Martians left the Terrans alone.
On Earth the exploding neighbor star was not noticed at all, human astronomers still being limited by speed of light. The Man from Mars, having been briefly back in the news, had dropped out of the news again. The minority leader in the Federation Senate called for "a bold, new approach" to the twin problems of population and malnutrition in southeast Asia, starting with increased emergency grants-in-aid to families with more than five children. Mrs. Percy B. S. Souchek sued the supervisors of Los Angeles City-County over the death of her pet poodle Piddle which had taken place during a five-day period of stationary inversion layer. Cynthia Duchess announced that she was going to have the Perfect Baby by a scientifically selected anonymous donor and an equally perfect host mother just as soon as a battery of experts completed calculating the exact instant for conception to insure that the wonder child would be equally a genius in music, art, and statesmanship - and that she would (with the aid of hormonal treatments) nurse her child herself. She gave out a statement to the press on the psychological benefits of natural feeding and permitted, or insisted, that the press take pictures of her to prove that she was physically endowed for this happy duty - a fact that her usual publicity pictures had never really left undecided-
Supreme Bishop Digby denounced her as the Harlot of Babylon and forbade any Fosterite to accept the commission, either as donor or hostmother. Alice Douglas was quoted as saying: "While I do not know Miss Duchess personally, one cannot help but admire her. Her brave example should be an inspiration to mothers everywhere."
By accident, Jubal Harshaw saw one of the pictures and the accompanying story in a magazine some visitor had left in his house. He chuckled over it and posted it on the bulletin board in the kitchen� then noted (as he had expected) that it did not stay up long, which made him chuckle again.
He did not have too many chuckles that week; the world had been too much with him. The working press soon ceased bothering Mike and the Harshaw household when it was clear that the story was over and that Harshaw did not intend to let any fresh news happen - but a great many thousands of other people, not in the news business, did not forget Mike. Douglas honestly tried to insure Mike's privacy; S. S. troopers now patrolled Harshaw's fence and an S.S. car circled over the grounds and challenged any car that tried to land. But Harshaw resented the necessity of having guards.
Guards kept people out; the mail and the telephone came through. The telephone Jubal coped with by changing his call number and having all calls routed through an answering service to which was given a very limited list of persons from whom Harshaw would accept calls - and, at that, he kept the instrument in the house set on "refuse amp; record" most of the time.
But the mail always comes through.
At first, Harshaw told Jill that the problem was Mike's. The boy had to grow up someday; he could start by handling his own mail and she could help and advise him. "But don't bother me with it; I have enough trouble with screwball mail of my own!"
Jubal could not make his decision stick; there was too much of it and Jill simply did not know how.
Just sorting the mail into categories was a headache. Jubal solved that by first making a phone call to the local postmaster (which got no results), then by a phone call to Bradley, which did get results after a "suggestion" from on high trickled back down to local level; thereafter mail for Mike arrived sacked as first class, second class, third class, and fourth class, with mail for everyone else in the household in still another sack.
Second and third class mail was used to insulate a new root cellar north of the house, the old root cellar having been dug by the former owner as a fallout shelter and never having been satisfactory as root cellar. Once the new root cellar was heavily over-insulated and could use no more, Jubal told Duke to dump such mail as fill to check erosion in gullies; combined with a small amount of brush such mail compacted very nicely.
Fourth class mail was a problem, especially as one package exploded prematurely in the village post office, blowing several years of "Wanted" announcements off the notice board and ruining one "Use Next Window" sign - by great good luck the postmaster was out for coffee and his assistant, an elderly lady with weak kidneys, was safe in the washroom. Jubal considered having all fourth class mail addressed to Mike processed by the bomb-disposal specialists of the S.S, who performed the same service for the Secretary General.
This turned out not to be necessary; Mike could spot a "wrongness" about a package without opening it. Thereafter all fourth class mail was unsacked in a heap just inside the gate; then, after the postman had left, Mike would pry through the pile from a distance, cause to disappear any harmful parcel; then Larry would truck the remainder to the house. Jubal felt that this method was far better than soaking suspect packages, opening them in darkness, X-raying them, or any other conventional method.
Mike loved opening the harmless packages; it made every day Christmas for him. He particularly enjoyed reading his own name on address labels. The plunder inside might or might not interest him; usually he gave it to one of the others - and, in the process, at last learned what "property" was in discovering that he could make gifts to his friends. Anything that nobody wanted wound up in a gully; this included, by definition, all gifts of food, as Jubal was not certain that Mike's nose for "wrongness" extended to poisons - especially after Mike had drunk, through error, a beaker of a poisonous solution Duke had left in the refrigerator he used for his photographic work. Mike had simply said mildly that the "Iced tea" had a flavor he was not sure that he liked.
Jubal told him that it was otherwise all right to keep anything that came to Mike by parcel post provided that none of it was (a) ever paid for, (b) ever acknowleged, (c) nor ever returned no matter how marked. Some of the items were legitimatly gifts; more of it was unordered merchandise. Either way, Jubal assumed conclusively that unsolicited chattels from strangers always represented efforts to make use of the Man from Mars and therefore merited no thanks.
An exception was made for live stock, from baby chicks to baby alligators which Jubal advised her to return unless she was willing to guarantee the care and feeding thereof, and the responsibility of keeping same from falling into the pool.
First class mail was a separate headache. After looking over a bushel or so of Mike's first class mail Jubal set up a list of categories:
A. Begging letters, personal and institutional - erosion fill.
B. Threatening letters - file unanswered. Second and later letters from any one source to be turned over to S.S.
C. Offers of business deals of any nature forward to Douglas unanswered.
D. Crackpot letters not containing threat - pass around any real dillies; the rest to go in a gully.
E. Friendly letters - answer only if accompanied by stamped, self-addressed envelope, in which case use one of several form letters to be signed by Jill (Jubal pointed out that letters signed by the Man from Mars were valuable per se, and an open invitation to more useless mail.)
F. Scatological letters - pass to Jubal (who had a bet with himself that no such letter would ever show the faintest sign of literary novelty) for further disposition - i.e., gully.
G. Proposals of marriage and propositions not quite so formal - ignore and file. Use procedure under "B" on third offense.
H. Letters from scientific and educational institutions - handle as under "E"; if answered at all, use form letter explaining that the Man from Mars was not available for anything; if Jill felt that a form brushoff would not do, pass along to Jubal.
I. Letters from persons who actually had met Mike, such as all the crew of the Champion, the President of the United States, and a few others - let Mike answer them exactly as he pleased; the exercise in penmanship would be good for him and the exercise in human personal relations he needed even more (and if he wanted advice, let him ask for it).
This guide cut the number of letters that had to be answered down to manageable size - a few each day for Jill, seldom even one for Mike. Just opening the mail took a major effort, but Jill found that she could skim and classify in about one hour each day, after she got used to it. The first four categories remained large at all times; category "G" was very large during the fortnight following the world stereocast from the Palace, then dwindled and the curve flattened to a steady trickle.
Jubal cautioned Jill that, while Mike should himself answer letters only from acquaintances and friends, mail addressed to him was his to read if he wished.
The third morning after the category system had gone into effect Jill brought a letter, category "G," to Jubal. More than half of the ladies and other females (plus a few misguided males) who supplied this category included pictures alleged to be of themselves; some of these pictures left little to the imagination, as did the letters themselves in many cases-
This letter enclosed a picture which managed not only to leave nothing to the imagination, but started over by stimulating fresh imaginings. Jill said, "Look at this, Boss! I ask you!"
Jubal read the letter, then looked at the picture. "She seems to know what she wants. What does Mike think of it?"
"He hasn't seen it. That's why I brought it to you."
Jubal glanced again at the picture. "A type which, in my youth, we referred to as 'stacked.' Well, her sex is not in doubt, nor her agility. But why are you showing it to me? I've seen better, I assure you."
"But what should I do with it? The letter is bad enough� but that disgusting picture - should I tear it up? Before Mike sees it?"
"Oh- Siddown, Nurse. What does it say on the envelope?"
"Nothing. Just the address and the return address."
"How does the address read?"
"Huh? 'Mr. Valentine Michael Smith, the Man from-"
"Oh. Then it's not addressed to you."
"Why, no, of course-"
"That's all I wanted to be sure of. Now let's get something straight. I am not Mike's guardian. You are neither his mother nor his chaperon. I've simply co-opted you as his secretary. If Mike wants to read everything that comes in here addressed to him, including third class junk mail, he is free to do so."
"Well, he does read almost all of those ads. But surely you don't want him to see filth? Jubal, Mike doesn't know what the world is like. He's innocent.
"So? How many men has he killed so far, Jill?"
Jill did not answer; she looked unhappy. Jubal went on: "If you want to help him, you will concentrate on teaching him that casual killing is frowned on in this society. Otherwise he is bound to be unpleasantly conspicuous when he goes out into the world."
"Uh, I don't think he wants to 'go out into the world.'"
"Well, I'm damned well going to push him out of the nest as soon as I think he can fly. He can come back later, if he wishes - But I shan't make it possible for him to live out his life here, as an arrested infant. For one thing, I can't even if I wanted to� because Mike will probably outlive me by sixty or seventy years and this nest will be gone. But you are correct; Mike is innocent our standards. Nurse, have you ever seen that sterile laboratory at Notre Dame?"
"No. I've read about it."
"Healthiest animals in the world but they can't ever leave the laboratory. Child, I'm not running a sterile laboratory. Mike has got to get acquainted with 'filth,' as you call it - and get immunized to it. One day he's going to meet the gal who wrote this letter, or her spiritual twin sister - in fact he's going to meet her by the dozens and hundreds, shucks, with his notoriety and his looks he can spend his life skipping from one warm bed to another, if he likes. You can't stop it, I can't stop it; it's up to Mike. Furthermore, I wouldn't want to stop it, although for my taste it's a silly way to spend one's life - doing the same monotonous exercises over and over again, I mean - what do you think?"
"I-" Jill stopped and blushed.
"I withdraw the question. Maybe you don't find them monotonous but none of my business, either way. But if you don't want Mike's feet kicked out from under him by the first five hundred women that get him alone and I don't regard it as a good idea, either; he should have other interests as well - then don't try to intercept his mail. Letters like that may vaccinate him a little� or at least tend to put him on guard. Don't make a thing out of it; just pass it along in the stack, cum 'filthy' picture. Answer his questions if he asks them� and try not to blush."
"Uh, all right. Boss, you're infuriating when you're logical."
"Yes, a most uncouth way to argue. Now run along."
"All right. But I'm going to tear up that picture after Mike has seen it."
"Oh, don't do that!"
"What? Do you want it, Boss?"
"Heaven forbid! I told you I had seen much better. But Duke is not as jaundiced as I am; he collects such pictures. If Mike doesn't want it - and five-to-one he doesn't give it to Duke - he'll be delighted."
"Duke collects such trash? But he seems such a nice person.
"He is. A very nice person indeed. Or I'd kick him out."
"But- I don't understand it"
Jubal sighed. "And I could sit here all day explaining it and you still wouldn't understand it. My dear, there are aspects of sex on which it is impossible to communicate between the two sexes of our race. They are sometimes grokked by intuition across the gulf that separates us, by a few exceptionally gifted individuals. But words are useless, so I won't try. Just take my word for it: Duke is a perfect knight, sans peur et sans reproche - and he would like to have that picture."
"All right, he can have it if Mike doesn't keep it. But I'll just pass it along to you. I won't give it to Duke myself - he might get ideas."
"Sissy. You might enjoy his ideas- Anything startling in the mail otherwise?"
"No. The usual crop of people who want Mike to endorse this and that, or peddle 'Official Man-from-Mars this's and that's-one character had the nerve to ask for a five-year monopoly royalty free, on the name, but wants Mike to finance it as well."
"I admire that sort of whole-hearted thief. Encourage him. Tell him that Mike is so rich that he makes crepes suzettes with Napoleon brandy and needs some tax losses - so how much guarantee would he like?"
"Are YOU serious, Boss? I'll have to dig it out of the group already sacked for Mr. Douglas."
"Of course I'm not serious. The gonif would show up here tomorrow, with his family. But you've given me a fine idea for a story, so run along. Front!"
Mike was not uninterested in the "disgusting" picture. He grokked correctly (if only theoreticly) what the letter and the picture symbolized - and studied the picture with the clear-eyed delight With which he studied each passing butterfly. He found both butterflies and women tremendously interesting - in fact, all the grokking world around him was enchanting and he wanted to drink so deep of it all that his own grokking would be perfect.
He understood, intellectually, the mechanical and biological processes being offered to him in these letters but he wondered why these strangers wanted his help in quickening their eggs? Mike understood (without grokking it) that these people made ritual of this simple necessity, a "growing closer" possibly almost as important and precious as the water ceremony. He was eager to grok it.
But he was not in a hurry, "hurry" being one human concept he had failed to grok at all. He was sensitively aware of the key importance of correct timing in all acts - but with the Martian approach: correct timing was accomplished by waiting. He had noticed, of course, that his human brothers lacked his own fine discrimination of time and often were forced to wait a little faster than a Martian would - but he did not hold their innocent awkwardness against them; he simply learned to wait faster himself to cover their lack.
In fact, he sometimes waited faster so efficiently that a human would have concluded that he was hurrying at breakneck speed. But the human would have been mistaken - Mike was simply adjusting his own waiting in warm consideration for the needs of others.
So he accepted Jill's edict that he was not to reply to any of these brotherly offers from female humans, but he accepted it not as a final veto but as a waiting - possibly a century hence would be better; in any case now was not the correct time since his water brother Jill spoke rightly.
Mike readily assented when Jill suggested, quite firmly, that he give this picture to Duke. He went at once to do so and would have done so anyhow; Mike knew about Duke's collection, he had seen it, looked through it with deep interest, trying to grok why Duke said, "That one ain't much in the face, but look at those legs - brother!" It always made Mike feel good to be called "brother" by one of his water brothers but legs were just legs, save that his own people had three each while humans each had only two - without being crippled thereby, he reminded himself, two legs were proper for humans, he must always grok that this was correct.
As for faces, Jubal had the most beautiful face Mike had ever seen, clearly and distinctly his own. It seemed to Mike that these human females in Duke's picture collection could hardly be said to have grown faces as yet, so much did one look like the other in the face. All young human females had much the same face - how could it be otherwise? Of course he had never had any trouble recognizing Jill's face; she was not only the first woman he had ever seen but, most important, his first female water brother - Mike knew every pore on her nose, every incipient wrinkle in her face and had praised each one in happy meditation.
But, while he now knew Anne from Dorcas and Dorcas from Miriam by their faces alone, it had not been so when first he came here. For several days Mike had distinguished between them by size and coloration - and, of course, by voice, since no two voices were ever alike. But, as sometimes did happen, all three females would be quiet at once and then it was well that Anne was so much bigger, Dorcas so small, and that Miriam, who was bigger than Dorcas but smaller than Anne, nevertheless need not be mistaken for the missing one if either Anne or Dorcas was absent because Miriam had unmistakable hair called "red," even though it was not the color called "red" when speaking of anything but hair.
This special meaning for "red" did not trouble Mike; he knew before he reached Earth that every English word held more than one meaning. It was a fact one could get used to, without grokking, just as the sameness of all girl faces could be gotten used to� and, after waiting, they were no longer quite the same. Mike now could call up Anne's face in his mind and count the pores in her nose as readily as with Jill's. In essence, even an egg was uniquely itself, different from all other eggs any where and when - Mike had always known that. So each girl had her own face, no matter how small those differences might be.
Mike gave the "disgusting" picture to Duke and was warmed by Duke's pleasure. Mike did not feel that he was depriving himself in parting with the picture; he had seen it once, he could see it in his mind whenever he wished - even the face in that picture, as it had glowed with a most unusual expression of beautiful pain.
He accepted Duke's thanks gravely and went happily back to read the rest of his mail.
Mike did not share Jubal's annoyance at the avalanche of mail; he reveled in it, the insurance ads quite as much as the marriage proposals. His trip to the Palace had opened his eyes to the enormous variety in this world and he was resolved to grok it all. He could see that it would take him several centuries and that he must grow and grow and grow, but he was undaunted and in no hurry - he grokked that eternity and the everbeautifully-changing now were identical.
He had decided not to reread the Encyclopedia Britannica; the flood of mail gave him brighter glimpses of the world. He read it, grokked what he could, remembered the rest for contemplation at night while the household slept.
From these nights of meditation he was beginning, he thought, to grok "business," and "money," and "buying," and "selling," and related un-Martian activities - the articles in the Encyclopedia had always left him feeling unfilled, as (he now grokked) each one had assumed that he knew many things that he did not know. But there arrived in the mail, from Mr. Secretary General Joseph Edgerton Douglas, a check book and other papers, and his brother Jubal had taken great pains to explain to him what money was and how it was used.
Mike had failed utterly to understand it at first, even though Jubal showed him how to make out his first check, gave him "money" in exchange for it, taught him how to count it.
Then suddenly, with a grokking so blinding that he trembled and forced himself not to withdraw, he understood the abstract symbolic nature of money. These pretty pictures and bright medallions were not "money"; they were concrete symbols for an abstract idea which spread all through these people, all through their world. But these things were not money, any more than water shared in water ceremony was the growing-closer. Water was not necessary to the ceremony� and these pretty things were not necessary to money. Money was an idea, as abstract as an Old One's thoughts - money was a great structured symbol for balancing and healing and growing closer.
Mike was dazzled with the magnificent beauty of money.
The flow and change and countermarching of the symbols was another matter, beautiful in small, but reminding him of games taught to nestlings to encourage them to learn to reason correctly and grow. It was the total structure that dazzled him, the idea that an entire world could be reflected in one dynamic, completely interconnected, symbol structure. Mike grokked then that the Old Ones of this race were very old indeed to have composed such beauty, and he wished humbly that he might soon be allowed to meet one of them.
Jubal encouraged him to spend some of his money and Mike did so, with the timid, uncertain eagerness of a bride being brought to bed. Jubal suggested that he "buy presents for his friends" and Jill helped him with it, starting by placing arbitrary limits: only one present for each friend and a total cost that was not even a reciprocal filled-three of the sum that had been placed to his account - Mike's original intention had been to spend all of that pretty balance on his friends.
He quickly learned how difficult it is to spend money. There were so many things from which to choose, all of them wonderful and most of them incomprehensible. Surrounded by thick catalogs from Marshall Field's to the Ginza, and back by way of Bombay and Copenhagen, he felt smothered in a plethora of riches. Even the Sears amp; Montgomery catalog was too much for him.
But Jill helped. "No, Mike, Duke would not want a tractor."
"Duke likes tractors."
"Um, maybe - but he's got one, or Jubal has, which is the same thing. He might like one of those cute little Belgian unicycles - he could take it apart and put it together and shine it all day long. But even that is too expensive, what with the taxes. Mike dear, a present ought not to be very expensive - unless you are trying to get a girl to marry you, or something. Especially 'something.' But a present should show that you thought about it and considered that person's tastes. Something he would enjoy but probably would not buy for himself."
"How?"
"That's always the problem. Wait a minute. I just remembered something in this morning's mail - I hope Larry hasn't carted it off yet." She was back quickly. "Found it! Listen to this: 'Living Aphrodite: A de-luxe Album of Feminine Beauty in Gorgeous Stereo-Color by the World's Greatest Artists of the Camera. Notice: this item will not be sent by mail. It will be forwarded at purchaser's risk by prepaid express only. Orders cannot be accepted from addresses in the following states-' Um, Pennsylvania is on the verboten list - but don't let that worry you; if it is addressed to you, it will be delivered - and if I know Duke's vulgar tastes, this is just what he would like."
Duke did like it. It was delivered, not by express, but via the S.S. patrol car capping the house - and the next ad for the same item to arrive in the house boasted: "-exactly as supplied to the Man from Mars, by special appointment," which pleased Mike and annoyed Jill.
Other presents were just as difficult, but picking a present for Jubal was supremely difficult. Jill was stumped. What does one buy for a man who has everything - everything, that is to say, that he wants which money can buy? The Sphinx? Three Wishes? The fountain that Ponce de Leon failed to find? Oil for his ancient bones, or one golden day of youth? Jubal had long ago even foresworn pets, because he outlived them, or (worse yet) it was now possible that a pet would outlive him, be orphaned.
Privately they consulted the others. "Shucks," Duke told them, "didn't you know? The boss likes statues."
"Really?" Jill answered. "I don't see any sculpture around."
"That's because most of the stuff he likes isn't for sale. He says that the crud they're making nowdays looks like disaster in a junk yard and any idiot with a blow torch and astigmatism can set himself up as a sculptor."
Anne nodded thoughtfully. "I think Duke is right. You can tell what Jubal's tastes in sculpture are by looking at the books in his study. But I doubt if it will help much."
Nevertheless they looked, Anne and Jill and Mike, and Anne picked out three books as bearing evidence (to her eyes) of having been looked at most often. "Hmm�" she said. "It's clear that the Boss would like anything by Rodin. Mike, if you could buy one of these for Jubal, which one would you pick? Oh, here's a pretty one - 'Eternal Springtime.'"
Mike barely glanced at it and turned the page. "This one."
"What?" Jill looked at it and shuddered. "Mike, that one is perfectly dreadful! I hope I die long before I look like that."
"That is beauty," Mike said firmly.
"Mike!" Jill protested. "You've got a depraved taste - you're worse than Duke. Or else you just don't know any better."
Ordinarily such a rebuke from a water brother, most especially from Jill, would have shut Mike up, forced him to spend the following night in trying to understand his fault. But this was art in which he was sure of himself. The portrayed statue was the first thing he had seen on Earth which felt like a breath of home to him. Although it was clearly a picture of a human woman it gave him a feeling that a Martian Old One should be somewhere around, responsible for its creation. "It is beauty," he insisted stubbornly. "She has her own face. I grok."
"Jill," Anne said slowly, "Mike is right."
"Huh? Anne! Surely you don't like that?"
"It frightens me. But Mike knows what Jubal likes. Look at the book itself. It falls open naturally to any one of three places. Now look at the pages - this page has been handled more than the other two. Mike has picked the Boss's favorite. This other one - 'The Caryatid Who has Fallen under the Weight of Her Stone' - he likes almost as well. But Mike's choice is Jubal's pet."
"I buy it," Mike said decisively.
But it was not for sale. Anne telephoned the Rodin Museum in Paris on Mike's behalf and only Gallic gallantry and her beauty kept them from laughing in her face. Sell one of the Master's works? My dear lady, they are not only not for sale but they may not be reproduced. Non, non, non! Quelle idt!
But for the Man from Mars some things are possible which are not possible for others. Anne called Bradley; a couple of days later he called her back. As a compliment from the French government - no fee, but a strongly couched request that the present never be publicly exhibited - Mike would receive, not the original, but a full-size, microscopically-exact replica, a bronze photopantogram of "She Who Used to Be the Beautiful Heaulmire."
Jill helped Mike select presents for the girls, here she knew her ground. But when he asked her what he should buy for her; she not only did not help but insisted that he must not buy her anything.
Mike was beginning to realize that, while a water brother always spoke rightly, sometimes they spoke more rightly than others, i.e., that the English language had depths to it and it was sometimes necessary to probe to reach the right depth. So he consulted Anne.
"Go ahead and buy her a present, dear. She has to tell you that but you give her a present anyhow. Hmm� Anne vetoed clothes and jewelry, finally selected for him a present which puzzled him - Jill already smelled exactly the way Jill should smell.
The small size and apparent unimportance of the present, when it arrived, added to his misgivings - and when Anne let him whiff it before having him give it to Jill, Mike was more in doubt than ever; the odor was very strong and smelled not at all like Jill.
Nevertheless, Anne was right; Jill was delighted with the perfume and insisted on kissing him at once. In kissing her he grokked fully that this gift was what she wanted and that it made them grow closer.
When she wore it at dinner that night, he discovered that the fragrance truly did not differ from that of Jill herself; in some unclear fashion it simply made Jill smell more deliciously like Jill than ever. Still stranger, it caused Dorcas to kiss him and whisper, "Mike hon� the negligee is lovely and just what I wanted - but perhaps someday you'll give me perfume?"
Mike could not grok why Dorcas would want it, since Dorcas did not smell at all like Jill and therefore perfume would not be proper for her nor, he realized, would he want Dorcas to smell like Jill; he wanted Dorcas to smell like Dorcas.
Jubal interrupted with: "Quit nuzzling the lad and let him eat his dinned Dorcas, you already reek like a Marseilles cat house; don't wheedle Mike for more stinkum."
"Doss, you mind your own business."
It was all very puzzling - both that Jill could smell still more like Jill and that Dorcas should wish to smell like Jill when she already smelled like herself� and that Jubal would say that Dorcas smelled like a cat when she did not. There was a cat who lived on the place (not as a pet, but as co-owner); on rare occasion it came to the house and deigned to accept a handout. The cat and Mike had grokked each other at once, and Mike had found its carniverous thoughts most pleasing and quite Martian. He had discovered, too, that the cat's name (Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche) was not the cat's name at all, but he had not told anyone this because he could not pronounce the cat's real name; he could only hear it in his head.
The cat did not smell like Dorcas.
Giving presents was a great goodness and the buying thereof taught Mike much about the true value of money. But he had not forgotten even momentarily that there were other things he was eager to grok. Jubal had put off Senator Boone's invitation to Mike twice without mentioning it to Mike and Mike had not noticed, since his quite different grasp of time made "next Sunday" no particular date.
But the next repetition of the invitation came by mall and was addressed to Mike; Senator Boone was under pressure from Supreme Bishop Digby to produce the Man from Mars and Boone had sensed that Harshaw was stalling him and might stall indefinitely.
Mike took it to Jubal, stood waiting. "Well?" Jubal growled. "Do you want to go, or don't you? You don't have to attend a Fosterite service. We can tell 'em to go to hell."
So a Checker Cab with a human driver (Harshaw refused to trust his life to an autocab) picked them up the next Sunday morning and delivered Mike, Jill, and Jubal to a public landing fiat just outside the sacred grounds of Archangel Foster Tabernacle of the Church of the New Revelation.

XXIII

JUBAL HAD BEEN TRYING to warn Mike all the way to church; of what, Mike was not certain. He had listened, he always listened - but the landscape below them tugged for attention, too; he had compromised by storing what Jubal said. "Now look, boy," Jubal had admonished, "these Fosterites are after your money. That's all right, most everybody is after your money; you just have to be firm. Your money and the prestige of having the Man from Mars join their church. They're going to work on you - and you have to be firm about that, too."
"Beg pardon?"
"Damn it, I don't believe you've been listening."
"I am sorry, Jubal."
"Well� look at it this way. Religion is a solace to many people and it is even conceivable that some religion, somewhere, really is Ultimate Truth. But in many cases, being religious is merely a form of conceit. The Bible Belt faith in which I was brought up encouraged me to think that I was better than the rest of the world; I was 'saved' and they were 'damned' - we were in a state of grace and the rest of the world were 'heathens' and by 'heathen' they meant such people as our brother Mahmoud. It meant that an ignorant, stupid lout who seldom bathed and planted his corn by the phase of the Moon could claim to know the final answers of the Universe. That entitled him to look down his nose at everybody else. Our hymn book was loaded with such arrogance - mindless, conceited, self-congratulation on how cozy we were with the Almighty and what a high opinion he had of us and us alone, and what hell everybody else was going to catch come Judgment Day. We peddled the only authentic brand of Lydia Pinkham's-"
"Jubal!" Jill said sharply. "He doesn't grok it."
"Uh? Sorry. I got carried away. My folks tried to make a preacher out of me and missed by a narrow margin; I guess it still shows."
"It does."
"Don't rub it in, girl. I would have made a good one if I hadn't fallen into the fatal folly of reading anything I could lay hands on. With just a touch more self confidence and a liberal helping of ignorance I could have been a famous evangelist. Shucks, this place we're headed for today would have been known as the 'Archangel Jubal Tabernacle.'"
Jill made a face. "Jubal, please! Not so soon after breakfast."
"I mean it. A confidence man knows that he's lying; that limits his scope. But a successful shaman ropes himself first; he believes what he says - and such belief is contagious; there is no limit to his scope. But I lacked the necessary confidence in my own infallibility; I could never become a prophet� just a critic - which is a poor thing at best, a sort of fourth-rate prophet suffering from delusions of gender." Jubal frowned. "That's what worries me about Fosterites, Jill. I think that they are utterly sincere and you and I know that Mike is a sucker for sincerity."
"What do you think they'll try to do to him?"
"Convert him, of course. Then get their hands on his fortune."
"I thought you had things fixed so that nobody could do that?"
"No, I just fixed it so that nobody could take it away from him against his will. Ordinarily he couldn't even give it away without the government stepping in. But giving it to a church, especially a politically powerful church like the Fosterites, is another matter."
"I don't see why."
Jubal sighed. "My dear, religion is practically a null area under the law. A church can do anything any other human organization can do and has no restrictions. It pays no taxes, need not publish records, is effectively immune to search, inspection, or control - and a church is anything that calls itself a church. Attempts have been made to distinguish between 'real' religions entitled to these immunities and 'cults.' This can't be done, short of establishing a state religion� which is a cure worse than the disease. In any case, we haven't done it, and both under what's left of the old United States Constitution and under the Treaty of Federation, all churches are equal and equally immune - especially if they swing a big bloc of votes. If Mike is converted to Fosterism� and makes a will in favor of his church� and then 'goes to heaven' some sunrise, it will all be, to put it in the correct tautology, 'as legal as church on Sunday.'"
"Oh, dear! I thought we had him safe at last."
"There is no safety this side of the grave."
"Well� what are you going to do about it, Jubal?"
"Nothing. Just fret, that's all."
Mike stored their conversation without any effort to grok it. He recognized the subject as one of utter simplicity in his own language but amazingly slippery in English. Since his failure to achieve mutual grokking on this subject, even with his brother Mahmoud, with his admittedly imperfect translation of the all-embracing Martian concept as: "Thou art God," be had simply waited until grokking was possible. He knew that the waiting would fructify at its time; his brother Jill was learning his language and he would be able to explain it to her. They would grok together.
In the meantime the scenery flowing beneath him was a never-ending delight, and he was filled with eagerness for experience to come. He expected, or hoped, to meet a human Old One.
Senator Tom Boone was waiting to meet them at the landing flat. "Howdy, folks! And may the Good Lord bless you on this beautiful Sabbath. Mr. Smith, I'm happy to see you again. And you, too, Doctor." He took his cigar out of his mouth and looked at Jill. "And this little lady - didn't I see you at the Palace?"
"Yes, Senator. I'm Gillian Boardman."
"Thought so, m'dear. Are you saved?"
"Uh, I guess not, Senator."
"Well, it's never too late. We'll be very happy to have you attend the seekers' service in the Outer Tabernacle - I'll find a Guardian to guide you. Mr. Smith and the Doc will be going into the Sanctuary, of course." The Senator looked around.
"Senator-"
"Uh, what, Doc?"
"If Miss Boardman can't go into the Sanctuary, I think we had all better attend the seekers' service. She's his nurse and translator."
Boone looked slightly perturbed. "Is he ill? He doesn't look it. And why does he need a translator? He speaks English - I heard him."
Jubal shrugged. "As his physician, I prefer to have a nurse to assist me, if necessary. Mr. Smith is not entirely adjusted to the conditions of this planet. An interpreter may not be necessary. But why don't you ask him? Mike, do you want Jill to come with you?"
"Yes, Jubal."
"But - Very well, Mr. Smith." Boone again removed his cigar, put two fingers between his lips and whistled. "Cherub here!"
A youngster in his early teens came dashing up. He was dressed in a short robe, tights, and slippers, and had what appeared to be pigeon's wings (because they were) fastened, spread, on his shoulders. He was bareheaded, had a crop of tight golden curls, and a sunny smile. Jill thought that he was as cute as a ginger ale ad.
Boone ordered, "Fly up to the Sanctum office and tell the Warden on duty that I want another pilgrim's badge sent to the Sanctuary gate right away. The word is Mars."
"'Mars,'" the kid repeated, threw Boone a Boy Scout salute, turned and made a mighty sixty-foot leap over the heads of the crowd. Jill realized why the short robe had looked so bulky; it concealed a personal jump harness.
"Have to be careful of those badges," Boone remarked. "You'd be surprised how many sinners would like to sneak in and sample a little of God's Joy without having their sins washed away first. Now we'll just mosey along and sight - see a little while we wait for the third badge. I'm glad you folks got here early."
They pushed through the crowd and entered the huge building, found themselves in a long high hallway. Boone stopped. "I want you to notice something. There is economics in everything, even in the Lord's work. Any tourist coming here, whether he attends seekers' service or not - and services run twenty-four hours a day - has to come in through here. What does he see? These happy chances." Boone waved at slot machines lining both walls of the hall. "The bar and quick lunch is at the far end, he can't even get a drink of water without running this gauntlet. And let me tell you, it's a remarkable sinner who can get that far without shedding his loose change.
"But we don't take his money and give him nothing. Take a look-" Boone shouldered his way to a machine, tapped the woman playing it on the shoulder; she was wearing around her neck a Fosterite rosary. "Please, Daughter."
She looked up, her annoyance changed to a smile. "Certainly, Bishop."
"Bless you. You'll note," Boone went on, as he fed a quarter into the machine, "that no matter whether it pays off in worldly goods or not, a sinner playing this machine is always rewarded with a blessing and an appropriate souvenir text."
The machine stopped whirring and, lined up in the windows, was: GOD-WATCHES-YOU.
"That pays three for one," Boone said briskly and fished the pay-off out of the receptacle, "and here's your souvenir text." He tore a paper tab off that had extruded from a slot, and handed it to Jill. "Keep it, little lady, and ponder it."
Jill sneaked a glance at it before putting it into her purse: "But the sinner's belly is filled with filth - N.R. XXII 17"
"You'll note," Boone went on, "that the pay-off is in tokens, not in coin - and the bursar's cage is clear back past the bar� and there is plenty of opportunity there to make love offerings for charity and other good works. So the sinner probably feeds them back in� with a blessing each time and another text to take home. The cumulative effect is tremendous, really tremendous! Why, some of our most diligent and pious sheep got their start right here in this room."
"I don't doubt it," agreed Jubal.
"Especially if they hit a jackpot. You understand, every combination is a complete sentence, a blessing. All but the jackpot. That's the three Holy Eyes. I tell you, when they see those eyes all lined up and starin' at 'em and all that manna from Heaven coming down, it really makes 'em think. Sometimes they faint. Here, Mr. Smith-" Boone offered Mike one of the slugs the machine had just paid. "Give it a whirl."
Mike hesitated. Jubal quickly took the proffered token himself - damn it, he didn't want the boy getting hooked by a one-armed bandit! "I'll try it, Senator." He fed the machine.
Mike really hadn't intended to do anything. He had extended his time sense a little and was gently feeling around inside the machine trying to discover what it did and why they were stopping to look at it. But he had been too timid to play it himself.
But when Jubal did so, Mike watched the cylinders spin around, noted the single eye pictured on each, and wondered what this "jackpot" was when all three were lined up. The word had only three meanings, so far as he knew, and none of them seemed to apply. Without really thinking about it, certainly without intending to cause any excitement, he slowed and stopped each wheel so that the eyes looked out through the window.
A bell tolled, a choir sang hosannas, the machine lighted up and started spewing slugs into the receptacle and on into a catch basin below it, in a flood. Boone looked delighted. "Well, bless you! Doc, this is your day! Here, I'll help you - and put one back in to take the jackpot off." He did not wait for Jubal but picked up one of the flood and fed it back in.
Mike was wondering why all this was happening, so he lined up the three eyes again. The same events repeated, save that the flood was a mere trickle. Boone stared at the machine. "Well, I'll be - blessed! It's not supposed to hit twice in a row. But never mind; it did - and I'll see that you're paid on both of them." Quickly he put a slug back in.
Mike still wanted to see why this was a "jackpot." The eyes lined up again.
Boone stared at them. Jill suddenly squeezed Mike's hand and whispered, "Mike� stop it!"
"But, Jill, I was seeing-"
"Don't talk about it. Just stop. Oh, you just wait till I get you home!" Boone said slowly, "I'd hesitate to call this a miracle. Machine probably needs a repairman." He shouted, "Cherub here!" and added, "We'd better take the last one off, anyhow," and fed in another slug.
Without Mike's intercession, the wheels slowed down on their own and announced: "FOSTER-LOVES-YOU," and the mechanism tried, but failed, to deliver ten more slugs. A Cherub, older and with sleek black hair, came up and said, "Happy day. You need help?"
"Three jackpots," Boone told him.
"'Three'?"
"Didn't you hear the music? Are you deaf? We'll be at the bar; fetch the money there. And have somebody check this machine."
"Yes, Bishop."
They left the Cherub scratching his head while Boone hurried them on through the Happiness Room to the bar at the far end. "Got to get you out of here," Boone said jovially, "before you bankrupt the Church. Doc, are you always that lucky?"
"Always," Harshaw said solemnly. He had not looked at Mike and did not intend to - he told himself that he did not know that the boy had anything to do with it� but he wished mightily that this ordeal were over and all of them home again.
Boone took them to a stretch of the bar counter marked "Reserved" and said, "This'll do - or would the little lady like to sit down?"
"This is fine." (-and if you call me "little lady" just once more I'll turn Mike loose on you!)
A bartender hurried up. "Happy day. Your usual, Bishop?"
"Double. What'll it be, Doc? And Mr. Smith? Don't be bashful; you're the Supreme Bishop's guests."
"Brandy, thank you. Water on the side."
"Brandy, thank you," Mike repeated� thought about it, and added, "No water for me, please." While it was true that the water of life was not the essence in the water ceremony, nevertheless he did not wish to drink water here.
"That's the spirits" Boone said heartily. "That's the proper spirit with spirits! No water. Get it? It's a joke." Re dug Jubal in the ribs. "Now what'll it be for the little lady? Cola? Milk for your rosy cheeks? Or do you want a real Happy Day drink with the big folks?"
"Senator," Jill said carefully, "Would your hospitality extend to a martini?"
"Would it! Best martinis in the whole world right here - we don't use any vermouth at all. We bless 'em instead. Double martini for the little lady. Bless you, son, and make it fast." He turned to the others. "We've just about time for a quick one, then pay our respects to Archangel Foster and on into the Sanctuary in time to hear the Supreme Bishop."
The drinks arrived and the jackpots' payoff. They drank with Boone's blessing, then he wrangled in a friendly fashion with Jubal over the three hundred dollars just delivered, insisting that all three prizes belonged to Jubal even though Boone had inserted the slugs on the second and third. Jubal settled it by scooping up all the money and depositing it in a love-offering bowl near them on the bar.
Boone nodded approvingly. "That's a mark of grace, Doc. We'll save you yet. Another round, folks?"
Jill hoped that someone would say yes. The gin was watered, she decided, and the flavor was poor; nevertheless it was starting a small flame of tolerance in her middle. But nobody spoke up, so she trailed along as Boone led them away, up a flight of stairs, past a sign reading: POSITIVELY NO SEEKERS NOR SINNERS ALLOWED ON THIS LEVEL - THIS MEANS YOU!
Beyond the sign was a heavy grilled gate. Boone said to it: "Bishop Boone and three pilgrims, guests of the Supreme Bishop."
The gate swung open. He led them around a curved passage and into a room.
It was a moderately large room, luxuriously appointed in a style that reminded Jill of undertakers' parlors, but it was filled with cheerful music. The basic theme seemed to be "Jingle Bells" but a Congo beat had been added and the arrangement so embroidered that its ancestry was not certain. Jill found that she liked it and that it made her want to dance.
The far wall of the room was clear glass and appeared to be not even that. Boone said briskly, "Here we are, folks - in the Presence." He knelt quickly, facing the empty wall. "You don't have to kneel, you're pilgrims - but do so if it makes you feel better. Most pilgrims do. And there he is just as he was when he was called up to Heaven."
Boone gestured with his cigar. "Don't he look natural? Preserved by a miracle, his flesh incorruptible. That's the very chair he used to sit in when he wrote his messages� and that's just the pose he was in when he went to Heaven. He never moved and he's never been moved - we just built the Tabernacle right around him� removing the old church, naturally, and preserving its sacred stones." Opposite them about twenty feet away, facing them, seated in a big arm chair remarkably like a throne, was an old man. He looked as if he were alive - and he reminded Jill strongly of an old goat that had been on the farm where she had spent her childhood summers. Yes, even to the out-thrust lower lip, the cut of the whiskers, and the fierce, brooding eyes. Jill felt her skin prickle; the Archangel Foster made her uneasy. Mike said to her in Martian, "My brother, this is an Old One?"
"I don't know, Mike. They say he is."
He answered in Martian, "I do not grok an Old One here."
"I don't know, I tell you."
"I grok wrongness."
"Mike! Remember!"
"Yes, Jill."
Boone said, "What was he saying, little lady? What was your question, Mr. Smith?"
Jill said quickly, "It wasn't anything. Senator, can I get out of here? I feel faint." She glanced back at the corpse. There were billowing clouds above it and one shaft of light always cut through and sought out the face. The light changed enough so that the face seemed to change and the eyes seemed bright and alive.
Boone said soothingly, "It sometimes has that effect, the first time. But you ought to look at him from the seekers' gallery below us - looking up at him and with entirely different music. Entirely. Heavy music, with subsonics in it, I believe it is - reminds 'em of their sins. Now this room is a Happy Thoughts meditation chamber for high officials of the Church - I often come here and sit and smoke a cigar for an hour if I'm feeling the least bit low."
"Please, Senator!"
"Oh, certainly. You just wait outside, m'dear. Mr. Smith, you stay as long as you like."
Jubal said, "Senator, hadn't we best get on into the services?"
They all left. Jill was shaking and squeezed Mike's hand - she had been scared silly that Mike might do something to that grisly exhibit - and get them all lynched, or worse.
Two guards, dressed in uniforms much like the Cherubim but more ornate, thrust crossed spears in their path when they reached the portal of the Sanctuary. Boone said reprovingly, "Come, come! These pilgrims are the Supreme Bishop's personal guests. Where are their badges?"
The confusion was straightened out, the badges produced and with them their door prize numbers. A respectful usher said, "This way, Bishop," and led them up wide stairs and to a center box directly facing the stage.
Boone stood back for them to go in. "You first, little lady." There followed a tussle of wills; Boone wanted to sit next to Mike in order to answer his questions. Harshaw won and Mike sat between Jill and Jubal, with Boone on the aisle.
The box was roomy and luxurious, with very comfortable, self-adjusting seats, ash trays for each seat and drop tables for refreshments folded against the rail in front of them. Their balcony position placed them about fifteen feet over the heads of the congregation and not more than a hundred feet from the altar. In front of it a young priest was warming up the crowd, shuffling to the music and shoving his heavily muscled arms back and forth, fists clenched, like pistons. His strong bass voice joined the choir from time to time, then he would lift it in exhortation:
"Up off your behinds! What are you waiting for? Gonna let the Devil catch you napping'?"
The aisles were very wide and a snake dance was moving down the right aisle, across in front of the altar, and weaving back up the center aisle, feet stomping in time with the priest's piston-like jabs and with the syncopated chant of the choir. Clumps clump, moan!� clump, clump, moan! Jill felt the beat of it and realized sheepishly that it would be fun to get into that snake dance - as more and more people were doing under the brawny young priest's taunts.
"That boy's a comer," Boone said approvingly. "I've team-preached with him a few times and I can testify that he turns the crowd over to you already sizzlin'. The Reverend 'Jug' Jackerman - used to play left tackle for the Rams. You've seen him play."
"I'm afraid not," Jubal admitted. "I don't follow football."
"Really? You don't know what you're missing. Why, during the season most of the faithful stay after services, eat their lunches in their pews, and watch the game. The whole back wall behind the altar slides away and you're looking right into the biggest stereo tank ever built. Puts the plays right in your lap. Better reception than you get at home - and it's more of a thrill to watch with a crowd around you." He stopped and whistled. "Hey, Cherub! Over here!"
An usher hurried over. "Yes, Bishop?"
"Son, you ran away so fast when you seated us, I didn't have time to put in my order."
"I'm sorry, Bishop."
"Being sorry won't get you into Heaven. Get happy, son. Get that old spring into your step and stay on your toes. Same thing all around, folks? Fine!" He gave the order and added, "and bring me back a handful of my cigars - just ask the chief barkeep."
"Right away, Bishop."
"Bless you, son. Hold it-" The head of the snake dance was just about to pass under them; Boone leaned over the rail, made a megaphone of his hands and cut through the high noise level. "Dawn! Hey, Dawn!" A woman looked up; he caught her eye, motioned her to come up. She smiled. "Add a whiskey sour to that order. Fly."
The woman showed up quickly, as did the drinks. Boone swung a seat out of the box's back row and put it cornerwise in front of him so that she could visit more easily. "Folks, meet Miss Dawn Ardent. M'dear, that's Miss Boardman, the little lady down in the corner - and this is the famous Doctor Jubal Harshaw here by me-"
"Really? Doctor, I think your stories are simply divine."
"Thank you."
"Oh, I really do. I put one of your tapes on my player and let it lull me to sleep almost every night."
"Higher praise a writer cannot expect," Jubal said with a straight face.
"That's enough, Dawn," put in Boone. "The young man sitting between them is� Mr. Valentine Smith the Man from Mars."
He eyes came open wider as her mouth opened. "Oh, my goodness!"
Boone roared. "Bless you, child! I guess I really snuck up on you that time."
She said, "Are you really the Man from Mars?"
"Yes, Miss Dawn Ardent."
"Just call me 'Dawn.' Oh, goodness!"
Boone patted her hand. "Don't you know it's a sin to doubt the word of a Bishop? M'dear, how would you like to help lead the Man from Mars to the light?"
"Oh, I'd love it!"
(You certainly would, you sleek bitch! Jill said to herself. She had been growing increasingly angry ever since Miss Ardent had joined them. The dress the woman was wearing was long sleeved, high necked, and opaque - and covered nothing. It was a knit fabric almost exactly the shade of her tanned skin and Jill was certain that skin was all there was under it - other than Miss Ardent, which was really quite a lot, in all departments. The dress was ostentatiously modest compared with the extreme styles worn by many of the female half of the congregation, some of whom, in the snake dance, seemed about to jounce out of their clothes.
Jill thought that, despite being dressed, Miss Ardent looked as if she had just wiggled out of bed and was anxious to crawl back in. With Mike. Quit squirming your carcass at him, you cheap hussy!
Boone said, "I'll speak to the Supreme Bishop about it, m'dear. Now you'd better get back downstairs and lead that parade. Jug needs your help."
She stood up obediently. "Yes, Bishop. Pleased to meet you, Doctor, and Miss Broad. I hope I'll see you again, Mr. Smith. I'll pray for you." She undulated away.
"A fine girl, that," Boone said happily. "Ever catch her act, Doctor?"
"I think not. What does she do?"
Boone seemed unable to believe his ears. "You don't know?"
"Didn't you hear her name? That's Dawn Ardent - she's simply the highest paid peeler in all Baja California, that's who she is. Men have committed suicide over her - very sad. Works under an irised spotlight and by the time she's down to her shoes, the light is just on her face and you really can't see anything else. Very effective. Highly spiritual. Would you believe it, looking at that sweet face now, that she used to be a most immoral woman?"
"I can't believe it."
"Well, she was. Ask her. She'll tell you. Better yet, come to a cleansing for seekers - I'll let you know when she's going to be on. When she confesses, it gives other women courage to stand up and tell about their sins. She doesn't hold anything back - and, of course, it does her good, too, to know that she's helping other people. Very dedicated woman now - flies her own car up here every Saturday night right after her last show, so as to be here in time to teach Sunday School. She teaches the Young Men's Happiness Class and attendance has more than tripled since she took over."
"I can believe that," Jubal agreed. "How old are these lucky 'Young Men'?"
Boone looked at him and laughed. "You're not fooling me, you old devil - somebody told you the motto of Dawn's class: 'Never too old to be young.'"
"No, truly."
"In any case you can't attend her class until you've seen the light and gone through cleansing and been accepted. Sorry. This is the One True Church, Pilgrim, nothing at all like those traps of Satan, those foul pits of iniquity that call themselves 'churches' in order to lead the unwary into idolatry and other abominations. You can't just walk in here because you want to kill a couple hours out of the rain - you gotta be saved first. In fact- Oh, oh, camera warning." Red lights were blinking in each corner of the great hail. "And Jug's got 'em done to a turn. Now you'll see some action."
The snake dance picked up more volunteers and the few left seated were clapping the cadence and bouncing up and down. Pairs of ushers were hurrying to pick up the fallen, some of whom were quiet but others, mostly women, were writhing and foaming at the mouth. These were dumped hastily in front of the altar and left to flop like freshly caught fish. Boone pointed his cigar at a gaunt redhead, a woman apparently about forty whose dress was badly torn by her exertions. "See that woman? It has been at least a year since she has gone all through a service without being possessed by the Spirit. Sometimes Archangel Foster uses her mouth to talk to us� and when that happens it takes four husky acolytes to hold her down. She could go to heaven any time, she's ready. But she's needed here. Anybody need a refill? Bar service is likely to be a little slow once the cameras are switched on and things get lively."
Almost absently Mike let his glass be replenished. He shared none of Jill's disgust with the scene. He had been deeply troubled when he had discovered that the "Old One" had been no Old One at all but mere spoiled food, with no Old One anywhere near. But he had tabled that matter and was drinking deep of the events around him.
The frenzy going on below him was so Martian in its flavor that he felt both homesick and warmly at home. No detail of the scene was Martian, all was wildly different, yet he grokked correctly that this was a growing-closer as real as water ceremony, and in numbers and intensity that he had never met before outside his own nest. He wished forlornly that someone would invite him to join that jumping up and down. His feet tingled with an urge to merge himself with them.
He spotted Miss Dawn Ardent again in its van and tried to catch her eye - perhaps she would invite him. He did not have to recognize her - by size and proportions even though he had noted when he had first seen her that she was exactly as tall as his brother Jill with very nearly the same shapings and masses throughout. But Miss Dawn Ardent had her own face, with her pains and sorrows and growings graved on it under her warm smile. He wondered if Miss Dawn Ardent might some day be willing to share water with him and grow closer. Senator Bishop Boone had made him feel wary and he was glad that Jubal had not permitted them to sit side by side. But Mike was sorry when Miss Dawn Ardent had been sent away.
Miss Dawn Ardent did not feel him looking at her. The snake dance carried her away.
The man on the platform had both his arms raised; the great cave became quieter. Suddenly he brought them down. "Who's happy?"

"WE'RE HAPPY!"

"Why?"
"GOD� LOVES US!""How d'you know?"
"FOSTER TOLD US!"He dropped to his knees, raised one clenched fist. "Let's hear that lion ROAR!"
The congregation roared and shrieked and screamed while he controlled the din using his fist as a baton, raising the volume, lowering it, squeezing it down to a subvocal growl, then suddenly driving it to crescendo that shook the balcony. Mike felt it beat on him and he wallowed in it, with ecstasy so painful that he feared that he would be forced to withdraw. But Jill had told him that he must not ever do so again, except in the privacy of his own room; he controlled it and let the waves wash over him.
The man stood up. "Our first hymn," he said briskly, "is sponsored by Manna Bakeries, makers of Angel Bread, the loaf of love with our Supreme Bishop's smiling face on every wrapper and containing a valuable premium coupon redeemable at your nearest neighborhood Church of the New Revelation, Brothers and Sisters, tomorrow Manna Bakeries with branches throughout the land start a giant, price-slashing sale of pre-equinox goodies. Send your child to school tomorrow with a bulging box of Archangel Foster cookies, each one blessed and wrapped in an appropriate text - and pray that each goodie he gives away may lead a child of sinners nearer to the light.
"And now let's really live it up with the holy words of that old favorite: 'Forward, Foster's Children!' All together-"
"Forward, Foster's Chil-dren! Smash apart your foes
Faith our Shield and Ar-mar! Strike them down by rows-!"
"Second verse!"
"Make no peace with sin-nen! God is on our side!"
Mike was so joyed by it all that he did not stop then to translate and weigh and try to grok the words. He grokked that the words were not of essence; it was a growing-closer. The snake dance started moving again, the marchers chanting the potent sounds along with the choir and those too feeble to march.
After the hymn they caught their breaths while there were announcements, Heavenly messages, another commercial, and the awarding of door prizes. Then a second hymn, "Happy Faces Uplifted," was sponsored by Dattelbaum's Department Stores where the Saved Shop in Safety since no merchandise is offered which competes with a sponsored brand - a children's Happy Room in each branch supervised by a Saved sister. The young priest moved out to the very front of the platform and cupped his ear, listening- "We� want� Digby!"
"Who?"
"We - Want - DIG-BY!"
"Louder! Make him hear you!"
"WE-WANT-DIG-BY!" Clap, clap, stomp, stomp.
"WE- WANT-DIG-BY!" Clap, clap, stomp, stomp- It went on and on, getting louder as the building rocked with it. Jubal leaned to Boone and said, "Much of that and you'll do what Samson did." "Never fear," Boone told him, around his cigar. "Reinforced, fireproof, and sustained by faith. Besides, it's built to shake; it was designed that way. Helps."
The lights went down, curtains behind the altar parted, and a blinding radiance from no visible source picked out the Supreme Bishop, waving his clasped hands over his head and smiling at them.
They answered with the lion's roar and he threw them kisses. On his way to the pulpit he stopped, half raised one of the possessed women still writhing slowly near the altar, kissed her on the forehead, lowered her gently, started on - stopped again and knelt by the bony redhead. The Supreme Bishop reached behind him and a portable microphone was instantly placed in his hand.
He put his other arm around the woman's shoulders, placed the pickup near her lips.
Mike could not understand her words. Whatever they were, he was reasonably sure that they were not English.
But the Supreme Bishop was translating, interjecting his words quickly at each pause in the foaming spate. "Archangel Foster is with us today - "He is especially pleased with you. Kiss the sister on your right - "Archangel Foster loves you all. Kiss the sister on your left-
"He has a special message for one of us here today."
The woman spoke again; Digby seemed to hesitate. "What was that? Louder, I pray you." She muttered and screamed at length.
Digby looked up and smiled. "His message is for a pilgrim from another planet - Valentine Michael Smith the Man from Mars! Where are you, Valentine Michael! Stand up, stand up!"
Jill tried to stop him but Jubal growled, "Easier to do it than to fight it. Let him stand up, Jill. Wave, Mike. Now you can sit down." Mike did so, amazed to find that they were now chanting: "Man from Mars! Man from Mars!"
The sermon that followed seemed to be directed at him, too, but try as he would, he could not understand it. The words were English, or most of them were, but they seemed to be put together wrongly and there was so much noise, so much clapping, and so many shouts of "Hallelujah!" and "Happy Day!" that he grew quite confused. He was glad when it was over.
As soon as the sermon was finished, Digby turned the service back to the young priest and left; Boone stood up. "Come on, folks. We pull a sneak now - ahead of the crowd."
Mike followed along, Jill's hand in his. Presently they were going through an elaborately arched tunnel with the noise of the crowd left behind them. Jubal said, "Does this way lead to the parking lot? I told my driver to wait."
"Eh?" Boone answered. "It does if you go straight ahead. But we're going to see the Supreme Bishop first."
"What?" Jubal replied. "No, I don't think we can. It's time for us to get on home."
Boone stared. "Doctor, you don't mean that. The Supreme Bishop is waiting for us right now. You can't just walk out on him - you must pay your respects. You're his guests."
Jubal hesitated, then gave in. "Well - there won't be a lot of other people? This boy has had enough excitement for one day."
"Just the Supreme Bishop. He wants to see you privately." Boone ushered them into a small elevator concealed in the decorations of the tunnel; moments later they were waiting in a parlor of Digby's private apartments.
A door opened, Digby hurried in. He had removed his vestments and was dressed in flowing robes. He smiled at them. "Sorry to keep you waiting, folks - I just have to have a shower as soon as I come off. You've no notion how it makes you sweat to punch Satan and keep on slugging. So this is the Man from Mars? God bless you, son. Welcome to the Lord's House. Archangel Foster wants you to feel at home here. He's watching over you."
Mike did not answer. Jubal was surprised to see how short the Supreme Bishop was. Lifts in his shoes when he was on stage? Or the way the lighting was arranged? Aside from the goatee he wore in evident imitation of the departed Foster, the man reminded him of a used-car salesman - the same ready smile and warm sincere manner. But he reminded Jubal of some one else, too� somebody- Got it! "Professor" Simon Magus, Becky Vesey's long-dead husband. Jubal relaxed a little and felt friendlier toward the clergyman. Simon had been as likable a scoundrel as he had ever known - Digby had turned his charm on Jill, "Don't kneel, daughter; we're just friends in private here." He spoke a few words to her, startling Jill with a surprising knowledge of her background and adding earnestly, "I have deep respect for your calling, daughter. In the blessed words of Archangel Foster, God commands us first to minister to the body in order that the soul may seek the light untroubled by ills of the flesh. I know that you are not yet one of us� but your service is blessed by the Lord. We are fellow travelers on the road to Heaven."
He turned to Jubal. "You, too, Doctor. Archangel Foster has told us that the Lord commands us to be happy - and many is the time I have put down my crook, weary unto death with the cares and woes of my flock, and enjoyed an innocent, happy hour over one of your stories - and have stood up refreshed, ready to fight again."
"Uh, thank you, Bishop."
"I mean it deeply. I've had your record searched in Heaven - now, now, never mind; I know that you are an unbeliever but let me speak. Even Satan has a purpose in God's Great Plan. It is not yet time for you to believe. Out of your sorrow and heartache and pain you spin happiness for other people. This is all credited on your page of the Great Ledger. Now please! I did not bring you here to argue technology. We never argue with anyone, we wait until they see the light and then we welcome them. But today we shall just enjoy a happy hour together."
Digby then proceeded to act as if he meant it. Jubal was forced to admit that the glib fraud was a charming host, and his coffee and liquor and food were all excellent. Jubal noticed that Mike seemed decidedly jumpy, especially when Digby deftly cut him out of the herd and spoke with him alone - but, confound it, the boy was simply going to have to get used to meeting people and talking to them on his own, without Jubal or Jill or somebody to feed him his lines.
Boone was showing Jill some relics of Foster in a glass case on the other side of the room; Jubal covertly watched her evident reluctance with mild amusement while he spread pate de fois gras on toast. He heard a door click and looked around; Digby and Mike were missing. "Where did they go, Senator?"
"Eh? What was that, Doctor?"
"Bishop Digby and Mr. Smith. Where are they?"
Boone looked around, seemed to notice the closed door. "Oh, they've just stepped in there for a moment. That's a little retiring room used for private audiences. You were in it, weren't you? When the Supreme Bishop was showing you around."
"Um, yes." It was a small room with nothing in it but a chair on a dais - a "throne," Jubal corrected himself with a private grin - and a kneeler with an arm rest. Jubal wondered which one would use the throne and which one would be left with the kneeler - if this tinsel bishop tried to argue religion with Mike he was in for some shocks. "I hope they don't stay in there too long. We really do have to be getting back."
"I doubt if they'll stay long. Probably Mr. Smith wanted a word in private. People often do - and the Supreme Bishop is very generous that way. Look, I'll call the parking lot and have your cab waiting right at the end of that passageway where we took the elevator - that's the Supreme Bishop's private entrance. Save you a good ten minutes."
"That's very kind of you."
"So if Mr. Smith has something on his soul he wants to confess, we won't have to hurry him. I'll step outside and phone." Boone left.
Jill came over and said worriedly, "Jubal, I don't like this. I think we were deliberately maneuvered so that Digby could get Mike alone and work on him."
"I'm sure of it."
"Well? They haven't any business doing that. I'm going to bust right in on them and tell Mike it's time to leave."
"Suit yourself," Jubal answered, "but I think you're acting like a broody hen. This isn't like having the S.S. on our tails, Jill; this swindle is much smoother. There won't be any strong-arm stuff." He smiled. "It's my opinion that if Digby tries to convert Mike, they'll wind up with Mike converting him. Mike's ideas are pretty hard to shake."
"I still don't like it."
"Relax. Help yourself to the free chow."
"I'm not hungry."
"Well, I am� and if I ever tuned down a free feed, they'd toss me out of the Authors' Guild." He piled paper-thin Virginia ham on buttered bread, added to it other items, none of them syntho, until he had an unsteady ziggurat, munched it and licked mayonnaise from his fingers.
Ten minutes later Boone had not returned. Jill said sharply, "Jubal, I'm not going to remain polite any longer. I'm going to get Mike out of there."
"Go right ahead."
She strode to the door. "Jubal, it's locked."
"Thought it might be."
"Well? What do we do? Break it down?"
"Only as a last resort." Jubal went to the inner door, looked it over carefully. "Mmm, with a battering ram and twenty stout men I might try it. But I wouldn't count on it. Jill, that door would do credit to a bank vault - it's just been prettied up to match the room. I've got one much like it for the fireproof off my study."
"What do we do?"
"Beat on it, if you want to. You'll just bruise your hands. I'm going to see what's keeping friend Boone-"
But when Jubal looked out into the hallway he saw Boone just returning. "Sorry," Boone said. "Had to have the Cherubim hunt up your driver. He was in the Happiness Room, having a bite of lunch. But your cab is waiting for you, just where I said."
"Senator," Jubal said, "we've got to leave now. Will you be so kind as to tell Bishop Digby?"
Boone looked perturbed. "I could phone him, if you insist. But I hesitate to do so - and I simply cannot walk in on a private audience."
"Then phone him. We do insist."
But Boone was saved the embarrassment as, just then, the inner door opened and Mike walked out. Jill took one look at his face and shrilled, "Mike! Are you all right?"
"Yes, Jill."
"I'll tell the Supreme Bishop you're leaving," said Boone and went past Mike into the smaller room. He reappeared at once. "He's left," he announced. "There's a back way into his study." Boone smiled. "Like cats and cooks, the Supreme Bishop goes without saying. That's a joke. He says that 'good-by's' add nothing to happiness in this world, so he never says good-by. Don't be offended."
"We aren't. But we'll say good-by now - and thank you for a most interesting experience. No, don't bother to come down; I'm sure we can find our way out."

XXIV

ONCE THEY WERE IN THE AIR Jubal said, "Well, Mike, what did you think of it?"
Mike frowned. "I do not grok."
"You aren't alone, son. What did the Bishop have to say?"
Mike hesitated a long time, finally said, "My brother Jubal, I need to ponder until grokking is."
"Ponder right ahead, son. Take a nap. That's what I'm going to do."
Jill said suddenly, "Jubal? How do they get away with it?"
"Get away with what?"
"Everything. That's not a church - it's a madhouse."
It was Jubal's turn to ponder before answering. "No, Jill, you're mistaken. It is a church� and the logical eclecticism of our times."
"Huh?"
"The New Revelation and all doctrines and practices under it are all old stuff, very old. All you can say about it is that neither Foster nor Digby ever had an original thought in his life. But they knew what would sell, in this day and age. So they pieced together a hundred timeworn tricks, gave them a new paint job, and they were in business. A booming business, too. The only thing that scares me is that I might live to see it sell too well - until it was compulsory for everybody."
"Oh, no!"
"Oh, yes. Hitler started with less and all he had to peddle was hate. Hate always sells well, but for repeat trade and the long pull happiness is sounder merchandise. Believe me, I know; I'm in the same grift myself. As Digby reminded me." Jubal grimaced. "I should have punched him, Instead, he made me like it. That's why I'm afraid of him. He's good at it, he's clever. He knows what people want. Happiness. The world has suffered a long, bleak century of guilt and fear - now Digby tells them that they have nothing to fear, in this life or hereafter, and that God commands them to love and be happy. Day in, day out, he keeps pushing it: Don't be afraid, be happy"
"Well, that part's all right," Jill admitted, "and I concede that he works hard at it. But-"
"Piffle! He plays hard."
"No, he gave me the impression that he really is devoted to his work, that he had sacrificed everything else to-"
"'Piffle!' I said. For Digby it's play. Jill, of all the nonsense that twists the world, the concept of 'altruism' is the worst. People do what they want to do, every time. If it sometimes pains them to make a choice - if the choice turns out to look like a 'noble sacrifice' - you can be sure that it is in no wise nobler than the discomfort caused by greediness� the unpleasant necessity of having to decide between two things both of which you would like to do when you can't do both. The ordinary bloke suffers that discomfort every day, every time he makes a choice between spending a buck on beer or tucking it away for his kids, between getting up when he's tired or spending the day in his warm bed and losing his job. No matter which he does he always chooses what seems to hurt least or pleasures most. The average chump spends his life harried by these small decisions. But the utter scoundrel and the perfect saint merely make the same choices on a larger scale. They still pick what pleases them. As Digby has done. Saint or scoundrel, he's not one of the harried little chumps."
"Which do you think he is, Jubal?"
"You mean there's a difference?"
"Oh, Jubal, your cynicism is just a pose and you know it! Of course there's a difference."
"Mmm, yes, you're right, there is. I hope he's just a scoundrel - because a saint can stir up ten times as much mischief as a scoundrel. Strike that from the record; you would just tag it as 'cynicism' - as if tagging it proved it wrong. Jill, what troubled you about those church services?"
"Well� everything. You can't tell me that that is worship."
"Meaning they didn't do things that way in the Little Brown Church in the Vale you attended as a kid? Brace yourself, Jill - they don't do it your way in St. Peter's either. Nor in Mecca."
"Yes, but - well, none of them do it that way! Snake dances, slot machines� even a bar right in church! That's not reverence, it's not even dignified! Just disgusting."
"I don't suppose that temple prostitution was very dignified, either."
"Huh?"
"I rather imagine that the two-backed beast is just as sweaty and comical when the act is performed in the service of a god as it is under any other circumstances. As for those snake dances, have you ever seen a Shaker service? No, of course not and neither have I; any church that is against sexual intercourse (as they were) doesn't last long. But dancing to the glory of God has a long and respected history. It doesn't have to be good dancing - according to eye-witness reports the Shakers could never have made the Bolshoi Ballet - it merely has to be enthusiastic. Do you consider the Rain Dances of our Southwest Indians irreverent?"
"No. But that's different."
"Everything always is - and the more it changes, the more it is the same. Now about those slot machines - ever see a Bingo game in church?"
"Well� yes. Our parish used to hold them when we were trying to raise the mortgage. But we held them on Friday nights; we certainly didn't do such things during church services."
"So? Minds me of a married woman who was very proud of her virtue. She slept with other men only when her husband was away."
"Why, Jubal, the two cases aren't even slightly alike!"
"Probably not. Analogy is even slipperier than logic. But, 'little lady'-"
"Smile when you call me that!"
"'It's a joke.' Why didn't you spit in his face? He had to stay on his good behavior no matter what we did; Digby wanted him to. But, Jill, if a thing is sinful on Sunday, it is sinful on Friday - at least it groks that way to an outsider, myself� or perhaps to a man from Mars. The only difference I can see is that the Fosterites give away, absolutely free, a scriptural text even if you lose. Could your Bingo games make the same claim?"
"Fake scripture, you mean. A text from the New Revelation. Boss, have you read the thing?"
"I've read it."
"Then you know. It's just dressed up in Biblical language. Part of it is just icky-sweet with no substance, like a saccharine tablet, more of it is sheer nonsense� and some of it is just hateful. None of it makes sense, it isn't even good morals."
Jubal was silent so long that Jill thought he had gone to sleep. At last he said, "Jill, are you familiar with Hindu sacred writings?"
"Mmm, I'm afraid not."
"The Koran? Or any other major scripture? I could illustrate my point from the Bible but I would not wish to hurt your feelings."
"Uh, I'm afraid I'm not much of a scholar, Jubal. Go ahead, you won't hurt my feelings."
"Well, I'll stick to the Old Testament, picking it to pieces usually doesn't upset people quite so much. You know the story of Sodom and Gomorrah? And how Lot was saved from these wicked cities when Yahweh smote 'em with a couple of heavenly A-bombs?"
"Oh, yes, of course. His wife was turned into a pillar of salt."
"Caught by the fallout, perhaps. She tarried and looked back. Always seemed to me to be too stiff a punishment for the peccadillo of female curiosity. But we were speaking of Lot. Saint Peter describes him as a just, Godly, and righteous man, vexed by the filthy conversation of the wicked. I think we must stipulate Saint Peter to be an authority on virtue, since to him was given the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven. But if you search the only records concerning Lot, in the Old Testament, it becomes hard to determine exactly what Lot did or did not do that established him as such a paragon. He divided up a cattle range at his brother's suggestion. He got captured in a battle. When he was tipped off, he lammed out of town in time to save his skin. He fed and sheltered two strangers overnight but his conduct shows that he knew them to be V.I.P.s whether or not he knew they were angels - and by the Koran and by my own lights, his hospitality would have counted for more if he had thought they were just a couple of unworthy poor in need of a pad and a handout. Aside from these insignificant items and Saint Peter's character reference, there is just one thing that Lot did mentioned anywhere in the Bible on which we can judge his virtue - virtue so great, mind you, that heavenly intercession saved his life. See chapter nineteen of Genesis, verse eight."
"And what does it say?"
"Look it up when we get home. I don't expect you to believe me."
"Jubal! You're the most infuriating man I've ever met."
"And you're a very pretty girl and a fair cook, so I don't mind your ignorance. All right, I'll tell you - then you look it up anyhow. Some of Lot's neighbors came and beat on his door and wanted to meet these two blokes from out of town. Lot didn't fight with them; he offered 'em a deal instead. He had two young daughters, virgins - at least, such was his opinion - and he told this crowd of men that he would give them these two little girls and they could use them any way they liked - a gang shagging, a midnight revue, he pleaded with them to do any damn thing they pleased to his daughters� only please go 'way and quit beating on his door."
"Jubal� does it really say that?"
"Look it up yourself. I've modernized the language but the meaning is as unmistakable as a whore's wink. Lot offered to let a gang of men - 'young and old,' the Bible say amp; - abuse two young virgins under his protection if only they wouldn't break down his door. Say!" Jubal leaned forward and beamed. "Maybe I should have tried that when the S.S. was breaking my door down! Maybe it would have got me into heaven - and Saint Peter knows my chances aren't too good otherwise." Then he frowned and looked worried. "No, it wouldn't have worked. The recipe plainly calls for 'virgins intactae' - and I wouldn't have known which two of you gals to offer those troopers."
"Hmmph! You won't find out from me."
"Possibly I couldn't find out from any of you. Even Lot might have been mistaken. But that's what he promised 'em - his virgin daughters, young and tender and scared - urged this street gang to rape them as much as they wished in any way they liked� if only they would leave him in peace?" Jubal snorted in disgust. "And the Bible cites this sort of scum as being a righteous man."
Jill said slowly, "I don't think that's quite the way we were taught it in Sunday School."
"Damn it, look it up! They probably gave you a Bowdlerized version. That's not the only shock in store for anybody who actually reads the Bible. Consider Elisha. It says here that Elisha was so all-fired holy that merely touching his bones restored a dead man to life. But he was a baldheaded old coot, like myself. So one day some children made fun of his baldness, just as you girls do. So God personally interceded and sent two bears to tear forty-two small children into bloody bits. That's what it says - second chapter of Second Kings."
"Boss, I never make fun of your bald head."
"Who was it sent my name to those hair-restorer quacks? Dorcas, maybe? Whoever it was, God knows - and she had better keep a sharp eye out for bears. I might turn pious in my dotage and start enjoying divine protection. But I shan't give you any more samples. The Bible is loaded with such stuff; read it and find out. Crimes that would turn your stomach are asserted to be either divinely ordered or divinely condoned� along with, I must add, a lot of hard common sense and some pretty workable rules for social behavior. I am not running down the Bible; it stacks up pretty well as sacred writings go. It isn't a patch on the sadistic, pornographic trash that goes by the name of sacred writings among the Hindus. Or a dozen other religions. But I'm not singling out any of them for condemnation, either; it is entirely conceivable that some one of these mutually contradictory mythologies is the literal word of God� that God is in truth the sort of bloodthirsty paranoid who would rend to bits forty-two children for the crime of sassing one of his priests. Don't ask me about the Front Office's policies; I just work here. My point is that Foster's New Revelation that you're so contemptuous of is pure sweetness-and-light as scripture goes. Bishop Digby's Patron is a pretty good Joe; He wants people to be happy-happy here on Earth plus guaranteed eternal bliss in Heaven. He doesn't expect you to chastise the flesh here and now in order to reap rewards after you're dead. Oh no! this is the modern giant economy package. If you like to drink and gamble and dance and wench - and most people do - come to church and do it under holy auspices. Do it with your conscience free of any trace of guilt. Really have fun at it. Live it up! Get happy!"
Jubal failed to look happy himself. He went on, "Of course there's a slight charge; Digby's God expects to be acknowledged as such - but that has been a foible of gods always. Anyone who is stupid enough to refuse to get happy on His terms is a sinner� and a sinner deserves anything that happens to him. But this is one rule common to all gods and goddesses throughout history; don't blame Foster and Digby, they didn't invent it. Their brand of snake oil is utterly orthodox in all respects."
"Boss, you sound as if you were halfway converted."
"Not me! I don't enjoy snake dances, I despise crowds, and I do not propose to let my social and mental inferiors tell me where I have to go on Sundays - and I wouldn't enjoy Heaven if that crowd is going to be there. I simply object to your criticizing them for the wrong things. As literature, the New Revelation stacks up about average - it should; it was composed by plagiarizing other scriptures. As for logic and internal consistency, these mundane rules do not apply to sacred writings and never have - but even on these grounds the New Revelation must be rated superior; it hardly ever bites its own tail. Try reconciling the Old Testament with the New Testament sometime, or Buddhist doctrine with Buddhist apocrypha. As morals, Fosterism is merely the Freudian ethic sugar-coated for people who can't take their psychology straight, although I doubt if the old lecher who wrote it - pardon me, 'was inspired to write it' - was aware of this. He was no scholar. But he was in tune with his times, he tapped the Zeitgeist. Fear and guilt and a loss of faith - how could he miss? Now pipe down, I'm going to nap."
"Who's been talking?"
"'The woman tempted me.'" Jubal closed his eyes.
On reaching home they found that Caxton and Mahmoud had flown in together for the day. Ben had been disappointed to find Jill not at home on his arrival but he had managed to bear up without tears through the company of Anne, Miriam, and Dorcas. Mahmoud always visited for the avowed purpose of seeing his protg, Mike, and Dr. Harshaw; however, he too had shown fortitude at having only Jubal's food, liquor, garden - and odalisques - to entertain him during his host's absence. He was lying face down with Miriam rubbing his back while Dorcas rubbed his head.
Jubal looked at him. "Don't get up."
"I can't, she's sitting on me. A little higher up, Miriam. Hi, Mike."
"Hi, my brother Stinky Dr. Mahmoud." Mike then gravely greeted Ben, and asked to be excused.
"Run along, son," Jubal told him.
Anne said, "Wait a minute, Mike. Have you had lunch?"
He said solemnly, "Anne, I am not hungry. Thank you," turned and went into the house.
Mahmoud twisted, almost unseating Miriam. "Jubal? What's troubling our son?"
"Yeah," said Ben. "He looks seasick."
"Let him alone and he'll get well. An overdose of religion. Digby has been working on him." Jubal sketched the morning's events.
Mahmoud frowned. "But was it necessary to leave him alone with Digby? This seems to me - pardon me, my brother! - unwise."
"He's not hurt. Stinky, he's got to learn to take such things in his stride. You've preached your brand of theology to him - I know you have; he's told me about it. Can you name me one good reason 'why Digby shouldn't have his innings? Answer me as a scientist, not as a Muslim."
"I am unable to answer anything other than as a Muslim," Dr. Mahmoud said quietly.
"Sorry. I recognize the correctness of your answer, even though I don't agree with it."
"But, Jubal, I used the word 'Muslim' in its exact, technical sense, not as a sectarian which Maryam incorrectly terms 'Mohammedan.'"
"And which I'm going to go right on calling you until you learn to pronounce 'Miriam' correctly! Quit squirming. I'm not hurting you."
"Yes, Maryant. Ouch! Women should not be so muscular. Jubal, as a scientist, I find Michael the greatest prize of my career. As a Muslim, I find in him a willingness to submit to the will of God� and this makes me happy for his sake, although I readily admit that there are great semantic difficulties and as yet he does not seem to grok what the English word 'God' means." He shrugged. "Nor the Arabic word 'Allah' But as a man - and always a Slave of God - I love this young man, our foster son and water brother, and I would not have him come under bad influences. Quite aside from his creed, this Digby strikes me as a bad influence. What do you think?"
"Ok!" Ben applauded. "He's a slimy bastard - and the only reason I haven't been taking his racket apart in my column is that the syndicate is afraid to print it. Stinky, keep talking that well and you'll have me studying Arabic and buying a rug."
"I hope so. But the rug is not necessary."
Jubal sighed. "I agree with both of you. I'd rather see Mike smoking marijuana than be converted by Digby. But I don't think there is the slightest chance of Mike's being taken in by that syncretic hodgepodge Digby peddles�and he's got to learn to stand up to bad influences. I consider you a good influence - but I don't really think you stand much more chance than Digby has - the boy has an amazingly strong mind of his own. Muhammad may have to make way for a new prophet."
"If God so wills it," Mahmoud answered calmly.
"That leaves no room for argument," Jubal agreed.
"We were discussing religion before you got home," Dorcas said softly "Boss, did you know that women have souls?"
"They do?"
"So Stinky says."
"Maryam," Mahmoud explained, "wanted to know why we 'Mohammedans' thought only men had souls. So I cited the Writings."
"Miriam, I'm surprised at you. That's as vulgar a misconception as the notion that Jews sacrifice Christian babies in secret, obscene rites. The Koran is explicit in half a dozen places that entire families enter into Paradise, men and Women together. For example, see 'Ornaments of Gold' -verse seventy, isn't it, Stinky?"
"'Enter the Garden, ye and your wives, to be made glad.' That's as well as it can be put, in English," agreed Mahmoud.
"Well," said Miriam, "I had heard about the beautiful houris that Mohammedan men have for playthings when they go to heaven and that didn't seem to leave much room for wives."
"Houris aren't women," said Jubal. "They are separate creations, like djinni and angels. They don't need human souls, they are spirits to start with, eternal and unchanging and beautiful. There are male houris, too, or the male equivalent of houris. Houris don't have to earn their way into Paradise; they're on the staff. They serve endless delicious foods and pass around drinks that never give hangovers and entertain in other ways as requested. But the souls of human wives don't have to do any housework, any more than the men. Correct, Stinky?"
"Close enough, aside from your flippant choice of words. The houris-" He stopped and sat up so suddenly that he dumped Miriam. "Say! It's just possible that you girls don't have souls!"
Miriam sat up and said bitterly, "Why, you ungrateful dog of an infidel! Take that back!" "Peace, Maryam. If you don't have a soul, then you're immortal anyhow and won't miss it. Jubal� is it possible for a man to die and not notice it?"
"Can't say. Never tried it."
"Could I have died on Mars and just dreamed that I came home? Look around you! A garden the Prophet himself would be pleased with. Four beautiful houris, passing around lovely food and delicious drinks at all hours. Even their male counterparts, if you want to be fussy. Is this Paradise?"
"I can guarantee that it isn't," Jubal assured him. "My taxes are due this week."
"Still, that doesn't affect me."
"And take these houris- Even if we stipulate for the sake of argument that they are of beauty adequate to meet the specifications - after all, beauty is in the eye of the beholder-"
"They pass."
"And you'll pay for that, Boss," Miriam added.
"-there still remains," Jubal pointed out, "one more requisite attribute of houris."
"Mmmm-" said Mahmoud, "I don't think we need go into that. In Paradise, rather than a temporary physical condition, it would be a permanent spiritual attribute - more a state of mind. Yes?"
"In that case," Jubal said emphatically, "I am certain that these are not houris."
Mahmoud sighed. "In that case I'll just have to convert one."
"Why only one? There are still places left in the world where you can have the full quota."
"No, my friend. In the wise words of the Prophet, while the Legislations permit four, it is impossible for a man to deal justly with more than one."
"That's some relief. Which one?"
"We'll have to see. Maryam, are you feeling spiritual?"
"You go to hell! 'Houris' indeed!"
"Jill?"
"Give me a break," Ben protested. "I'm still working on Jill."
"Later, Jill. Anne?"
"Sorry. I've got a date."
"Dorcas? You're my last chance."
"Stinky," she said softly, "just how spiritual do you want me to feel?"
When Mike got inside the house, he went straight upstairs to his room, closed the door, got on the bed, assumed the foetal position, rolled up his eyes, swallowed his tongue, and slowed his heart almost to nothing. He knew that Jill did not like him to do this in the daytime, but she did not object as long as he did not do it publicly. There were so many things that he must not do publicly, but only this one really aroused her ire. He had been waiting to do this ever since he had left that room of terrible wrongness; he needed very badly to withdraw and try to grok all that had happened. For he had done something else that Jill had told him not to. He felt a very human urge to tell himself that it had been forced on him, that it was not his fault; but his Martian training did not permit him this easy escape. He had arrived at a cusp, right action had been required, the choice had been his. He grokked that he had chosen correctly. But his water brother Jill had forbidden this choice - but that would have left him no choice. This was contradiction; at a cusp, choice is. By choice, spirit grows.
He considered whether or not Jill would have approved had he taken other action, not wasting food?
No, he grokked that Jill's injunction had covered that variant of action, too.
At this point the being sprung from human genes shaped by Martian thought, and who could never be either one, completed one stage of his growth, burst out and ceased to be a nestling. The solitary loneliness of predestined free will was then his and with it the Martian serenity to embrace it, cherish it, savour its bitterness, and accept its consequences. With tragic joy he knew that this cusp was his, not Jill's. His water brother could teach, admonish, guide - but choice at a cusp was not shared. Here was "ownership" beyond any possible sale, gift, hypothecation; owner and owned grokked fully, inseparable. He eternally was the action he had taken at cusp.
Now that he knew himself to be self he was free to grok ever closer to his brothers, merge without let. Self's integrity was and is and ever had been. Mike stopped to cherish all his brother selves, the many threesfulfilled on Mars, both corporate and discorporate, the precious few on Earth - the as-yet-unknown powers of three on Earth that would be his to merge with and cherish now that at last long waiting he grokked and cherished himself.
Mike remained in his trance; there was still much to grok, loose ends and bits and pieces to be puzzled over and fitted into his growing pattern - all that he had seen and heard and been at the Archangel Foster Tabernacle (not just the cusp he had encountered when he and Digby had come face to face alone), why Bishop Senator Boone had made him warily uneasy without frightening him, why Miss Dawn Ardent had tasted like a water brother when she was not, the texture and smell of the goodness he had incompletely grokked in the jumping up and down and the wailing - Jubal's stored conversation both coming and going - Jubal's words troubled him more than other details; he studied them with great care, compared them with what he had been taught as a nestling, making great effort to bridge between his two languages, the one he thought with and the one he now spoke and was gradually learning to think in, for some purposes. The human word "church" which turned up over and over again among Jubal's words gave him most knotty difficulty; there was no Martian concept of any sort to match it - unless one took "church" and "worship" and "God" and "congregation" and many other words and equated them all to the totality of the only world he had known during most of his growing-waiting� then forced the concept back awkwardly into English in that phrase which had been rejected (but by each differently) by Jubal, by Mahmoud, by Digby.
"Thou art God" He came closer to understanding it in English himself now, although it could never have the crystal inevitability of the Martian concept it stood for. In his mind he spoke simultaneously the English sentence and the Martian word and felt closer grokking. Repeating it like a student telling himself that the jewel is in the lotus he sank into nirvana untroubled.
Shortly before midnight he speeded up his heart, resumed normal breathing, ran down his engineering check list, found that all was in order, uncurled and sat up. He had been spiritually weary; now he felt light and gay and clear-headed, eager to get on with the many actions he saw spreading out before him.
He felt a puppyish need for company almost as strong as his earlier necessity for quiet. He stepped out into the upper hail, was delighted to encounter a water brother.

"!!!!"

"Oh. Hello, Mike. My, you look chipper."
"I feel fine! Where is everybody?"
"Everybody's asleep but you and me - so keep your voice down. Ben and Stinky went home an hour ago and people started going to bed."
"Oh." Mike felt mildly disappointed that Mahmoud had left; he wanted to explain to him his new grokking. But he would do so, when next he saw him.
"I ought to be asleep, too, but I felt like a snack. Are you hungry?"
"Me? Sure, I'm hungry!"
"Good. You ought to be, you missed dinner. Come on, I know there's some cold chicken and we'll see what else." They went downstairs, loaded a tray lavishly. "Let's take it outside. It's still plenty warm."
"That's a fine idea," Mike agreed.
"Warm enough to swim if we wanted to - this is a real Indian summer. Just a second, I'll switch on the floods."
"Don't bother," Mike answered. "I'll carry the tray, I can see." He could see, as they all knew, in almost total darkness. Jubal said that his exceptional night-sight probably came from the conditions in which he had grown up, and Mike grokked that that was true but he grokked also that there was more to it than that; his foster parents had taught him to see. As for the night being warm enough, he would have been comfortable naked on Mount Everest, but he knew that his water brothers had very little tolerance for changes in temperature and pressure; he was always considerate of their weakness, once he had learned of it. But be was eagerly looking forward to snow - seeing for himself that each tiny crystal of the water of life was a unique individual, as he had read - walking barefoot in it, rolling in it.
In the meantime he was equally pleased with the unseasonably warm autumn night and the still more pleasing company of his water brother.
"Okay, you carry the tray. I'll switch on just the underwater lights. That'll be plenty to eat by."
"Fine." Mike liked having light coming up through the ripples; it was a goodness, a beauty, even though he did not need it. They picnicked by the pool, then lay back on the grass and looked at the stars.
"Mike, there's Mars. It is Mars, isn't it? Or is it Antares?"
"It is Mars."
"Mike? What are they doing on Mars?"
He hesitated a long time; the question was too wide in scope to pin down to the sparse English language. "On the side toward the horizon - the southern hemisphere - it is spring; the plants are being taught to grow."
"'Taught to grow?'"
He hesitated only slightly. "Larry teaches plants to grow every day. I have helped him. But my people - the Martians, I mean; I grok now that you are my people - teach the plants another way. In the other hemisphere it is growing colder and the nymphs, those who have stayed alive through the summer, are being brought into the nests for quickening and more growing." He thought. "Of the humans we left at the equator when I came here, one has discorporated and the others are sad."
"Yes, I heard about it in the news."
Mike had not heard about it in the news; he had not known it until he was asked. "They should not be sad. Mr. Booker T. W. Jones Food Technician First Class is not sad; the Old Ones have cherished him."
"You knew him?"
"Yes. He had his own face, dark and beautiful. But he was homesick."
"Oh, dear! Mike� do you ever get homesick? For Mars?"
"At first I was very homesick," he answered truthfully. "I was lonely always." He rolled toward her and took her in his arms. "But now I am not lonely. I grok I shall never be lonely again."
"Mike darling-" They kissed, and went on kissing.
Presently his water brother said breathlessly. "Oh, my! That was almost worse than the first time."
"You are all right, my brother?"
"Yes. Yes indeed. Kiss me again."
Quite a long time later, by cosmic clock, she said, "Mike? Is that - I mean, 'Do you know-'"
"I know. It is for growing-closer. Now we grow closer."
"Well, I've been ready a long time-goodness, we all have, but never mind, dear; turn just a little. I'll help."
As they merged, grokking together, Mike said softly and triumphantly: "Thou art God."
Her answer was not in words. Then, as their grokking made them ever closer and Mike felt himself almost ready to discorporate, her voice called him back: "Oh?� Oh! Thou art God!"
"We grok God."

XXV

ON MARS THE LITTLE HUMAN ADVANCE GUARD were building half-buried pressure domes for the larger male amp; female party that would arrive by next ship. This work went much faster than originally scheduled as the Martians were uncritically helpful. Part of the time saved was spent in preparing a preliminary estimate on a very long-distance plan to free the bound oxygen in the sands of Mars to make the planet more friendly to future human generations.
The Old Ones neither helped nor hindered these long-distance human plans; time was not yet. Their own meditations were approaching a violent cusp that would control the shape of Martian art for many millennia. On Earth elections continued as usual and a very advanced poet published a limited edition of verse consisting entirely of punctuation marks and spaces; Time magazine reviewed it and suggested that the Federation Assembly Daily Record could profitably be translated into the same medium. The poet was invited to lecture at the University of Chicago, which he did, clad in full formal evening dress lacking only trousers and shoes.
A colossal advertising campaign opened to sell more sexual organs of plants for human use and Mrs. Joseph ("Shadow of Greatness") Douglas was quoted as saying: "I would no more think of sitting down to eat without flowers on my table than without serviettes." A Tibetan swami from Palermo, Sicily, announced in Beverly Hills a newly discovered, ancient yoga discipline for ripple breathing which greatly increased both pranha and the cosmic attraction between the sexes. His chelas were required to assume the matsyendra posture dressed in hand-woven diapers while he read aloud from the Rig-Veda and an assistant guru checked through their purses in another room - nothing was ever stolen from the purses; the purpose was less immediate.
The President of the United States, by proclamation, named the first Sunday in November as "National Grandmothers' Day" and urged the grandchildren of America to say it with flowers. A funeral parlor chain was indicted for price-cutting. The Fosterite bishops, after secret conclave, announced the Church's second Major Miracle: Supreme Bishop Digby had been translated bodily to Heaven and spot-promoted to Archangel, ranking with but after Archangel Foster. The glorious news had been held up pending Heavenly confirmation of the elevation of a new Supreme Bishop, Huey Short - a compromise candidate accepted by the Boone faction after the lots had been cast repeatedly.
L'Unita and Hoy published identical doctrinaire denunciations of Short's elevation, L'Osservatore Romano and the Christian Science Monitor ignored it, Times of India snickered at it editorially, and the Manchester Guardian reported it without comment - the Fosterite congregation in England was small but extremely militant.
Digby was not pleased with his promotion. The Man from Mars had interrupted him with his work half finished - and that stupid jackass Short was certain to louse it up. Foster listened to him with angelic patience until Digby ran down, then said, "Listen, junior, you're an angel now - so forget it. Eternity is no time for recriminations. You too were a stupid jackass until you poisoned me. Afterwards you did well enough. Now that Short is Supreme Bishop he'll do all right, too; he can't help it. Same as with the Popes. Some of them were warts until they got promoted. Check with one of them, go ahead - there's no professional jealousy here."
Digby calmed down a little, but made one request.
Foster shook his halo in negation. "You can't touch him. You shouldn't have tried to touch him in the first place. Oh, you can submit a requisition for a miracle if you want to make a bloody fool of yourself. But, I'm telling you, it'll be turned down - you simply don't understand the system yet. The Martians have their own setup, different from ours, and as long as they need him, we can't touch him. They run their own show their own way - the Universe has variety, something for everybody - a fact you field workers often miss."
"You mean this punk can brush me aside and I've got to hold still for it?"
"I held still for the same thing, didn't I? I'm helping you now, am I not? Now look, there's work to be done and lots of it - before you can expect to be promoted again. The Boss wants performance, not gripes - if you need a Day off to get your nerve back, duck over to the Muslim Paradise and take it. Otherwise, straighten your halo, square your wings, and dig in. The sooner you start acting like an angel the quicker you'll start feeling angelic. Get Happy, junior!"
Digby heaved a deep ethereal sigh. "Okay, I'm Happy. Where do I start?"
Jubal was not disturbed by Digby's disappearance because he did not hear of it even as soon as it was announced, and, when he did hear, while he had a fleeting suspicion as to who had performed the miracle, he dismissed it from his mind; if Mike had had a finger in it, he had gotten away with it - and what happened to supreme bishops worried Jubal not at all as long as he didn't have to be bothered with it.
More important, his own household had gone through a considerable upset. In this case Jubal knew what had happened but did not care to inquire. That is to say, Jubal guessed what had happened but did not know with whom - and didn't want to know. A slight case of rape. Was "rape" the word? Well, "statutory rape." No, not that, either; Mike was of legal age and presumed to be able to defend himself in the clinches. Anyhow, it was high time the boy was salted, no matter how it had happened.
Jubal couldn't even reconstruct the crime from the way the girls behaved because their patterns kept shifting - sometimes ABC vs D, then BCD vs A� or AB vs CD, or AD vs CB, through all possible ways that four women can gang up on each other.
This continued for most of the week following that ill-starred trip to church, during which period Mike stayed in his room in a withdrawal trance so deep that Jubal would have pronounced him dead had he not seen it before. Jubal would not have minded it if the service around the place had not gone to hell in a bucket. The girls seemed to spend half their time tiptoeing in to see if Mike was all right" and they were too preoccupied to cook properly, much less to be decent secretaries. Even rock-steady Anne - hell, Anne was the worst of the lot! Absent-minded and subject to unexplained tears� and Jubal would have bet his life that if Anne were to witness the Second Coming, she would simply have memorized date, time, personae, events, and barometric pressure without batting her calm blue eyes.
Then late Thursday afternoon Mike woke himself up and suddenly it was ABCD in the service of Mike, "less than the dust beneath his chariot wheels." Inasmuch as the girls now found time to give Jubal perfect service too, Jubal counted his blessings and let it lie - except for a wry and very private thought that, if he had demanded a showdown, Mike could easily quintuple their salaries simply by dropping a post card to Douglas - but that the girls would just as readily have supported Mike.
Once domestic tranquility was restored Jubal did not mind that his kingdom was now ruled by a mayor of the palace. Meals were on time and (if possible) better than ever; when he shouted "Front!" the girl who appeared was bright-eyed, happy, and efficient - such being the case, Jubal did not give a hoot who rated the most side boys. Or girls.
Besides, the change in Mike was as interesting to Jubal as the restoration of peace was pleasant. Before that week Mike had been docile in a fashion that Jubal classed as pathological; now he was so self-confident that Jubal would have described it as cocky had it not been that Mike continued to be unfailingly polite and considerate.
But he accepted homage from the girls as if a natural right, he seemed older than his calendar age rather than younger, his voice had deepened, he spoke with disciplined forcefulness rather than timidly. Jubal decided that Mike had joined the human race; he could, in his mind, discharge this patient as cured.
Except (Jubal reminded himself) on one point: Mike still did not laugh. He could smile at a joke and sometimes did not ask to have them explained to him. Mike was cheerful, even merry - but he never laughed.
Jubal decided that it was not important. This patient was sane, healthy� and human. Short weeks earlier Jubal would have given odds against the cure taking place. He was honest and humble enough as a physician not to claim credit; the girls had had more to do with it. Or should he say "girl?"
From the first week of his stay Jubal had told Mike almost daily that he was welcome to stay� but that he should stir out and see the world as soon as he felt able. In view of this Jubal should not have been surprised when Mike announced one breakfast that he was leaving. But he was both surprised and, to his greater surprise, hurt.
He covered it by using his napkin unnecessarily before answering, "So? When?"
"We're leaving today."
"Um- Plural." Jubal looked around the table. "Are Larry and Duke and I going to have to put up with our own cooking until I can dig up more help?"
"We've talked that over," Mike answered. "Jill is going with me - nobody else. I do need somebody with me, Jubal; I know quite well that I don't know, as yet, how people do things out in the world. I still make mistakes; I need a guide, for a time. I think it ought to be Jill, because she wants to go on learning Martian - and the others think so, too. But if you want Jill to stay, then it could be someone else. Duke and Larry are each willing to help me, if you can't spare one of the girls."
"You mean I get a vote?"
"What? Jubal, it has to be your decision. We all know that."
(Son, you're a gent - and you've probably just told your first lie - I doubt if I could hold even Duke if you set your mind against it.) "I guess it ought to be Jill. But look, kids - This is still your home. The latch string is out."
"We know that - and we'll be back. Again we will share water."
"We will, son."
"Yes, Father."
"Huh?"
"Jubal, there is no Martian word for 'father.' But lately I have grokked that you are my father. And Jill's father."
Jubal glanced at Jill. "Mmm, I grok. Take care of yourselves."
"Yes. Come, Jill." They were gone before he left the table.

XXVI

IT WAS THE USUAL SORT OF CARNIVAL in the usual sort of town. The rides were the same, the cotton candy tasted the same, the flat joints practiced a degree of moderation acceptable to the local law in separating the marks from their half dollars, whether with baseballs thrown at targets, with wheels of fortune, or what - but the separation took place just the same. The sex lecture was trimmed to suit local opinions concerning Charles Darwin's opinions, the girls in the posing show wore that amount of gauze that local mores required, and the Fearless Fentons did their Death-Defying (in sober truth) Double Dive just before the last bally each night.
The ten-in-one show was equally standard. It did not have a mentalist, it did have a magician; it did not have a bearded lady, it did have a half-man half-woman; it did not have a sword swallower, it did have a fire eater. In place of a tattooed man the show had a tattooed lady who was also a snake charmer - and for the blow-off (at another half dollar per mark) she appeared "absolutely nude!� clothed only in bare living flesh in exotic designs!"-and any mark who could find one square inch below her neckline untattooed would be awarded a twenty dollar bill.
That twenty dollars had gone unclaimed all season, because the blowoff was honestly ballyhooed. Mrs. Paiwonski stood perfectly still and completely unclothed - other than in "bare, living flesh"� in this case a fourteen-foot boa constrictor known as "Honey Bun." Honey Bun was looped around Mrs. P. so strategically that even the local ministerial alliance could find no real excuse to complain, especially as some of their own daughters wore not nearly as much and covered still less while attending the carnival. To keep the placid, docile Honey Bun from being disturbed, Mrs. P. took the precaution of standing on a small platform in the middle of a canvas tank - on the floor of which were more than a dozen cobras.
The occasional drunk who was certain that all snake charmer's snakes were defanged and so tried to climb into the tank in pursuit of that undecorated square inch invariably changed his opinion as soon as a cobra noticed him, lifted and spread its hood.
Besides, the lighting wasn't very good.
However, the drunk could not have won the twenty dollars in any case. Mrs. P's claim was much sounder than the dollar. She and her late husband had had for many years a tattooing studio in San Pedro; when trade was slack they had decorated each other - and, eventually, at some minor inconvenience to herself, the art work on her was so definitively complete from her neck down that there was no possible room for an encore. She took great pride both in the fact that she was the most completely decorated woman in the world (and by the world's greatest artist, for such was her humbly grateful opinion of her late husband) and also in the certainty that every dollar she earned was honest.
She associated with grifters and sinners and did not hold herself aloof from them. But her own integrity was untouched. She and her husband had been converted by Foster himself, she kept her membership in San Pedro and attended services at the nearest branch of the Church of the New Revelation no matter where she was.
Patricia Paiwoush would gladly have dispensed with the protection of Honey Bun in the blow-off not merely to prove that she was honest (that needed no proof, since she knew it was true) but because she was serene in her conviction that she was the canvas for religious art greater than any on the walls or ceilings of the Vatican. When she and George had seen the light. there was still about three square feet of Patricia untouched before he died she carried a complete pictorial life of Foster, from his crib with the angels hovering around to the day of glory when he had taken his appointed place among the archangels.
Regrettably (since it might have turned many sinners into seekers of the light) much of this sacred history had to be covered up. the amount depending on the local lawmen. But she could show it in closed Happiness meetings of the local churches she attended, if the shepherd wanted her to, which he almost always did. But, while it was always good to add to Happiness, the saved did not need it; Patricia would rather have saved sinners. She couldn't preach, she couldn't sing, and she had never been called to speak in tongues but she was a living witness to the light.
In the ten-in-one, her act came next to last, just before the magician; this gave her time to put away unsold photographs of herself (a quarter for black amp; white, half a dollar in color, a set of special photographs for five dollars in a sealed envelope sold only to marks who signed a printed form alleging that they were doctors of medicine, psychology, sociology, or other such entitled to professional material not available to the general public - and such was Patricia's integrity that she would not sell these even for ten dollars if the mark did not look the part; she would then ask to see his business card - no dirty dollars were going to put her kids through school - and also gave her time to slip behind the rear canvas and get herself and her snakes ready for the blow-off.
The magician, Dr. Apollo, performed on the last platform nearest to the canvas fly leading to the blow-off. He started by passing out to his audience a dozen shiny steel rings, each as wide as a plate; he invited them to convince themselves that each ring was solid and smooth. Then he had them hold the rings so that they overlapped. Dr. Apollo walked along the platform, reached out with his wand and tapped each overlap - the solid steel links formed a chain.
Casually he laid his wand in the air, rolled up his sleeves, accepted a bowl of eggs from his assistant, and started to juggle half a dozen of them. His juggling did not attract too many eyes; his assistant was more worthy of stares. She was a fine example of modern functional design and, while she wore a great deal more than did the young ladies in the posing show, nevertheless there seemed to be a strong probability that she was not tattooed anywhere. The marks hardly noticed it when the six eggs became five, then four three, two - until at last Dr. Apollo was tossing one egg in the air, with his sleeves still rolled up and a puzzled look on his face. At last he said, "Eggs are getting scarcer every year," and tossed the remaining egg over the heads of those nearest the platform to a man in the back of the crowd. "Catch!"
He turned away and did not seem to notice that the egg never reached its destination.
Dr. Apollo performed several other tricks, while wearing always the same slightly puzzled expression and with the same indifferent patter. Once he called a young boy close to the platform. "Son, I can tell you what you are thinking. You think I'm not a real magician. And you're right. For that you win a dollar." He handed the kid a dollar bill. It disappeared.
The magician looked unhappy. "Dropped it? Well, hang on to this one." A second bill disappeared.
"Oh, dear. Well, we'll have to give you one more chance. Use both hands. Got it? All right, better get out of here fast with it - YOU should be home in bed anyhow." The kid dashed away with the money and the magician turned back and again looked puzzled "Madame Merlin, what should we do now?"
His pretty assistant came up to him, pulled his head down by one ear, whispered into it. He shook his head. "No, not in front of all these people."
She whispered again; he looked distressed. "I'm sorry, friends, but Madame Merlin insists that she wants to go to bed. Will any of you gentlemen help her?"
He blinked at the rush of volunteers - "Oh, just two of you. Were any of you gentlemen in the Army?"
There were still more than enough volunteers. Dr. Apollo picked two and said, "There's an army cot under the end of the platforms just lift up the canvasflow, will you set it up for her here on the platform? Madame Merlin, face this way, please."
While the two men set up the cot, Dr. Apollo made passes in the air at his assistant. "Sleep� sleep� you are now asleep. Friends, she is in a deep trance. Will you two gentlemen who so kindly prepared her bed now place her on it? One take her head, one take her feet. Careful, now - " In corpse-like rigidity the girl was transferred to the cot.
"Thank you, gentlemen. But we ought not to leave her uncovered, should we? There was a sheet here, somewhere. Oh, there it is." The magician reached out, recovered his wand from where he had parked it, pointed to a table laden with props at the far end of his platform; a sheet detached itself from the pile and came to him. "Just spread this over her. Cover her head, too; a lady should not be exposed to public gaze while sleeping. Thank you. Now if you will just step down off the platform. Fine! Madame Merlin� can you hear me?"
"Yes, Doctor Apollo."
"You were heavy with sleep. Now you are resting. You feel lighter, much lighter. You are sleeping on a bed of clouds. You are floating away on clouds - " The sheet-covered form raised slowly up about a foot. "Wups! Don't get too light. We don't want to lose you."
In the crowd, a boy in his late teens explained in a loud whisper, "She's not under the sheet now. When they put the sheet over her, she went down through a trap door. That's just a light framework, doesn't weigh as much as the sheet. And in a minute he'll flip the sheet away and while he does, the framework will collapse and disappear. It's just a gimmick - anybody could do it,"
Dr. Apollo ignored him and went on talking. "A little higher, Madame Merlin. Higher. There - " The draped form floated about six feet above the platform.
The smart youngster whispered to his friends, "There's a slender steel rod but you can't see it too easily. It's probably where one corner of the sheet hangs down there and touches the cot."
Dr. Apollo turned and requested his volunteers to remove the cot and put it back under the platform. "She doesn't need it now. She sleeps on clouds." He faced the floating form and appeared to be listening. "What? Louder, please. Oh? She says that she doesn't want the sheet - it's too heavy."
("Here's where the framework disappears.")
The magician tugged one corner of the sheet, snatched it away; the audience hardly noticed that the sheet disappeared without his bothering to gather it in; they were looking at Madame Merlin, still floating, still sleeping, six feet above the platform. The platform stood in the middle rear of the tent and the audience surrounded it on all sides. A companion of the boy who knew all about stage magic said, "Okay, Speedy, where's the steel rod?"
The kid said uncertainly, "You have to look where he doesn't want you to look, it's the way they've got those lights fixed to shine right into your eyes."
Dr. Apollo said, "That's enough sleep, fairy princess. Give me your hand. Wake up, wake up!" He took her hand, pulled her erect and helped her step down to the platform.
("You see? You saw how stiff she got down, you saw where she put her foot? That's where the steel rod went." The kid added with satisfaction, "Just a gimmick.")
The magician went on talking, "And now friends, if you will kindly give your attention to our learned lecturer, Professor Timoshenko-"
The talker cut in at once. "Don't go 'way! For this one performance only by arrangement with the Council of Colleges and Universities and with the permission of the Department of Safety and Welfare of this wonderful city, we are offering this twenty dollar bill absolutely free to any one of you-"
Most of the tip was turned into the blow-off. A few wandered around, then started to leave as most of the lights in the main tent were turned off. The freaks and other carnies started packing their props and slum preparatory to tear-down. There was a train jump coming in the morning and living tops would remain up for a few hours sleep, but canvas boys were already loosening stakes on the sideshow top.
Shortly the talker-owner-manager of the ten-in-one came back into the semi-darkened tent, having rushed the blow-off and spilled the last marks out the rear exit. "Smitty, don't go 'way. Got something for you." He handed the magician an envelope, which Dr. Apollo tucked away without looking at it. The manager added, "Kid, I hate to tell you this - but you and your wife ain't going with us to Paducah."
"I know."
"Well� look, don't take it hard, there's nothing personal about it - but I got to think of the show. We're replacing you with a mentalist team. They do a top reading act, then she runs a phrenology and mitt camp while he makes with the mad ball. We need 'em� and you know as well as I do you didn't have no season's guarantee. You were just on trial."
"I know," agreed the magician. "I knew it was time to leave. No hard feelings, Tim."
"Well, I'm glad you feel that way about it." The talker hesitated. "Smitty, do you want some advice? Just say no if you don't."
"I would like very much to have your advice," the magician said simply.
"Okay, you asked for it. Smitty, your tricks are good. Hell, some of 'em even got me baffled. But clever tricks don't make a magician. The trouble is you're not really with it. You behave like a carney - you mind your own business and you never crab anybody else's act and you're helpful if anybody needs it. But you're not a carney. You know why? You don't have any feeling for what makes a chump a chump; you don't get inside his mind. A real magician can make the marks open their mouths and catch flies just by picking a quarter out of the air. That Thurston's levitation you do - I've never seen it done any more perfectly but the marks don't warm to it. No psychology. Now take me, for example. I can't even pick a quarter out of the air - hell, I can barely use a knife and fork without cutting my mouth. I got no act� except I got the one act that counts. I know marks. I know where that streak of larceny is in his heart, I know just how wide it is. I know what he hungers for, whether he knows it or not. That's showmanship, son, whether you're a politician running for office, a preacher pounding a pulpit� or a magician. You find out what the chumps want and you can leave half your props in your trunk."
"I'm sure you're right."
"I know I am. He wants sex and blood and money. We don't give him any real blood - unless a fire eater or a knife thrower makes a terrible mistake. We don't give him money, either; we just encourage him to hope for it while we take away a little. We don't give him any real sex. But why do seven out of ten of a tip buy the blow-off? To see a nekkid broad, that's why - and a chance to be paid a double sawbuck for lookin' - when maybe they got one just as good or better at home, nekkid anytime they like. So he don't see one and he don't get paid - and still we send him out happy.
"What else does a chump want? Mystery! He wants to think that the world is a romantic place when he knows damn well it ain't. That's your job� only you ain't learned how. Shucks, son, even the marks know that your tricks are fake� only they'd like to believe they're real, and it's up to you to help 'em believe, as long as they're inside the show. That's what you lack."
"How do I get it, Tim? How do I learn what makes a chump tick?"
"Hell, I can't tell you that; that's the piece you have to learn for yourself. Get out and stir around and be a chump yourself a while, maybe. But- Well, take this notion you had of billing yourself as 'The Man from Mars.' You mustn't offer the chump what he won't swallow. They've all seen the Man from Mars, in pictures and on stereovision. Hell, I've seen him myself. Sure, you look a bit like him, same general type, a casual resemblance - but even if you were his twin brother, the marks know they won't find the Man from Mars in a ten-in-one in the sticks. It's as silly as it would be to bill a sword swallower as 'the President of the United States.' Get me? A chump wants to believe - but he won't thank you to insult what trace of intelligence he has. And even a chump has brains of a sort. You have to remember that."
"I will remember."
"Okay. I talk too much - but a talker gets in the habit. Are you kids going to be all right? How's the grouch bag? Hell, I oughtn't to do it - but do you need a loan?"
"Thanks, Tim. We're not hurtin' any."
"Well, take care of yourself. Bye, Jill." He hurried out.
Patricia Paiwonski came in through the rear fly, wearing a robe. "Kids? Tim sloughed your act."
"We were leaving anyhow, Pat."
"I knew he was going to. He makes me so mad I'm tempted to jump the show myself."
"Now, Pat-"
"I mean it. I could take my act anywhere and he knows it. Leave him without a blow-off. He can get other acts� but a good blow-off that the clowns won't clobber is hard to find."
"Pat, Tim is right, and Jill and I know it. I don't have showmanship."
"Well� maybe so. But I'm going to miss you. You've been just like my own kids to me. Oh, dear! Look, the show doesn't roll until morning - come back to my living top and set awhile and visit."
Jill said, "Better yet, Patty, come into town with us and have a couple of drinks. How would you like to soak yourself in a big, hot tub, with bath salts?"
"Uh, I'll bring a bottle."
"No," Mike objected, "I know what you drink and we've got it. Come along."
"Well, I'll come - you're at the Imperial, aren't you? - but I can't come with you. I've got to be sure my babies are all right first and tell Honey Bun I'll be gone a bit and fix her hot water bottles. I'll catch a cab. Half an hour, maybe."
They drove into town with Mike at the controls. It was a fairly small town, without automatic traffic control even downtown. Mike drove with careful precision, exactly at zone maximum and sliding the little ground car into holes Jill could not see until they were through them. He did it without effort in the same fashion in which he juggled. Jill knew how it was done, had even learned to do it a bit herself; Mike stretched his time sense until the problem of juggling eggs or speeding through traffic was an easy one with' everything in slow motion. Nevertheless she reflected that it was an odd accomplishment for a man who, only months earlier, had been baffled by tying shoelaces.
She did not talk. Mike could talk while on extended time, if necessary, but it was awkward to converse while they were running on different time rates. Instead she thought with mild nostalgia of the life they were leaving, calling it up in her mind and cherishing it, some of it in Martian concepts, more of it in English. She had enjoyed it very much. All her life, until she had met Mike, she had been under the tyranny of the clock, first as a little girl in school, then as a bigger girl in a much harder school, then under the unforgiving pressures of hospital routine.
The carnival had been nothing like that. Aside from the easy and rather pleasant chore of standing around and looking pretty several times a day from midafternoon to the last bally of the night, she never had anything she actually had to do at any set time. Mike did not care whether they ate once a day or six times, and whatever housekeeping she chose to do suited him. They had their own living top and camping equipment; in many towns they had never left the lot from arrival to tear-down. The carnival was a closed little world, an enclave, where the headlines and troubles of the outside world did not reach. She had been happy in it.
To be sure, in every town the lot was crawling with marks - but she had acquired the carney viewpoint; marks did not count - they might as well have been behind glass. Jill quite understood why the girls in the posing show could and did exhibit themselves in very little (and, in some towns, nothing, if the fix was solid) without feeling immodest� and without being immodest in their conduct outside the posing show. Marks weren't people to them; they were blobs of nothing, hardly seen, whose sole function was to cough up half dollars for the take.
Yes, the carnie had been a happy, utterly safe home, even though their act had flopped. It had not always been that way when first they left the safety of Jubal's home to go out into the world and increase Mike's education. They had been spotted more than once and several times they had had trouble getting away, not only from the press, but from the endless people who seemed to feel that they had a right to demand things of Mike, simply because he had the misfortune to be the Man from Mars.
Presently Mike had thought his features into more mature lines and had made other slight changes in his appearance. That, plus the fact that they frequented places where the Man from Mars would certainly not be expected (by the public) to go, got them privacy. About that time, when Jill was phoning home to give a new mailing address, Jubal had suggested a cover-up story - and a couple of days later Jill had read that the Man from Mars had again gone into retreat, this time in a Tibetan monastery.
The retreat had actually been "Hank's Grill" in a "nowhere" town, with Jill as a waitress and Mike as dishwasher. It was no worse than being a nurse and much less demanding - and her feet no longer hurt. Mike had a remarkably quick way of cleaning dishes, although he had to be careful not to use it when the boss was watching. They kept that job a week, then moved on, sometimes working, sometimes not. They visited public libraries almost daily, once Mike found out about them - Jill had discovered that Mike had taken for granted that Jubal's library contained a copy of every book on Earth. When he learned the marvelous truth, they had remained in Akron nearly a month. Jill did quite a lot of shopping that month, as Mike with a book was almost no company at all.
But Baxter's Combined Shows and Riot of Fun for All the Family had been the nicest part of their meandering trip. Jill recalled with an inner giggle the time in - what town? - no matter-when the entire posing show had been pinched. It wasn't fair, even by chumps' standards, since that concession always worked under precise prearrangement: bras or no bras; blue lights or bright lights; whatever the top town clown ordained. Nevertheless the sheriff had hauled them in and the local justice of the peace had seemed disposed not only to fine but to jail the girls as "vagrants."
The lot had closed down and most of the carnies had gone to the hearing, along with innumerable chumps slavering to catch sight of "shameless women" getting their come-uppance. Mike and Jill had managed to crowd against the back wall of the courtroom.
Jill had long since impressed on Mike that he must never do anything that an ordinary human could not do where it might be noticed. But Mike had grokked a cusp and had not discussed it with Jill.
The sheriff was testifying as to what he had seen, the details of this "public lewdness" - and he was enjoying it.
Mike had restrained himself, Jill admitted. In the midst of testimony both sheriff and judge became suddenly and completely without clothes of any sort.
She and Mike slipped quietly away during the excitement, and later she learned that the accused, all of them, had left, too, and nobody seemed disposed to object. Of course no one had connected the miracle with Mike, and he himself had never mentioned it to Jill - nor she to him; it was not necessary. The show had torn down at once and moved on two days early, to a more honest town where the rule was net bra and briefies and no beefs afterwards.
But Jill would treasure forever the expression on the sheriff's face, and his appearance, too, when it was plain to be seen that his sudden sag in front meant that the sheriff had been wearing a tight corset for his pride.
Yes, carnie days had been nice days. She started to speak to Mike in her mind, intending to remind him of how funny that hick sheriff had looked with creases from his girdle on his hairy pot belly. But she stopped. Martian had no concept for "funny" so of course she could not say it. They shared a growing telepathic bond - but in Martian only.
("Yes Jill?") his mind answered hers.
("Later.")
Shortly they approached the Imperial Hotel and she felt his mind slow down as he parked the car. Jill much preferred camping on the carnival grounds� except fox one thing: bathtubs. Showers were a1l right, but nothing could beat a big tub of hot, hot water, climb into it up to your chin and soak! Sometimes they checked into a hotel for a few days and rented a ground car. Mike did not, by early training, share her fanatic enthusiasm for scrubbing; he was now as fastidiously clean as she was - but only because she had trained him to be; it did not annoy him. Moreover, he could keep himself immaculate without wasting time on washing or bathing, just as he never had to see a barber once he knew precisely how Jill wanted his hair to grow. But Mike, too, liked the time spent in hotels for the sake of baptism alone; be enjoyed immersing himself in the water of life as much as ever, irrespective of a non-existant need to clean and no longer with any superstitious feeling about water.
The Imperial was a very old hotel and had not been much even when new, but the tub in what was proudly called the "Bridal Suite" was satisfactorily large. Jill went straight to it as they came in, started to fill it - and was hardly surprised to find herself suddenly ready for her bath, even to pretty bare feet, except that her purse was still clutched under her arm. Dear Mike! He knew how she liked to shop. how pleased she was with new clothes; he gently forced her to indulge her childish weakness by sending to neverwhere any outfit which he sensed no longer delighted her. He would have done so daily had she not cautioned him that too many new clothes would make them conspicuous around the carnival.
"Thanks, dear!" she called out. "Let's climb in."
He had either undressed or caused his own clothes to go away - probably the former she decided; Mike found buying clothes for himself without interest. He still could see no possible reason for clothes other than for simple protection against the elements, a weakness he did not share. They got into the tub facing each other; she scooped up a handful of water, touched it to her lips, offered it to him. It was not necessary to speak, nor was the ritual necessary; it simply pleased Jill to remind them both of something for which no reminder could ever be necessary, through all eternity.
When he raised his head, she said, "The thing I was thinking of while you were driving was how funny that horrid sheriff looked in his skin"
"Did be look funny?"
"Oh, very funny indeed! It was all I could do to keep from laughing out loud. But I did not want us noticed."
"Explain to me why he was funny. I do not see the joke."
"Uh� dear, I don't think I can explain it. It was not a joke - not like puns and things like that which can be explained."
"I did not grok that he was funny," Mike said seriously. "In both those men - the judge and the lawman - I grokked wrongness. Had I not known that it would displease you, I would have sent them both away."
"Dear Mike." She touched his cheek. "Good Mike. Believe me, dearest, it was better far to do only what you did do. Neither one of them will ever live it down - and I'll bet that there won't be another attempt to arrest anyone for indecent exposure in that township for another fifty years. Let's talk about something else. I have been wanting to say that I am sorry, truly sorry, that your act didn't go over. I did my best in writing the patter for it, dear - but I guess I'm no showman, either."
"It was my lack, Jill. Tim speaks rightly - I don't grok the chumps. Nevertheless it has been good to be with Baxter's Combined Shows� I have grokked closer to the chumps each day."
"Only we must not call them chumps any longer, nor marks, now that we are no longer with it. Just people - not 'chumps.'"
"I grok that they are chumps."
"Yes, dear. But it isn't polite to say so."
"I will remember."
"Have you decided where we are going now?"
"No. When the time comes, I will know."
"Yes, dear." Jill reflected that Mike always did know. From his first change from docility to dominance he had grown steadily in strength and sureness in all ways. The boy (he had seemed like a boy then) who had found it tiring to hold an ash tray in the air, could now not only hold her in the air (and it did feel like "floating on clouds"; that was why she had written it into the patter that way) while doing several other things and continuing to talk, but also could exert any other strength he needed. She recalled one very rainy lot where one of the trucks had bogged down. Twenty men were crowded around it, trying to get it free - Mike had added his shoulder� and the truck moved.
She had seen how it had happened; the sunken hind wheel had simply lifted itself out of the mud. But Mike, much more sophisticated now, had not allowed anyone to guess.
She recalled, too, when be had at last grokked that the injunction about "wrongness" being necessary before he could make things go away applied only to living, grokking things - her dress did not have to have "wrongness" for him to toss it away. The injunction was merely a precaution in the training of nestlings; an adult was free to do as he grokked.
She wondered what his next major change would be? But she did not worry about it; Mike was good and wise. All she could teach him were little details of how to live among humans - while leaning much more from him, in perfect happiness, greater happiness than she had known since her father died. "Mike, wouldn't it be nice to have Dorcas and Anne and Miriam all here in the tub, too? And Father Jubal and the boys and - oh, our whole family!"
"It would take a bigger tub."
"Who minds a little crowding? But Jubal's pool would do nicely. When are we making another visit home, Mike? Jubal asks me every time I talk to him."
"I grok it will be soon."
"Martian 'soon'? Or Earth 'soon'? Never mind, darling, I know it will be when the waiting is filled. But that reminds me that Aunt Patty will be here soon and I do mean Earth 'soon.' Wash me off?"
She stood up, he stayed where he was. The soap lifted out of the soap dish, traveled all over her, replaced itself, and the soapy layer slathered into bubbles of lather. "Oooh! That's enough. You tickle."
"Rinse?"
"I'll just dunk." Quickly she squatted down, sloshed suds off her, stood up. "Just in time, too."
Someone was knocking at the outer door. "Dearie? Are you decent?"
"Coming, Pat!" Jill shouted and added as she stepped out of the tub, "Dry me, please?"
At once she was dry, leaving not even wet footprints on the bath mat. "Dear? You'll remember to put on some clothes before you come out? Patty's a lady - not like me."
"I will remember."

XXVII

JILL STOPPED TO GRAB a negligee from a well-stocked wardrobe, hurried out into the living room and let in Mrs. Paiwonski. "Come in, dear. We were grabbing baths in a hurry; he'll be right out. I'll get you a drink - then you can have your second drink in the tub if you like. Loads of hot water."
"I had a shower after I put Honey Bun to bed, but - yes, I'd love a tub bath. But, Jill baby, I didn't come here to borrow your bath tub; I came because I'm just heartsick that you kids are leaving the show."
"We won't lose track of you." Jill was busy with glasses. The hotel was so old that not even the "Bridal Suite" had its own ice dispenser but the night bellman, indoctrinated and subsidized, had left a carton of ice cubes. "Tim was right and you know he was. Mike and I have got to slick up our act a lot before we can hold up our end."
"Your act is okay. Needs a few laughs in it, maybe, but - Hi, Smitty." As Mike came in, she offered him a gloved hand. Mrs. Paiwonski always wore gloves away from the lot, and a high-necked dress and stockings. Dressed so, she looked like a middle-aged, most respectable widow, who had kept her figure trim in spite of her years - looked so, because she was precisely that.
"I was just telling Jill," she went on, "that you've got a good act, you two."
Mike smiled gently. "Now, Pat, you don't have to kid us. It stinks. We know it."
"No, it doesn't, dearie. Oh, maybe it needs a little something to give it some zing. A few jokes. Or, well, you could even cut down on Jill's costume a little. You've got an awful cute figure, hon."
Jill shook her head. "That wouldn't do it."
"Well, I saw a magician once that used to bring his assistant out dressed for the Gay 'Nineties - the eighteen-nineties, that is - not even her legs showing. Then he would disappear one garment after another. The marks loved it. But don't misunderstand me, dear - nothing unrefined. She finished� oh, in almost as much as you wear now."
"Patty," Jill said frankly, "I'd do our act stark naked if the clowns wouldn't close the show." As she said it, she realized that she meant it - and wondered how Graduate Nurse Boardman, floor supervisor, had reached the point where she could mean it?
Mike, of course- And she was quite happy about it.
Mrs. Paiwonski shook her head. "You couldn't, honey. The marks would riot. Just a touch more ginger ale, dear. But if you've got a good figure, why not use it? How far do you think I would get as a tattooed lady ii I didn't peel off all they'll let me?"
"Speaking of that," Mike said, "you don't look comfortable in all those clothes, Pat. I think the aircooling in this dump has gone sour again - it must be at least eighty." He himself was dressed in a light robe, his concession to the easy-going conventions of carney good manners. Extreme heat, he had learned, affected him slightly, enough so that he sometimes had to adjust consciously his metabolism-extreme cold affected him not at all. But he knew that their friend was used to the real comfort of almost nothing and affected the clothes she now wore to cover her tattoos when out among the marks; Jill had explained it to him. "Why don't you get comfortable? 'Ain't nobody here but just us chickens.'" The latter, he knew, was a joke, an appropriate one for emphasizing that friends were in private - Jubal had tried to explain it to him, but failed. But Mike had carefully noted when and how the idiom could be used.
"Sure, Patty," Jill agreed. "If you're raw under that dress, I can get you something light and comfortable. Or we'll just make Mike close his eyes."
"Uh� well, I did slip back into one of my costumes."
"Then don't be stiff with friends. I'll get your zippers."
"Let me get these stockings and shoes." She went on talking while trying to think how she could get the conversation around to religion, where she wanted it. Bless them, these kids were ready to be seekers, she was certain - and she had counted on the whole season to bring them around to the light� not just one hurried visit before they left. "The point about show business, Smitty, is that first you have to know what the marks want� and you have to know what it is you're giving them and how to make 'em like it. Now if you were a real magician - oh, I don't mean that you aren't skillful, dear, because you are." She tucked her carefully rolled hose in her shoes, loosened her garter belt and got out of it modestly, let Jill get her dress zippers. "I mean if your magic was real like you had made a pact with the Devil. That'd be one thing. But the marks know that it's clever sleight-of-hand. So you give 'em a light-hearted show to match. But did you ever see a fire eater with a pretty assistant? Heavens, a pretty girl would just clutter his act; the marks are standing around hoping he'll set fire to hisself - or blow up."
She snaked the dress over her head; Jill took it and kissed her. "You look more natural, Aunt Patty. Sit back and enjoy your drink."
"Just a second, dearie." Mrs. Paiwonski prayed mightily for guidance - wished that she were a preacher� or had even the gift of gab of a talker. Well, her pictures would just have to speak for themselves - and they would; that was why George had put them there. "Now this is what I've got to show the marks� this and my snakes, but this is more important. Have either one of you ever looked, really looked, at my pictures?"
"No," Jill admitted, "I guess not. We didn't want to stare at you, like a couple of marks."
"Then stare at me now, dears - because that's why George, bless his sweet soul safe in heaven, put them on me. To be stared at� and studied. Now right up here under my chin is the birth scene of our prophet, the holy Archangel Foster - just an innocent babe and maybe not knowing what Heaven had in store for him. But the angels knew - see 'em there around him? The next scene is his first miracle, when a young sinner in the country school he attended shot down a poor little birdie� and he picked it up and stroked it and it flew away unharmed. See the school house behind? Now it kind of jumps a little and I'll have to turn my back. But all of 'em are dated for each holy event in his life." She explained how George had not had a bare canvas to work with when first the great opus was started - since they had both been sinners and young Patricia already rather much tattooed� how with great effort and inspired genius George had been able to turn "The Attack on Pearl Harbor" into "Armageddon," and "Skyline of New York" into "The Holy City."
"But," she admitted candidly, "even though every single one of them is a sacred picture now, it did kind of force him to skip around to find enough bare skin to record in living flesh a witness to each milestone in the earthly life of our prophet. Here you see him preaching on the steps of the ungodly theological seminary that turned him down - that was the first time he was arrested, the beginning of the Persecution. And on around, right on my spine, you see him smashing idolatrous images� and next you see him in jail, with the holy light streaming down on it. Then the Faithful Few bust into the jail-"
The Reverend Foster had realized early that, when it came to upholding religious freedom, brass knucks, clubs, and a willingness to tangle with cops was worth far more than passive resistance. His had been a church militant from scratch. But he had been a tactician, too; pitched battles were fought only where the heavy artillery was on the side of the Lord.
"-and they rescue him and tar amp; feather the idolatrous judge who put him there. Around in front here. Uh, you can't see it very well; my bra covers most of it, A shame."
("Michael, what does she want?")
("Thou knowest. Tell her. ")
"Aunt Patty," Jill said gently, "you want us to look at all your pictures. Don't you?"
"Well�it's just as Tim says in the bally, George used up all the skin I have in making the story complete."
"If George went to all that work, I'm sure he meant for them to be seen. Take off your costume. I told you that I wouldn't mind working our own act stark naked if they'd let me - and ours is just entertainment. Yours has a purpose - a holy purpose."
"Well� all right. If you really want me to." She sang a silent hallelujah and decided that Foster himself was sustaining her - with blessed luck and George's pictures she would yet have these dear kids seeking the light.
"I'll unhook you-"
("Jill-")
("No, Michael?")
("Wait")
To her utter surprise and some fear Mrs. Paiwonski found that her spangled briefies and bra were gone! But Jill was surprised to find that her almost - new negligee followed the little costume into wherever and nowhere. Jill was only mildly surprised when Mike's robe disappeared, too; she chalked it up, correctly but not completely, to his catlike good manners.
Mrs. Paiwonski clutched at her mouth and gasped. Jill at once put her arms around her. "There, there, dear! It's all right, nobody's hurt." She turned her head and said, "Mike, you did it, you'll simply have to tell her."
"Yes, Jill. Pat-"
"Yes, Smitty?'
"You said a while ago that I wasn't a real magician, that my tricks were just sleight-of-hand. You were going to take off your costume anyhow - so I took it off for you."
"But how? And where is it?"
"Same place Jill's wrapper is - and my robe. Gone."
"But don't worry about it, Patty," put in Jill. "We'll replace it. Two more - and twice as pretty. Mike, you shouldn't have done it."
"I'm sorry, Jill. I grokked it was all right."
"Well� I suppose it is." Jill decided that Aunt Patty wasn't too upset - and certainly she would never tell; she was carney.
Mrs. Paiwonski was not worried by the loss of two scraps of costume, nor by her own nudity. Nor by the nakedness of the other two. But she was greatly troubled by a theological problem that she felt was out of her depth. "Smitty? That was real magic?"
"I guess you would call it that," he agreed, using the words most exactly.
"I'd rather call it a miracle," she said bluntly.
"You can call it that, too, if you want to. But it wasn't sleight-of-hand."
"I know that. You weren't even near me." She, who daily handled live cobras and who had more than once handled obnoxious drunks with her bare hands (to their sorrow), was not afraid. Patricia Paiwonski was not afraid of the Devil himself; she was sustained by her faith that she was saved and therefore invulnerable to the Devil. But she was uneasy for the safety of her friends. "Smitty� look me in the eye. Have you made a pact with the Devil?"
"No, Pat, I have not."
She continued to look into his eyes, then said, "You aren't lying-"
"He doesn't know how to lie, Aunt Patty."
"-so it's a miracle. Smitty� you are a holy man!"
"I don't know, Pat."
"Archangel Foster didn't know that he was a holy man until he reached his teens� even though he performed many miracles before that time. But you are a holy man; I can feel it." She thought. "I think I felt it when I first met you."
"I don't know, Pat."
"I think he may be," admitted Jill. "But he really doesn't know, himself. Michael� I think we've told her too much not to tell her more."
"'Michael!'" Patty repeated suddenly. "The Archangel Michael, send down to us in human form."
"Aunt Patty, please! If he is, he doesn't know it-"
"He wouldn't necessarily know it. God performs his wonders in his own way."
"Aunt Patty, will you please wait and let me talk, just for a bit?"
Some minutes later Mrs. Paiwonski had accepted that Mike was indeed the Man from Mars, she had agreed to accept him as a man and to treat him as a man� while stating explicitly that she still held to her own opinion as to his true nature and why he was on Earth - explaining (somewhat fuzzily, it seemed to Jill) that Foster had been really and truly a man while he was on Earth, but had been also and always had been, an archangel, even though he had not known it himself. If Jill and Michael insisted that they were not saved, she would treat them as they asked to be treated - God moves in mysterious ways.
"I think you could properly call us 'seekers,'" Mike told her.
"Then that's enough, my dears! I'm sure you're saved - but Foster himself was a seeker in his early years. I'll help."
She had participated in another minor miracle. They had been seated in a circle on the rug. Jill lay back flat and suggested it to Mike in her mind. With no patter of any sort, with no sheet nor anything to conceal a non-existent steel rod, Mike lifted her. Patricia watched it with serene happiness, convinced that she was vouchsafed sight of a miracle. "Pat," Mike then said. "Lie flat."
She did so without argument, as readily as if he had been Foster. Jill turned her head. "Hadn't you better put me down first, Mike?"
"No, I can do it."
Mrs. Paiwonski felt herself gently lifted. She was not frightened by it; she simply felt overpowering religious ecstasy like heat lightning in her loins, making tears come to her eyes, the power of which she had not felt since, as a young woman, Holy Foster himself had touched her. When Mike moved them closer together and Jill put her arms around her, her tears increased, but her cries were the gentle sobs of happiness.
Presently he lowered them gently to the floor and found, as he expected, that he was not tired - he could not recall when last he had been tired.
Jill said to him, "Mike� we need a glass of water."
("????")
("Yes, " her mind answered.)
("And?")
("Of elegant necessity. Why do you think she came here?")
("I knew. I was not sure that you knew� or would approve. My brother. My self")
("My brother.")
Mike did not get up to fetch water. He sent a glass from the tray of drinks into the bathroom, had the tap fill it, returned it to Jill's hands. Mrs. Paiwonski watched this with almost absent-minded interest; she was beyond being astonished. Jill held the glass, said to her, "Aunt Patty, this is like being baptized� and like getting married. It's� a Martian thing. It means that you trust us and we trust you� and we can tell you anything and you can tell us anything� and that we are always partners, now and forever. It's very serious� and once done it can never be broken. If you broke it, we would have to die - at once. Saved or not. If we broke it - but we won't. But you don't have to share water with us if you don't want to - we'll still be friends. Now - if this in any way interferes with your faith, don't do it. We don't belong to your church even though you guessed that we did. We don't. We may never belong. 'Seekers' is the most you can call us now. Mike?"
"We grok," he agreed. "Pat, Jill speaks rightly. I wish we could say it to you in Martian, it would be clearer. But this is everything that getting married is� and a great deal more. We are free to offer water to you but if there is any reason at all, in your religion or in your heart, not to accept - don't drink it!"
Patricia Paiwonski took a deep breath. She had made such a decision once before - with her husband watching� and had not funked it. And who was she to refuse a holy man? And his blessed bride? "I want it," she said firmly.
Jill took a sip. "We grow ever closer." She passed the glass to Mike.
He looked at Jill, then at Patricia. "I thank you for water, my brother." He took a sip. "Pat, I give you the water of life. May you always drink deep." He passed the glass to her.
Patricia took it. "Thank you. Thank you, oh my dears! The 'water of life' - oh, I love you both!" She drank thirstily.
Jill took the glass from her, finished it. "Now we grow closer, my brothers."
("Jill?")
("Now!!!")
Michael lifted his new water brother, wafted her in and placed her gently on the bed.
Valentine Michael Smith had grokked, when first he had known it fully, that physical human love - very human and very physical - was not simply a necessary quickening of eggs, nor was it mere ritual through which one grew closer; the act itself was a growing-closer, a very great goodness - and (so far as he knew) unknown even to the Old Ones of his former people. He was still grokking it, trying at every opportunity to grok its fullness. But he had long since broken through any fear that heresy lay in his suspicion that even the Old Ones did not know this ecstasy - he grokked already that these his new people held spiritual depths unique. Happily he tried to sound them, with no inhibitions from his childhood to cause him guilt or reluctance of any sort.
His human teachers had been unusually well qualified to instruct his innocence without bruising it. The result was as unique as he himself.
Jill was very pleased but not really surprised to find that "Aunt Patty" accepted as inevitable and necessary, and with forthright fullness, the fact that sharing water in a very ancient Martian ceremony with Mike led at once to sharing Mike himself in a human rite ancient itself. Jill was somewhat surprised (although still pleased) at Pat's continued calm acceptance when it certainly had been demonstrated to their new water brother that Mike was capable of more miracles than he had disclosed up to then. However, Jill did not then know that Patricia Paiwonski had met a holy man before - Patricia expected more of holy men. Jill herself was simply serenely happy that a cusp had been reached and passed with right action and was ecstatically happy herself to grow closer as the cusp was determined - all of which she thought in Martian and quite differently.
In time they rested and Jill had Mike treat Patty to a bath given by telekinesis, and herself sat on the edge of the tub and squealed and giggled when the older woman did. It was just play, very human and not at all Martian; Mike had done it for Jill on the initial occasion almost lazily rather than raise himself up out of the water - an accident, more or less. Now it had become a custom, one that Jill knew Patty would like. It tickled Jill to see Patty's face when she found herself being scrubbed all over by gentle. invisible hands� and then, presently dried in a whisk with neither towel nor blast of air.
Patricia blinked. "After that I need a drink. A big one."
"Certainly, darling."
"And I still want to show you kids my pictures� all of them." Patricia followed Jill out into the living room, Mike in train, and stood in the middle of the rug. "But first look at me. Look at me, not at my pictures. What do you see?"
With mild regret Mike stripped her tattoos off in his mind and looked at his new brother without her decorations. He liked her tattoos very much; they were peculiarly her own, they set her apart and made her a self. They seemed to him to give her a slightly Martian flavor, in that she did not have the bland sameness of most humans. He had already memorized them all and had thought pleasantly of having himself tattooed all over, once be grokked what should be pictured. The life of his father, water brother Jubal? He would have to ponder it. He would discuss it with Jill - and Jill might wish to be tattooed, too. What designs would make Jill more beautifully Jill? In the way in which perfume multiplied Jill's odor without changing it?
What he saw when he looked at Pat without her tattoos pleased him but not as much; she looked as a woman necessarily must look to be woman. Mike still did not grok Duke's collection of pictures; the pictures were interesting and had taught Mike that there was more variety in the sizes, shapes, proportions and colors of women than he had known up to then and that there was some variety in the acrobatics involving physical love - but having learned these simple facts he seemed to grok that there was nothing more to be learned from Duke's prized pictures. Mike's early training had made of him a very exact observer, by eye (and other senses), but that same training had left him unresponsive to the subtle pleasures of voyeurism, it was not that be did not find women (including, most emphatically Patricia Paiwonski) sexually stimulating, but it lay not in seeing them. Of his senses, smell and touch counted much higher - in which he was quasi-human, quasi-Martian; the parallel Martian reflex (as unsubtle as a sneeze) was triggered by those two, but could activate only in season - what must be termed "sex" in a Martian is as romantic as intravenous feeding.
But, having been invited to see her without her pictures. Mike did notice more sharply one thing about Patricia that he already knew: she had her own face, marked in beauty by her life. She bad, he saw with gentle wonder, her own face even more than Jill had, and it made him feel toward Pat even more of an emotion he did not as yet call love but for which be used a Martian concept more discriminating.
She had her own odor, too, and her own voice, as all humans did. Her voice was husky and he liked to hear it even when he did not grok her meaning; her odor was mixed (he knew) with an unscrubbed trace of bitter muskiness from daily contact with snakes. It did not put him off; Pat's snakes were part of Pat as were her tattoos. Mike liked Pat's snakes and could handle the poisonous ones with perfect safety - and not alone by stretching time to anticipate and avoid their strikes. They grokked with him; he savored their innocent merciless thoughts - they reminded him of home. Other than Pat, Mike was the only person who could handle Honey Bun with pleasure to the boa constrictor. Her torpor was usually such that others could, if necessary, handle her - but Mike she accepted as a substitute for Pat.
Mike let the pictures reappear.
Jill looked at her and wondered why Aunt Patty had ever let herself be tattooed in the first place? She would really look rather nice - if she weren't a living comic strip. But she loved Aunt Patty for what she was, not the way she looked - and, of course, it did give her a steady living at least until she got so old and haggard that the marks wouldn't pay to look at her even if all those pictures had been signed by Rembrandt. She hoped that Patty was tucking away plenty in the grouch bag then she remembered that Aunt Patty was now one of Mike's water brothers (and her own, of course) and Mike's endless fortune gave Patty certain old-age insurance; Jill felt warmed by it.
"Well?" repeated Mrs. Paiwonski. "What do you see? How old am I, Michael?"
"I don't know," he said simply.
"Guess."
"I can't guess, Pat."
"Oh, go ahead. You won't hurt my feelings."
"Patty," Jill put in, "he really does mean that he can't guess. He hasn't had much chance to learn to judge ages - you know how short a time he's been on Earth. And besides that, Mike thinks of things in Martian years and Martian arithmetic. If it's time or figures, I keep track of it for him."
"Well� you guess, hon. Be truthful."
Jill looked Patty over again, noting her trim figure but also noting her hands and throat and the corners of her eyes - then discounted her guess by five years despite the Martian honesty she owed a water brother. "Mmm, thirtyish, give or take a year."
Mrs. Paiwonski laughed triumphantly. "That's just one bonus from the True Faith, my dears! Jill hon, I'm 'way into my forties. Just how far in we won't say; I've quit counting."
"You certainly don't look it."
"I know I don't. That's what Happiness does for you, dear. Alter my first kid, I let my figure go to pot. I got quite a can on me - they invented the word 'broad' just to fit me. My belly always looked like four months gone, or worse. My busts hung down - and I've never had 'em lifted. You don't have to believe me; sure, I know a good plastic surgeon doesn't leave a scar� but on me it would show, dear; it would chop chunks out of two of my pictures.
"Then I seen the light! I got converted. Nope, not exercise, not diet - I still eat like a pig and you know it. Happiness, dear. Perfect Happiness in the Lord through the help of Blessed Foster."
"It's amazing," said Jill, and meant it. She knew women who had kept their looks quite as well (as she firmly intended to keep hers) but in every case only through great effort. She knew that Aunt Patty was telling the truth about diet and exercise, at least during the time she had known her� and as a surgical nurse Jill knew exactly what was excised and where in a breast-lifting job; those tattoos had certainly never known a knife.
But Mike was not amazed. He assumed conclusively that Pat had learned how to think her body as she wished it, whether she attributed it to Foster or not. He was still trying to teach this control to Jill, but knew that she would have to perfect her knowledge of Martian before it could be perfect. No hurry, waiting would accomplish it. Pat went on talking:
"I wanted you to see what the Faith has done for me. But that's just outside; the real change is inside. Happiness. I've got to try to tell you about it. The good Lord knows that I'm not ordained and I'm not gifted with tongues� but I've got to try. And then I'll answer your questions if I can. The first thing that you've got to accept is that all the other so-called churches are traps of the Devil. Our dear Jesus preached the True Faith, so Foster said and I truly believe. But, in the Dark Ages his words were deliberately twisted and added to and changed until Jesus wouldn't recognize 'em. And that is why Foster was sent down to Earth, to proclaim a New Revelation and straighten it out and make it clear again."
Patricia Paiwonski pointed her finger and suddenly looked very impressive, a priestess clothed in holy dignity and mystic symbols. "God wants us to be Happy. He filled the world with things to make us Happy if only we see the light. Would God let grape juice turn into wine if He didn't want us to drink and be joyful? He could just as easily let is stay grape juice� or turn it straight into vinegar that nobody could get a happy giggle out of. Ain't that true? Of course He don't mean you should get roaring drunk and beat your wife and neglect your kids� but He gave us good things to use, not abuse� and not to ignore. But if you feel like a drink or six, among friends who have seen the light, too, and it makes you want to jump up and dance and give thanks to the Lord on high for his goodness - why not? God made alcohol and he made feet - and he made 'em so you could put 'em together and be happy!"
She paused and said, "Fill 'er up again, honey; preaching is thirsty work - and not too strong on the ginger ale this time; that's good rye. And that ain't all. If God didn't want women to be looked at, he would have made 'em ugly - that's reasonable, isn't it? God isn't a cheat; He set up the game Himself - He wouldn't rig it so that the marks can't win, like a flat joint wheel in a town with the fix on. He wouldn't send anybody to Hell for losing in a crooked game.
"All right! God wants us to be Happy and he told us how: 'Love one another!' Love a snake if the poor thing needs love. Love thy neighbor if he's seen the light and has love in his heart� and the back of your hand only to sinners and Satan's corruptors who want to lead you away from the appointed path and down into the pit. And by 'love' he didn't mean namby-pamby old-maid-aunt love that's scared to look up from a hymn book for fear of seeing a temptation of the flesh. If God hated flesh, why did lie make so much of it? God is no sissy. He made the Grand Canyon and comets coursing through the sky and cyclones and stallions and earthquakes - can a God who can do all that turn around and practically wet his pants just because some little sheila leans over a mite and a man catches sight of a tit? You know better, hon - and so do I! When God told us to love, He wasn't holding out a card on us; He meant it. Love little babies that always need changing and love strong, smelly men so that there will be more little babies to love - and in between go on loving because it's so good to love!
"Of course that don't mean to peddle it any more than a bottle of rye whiskey means I gotta get fighting drunk and clobber a cop. You can't sell love and you can't buy Happiness, no price tags on either one and if you think there is, the way to Hell lies open to you. But if you give with an open heart and receive what God has an unlimited supply of, the Devil can't touch you. Money?" She looked at Jill. "Hon, would you do that water-sharing thing with somebody, say for a million dollars? Make it ten million, tax free."
"Of course not." ("Michael, do you grok this?")
("Almost in fullness, Jill. Waiting is. ")
"You see, dearie? I knew what it meant, I knew love was in that water. You're seekers, very near the light. But since you two, from the love that is in you, did 'share water and grow closer,' as Michael says, I can tell you things I couldn't ordinarily tell a seeker-"
The Reverend Foster, self-ordained - or directly ordained by God, depending on authority cited - had an intuitive instinct for the pulse of his culture and his times at least as strong as that of a skilled carney sizing up a mark. The country and culture commonly known as "America" had had a badly split personality all through its history. Its overt laws were almost always puritanical for a people whose covert behavior tended to be Rabelaisian; its major religions were all Apollonian in varying degree - its religious revivals were often hysterical in fashion almost Dionysian. In the twentieth century (Terran Christian Era) nowhere on Earth was sex so vigorously suppressed as in America - and nowhere else was there such a deep interest in it.
The Reverend Foster had in common with almost every great religious leader of that planet two traits: he had an extremely magnetic personality ("hypnotist" was a word widely used by his detractors, along with others less mild) and, sexually, he did not fall anywhere near the human norm. Great religious leaders on Earth were always either celibate, or the antithesis. (Great leaders, the innovators - not necessarily the major administrators and consolidators.) Foster was not celibate.
Nor were any of his wives and high priestesses - the clincher for complete conversion and rebirth under the New Revelation usually included a ritual which Valentine Michael Smith at a later time was to grok as especially suited for growing-closer.
This, of course, was nothing new; in Terran history sects, cults, and major religions too numerous to list had used essentially the same technique - but not on a major scale in America before Foster's times. Foster was run out of town more than once before he "perfected" a method and organization that permitted him to expand his capric cult. In organization he borrowed as liberally from freemasonry, from Catholicism, from the Communist Party, and from Madison Avenue as he had borrowed from any and all earlier scriptures in composing his New Revelation� and he sugar-coated it all as a return to primitive Christianity to suit his customers. He set up an outer church which anybody could attend - and a person could remain a "seeker" with many benefits of the church for years. Then there was a middle church, which to all outward appearance was "The Church of the New Revelation," the happy saved, who paid their tithes, enjoyed all economic benefits of the church's ever-widening business tie-ins, and whooped it up in the endless carnival amp; revival atmosphere of Happiness, Happiness, Happiness! Their sins were forgiven - and henceforth very little was sinful as long as they supported their church, dealt honestly with their fellow Fosterites, condemned sinners, and stayed Happy. The New Revelation does not specifically encourage adultery; it simply gets rather mystical in discussing sexual conduct.
The saved of the middle church supplied the ranks of the shock troops when direct action was needed. Foster borrowed a trick from the early twentieth-century Wobblies; if a community tried to suppress a budding Fosterite movement, Fosterites from elsewhere converged on that town until there were neither jails nor cops enough to cope with them - and the cops usually had had their ribs kicked in and the jails were smashed.
If some prosecutor were brave enough to push an indictment thereafter, it was almost impossible to make it stick. Foster (after learning his lesson under fire) saw to it that such prosecutions were indeed persecution under the letter of the law; not one conviction of a Fosterite qua Fosterite ever was upheld by the national Supreme Court - nor, later, by the High Court.
But, in addition to the overt church, there was the Inner Church, never named as such - a hard core of the utterly dedicated who made up the priesthood, all the church lay leaders, all keepers of keys and records and makers of policy. They were the "reborn," beyond sin, certain of their place in heaven, and sole participants of the inner mysteries - and the only candidates for direct admission to Heaven.
Foster selected these with great care, doing so personally until the operation got too big. He looked for men as much like himself as possible and for women like his priestess - wives - dynamic, utterly convinced (as he was himself convinced), stubborn, and free (or able to be freed, once their guilt and insecurity was purged) of jealousy in its simplest, most human meaning - and all of them potential satyrs and nymphs, as the secret inner church was that utterly Dionysian cult that America had never had and for which there was an enormous potential market.
But he was most cautious - if candidates were married, it had to be both spouses. An unmarried candidate had to be sexually attractive as well as sexually aggressive - and he impressed on his priests that the males must always equal or exceed in number the females. Nowhere is it admitted that Foster had studied the histories of earlier, somewhat parallel cults in America but he either knew (or sensed) that most of such had foundered because the possessive concupiscence of their priests led to male jealousy and violence. Foster never made this error; not once did he keep a woman entirely to himself, not even the women he married legally.
Nor did he try too eagerly to expand his core group; the middle church, the one known to the public, offered plenty to slake the milder needs of the great masses of guilt-ridden and unhappy. If a local revival produced even two couples who were capable of "Heavenly Marriage" Foster was content - if it produced none, he let the other seeds grow and sent in a salted priest and priestess to nurture them.
But, so far as possible, he always tested candidate couples himself, in company with some devoted priestess. Since such a couple was already "saved" insofar as the middle church was concerned, he ran little risk - none, really, with the woman candidate and he always sized up the man himself before letting his priestess go ahead.
At the time she was saved, Patricia Paiwonski was still young, married, and "very happy, very happy." She had her first child, she looked up to and admired her much older husband. George Paiwonski was a generous, very affectionate man. He did have one weakness, which often left him too drunk to show his affection after a long day� but his tattooing needle was still steady and his eye sharp. Patty counted herself a faithful wife and, on the whole, a lucky one - true, George occasionally got affectionate with a female client� quite affectionate if it was early in the day - and, of course, some tattooing required privacy, especially with ladies. Patty was tolerant� besides, she sometimes herself made a date with a male client, especially after George got to hitting the bottle more and more.
Nevertheless there was a lack in her life, one which was not filled even when an especially grateful client made her the odd gift of a bull snake - shipping out on a freighter, he said, and couldn't keep it any longer. She had always liked pets and had none of the vulgar phobia about snakes; she made a home for it in their show window facing the street, and George made a beautiful four-color picture to back it up: "Don't Tread on Me!" His new design turned out to be very popular.
Presently she had more snakes and they were quite a comfort to her. But she was the daughter of an Ulster Protestant and a girl from Cork; the armed truce between her parents had left her with no religion.
She was already a "seeker" when Foster preached in San Pedro; she had managed to get George to go a few Sundays but he had not yet seen the light.
Foster brought them the light, they made their confessions the same day. When Foster returned six months later for a quick check on how his branch was doing, the Paiwonskis were so dedicated that he gave them personal attention.
"I never had a minute's trouble with George from the day he saw the holy light," she told Mike and Jill - "Of course, he still drank� but he drank in church and never too much. When our holy leader returned, George had already started his Great Project. Naturally we wanted to show it to Foster, if he could find time-" Mrs. Paiwonski hesitated. "Kids, I really ought not to be telling you any of this."
"Then don't," sill said emphatically "Patty darling, neither of us want you ever to do or say anything you don't feel easy about. 'Sharing water' has to be easy and natural� and waiting until it comes easy for you is easy for us."
"Uh� but I do want to share it. Look, darlings, I trust you both utterly. But I just want you to remember that this is Church things I'm telling you, so you mustn't ever tell anyone� just as I wouldn't tell anything about you."
Mike nodded. "Here on Earth we sometimes call it 'water brother' business. On Mars there's no problem� but here I grok that there sometimes is. 'Water brother' business you don't repeat."
"I�I,'Grok.' That's a funny word, but I'm learning it, All right, darlings, this is 'water brother' business. Did you know that all Fosterites are tattooed? Real Church members I mean, the ones who are eternally saved forever and ever and a day - like me? Oh, I don't mean tattooed all over, the way I am, but - look, see that? Right over my heart� see? That's Foster's holy kiss. George worked it into the design so that it looks like part of the picture it's in� so that nobody could guess unless I told 'em. But it's his kiss - and Foster put it there hisself!" She looked ecstatically proud.
They both examined it. "It is a kiss mark," Jill said wonderingly. "Just like somebody had kissed you there wearing lipstick. But, until you showed us, I thought it was part of that sunset."
"Yes, indeedy, that's why George did it. Because you don't go showing Foster's kiss to anyone who doesn't wear Foster's kiss - and I never have, up to now. But," she insisted, "I'm sure you're going to wear one, both of you, someday - and when you do, I want to be the one to tattoo 'em on."
Jill said, "I don't quite understand, Patty. I can see that it's wonderful for you to have been kissed by Foster - but how can he ever kiss us? After all, he's up in Heaven."
"Yes, dearie, he is. But let me explain. Any ordained priest or priestess can give you Foster's kiss. It means God's in your heart. God is part of you� forever."
Mike was suddenly intent. "Thou art God!"
"Huh, Michael? Well, that is a strange way to say it - I've never heard a priest put it quite that way. But that does sort of express it� God is in you and of you and with you, and the Devil can't ever get at you."
"Yes," agreed Mike. "You grok God." He thought happily that this was nearer to putting the concept across than he had ever managed before except that Jill was learning it, in Martian. Which was inevitable. "That's the idea, Michael. God� groks you - and you are married in Holy Love and eternal Happiness to His Church. The priest, or maybe priestess - it can be either - kisses you and then the kiss mark is tattooed on to show that it's forever. Of course it doesn't have to be this big - mine is just exactly the size and shape of Foster's blessed lips - and the kiss can be placed anywhere to shield from sinful eyes. Lots of men have a patch of skull shaved and then wear a hat or a bandage until the hair grows out. Or any spot where it's blessed certain it won't be seen unless you want it to be. You mustn't sit or stand on it - but anywhere else is okay. Then you show it when you go into a closed Happiness gathering of the eternally saved."
"I've heard of Happiness meetings," Jill commented, "but I've never known quite what they are."
"Well," Mrs. Paiwonski said judicially, "there are Happiness meetings and Happiness meetings. The ones for ordinary members, who are saved but might backslide, are an awful lot of fun - grand parties with only the amount of praying that comes natural and happily, and plenty of whoopit-up that makes a good party. Maybe, even, a little real lovin' - but that's frowned on there and you'd better be mighty careful who and how, because you mustn't be a seed of dissension among the brethren. The Church is way strict about keeping things in their proper place.
"But a Happiness meeting for the eternally saved - well, you don't have to be careful because there won't be anybody there who can sin - all past and done with. If you want to drink and pass out� okay, it's God's will or you wouldn't want to. You want to kneel down and pray, or lift up your voice in song - or tear off your clothes and dance; it's God's will. Although," she added, "you might not have any clothes on at all, because there can't possibly be anybody there who would see anything wrong in it."
"It sounds like quite a party," said Jill.
"Oh, it is, it is - always! And you're filled with heavenly bliss the whole time. And if you wake up in the morning on a couch with one of the eternally saved brethren, you know he's there because God willed it to make you all blessedly Happy. And you are. They've all got Foster's kiss on - they're yours." She frowned slightly. "It feels a little like 'sharing water.' You understand me?"
"I grok," agreed Mike.
("Mike?!!?")
("Wait, Jill. Wait for fullness.")
"But don't think," Patricia said earnestly, "that a person can get into an Inner Temple Happiness meeting just with a little tattoo mark - after all, it's too easy to fake. A visiting brother or sister - well, take me. As soon as I know where the carnie is going, I write to the local churches and send 'em my finger prints so they can check 'em against the master file of the eternally saved at Archangel Foster Tabernacle - unless they already know me. I give 'em my address care of Billboard. Then when I go to church - and I always go to church Sundays and I would never miss a Happiness meeting even if it means Tim has to slough the blow-off some nights - I go first time and get positively identified. Most places they're mighty glad to see me; I'm an added attraction, with my unique and unsurpassed sacred pictures - I often spend most of the evening just letting people examine me� and every minute of it bliss. Sometimes the priest wants me to bring Honey Bun and I do Eve and the serpent - that takes body make-up, of course, or skin-colored tights if there isn't time. Some local brother plays Adam and we get scourged out of the Garden of Eden, and the local priest explains the real meaning, not all the twisted lies you hear - and we end by regaining our blessed innocence and happiness, and that's certain to get the party really rolling. Joy!"
She added, "But everybody is always interested in my Foster's kiss, Because, since he went back to Heaven almost twenty years ago now and the Church has increased and flourished, not too many of us have a Foster's kiss that wasn't laid on by proxy - I always have the Tabernacle testify to that, too. And I tell them about it. Uh-"
Mrs. Paiwonski hesitated, then told them about it, in explicit detail - and Jill wondered where her admittedly limited ability to blush had gone? Then she grokked that Mike and Patty were two of a kind - God's innocents, unable to be anything else, no matter what they did. She wished, for Patty's sake, that this preposterous mishmash were really true, that Foster had really been a holy prophet who had saved her for eternal bliss.
But Foster! God's Wounds, what a travesty! Then suddenly, through her greatly improved recall, Jill was standing back in a room with a wall of glass and looking into Foster's dead eyes. But, in her mind, he seemed alive and she felt a shiver in her loins and wondered what she would have done if Foster himself had offered her his holy kiss - and his holy self?
She shut it out of her mind, but not before Mike had caught much of it. She felt him smile, with knowing innocence.
She stood up. "Pattycake darling, what time do you have to be back at the lot?"
"Oh dear! I should be back this blessed minute!"
"Why? The show doesn't roll until nine-thirty."
"Well� Honey Bun misses me�and she's jealous if I stay out late."
"Can't you tell her that it's a Happiness meeting night?"
"Uh�The older woman gathered Jill in her arms. "It is! It certainly is!"
"Good. Then I'm going to get a certain amount of sleep - Jill is bushed, believe me. What time do you have to be up, then?"
"Uh, if I'm back on the lot by eight, I can get Sam to tear down my living top and have time to make sure that my babies are loaded safely."
"Breakfast?"
"I don't eat breakfast right away, I'll get it on the train. Just coffee when I wake up, usually."
"We can make that right here in the room. I'll see that you're up. Now you dears stay up and talk religion as long as you like; I won't let you oversleep - if you sleep. Mike doesn't sleep."
"Not at all?"
"Never. He sort of curls up and thinks a while, if he's got something to think about - but he doesn't sleep."
Mrs. Paiwonski nodded solemnly. "Another sign. I know it - and, Michael, some day you will know. Your call will come."
"Maybe," agreed Jill. "Mike, I'm falling asleep. Pop me into bed. Please?" She was lifted, wafted into the bedroom, the covers rolled back by invisible hands - she was asleep before he covered her.
Jill woke up, as she had planned, exactly at seven. Mike had a clock in his head, too, but his was quite erratic so far as Earth calendars and times were concerned; it vibrated to another need. She slipped out of bed, put her head into the other room. Lights were out and the shades were tight; it was quite dark. But they were not asleep. Jill heard Mike say with soft certainty:
"Thou art God."
"'Thou art God' - " Patricia whispered back in a voice as heavy as if drugged.
"Yes. Jill is God."
"Jill� is God. Yes, Michael."
"And thou art God."
"Thou - are God. Now, Michael, now!"
Jill went very softly back in and quietly brushed her teeth. Presently she let Mike know in her mind that she was awake and found, as she expected, that he knew it. When she came back into the living room, shades were up and morning sun was streaming in. "Good morning, darlings!" She kissed them both.
"Thou art God," Patty said simply.
"Yes, Patty. And thou art God. God is in all of us." She looked at Patty in the harsh, bright morning light and noted that her new brother did not look tired. She looked as if she had had a full night of sleep and some extra� and looked younger and sweeter than ever. Well, she knew that effect - if Mike wanted to stay up, instead of reading or thinking all night, Jill never found it any trouble� and she suspected that her own sudden sleepiness the night before had been Mike's idea, too - and heard Mike agree in his mind that it was.
"Now coffee for both you darlings - and me, too. And I just happen to have stashed away a redipak of orange juice, too."
They breakfasted lightly, filled out with happiness. Jill saw Patty looking thoughtful. "What is it, dear?"
"Uh, I hate to mention this - but what are you kids going to eat on? Happens that Aunt Patty has a pretty well stuffed grouch bag and I thought-"
Jill laughed. "Oh, darling, I'm sorry; I didn't mean to laugh. But the Man from Mars is rich! Surely you know that? Or don't you ever read the news?"
Mrs. Paiwonski looked baffled. "Well, I guess I knew - that way. But you can't trust anything you hear over the news."
Jill sighed. "Patty, you're an utter darling. And believe me, now that we're water brothers, we wouldn't hesitate an instant to impose on you - 'sharing the nest' isn't just poetry. But it happens to be the other way around. If you ever need money - it doesn't matter how much; we can't use it up - just say so. Any amount. Any time. Write to me - or better yet, call me - because Mike doesn't have the foggiest idea about money. Why, dear, I've got a couple of hundred thousand dollars in a checking account in my name right this minute. Want some of it?"
Mrs. Paiwonski looked startled, something she had not looked since Mike had caused her costume to go away. "Bless me! No, I don't need money."
Jill shrugged. "If you ever do, just holler. We can't possibly spend it all and the government won't let Mike give it away. At least, not much of it. If you want a yacht - Mike would enjoy giving you a yacht."
"I certainly would, Pat. I've never seen a yacht."
Mrs. Paiwonski shook her head. "Don't take me up on a tall mountain, dearie - I've never wanted much� and all I want from you two is your love-"
"You have that," Jill told her.
"I don't grok 'love'," Mike said seriously. "But Jill always speaks rightly. If we've got it, it's yours."
"-and to know that you're both saved. But I'm no longer worried about that. Mike has told me about waiting, and why waiting is. You understand me, Jill?"
"I grok. I'm no longer impatient about anything."
"But I do have something for you two." The tattooed lady got up and crossed to where she had left her purse, took a book out of it. She came back, stood close to them. "My dear ones� this is the very copy of the New Revelation that Blessed Foster gave me� the night he placed his kiss on me. I want you to have it."
Jill's eyes suddenly filled with tears and she felt herself choking. "But, Aunt Patty - Patty our brother! We can't take this one. Not this one. We'll buy one."
"No. It's�it's 'water' I'm sharing with you. For growing-closer."
"Oh-" Jill jumped up. "We'll take it. But it's ours now - all of us." She kissed her.
Presently Mike tapped her on the shoulder. "Greedy little brother. My turn."
"I'll always be greedy, that way."
The Man from Mars kissed his new brother first on her mouth, then paused and gently kissed the spot where Foster had kissed her. Then he pondered, briefly by Earth time, picked a corresponding spot on the other side where he saw that George's design could be matched well enough for his purpose - kissed her there while he thought by stretched-out time and in great detail what he wanted to accomplish. It was necessary to grok the capillaries - To the other two, subject and spectator, he simply gently and briefly pressed his lips to the garishly decorated skin. But Jill caught a hint of the effort he had exerted and looked. "Patty! See!"
Mrs. Paiwonski looked down at herself. Marked on her skin, paired stigmata in blood red, were his lips. She started to faint - then showed the depth of her own staunch faith. "Yes. Yes! Michael-"
Most shortly thereafter the tattooed lady had disappeared, replaced by a rather mousy housewife in high neck, long sleeves and gloves. "I won't cry," she said soberly, "and it's not good-by; there are no good-bys in eternity. But I will be waiting." She kissed them both, briefly, left without looking back.

XXVIII

"BLASPHEMY!"Foster looked up. "Something bite you, Junior?" This temporary annex had been run up in a hurry and things did get in - swarms of almost invisible imps usually� harmless, of course, but a bite from one left an itch on the ego.
"Uh� you'd have to see it to believe it - here, I'll run the omniscio back a touch."
"You'd be surprised at what I can believe, Junior." Nevertheless Digby's supervisor shifted a part of his attention. Three temporals - humans, he saw they were; a man and two women - speculating about the eternal. Nothing odd about that. "Yes?"
"You heard what she said! The 'Archangel Michael' indeed!"
"What about it?"
"'What about it?' Oh, for God's sake!"
"Very possibly."
Digby was so indignant that his halo quivered. "Foster, you must not have taken a good look. She meant that over-age juvenile delinquent that sent me to the showers. Scan it again."
Foster let the gain increase, noted that the angel-in-training had spoken rightly - and noticed something else and smiled his angelic smile. "How do you know he isn't, Junior?"
"Huh?"
"I haven't seen Mike around the Club lately and I recall that his name has been scratched on the Millennial Solipsist Tournament - that's a Sign that he's likely away on detached duty, as Mike is one of the most eager Solipsism players in this sector."
"But the notion's obscene!"
"You'd be surprised how many of the Boss's best ideas have been called 'obscene' in some quarters - or, rather, you should not be surprised, in view of your field work. But 'obscene' is a concept you don't need; it has no theological meaning. 'To the pure all things are pure.'"
"But-"
"I'm still Witnessing, Junior. You listen. In addition to the fact that our brother Michael seems to be away at this micro-instant - and I don't keep track of him; we're not on the same watch list - that tattooed lady who made that oracular pronouncement is not likely to be mistaken; she's a very holy temporal herself."
"Who says?"
"I say. I know." Foster smiled again with angelic sweetness. Dear little Patricia! Getting a little long in the tooth now but still Earthily desirable - and shining with an inner light that made her look like a stained glass window. He noted without temporal pride that George had finished his great dedication since he had last looked at Patricia - and that picture of his being called up to Heaven wasn't bad, not bad at all, in the Higher sense. He must remember to look up George and compliment him on it, and tell him he had seen Patricia - hmm, where was George? A creative artist in the universe design section working right under the Architect, as he recalled - no matter, the master file would dig him out in a split millennium.
What a delicious little butterball Patricia had been and such holy frenzy! If she had had just a touch more assertiveness and a touch less humility he could have made her a priestess. But such was Patricia's need to accept God according to her own nature that she could have qualified only among the Lingayats� where she wasn't needed. Foster considered scanning back and seeing her as she had been, decided against it with angelic restraint; there was work to be done - "Forget the omniscio, Junior. I want a word with you." Digby did so and waited. Foster twanged his halo, an annoying habit he had when he was meditating. "Junior, you aren't shaping up too angelically."
"I'm sorry."
"Sorrow is not for eternity. But the Truth is you've been preoccupied with that young fellow who may or may not be our brother Michael. Now wait - in the first place it is not for you to judge the instrument used to call you from the pasture. In the second place it is not he who vexes you - you hardly knew him - what's bothering you is that little brunette secretary you had. She had earned my kiss quite some temporal period before you were called. Hadn't she?"
"I was still testing her."
"Then no doubt you have been angelically pleased to note that Supreme Bishop Short, after giving her a most thorough examination himself - oh, very thorough; I told you he would measure up - has passed her and she now enjoys the wider Happiness she deserves. Mmmm, a shepherd should take joy in his work� but when he's promoted, he should take joy in that, too. Now it just happens I know there is a spot open for a Guardian-in-Training in a new sector being opened up - a job under your nominal rank, I concede, but good angelic experience. This planet - well, you can think of it as a planet; you'll see - is occupied by a race of tripolaxity instead of bipolarity and I have it on High Authority that Don Juan himself could not manage to take Earthly interest in any of their three polarities� that's not an opinion; he was borrowed as a test. He screamed, and prayed to be returned to the solitary hell he has created for himself."
"Going to send me out to Flatbush, huh? So I won't interfere!"
"Tut, tut! You can't interfere - the one impossibility that permits all else to be possible; I tried to tell you that when you arrived. But don't let it fret you; you are eternally permitted to try. Your orders will include a loop so that you will check back at here - now without any loss of temporality. Now fly away and get cracking; I have work to do." Foster turned back to where he had been interrupted. Oh, yes, a poor soul temporally designated as "Alice Douglas" - to be a goad was a hard assignment at best and she had met it unflaggingly. But her job was complete and now she would need rest and rehabilitation from the inescapable battle fatigue� she'd be kicking and screaming and foaming ectoplasm at all orifices.
Oh, she would need a thorough exorcism after a job that rough! But they were all rough; they couldn't be anything else. And "Alice Douglas" was an utterly reliable field operative; she could take any left-hand assignment as long as it was essentially virginal - burn her at the stake or put her in a nunnery; she always delivered.
Not that he cared much for virgins, other than with professional respect for any job well done. Foster sneaked a quick last look at Mrs. Paiwonski. There was a fellow worker he could appreciate. Darling little Patricia! What a blessed, lusty benison-

XXIX

AS THE DOOR OF THEIR SUITE closed itself behind Patricia Paiwonski, Jill said, "What now, Mike?"
"We're leaving. Jill, you've read some abnormal psychology."
"Yes, of course. In training. Not as much as you have, I know."
"Do you know the symbolism of tattooing? And snakes?"
"Of course. I knew that about Patty as soon as I met her. I had been hoping that you would find a way."
"I couldn't, until we were water brothers. Sex is necessary, sex is a helpful goodness - but only if it is sharing and growing closer. I grok that if I did it without growing closer - well, I'm not sure."
"I grok that you would learn that you couldn't, Mike. That is one of the reasons - one of the many reasons - I love you."
He looked worried. "I still don't grok 'love.' Jill, I don't grok 'people.' Not even you. But I didn't want to send Pat away."
"Stop her. Keep her with us."
("Waiting is, Jill.")
("I know.")
He added aloud, "Besides, I doubt if I could give her all she needs. She wants to give herself all the time, to everybody. Even her Happiness meetings and her snakes and the marks aren't enough for Pat. She wants to offer herself on an altar to everybody in the world, always - and make them happy. This New Revelation� I grok that it is a lot of other things to other people. But that is what it is to Pat."
"Yes, Mike. Dear Mike."
"Time to leave. Pick the dress you want to wear and get your purse. I'll dispose of the rest of the trash."
Jill thought somewhat sadly that she would like, sometimes, to take along just one or two things. But Mike always moved on with just the clothes on his back - and seemed to grok that she preferred it that way, too. "I'll wear that pretty blue one."
It floated out to her, poised itself over her, wriggled down onto her as she held up her hands; the zipper closed. Shoes to suit it walked toward her, waited while she stepped into them. "I'm ready, Mike."
Mike had caught the wistful flavor of her thought, but not the concept; it was too alien to Martian ideas. "Jill? Do you want to stop and get married?"
She thought about it. "We couldn't, today, Mike. It's Sunday. We couldn't get a license."
"Tomorrow, then. I will remember. I grok that you would like it."
She thought about it. "No, Mike."
"Why not, Jill?"
"Two reasons. One, we couldn't be any closer through it, because we already share water. That's logic, both in English and in Martian. Yes?"
"Yes."
"And two, a reason valid just in English. I wouldn't have Dorcas and Anne and Miriam - and Patty - think that I was trying to crowd them out and one of them might think so."
"No, Jill, none of them would think so."
"Well, I won't chance it, because I don't need it. Because you married me in a hospital room ages and ages ago. Just because you were the way you are. Before I even guessed it." She hesitated. "But there is something you might do for me."
"What, Jill?"
"Well, you might call me pet names occasionally! The way I do you."
"Yes, Jill. What pet names?"
"Oh!" She kissed him quickly. "Mike, you're the sweetest, most lovable man I've ever met - and the most infuriating creature on two planets! Don't bother with pet names. Just call me 'little brother' occasionally�it makes me go all quivery inside."
"Yes, Little Brother."
"Oh, my! Now get decent fast and let's get out of here - before I take you back to bed. Come on. Meet me at the desk; I'll be paying the bill." She left very suddenly.
They went to the town's station flat and caught the first Greyhound going anywhere. A week or two later they stopped at home, shared water for a couple of days, left again without saying good-by - or, rather, Mike did not; saying good-by was one human custom Mike stubbornly resisted and never used with his own. He used it formally with strangers under circumstances in which Jill required him to.
Shortly they were in Las Vegas, stopping in an unfashionable hotel near but not on the Strip. Mike tried all the games in all the casinos while Jill filled in the time as a show girl-gambling bored her. Since she couldn't sing or dance and had no act, standing or parading slowly in a tall improbable hat, a smile, and a scrap of tinsel was the job best suited to her in the Babylon of the West. She preferred to work if Mike was busy and, somehow, Mike could always get her the job she picked out. Since the casinos never closed, Mike was busy almost all their time in Las Vegas.
Mike was careful not to win too much in any one casino, keeping to limits Jill set for him. After he had milked each one for a few thousand he carefully put it all back, never letting himself be the big-money player at any game, whether winning or losing. Then he took a job as a croupier, studying people, trying to grok why they gambled. He grokked unclearly a drive in many of the gamblers that seemed to be intensely sexual in nature - but he seemed to grok wrongness in this. He kept the job quite a while, letting always the little ball roll without interference.
Jill was amused to discover that the customers in the palatial theater restaurant where she worked were just marks� marks with more money but still marks. She discovered something about herself, too; she enjoyed displaying herself, as long as she was safe from hands that she did not want to grab her. With her steadily increasing Martian honesty she examined this newly uncovered facet in herself. In the past, while she had known that she enjoyed being admired, she had sincerely believed that she wanted it only from a select few and usually only from one - she had been irked at the discovery, now long past, that the sight of her physical being really didn't mean anything to Mike even though he had been and remained as aggressively and tenderly devoted to her physically as a woman could dream of - if he wasn't preoccupied.
And he was even generous about that, she reminded herself. If she wished, he would always let her call him out of his deepest withdrawal trances, shift gears without complaint and be smiling and eager and loving.
Nevertheless, there it was - one of his strangenesses, like his inability to laugh. Jill decided, after her initiation as a show girl, that she enjoyed being visually admired because that was the one thing Mike did not give her.
But her own perfecting self-honesty and steadily growing empathy did not allow that theory to stand. The male half of the audience always had that to-be-expected high percentage who were too old, too fat, too bald, and in general too far gone along the sad road of entropy to be likely to be attractive to a female of Jill's youth, beauty, and fastidiousness - she had always been scornful of "lecherous old wolves"-although not of old men per se, she reminded herself in her own defense; Jubal could look at her, even use crude language in deliberate indecencies, and not give her the slightest feeling that he was anxious to get her alone and grope her. She was so serenely sure of Jubal's love for her and its truly spiritual nature that she told herself that she could easily share a bed with him, go right to sleep - and be sure that be would also, with only the goodnight peck she always gave him.
But now she found that these unattractive males did not set her teeth on edge. When she felt their admiring stares or even their outright lust - and she found that she did feel it, could even identify the source - she did not resent it; it warmed her and made her feel smugly pleased.
"Exhibitionism" had been to her simply a word used in abnormal psychology - a neurotic weakness she had held in contempt. Now, in digging out her own and looking at it, she decided that either this form of narcissism was normal, or she was abnormal and had not known it. But she didn't feel abnormal; she felt healthy and happy - healthier than she had ever been. She had been always of better than average health-nurses need to be - but she hadn't had a sniffle nor even an upset stomach in she couldn't remember when� why, she thought wonderingly, not even cramps.
Okay, she was healthy - and if a healthy woman liked to be looked at - and not as a side of beef! - then it follows as the night from day that healthy men should like to look at them, else there was just no darn sense to it! At which point she finally understood, intellectually, Duke and his pictures� and begged his pardon in her mind.
She discussed it with Mike, tried to explain her changed viewpoint - not easy, since Mike could not understand why Jill had ever minded being looked at, at any time, by anyone. Not wishing to be touched he understood; Mike avoided shaking hands if he could do so without offense, he wanted to touch and be touched only by water brothers (Jill wasn't sure just how far this included male water brothers in Mike's mind; she had explained homosexuality to him, after he had read about it and failed to grok it - and had given him practical rules for avoiding even the appearance thereof and how to keep such passes from being made at him, since she assumed correctly that Mike, pretty as he was, would attract such passes. He had followed her advice and had set about making his face more masculine, instead of the androgynous beauty he had first had. Nevertheless Jill was not sure that Mike would refuse such an invitation from, say, Duke - but fortunately Mike's male water brothers were all decidedly masculine men, just as his others were very female women. Jill hoped that it would stay that way; she suspected that Mike would grok a "wrongness" in the poor in-betweeners anyhow - they would never be offered water.)
Nor could Mike understand why it now pleased her to be stared at. The only time when their two attitudes had been even roughly similar had been as they left the carnival, when Jill had discovered that she had become indifferent to stares - willing to do their act "stark naked," as she had told Patty, if it would help.
Jill saw that her present self-knowledge had been nascent at that point; she had never been truly indifferent to masculine stares. Under the unique necessities of adjusting to life with the Man from Mars she had been forced to shuck off part of her artificial, training-imposed persona, that degree of lady-like prissiness a nurse can retain despite the rigors of an unusually no-nonsense profession. But Jill hadn't known that she had any prissiness to lose until she lost it.
Of course, Jill was even more of a "lady" than ever - but she preferred to think of herself as a "gent." But she was no longer able to conceal from her conscious mind (nor had any wish to) that there was something inside her as happily shameless as a tabby in heat going into her belly dance for the enticement of the neighborhood toms.
She tried to explain all this to Mike, giving him her theory of the complementary and functional nature of narcissist display and voyeurism, with herself and Duke as clinical examples. "The truth is, Mike, that I find I get a real kick out of having all those men stare at me� lots of men and almost any man. So now I grok why Duke likes to have lots of pictures of women, the sexier the better. Same thing, only in reverse. It doesn't mean that I want to go to bed with them, any more than Duke wants to go to bed with a photograph - shucks, dearest, I don't even want to say hello to them. But when they look at me and tell me - think at me - that I'm desirable, it gives me a tingle, a warm pleasant feeling right in my middle." She frowned slightly. "You know, I think I ought to get a real naughty picture taken of me and send it to Duke. Just to tell him that I'm sorry I snooted him and failed to grok what I thought was a weakness in him, If it's a weakness, I've got it, too - but girl style. If it is a weakness - but I grok it isn't."
"All right. We'll find a photographer in the morning."
She shook her head. "I'll simply apologize to Duke the next time we go home, I wouldn't actually send such a picture to Duke. He has never made a pass at me - and I don't want him getting ideas."
"Jill, you would not want Duke?"
She heard an echo of "water brother" in his mind. "Hmm truthfully I've never really thought about it. I guess I've been 'being faithful' to you - not that it has been an effort. But I grok you speak rightly; I wouldn't turn Duke down - and I would enjoy it, too. What do you think of that darling?"
"I grok a goodness," Mike said seriously.
"Hmm� my gallant Martian, there are times when we human females appreciate at least a semblance of jealousy - but I don't think there is the slightest chance that you will ever grok 'jealousy.' Darling, what would you grok if one of those marks - those men in the audience, not a water brother - made a pass at me?"
Mike barely smiled. "I grok he would be missing."
"Mmm� I grok he might be, too. But, Mike - listen to me carefully, dear. You promised me that you wouldn't do anything of that sort except in utter emergency. So don't be hasty. If you hear me scream and shout, and reach into my mind and know that I'm in real trouble, that's another matter. But I was coping with wolves when you were still on Mars. Nine times out often, if a girl gets raped, it's at least partly her own fault. That tenth time - well, all right. Give him your best heave-ho to the bottomless pit. But you aren't going to find it necessary."
"All right, I will remember. I wish you were sending that naughty picture to Duke."
"What, dear? I will if you want me to. It's just that if I ever make a pass at Duke - and I might, now that you've put the idea into my little pointy head - I'd rather grab his shoulders and look him in the eye and say, 'Duke, how about it? - I'm willing.' I don't want to do it by sending him a naughty picture through the mail, like those nasty women used to send to you. But if you want me to, okay. Uh, I needn't make it too naughty - I could make it obviously a show girl's professional picture and tell him what I'm doing and ask him if he has room for it in his scrap book. He might not take it as a pass."
Mike frowned. "I spoke incompletely. If you wish to send Duke a naughty picture, do so. If you do not wish, then do not. But I had hoped to see the naughty picture taken. Jill, what is a 'naughty' picture?"
Mike was baffled by the whole idea - Jill's reversal from an attitude that he had never understood but had learned to accept into exactly the opposite attitude of pleasure - sexual pleasure, he understood - at being stared at� plus a third and long-standing bafflement at Duke's "art" collection - it certainly was not art. But the pale, wan Martian thing which parallels tumultuous human sexuality gave him no foundation for grokking either narcissism or voyeurism, modesty or display.
He added, '"Naughty' means a wrongness, usually a small wrongness, but I grokked that you did not mean even a small wrongness, but a goodness." a naughty picture could be either one, I guess - depending on who it's for - now that I'm over some prejudice. But - Mike, I'll have to show you; I can't tell you. But first close those slats, will you?"
The Venetian blinds flipped themselves shut. "All right," she said. "Now this pose would be just a little bit naughty - any of the show girls would use it as a professional pic� and this one is just a little bit more so, some of the girls would use it. But this one is unmistakably naughty and this one is quite naughty� and this one is so extremely naughty that I wouldn't pose for it with my face wrapped in a towel - unless you wanted it."
"But if your face was covered, why would I want it?"
"Ask Duke. That's all I can say."
He continued to look puzzled. "I grok not wrongness, I grok not goodness. I grok-" He used a Martian word indicating a null state of all emotions.
But he was interested because he was so baffled; they went on discussing it, in Martian as much as possible because of its extremely fine discriminations for emotions and values - and in English, too, because Martian. rich as it is, simply couldn't cope with the concepts.
Mike showed up at a ringside table that night, Jill having coached him in how to bribe the matre d'htel to give him such a spot; he was determined to pursue this mystery. Jill was not averse. She came strutting out in the first production number, her smile for everyone but a quick wink for Mike as she turned and her eyes passed across his. She discovered that, with Mike present, the warm, pleased sensation she had been enjoying nightly was greatly amplified - she suspected that, if the lights were out, she would glow in the dark.
When the parade stopped and the girls formed a tableau, Mike was no more than ten feet from her - she had been promoted her first week to a front position. The director had looked her over on her fourth day with the show and had said, "I don't know what it is, kid. We've got girls around town begging for just any job with twice the shape you've got - but when the lights hit you, you've got what the customers look at. Okay, I'm moving you up where they can see better. The standard raise� and I still don't know why."
She posed and talked with Mike in her mind. ("Feel anything?")
("I grok but not in fullness.')
("Look where I am looking, my brother. The small one. He quivers. He thirsts for me.')
("I grok his thirst ")
("Can you see him?") Jill stared straight into the customer's eyes and gave him a warm smile� not alone to increase his interest in her but also to let Mike use her eyes, if possible. As her grokking of Martian thought had increased and as they had grown steadily closer in other ways they had begun to be able to use this common Martian convenience. Not fully as yet, but with increasing ease - Jill had no control over it; Mike could see through her eyes simply by calling to her, she could see through his only if he gave it his attention.
("We grok him together," Mike agreed. ("Great thirst for my little brother.")
("!!!!")
("Yes. Beautiful agony.")
A music cue told Jill to break her pose and resume her slow strut. She did so, moving with proud sensuousness and feeling lust boil up in herself in response to emotions she was getting both from Mike and from the stranger. The routine caused her to walk away from Mike and almost toward the rutty little stranger, approaching him during her first few steps. She continued to lock eyes with him.
At which point something happened which was totally unexpected to her because Mike had never explained that it was possible. She had been letting herself receive as much as possible of the stranger's emotions, intentionally teasing him with eyes and body, and relaying what she felt from him back to Mike - when suddenly the circuit was completed and she was looking at herself, seeing herself through strange eyes, much more lavish than she considered herself to be - and feeling the primitive need with which that stranger saw her.
Blindly she stumbled and would have fallen flat had not Mike instantly sensed her hazard, caught her, lifted her, straightened her up, and steadied her until she could walk unassisted, second-sight gone.
The parade of beauties continued on through exit. Once off stage the girl behind her said, "What the devil happened to you, Jill?"
"Caught my heel."
"Happens. But that was the wildest recovery I ever saw. For a second there you looked like a puppet on strings."
(-and so I was, dear, and so I was! But we won't go into that.) "I'm going to ask the stage manager to check that spot. I think there's a loose board. A gal could break her leg."
For the rest of the show whenever she was on stage Mike gave her quick glimpses of how she looked to various men while always making sure that she was not again taken by surprise. Jill was amazed to discover how varied were their images of her: one noticed only her legs, another seemed fascinated by the undulations of her torso, a third saw only her proud bosom. Then Mike, warning her first, let her look at other girls in the tableaux. She was relieved to find that Mike saw them as she saw them - but sharper.
But she was amazed to find that her own excitement did not diminish as she looked at, second hand, the girls around her; it increased.
Mike left promptly at the finale, ducking out ahead of the crowd as she had warned him to do, She did not expect to see him again that night since he had asked for relief from his job as croupier only long enough to see his wife in her show. But when she dressed and returned to their hotel room, she felt him inside before she reached the room.
The door opened for her, she stepped inside, it closed behind her. "Hello, darling!" she called out. "How nice you came home!"
He smiled gently. "I now grok naughty pictures." Her clothes vanished. "Make naughty pictures."
"Huh? Yes, dear, of course." She ran through much the same poses she had earlier in the day. With each one, as soon as she was in it, Mike let her use his eyes to see herself. She looked at herself and felt his emotions and felt her own swell in response in a closed and mutually amplified re-echoing. At last she placed herself in a pose as randily carefree as her imagination could devise.
"Naughty pictures are a great goodness," Mike said gravely.
"Yes! And now I grok them, too! What are you waiting for?"
They quit their jobs and for the next several days saw as many of the revues as possible, during which period Jill made still another discovery: she "grokked naughty pictures" only through a man's eyes. If Mike watched, she caught and shared his mood, from quiet sensuous pleasure in a beautiful woman to fully aroused excitement at times - but if Mike's attention was elsewhere, the model, dancer, or peeler was just another woman to Jill, possibly pleasant to look at but in no wise exciting. She was likely to get bored and wish mildly that Mike would take her home. But only mildly for she was now nearly as patient as he was.
She pondered this new fact from all sides and decided that she preferred not to be excited by women other than through his eyes. One man gave her all the problems she could handle and more - to have discovered in herself unsuspected latent lesbian tendencies would have been entirely too much.
But it certainly was a lot of fun - "a great goodness" - to see those girls through his eyes as he had now learned to see them - and a still greater, ecstatic goodness to know that, at last, he looked at her herself in the same way� only more so.
They stopped in Palo Alto long enough for Mike to try (and fail to) swallow all the Hoover Library in mammoth gulps. The task was mechanically impossible; the scanners could not spin that fast, nor could Mike turn pages of bound books fast enough to read them all. He gave up and admitted that he was taking in raw data much faster than he could grok it, even by spending all hours the library was closed in solitary contemplation. With relief Jill moved them to San Francisco and he embarked on a more systematic search.
She came back to their flat one day to find him sitting, not in trance but doing nothing, and surrounded by books - many books: The Talmud, the Kama Sutra, Bibles in various versions, the Book of the Dead, the Book of Mormon, Patty's precious copy of the New Revelation, Apocrypha of various sorts, the Koran, the unabridged Golden Bough, The Way, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, the sacred writings of a dozen other religions major and minor - even such deviant oddities as Crowley's Book of the Law.
"Trouble, dear?"
"Jill, I don't grok." He waved his hand at the books. ("Waiting, Michael Waiting for fullness is- ")
"I don't think waiting will ever fill it. Oh, I know what's wrong; I'm not really a man, I'm a Martian - a Martian in a body of the wrong shape."
"You're plenty of man for me, dear - and I love the way your body is shaped."
"Oh, you grok what I'm talking about. I don't grok people. I don't understand this multiplicity of religions. Now among my people-"
"Your people, Mike?"
"Sorry. I should have said that, among the Martians, there is only one religion - and that one is not a faith, it's a certainty. You grok it. 'Thou art God!"
"Yes," she agreed. "I do grok� in Martian. But you know, dearest, that it doesn't say the same thing in English� or any other human speech. I don't know why."
"Mmmm� on Mars, when we needed to know anything - anything at all - we could consult the Old Ones and the answer was never wrong. Jill, is it possible that we humans don't have any 'Old Ones?' No souls, that has to mean. When we discorporate - die! - do we die dead? die all over and nothing left? Do we live in ignorance because it doesn't matter? Because we are gone and not a rack behind in a time so short that a Martian would use it for one long contemplation? Tell me, Jill. You're human."
She smiled with sober serenity. "You yourself have told me. You have taught me to know eternity and you can't take it away from me, ever. You can't die, Mike - you can only discorporate." She gestured down at herself with both hands. "This body that you have taught me to see through your eyes� and that you have loved so well, someday it will be gone. But I shall not be gone� I am that I am! Thou art God and I am God and we are God, eternally. I am not sure where I will be, or whether I will remember that I was once Jill Boardman who was happy trotting bedpans and equally happy strutting her stuff in her buff under bright lights. I have liked this body-"
With a most uncustomary gesture of impatience Mike threw away her clothes.
"Thank you, dear," she said quietly, not stirring from where she was seated. "It has been a nice body to me - and to you - to both of us who thought of it. But I don't expect to miss it when I am through with it. I hope that you will eat it when I discorporate."
"Oh, I'll eat you, all right - unless I discorporate first."
"I don't suppose that you will. With your much greater control over your sweet body I suspect that you can live several centuries at least. If you wish it. Unless you choose to discorporate sooner."
"I might. But not now. Jill, I've tried and tried. How many churches have we attended?"
"All the sorts there are in San Francisco, I think - except, possibly, for little, secret ones that don't list their addresses. I don't recall how many times we have been to seekers' services."
"That's just to comfort Pat - I'd never go again if you weren't sure that she needs to know that we haven't given up."
"She does need to. And we can't lie about it - you don't know how and I can't, not to Patty. Nor any brother."
"Actually," he admitted, "the Fosterites do have quite a bit on the ball. All twisted, of course. They are clumsy, groping - the way I was as a carney. And they'll never correct their mistakes, because this thing-" He caused Patty's book to lift. "-is mostly crap!"
"Yes. But Patty doesn't see those parts of it. She is wrapped in her own innocence. She is God and behaves accordingly� only she doesn't know who She is."
"Uh huh," he agreed. "That's our Pat. She believes it only when I tell her - with proper emphasis. But, Jill, there are only three places to look. Science - and I was taught more about how the physical universe is put together while I was still in the nest than human scientists can yet handle. So much that I can't even talk to them� even about as elementary a gimmick as levitation. I'm not disparaging human scientists� what they do and how they go about it is just as it should be; I grok that fully. But what they are after is not what I am looking for - you don't grok a desert by counting its grains of sand. Then there's philosophy - supposed to tackle everything. Does it? All any philosopher ever comes out with is exactly what be walked in with - except for those self-deluders who prove their assumptions by their conclusions, in a circle. Like Kant. Like many other tail-chasers. So the answer, if it's anywhere, ought to be here." He waved at the pile of religious books. "Only it's not. Bits and pieces that grok true, but never a pattern - or if there is a pattern, every time, without fail, they ask you to take the hard part on faith. Faith! What a dirty Anglo-Saxon monosyllable - Jill, how does it happen that you didn't mention that one when you were teaching me the words that mustn't be used in polite company?"
She smiled. "Mike, you just made a joke."
"I didn't mean it as a joke� and I can't see that it's funny. Jill, I haven't even been good for you - you used to laugh. You used to laugh and giggle until I worried about you. I haven't learned to laugh; instead you've forgotten how. Instead of my becoming human� you're becoming Martian."
"I'm happy, dear. You probably just haven't noticed me laughing."
"If you laughed clear down on Market Street, I would hear it. I grok. Once I quit being frightened by it I always noticed it - you, especially. If I grokked it, then I would grok people - I think. Then I could help somebody like Pat� either teach her what I know, or learn from her what she knows. Or both. We could talk and understand each other."
"Mike, all you need to do for Patty is to see her occasionally. Why don't we, dear? Let's get out of this dreary fog. She's home now; the carnie is closed for the season. Drop south and see her� and I've always wanted to see Baja California; we could go on south into warmer weather - and take her with us, that would be fun!"
"All right."
She stood up. "Let me get a dress on. Do you want to save any of those books? Instead of one of your usual quick housecleanings I could ship them to Jubal."
He flipped his fingers at them and all were gone but Patricia's gift. "Just this one and we'll take it with us; Pat would notice. But, Jill, right now I need to go out to the zoo."
"All right."
"I want to spit back at a camel and ask him what he's so sour about. Maybe camels are the real 'Old Ones' on this planet� and that's what is wrong with the place."
"Two jokes in one day, Mike."
"I ain't laughing. And neither are you. Nor is the camel. Maybe he groks why. Come on. is this dress all right? Do you want underclothes? I noticed you were wearing some when i moved those other clothes."
"Please, dear. It's windy and chilly outdoors."
"Up easy." He levitated her a couple of feet. "Pants. Stockings. Garter belt. Shoes. Down you go and lift your arms. Bra? You don't need a bra. And now the dress - and you're decent again. And you're pretty, whatever that is. You look good. Maybe I can get a job as a lady's maid if I'm not good for anything else. Baths, shampoos, massages, hair styling, make-up, dressing for all occasions - I've even learned to do your nails in a fashion that suits you. Will that be all, Madam?"
"You're a perfect lady's maid, dear. But I'm going to keep you myself."
"Yes, I grok I am. You look so good I think I'll toss it all away again and give you a massage. The growing closer kind."
"Yes, Michael!"
"I thought you had learned waiting? First you have to take me to the zoo and buy me peanuts."
"Yes, Mike. Jill will buy you peanuts."
It was cold and windy out at Golden Gate Park but Mike did not notice it and Jill had learned that she didn't have to be cold or uncomfortable if she did not wish it. Nevertheless it was pleasant to relax her control by going into the warm monkey house. Aside from its heat Jill did not like the monkey house too well - monkeys and apes were too much like people, too depressingly human. She was, she thought, finished forever with any sort of prissiness; she had grown to cherish an ascetic, almost Martian joy in all things physical The public copulations and evacuations of these simian prisoners did not trouble her as they once had; these poor penned people possessed no privacy, they were not at fault. She could now watch such without repugnance; her own impregnable fastidiousness untouched. No, it was that they were "Human, All Too Human", every action, every expression, every puzzled troubled look reminded her of what she liked least about her own race.
Jill preferred the Lion House - the great males arrogant and sure of themselves even in captivity - the placid motherliness of the big females, the lordly beauty of Bengal tigers with jungle staring out of their eyes, the little leopards - swift and deadly, the reek of musk that airconditioners could not purge. Mike usually shared her tastes for other exhibits, too; he would spend hours in the Aviary, or the Reptile House, or in watching seals - once he had told her that, if one had to be hatched on this planet to be a sea lion would be of greatest goodness.
When he had first seen a zoo, Mike had been much upset; Jill had been forced to order him to wait and grok, as be had been about to take immediate action to free all the animals. He had conceded presently, under her arguments - that most of these animals could not stay alive free in the climate and environment where he proposed to turn them loose, that a zoo was a nest� of a sort. He had followed this first experience with many hours of withdrawal, after which he never again threatened to remove all the bars and glass and grills. He explained to Jill that the bars were to keep people out at least as much as to keep the animals in, which he had failed to grok at first. After that Mike never missed a zoo wherever they went.
But today even the unmitigated misanthropy of the camels could not shake Mike's moodiness; he looked at them without smiling. Nor did the monkeys and apes cheer him up. They stood for quite a while in front of a cage containing a large family of capuchins, watching them eat, sleep, court, nurse, grooms and swarm aimlessly around the cage, while Jill surreptitiously tossed them peanuts despite "No Feeding" signs.
She tossed one to a medium sized monk; before he could eat it a much larger male was on him and not only stole his peanut but gave him a beating, then left. The little fellow made no attempt to pursue his tormentor; be squatted at the scene of the crime, pounded his knucks against the concrete floor, and chattered his helpless rage. Mike watched it solemnly. Suddenly the mistreated monkey rushed to the side of the cage, picked a monkey still smaller, bowled it over and gave it a drubbing worse than the one he had suffered - after which he seemed quite relaxed. The third monk crawled away, still whimpering, and found shelter in the arm of a female who had a still smaller one, a baby, on her back. The other monkeys paid no attention to any of it.
Mike threw back his head and laughed - went on laughing, loudly and uncontrollably. He gasped for breath, tears came from his eyes; he started to tremble and sink to the floor, still laughing.
"Stop it, Mike!"
He did cease folding himself up but his guffaws and tears went on. An attendant hurried over. "Lady, do you need help?"
"No. Yes, I do. Can you call us a cab? Ground car, air cab, anything - I've got to get him out of here." She added, "He's not well."
"Ambulance? Looks like he's having a fit."
"Anything!" A few minutes later she was leading Mike into a piloted air cab. She gave the address, then said urgently. "Mike, you've got to listen to me. Quiet down."
He became somewhat more quiet but continued to chuckle, laugh aloud, chuckle again, while she wiped his eyes, for all the few minutes it took to get back to their flat. She got him inside, got his clothes off, made him lie down on the bed. "All right, dear. Withdraw now if you need to."
"I'm all right. At last I'm all right."
"I hope so." She sighed. "You certainly scared me, Mike."
"I'm sorry, Little Brother. I know. I was scared, too, the first time I heard laughing."
"Mike, what happened?"
"Jill� I grok people!"
"Huh?" ("!!??")
("I speak rightly, Little Brother. I grok.")
"I grok people now, Jill Little Brother� precious darling, little imp with lively legs and lovely lewd lascivious lecherous licentious libido� beautiful bumps and pert posterior� with soft voice and gentle hands. My baby darling."
"Why, Michael!"
"Oh, I knew all the words; I simply didn't know when or why to say them� nor why you wanted me to. I love you, sweetheart - I grok 'love' now, too."
"You always have. I knew. And I love you� you smooth ape. My darling."
"'Ape,' yes. Come here, she ape, and put your head on my shoulder and tell me a joke."
"Just tell you a joke?"
"Well, nothing more than snuggling. Tell me a joke I've never heard and see if I laugh at the right place. I will, I'm sure of it - and I'll be able to tell you why it's funny. Jill� I grok people!"
"But how, darling? Can you tell me? Does it need Martian? Or mindtalk?"
"No, that's the point. I grok people. I am people� so now I can say it in people talk. I've found out why people laugh. They laugh because it hurts so much� because it's the only thing that'll make it stop hurting."
Jill looked puzzled. "Maybe I'm the one who isn't people. I don't understand."
"Ah, but you are people, little she ape. You grok it so automatically that you don't have to think about it. Because you grew up with people. But I didn't. I've been like a puppy raised apart from other dogs - Who couldn't be like his masters and had never learned how to be a dog. So I had to be taught. Brother Mahmoud taught me, Jubal taught me, lots of people taught me� and you taught me most of all. Today I got my diploma - and I laughed. That poor little monk."
"Which one, dear? I thought that big one was just mean� and the one I flipped the peanut to turned out to be just as mean. There certainly wasn't anything funny."
"Jill, Jill my darling! Too much Martian has rubbed off on YOU. Of course it wasn't funny - it was tragic. That's why I had to laugh. I looked at a cageful of monkeys and suddenly I saw all the mean and cruel and utterly unexplainable things I've seen and heard and read about in the time I've been with my own people and suddenly it hurt so much I found myself laughing."
"But- Mike dear, laughing is something you do when something is nice� not when it's horrid."
"Is it? Think back to Las Vegas - When all you pretty girls came out on the stage, did people laugh?"
"Well� no."
"But you girls were the nicest part of the show. I grok now, that if they had laughed, you would have been hurt. No, they laughed when a comic tripped over his feet and fell down� or something else that is not a goodness."
"But that's not all people laugh at."
"Isn't it? Perhaps I don't grok all its fullness yet. But find me something that really makes you laugh, sweetheart� a joke, or anything else - but something that gave you a real belly laugh, not a smile. Then we'll see if there isn't a wrongness in it somewhere and whether you would laugh if the wrongness wasn't there." He thought. "I grok when apes learn to laugh, they'll be people."
"Maybe." Doubtfully but earnestly Jill started digging into her memory for jokes that had struck her as irresistibly funny, ones which had jerked a laugh out of her� incidents she had seen or heard of which had made her helpless with laughter:
"-her entire bridge club."
"Should I bow?"
"Neither one, you idiot - instead!"
"-the Chinaman objects."
"-broke her leg."
"-make trouble for me!"
"-but it'll spoil the ride for me."
"-and his mother-in-law fainted."
"Stop you? Why, I bet three to one you could do it!"
"-something has happened to Ole."
"-and so are you, you clumsy ox!"
She gave up on "funny" stories, pointing out to Mike that such were just fantasies, not real, and tried to recall real incidents. Practical jokes? All practical jokes supported Mike's thesis, even ones as mild as a dribble glass - and when it came to an interne's notion of a practical joke - well, internes and medical students should be kept in cages. What else? The time Elsa Mae had lost her monogrammed panties? It hadn't been funny to Elsa Mae. Or the- She said grimly, "Apparently the pratfall is the peak of all humor. It's not a pretty picture of the human race, Mike."
"Oh, but it is!"
"Huh?"
"I had thought - I had been told - that a 'funny' thing is a thing of a goodness. It isn't. Not ever is it funny to the person it happens to. Like that sheriff without his pants. The goodness is in the laughing itself. I grok it is a bravery� and a sharing� against pain and sorrow and defeat."
"But - Mike, it is not a goodness to laugh at people."
"No. But I was not laughing at the little monkey. I was laughing at you people. And I suddenly knew that I was people and could not stop laughing." He paused. "This is hard to explain, because you have never lived as a Martian, for all that I've told you about it. On Mars there is never anything to laugh at. All the things that are funny to us humans either physically cannot happen on Mars or are not permitted to happen - sweetheart, what you call 'freedom' doesn't exist on Mars; everything is planned by the Old Ones - or the things that do happen on Mars which we laugh at here on Earth aren't funny because there is no wrongness about them. Death, for example."
"Death isn't funny."
"Then why are there so many jokes about death? Jill, with us - us humans - death is so sad that we must laugh at it. All those religions - they contradict each other on every other point but every one of them is filled with ways to help people be brave enough to laugh even though they know they are dying." He stopped and Jill could feel that he had almost gone into his trance state. "Jill? Is it possible that I was searching them the wrong way? Could it be that every one of all those religions is true?"
"Huh? How could that possibly be? Mike, if one of them is true, then the others are wrong. Logic."
"So? Point to the shortest direction around the universe. It doesn't matter which way you point, it's the shortest� and you're pointing right back at yourself."
"Well, what does that prove? You taught me the true answer, Mike. 'Thou art God.'"
"And Thou art God, my lovely. I wasn't disputing that� but that one prime fact which doesn't depend at all on faith may mean that all faiths are true."
"Well� if they're all true, then right now I want to worship Siva." Jill changed the subject with emphatic direct action.
"Little pagan," he said softly. "They'll run you out of San Francisco."
"But we're going to Los Angeles� where it won't be noticed. Oh! Thou art Siva!"
"Dance, Kali, dance!"
Some time during the night she woke and saw him standing at the window, looking out over the city. ("Trouble, my brother?")
He turned and spoke. "There's no need for them to be so unhappy."
"Darling, darling! I think I had better take you home. The city is not good for you."
"But I would still know it. Pain and sickness and hunger and fighting - there's no need for any of it. It's as foolish as those little monkeys."
"Yes, darling. But it's not your fault-"
"Ah, but it is!"
"Well� that way - yes. But it's not just this one city; it's five billion people and more. You can't help five billion people."
"I wonder."
He came over and sat down by her. "I grok with them now, I can talk to them. Jill, I could set up our act again� and make the marks laugh every minute. I am certain."
"Then why not do it? Patty would certainly be pleased� and so would I. I liked being 'with it' - and now that we've shared water with Patty, it would be like being home."
He didn't answer. Jill felt his mind and knew that he was contemplating, trying to grok. She waited.
"Jill? What do I have to do to be ordained?"

PART FOUR: HIS SCANDALOUS CAREER
XXX

THE FIRST MIXED LOAD Of permanent colonists arrived on Mars; six of the seventeen survivors of the twenty-three originals returned to Earth. Prospective colonists trained in Peru at sixteen thousand feet. The president of Argentina moved one night to Montevideo, taking with him such portables as could be stuffed into two suitcases, and the new Presidente started an extradition process before the high Court to yank him back, or at least the two suitcases. Last rites for Alice Douglas were held privately in the National Cathedral with less than two thousand attending, and editorialists and stereo commentators alike praised the dignified fortitude with which the Secretary General took his bereavement. A three-year-old named Inflation, carrying 126 pounds with Jinx Jenkins Up, won the Kentucky Derby, paying fifty-four for one, and two guests of the Colony Airotel, Louisville, Kentucky, discorporated, one voluntarily, the other by heart failure.
Another bootleg edition of the (unauthorized) biography The Devil and Reverend Foster appeared simultaneously on news stands throughout the United States; by nightfall every copy had been burned and the plates destroyed, along with incidental damage to other chattels and to real estate, plus a certain amount of mayhem, maiming, and simple assault. The British Museum was rumored to possess a copy of the first edition (untrue), and also the Vatican Library (true, but available only to certain church scholars).
In the Tennessee legislature a bill was again introduced to make the ratio pi exactly equal to three; it was reported out by the committee on public education and morals, passed with no objection by the lower house and died in committee in the upper house. An interchurch fundamentalist group opened offices in Van Buren, Arkansas, for the purpose of soliciting funds to send missionaries to the Martians; Dr. Jubal Harshaw happily sent them a lavish donation, but took the precaution of sending it in the name (and with the address) of the editor of the New Humanist, a rabid atheist and his close friend.
Other than that, Jubal had very little to feel amused about - there had been too much news about Mike lately, and all of it depressing. He had treasured the occasional visits home of Jill and Mike and had been most interested in Mike's progress, especially after Mike developed a sense of humor. But they came home less frequently now and Jubal did not relish the latest developments.
It had not troubled Jubal when Mike was run out of Union Theological Seminary, hotly pursued in spirit by a pack of enraged theologians, some of whom were angry because they believed in God and others because they did not - but all united in detesting the Man from Mars. Jubal honestly evalued anything that happened to a theologian short of breaking him on the wheel was no more than meet - and the experience was good for the boy; he'd know better next time.
Nor had he been troubled when Mike (with the help of Douglas) had enlisted under an assumed name in the Federation armed forces. He had been quite sure (through private knowledge) that no sergeant could cause Mike any permanent distress, and contrariwise, Jubal was not troubled by what might happen to sergeants or other ranks - an unreconciled old reactionary, Jubal had burned his own honorable discharge and all that went with it on the day that the United States had ceased having its own armed forces.
Actually, Jubal had been surprised at how little shambles Mike had created as "Private Jones" and how long be had lasted - almost three weeks. He had crowned his military career the day that be had seized on the question period following an orientation lecture to hold forth on the utter uselessness of force and violence under any circumstances (with some side continents on the desirability of reducing surplus population through cannibalism) and had offered himself as a test animal for any weapon of any nature to prove to them that force was not only unnecessary but literally impossible when attempted against a self-disciplined person.
They had not taken his offer; they had kicked him out.
But there had been a little more to it than that, Douglas had allowed Jubal to see a top-level super secret eyes-only numbered-one-of-three report after cautioning Jubal that no one, not even the Supreme Chief of staff, knew that "Private Jones" was the Man from Mars. Jubal had merely scanned the exhibits, which had been mostly highly conflicting reports of eye witnesses as to what had happened at various times when "Jones" had been "trained" in the uses of various weapons; the only surprising thing to Jubal about them was that some witnesses had the courage and self-confidence to state under oath that they had seen weapons disappear. "Jones" had also been placed on the report three times for losing weapons, same being accountable property of the Federation.
The end of the report was all that Jubal had bothered to read carefully enough to remember: "Conclusion: Subject man is an extremely talented natural hypnotist and, as such, could conceivably be useful in intelligence work, although he is totally unfitted for any combat branch. However, his low intelligence quotient (moron), his extremely low general classification score, and his paranoid tendencies (delusions of grandeur) make it inadvisable to attempt to exploit his idiot-savant talent. Recommendation: Discharge, Inaptitude - no pension credit, no benefits."
Such little romps were good for the boy and Jubal had greatly enjoyed Mike's inglorious career as a soldier because Jill had spent the time at home. When Mike had come home for a few days after it was over, he hadn't seemed hurt by it - he had boasted to Jubal that he had obeyed Jill's wishes exactly and hadn't disappeared anybody merely a few dead things� although, as Mike grokked it, there had been several times when Earth could have been made a better place if Jill didn't have this queasy weakness. Jubal didn't argue it; he had a lengthy - though inactive, "Better Dead" list himself.
But apparently Mike had managed to have fun, too. During parade on his last day as a soldier, the commanding General and his entire staff had suddenly lost their trousers as Mike's platoon was passing in review - and the top sergeant of Mike's company fell flat on his face when his shoes momentarily froze to the ground. Jubal decided that, in acquiring a sense of humor, Mike had developed an atrocious taste in practical jokes - but what the hell? the kid was going through a delayed boyhood; he needed to dump over a few privies. Jubal recalled with pleasure an incident in medical school involving a cadaver and the Dean - Jubal had worn rubber gloves for that caper, and a good thing, too!
Mike's unique ways of growing up were all right; Mike was unique.
But this last thing - "The Reverend Dr. Valentine M. Smith, AS., D.D., Ph.D.," founder and pastor of the Church of All Worlds, inc. - gad! It was bad enough that the boy had decided to be a Holy Joe, instead of leaving other people's souls alone, as a gentleman should. But those diploma-mill degrees he had tacked onto his name - Jubal wanted to throw up.
The worst of it was that Mike had told him that he had gotten the whole idea from something he had heard Jubal say, about what a church was and what it could do. Jubal was forced to admit that it was something he could have said, although he did not recall it; it was little consolation that the boy knew so much law that he might have arrived at the same end on his own.
But Jubal did concede that Mike had been cagy about the operation - some actual months of residence at a very small, very poor (in all senses) sectarian college, a bachelor's degree awarded by examination, a "call" to their ministry followed by ordination in this recognized though flat-headed sect, a doctor's dissertation on comparative religion which was a marvel of scholarship while ducking any real conclusions (Mike had brought it to Jubal for literary criticism, Jubal had added some weasel words himself through conditioned reflex), the award of the "earned" doctorate coinciding with an endowment (anonymous) to this very hungry school, the second doctorate (honorary) right on top of it for "contributions to interplanetary knowledge" from a distinguished university that should have known better, when Mike let it be known that such was his price for showing up as the drawing card at a conference on solar system studies. The one and only Man from Mars had turned down everybody from CalTech to the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in the past; Harvard University could hardly be blamed for swallowing the bait.
Well, they were probably as crimson as their banner now, Jubal thought cynically. Mike had then put in a few weeks as assistant chaplain at his church-mouse alma mater - then had broken with the sect in a schism and founded his own church. Completely kosher, legally airtight, as venerable in precedent as Martin Luther� and as nauseating as last week's garbage.
Jubal was called out of his sour daydream by Miriam. "Boss! Company!"
Jubal looked up to see a car about to land and ruminated that he had not realized what a blessing that S.S. patrol cap had been until it was withdrawn.
"Larry, fetch my shotgun - I promised myself that I would shoot the next dolt who landed on the rose bushes."
"He's landing on the grass, Boss."
"Well, tell him to try again. We'll get him on the next pass."
"Looks like Ben Caxton."
"So it is. We'll let him live - this time. Hi, Ben! What'll you drink?"
"Nothing, this early in the day, you professional bad influence. Need to talk to you, Jubal."
"You're doing it. Dorcas, fetch Ben a glass of warm milk; he's sick."
"Without too much soda," amended Ben, "and milk the bottle with the three dimples in it. Private talk, Jubal."
"All right, up to my study - although if you think you can keep anything from the kids around here, let me in on your method." After Ben finished greeting properly (and somewhat unsanitarily, in three cases) the members of the family, they moseyed upstairs.
Ben said, "What the deuce? Am I lost?"
"Oh. You haven't seen the alterations, have you? A new wing on the north, which gives us two more bedrooms and another bath downstairs - and up here, my gallery."
"Enough statues to fill a graveyard!"
"Please, Ben. 'Statues' are dead politicians at boulevard intersections. What you see is 'sculpture.' And please speak in a low, reverent tone lest I become violent� for here we have exact replicas of some of the greatest sculpture this naughty globe has produced."
"Well, that hideous thing I've seen before� but when did you acquire the rest of this ballast?"
Jubal ignored him and spoke quietly to the replica of La Belle Heaulmire. "Do not listen to him, ma petite chre - he is a barbarian and knows no better." He put his hand to her beautiful ravaged cheek, then gently touched one empty, shrunken dug. "I know just how you feel but it can't be very much longer. Patience, my lovely."
He turned back to Caxton and said briskly, "Ben, I don't know what you have on your mind but it will have to wait while I give you a lesson in how to look at sculpture - though it's probably as useless as trying to teach a dog to appreciate the violin. But you've just been rude to a lady and I don't tolerate that."
"Huh? Don't be silly, Jubal; you're rude to ladies - live ones - a dozen times a day. And you know which ones I mean."
Jubal shouted, "Anne! Upstairs! Wear your cloak!"
"You know I wouldn't be rude to the old woman who posed for that. Never. What I can't understand is a so-called artist having the gall to pose somebody's great grandmother in her skin� and you having the bad taste to want it around."
Anne came in, cloaked, said nothing. Jubal said to her, "Anne have I ever been rude to you? Or to any of the girls?"
"That calls for an opinion."
"That's what I'm asking for. Your opinion. You're not in court-"
"You have never at any time been rude to any of us, Jubal."
"Have you ever known me to be rude to a lady?"
"I have seen you be intentionally rude to a woman. I have never seen you be rude to a lady."
"That's all. No, one more opinion. What do you think of this bronze?"
Anne looked carefully at Rodin's masterpiece, then said slowly, "When I first saw it, I thought it was horrible. But I have come to the conclusion that it may be the most beautiful thing I have ever seen."
"Thanks. That's all." She left. "Do you want to argue it, Ben?"
"Huh? When I argue with Anne, that's the day I turn in my suit." Ben looked at it. "But I don't get it."
"All right, Ben. Attend me. Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist - a master - and that is what Auguste Rodin was - can look at an old woman, portray her exactly as she is� and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be� and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, or even you, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply prisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart� no matter what the merciless hours have done to her. Look at her, Ben. Growing old doesn't matter to you and me; we were never meant to be admired - but it does to them. Look at her!"
Ben looked at her. Presently Jubal said gruffly, "All right, blow your nose and wipe your eyes - she accepts your apology. Come on and sit down. That's enough for one lesson."
"No," Caxton answered, "I want to know about these others. How about this one? It doesn't bother me as much� I can see it's a young girl, right off. But why tie her up like a pretzel?"
Jubal looked at the replica "Caryatid Who has Fallen under the Weight of her Stone" and smiled. "Call it a tour de force in empathy, Ben. I won't expect you to appreciate the shapes and masses which make that figure much more than a 'pretzel' - but you can appreciate what Rodin was saying. Ben, what do people get out of looking at a crucifix?"
"You know how much I go to church."
"'How little' you mean. Still, you must know that, as craftsmanship, paintings and sculpture of the Crucifixion are usually atrocious - and the painted, realistic ones often used in churches are the worst of all� the blood looks like catsup and that ex-carpenter is usually portrayed as if he were a pansy� which He certainly was not if there is any truth in the four Gospels at all. He was a hearty man, probably muscular and of rugged health. But despite the almost uniformly poor portrayal in representations of the Crucifixion, a poor one is about as effective as a good one for most people. They don't see the defects; what they see is a symbol which inspires their deepest emotions; it recalls to them the Agony and Sacrifice of God."
"Jubal, I thought you weren't a Christian?"
"What's that got to do with it? Does that make me blind and deaf to fundamental human emotion? I was saying that the crummiest painted plaster crucifix or the cheapest cardboard Christmas Crche can be sufficient symbol to evoke emotions in the human heart so strong that many have died for them and many more live for them. So the craftsmanship and artistic judgment with which such a symbol is wrought are largely irrelevant. Now here we have another emotional symbol - wrought with exquisite craftsmanship, but we won't go into that, yet. Ben, for almost three thousand years or longer, architects have designed buildings with columns shaped as female figures - it got to be such a habit that they did it as casually as a small boy steps on an ant. After all those centuries it took Rodin to see that this was work too heavy for a girl. But he didn't simply say, 'Look, you jerks, if you must design this way, make it a brawny male figure.' No, he showed it� and generalized the symbol. Here is this poor little caryatid who has tried - and failed, fallen under the load. She's a good girl - look at her face. Serious, unhappy at her failure, but not blaming anyone else, not even the gods� and still trying to shoulder her load, after she's crumpled under it.
"But she's more than good art denouncing some very bad art; she's a symbol for every woman who has ever tried to shoulder a load that was too heavy for her - over half the female population of this planet, living and dead, I would guess. But not alone women - this symbol is sexless. It means every man and every woman who ever lived who sweated out life in uncomplaining fortitude, whose courage wasn't even noticed until they crumpled under their loads. It's courage, Ben, and victory."
"'Victory?'"
"Victory in defeat, there is none higher. She didn't give up, Ben; she's still trying to lift that stone after it has crushed her. She's a father going down to a dull office job while cancer is painfully eating away his insides, so as to bring home one more pay check for the kids. She's a twelve-year old girl trying to mother her baby brothers and sisters because Mama had to go to Heaven. She's a switchboard operator sticking to her job while smoke is choking her and the fire is cutting off her escape. She's all the unsung heroes who couldn't quite cut it but never quit. Come. Just salute as you pass her and come see my Little Mermaid."
Ben took him precisely at his word; if Jubal was surprised, he made no comment. "Now this one," he said, "is the only one Mike didn't give to me. But there is no need to tell Mike why I got it� aside from the self-evident fact that it's one of the most delightful compositions ever conceived and proudly executed by the eye and hand of man."
"She's that, all right. This one I don't have to have explained - it's just plain pretty!"
"Yes. And that is excuse in itself, just as with kittens and butterflies. But there is more to it than that� and she reminded me of Mike. She's not quite a mermaid - see? - and she's not quite human. She sits on land, where she has chosen to stay� and she stares eternally out to sea, homesick and forever lonely for what she left behind. You know the story?"
"Hans Christian Andersen."
"Yes. She sits by the harbor of Kbenhavn-Copenhagen was his home town - and she's everybody who ever made a difficult choice. She doesn't regret her choice, but she must pay for it; every choice must be paid for. The cost to her is not only endless homesickness. She can never be quite human; when she uses her dearly bought feet, every step is on sharp knives. Ben, I think that Mike must always walk on knives - but there is no need to tell him I said so. I don't think he knows this story or, at least, I don't think he knows that I connect him with it."
"I won't tell him." Ben looked at the replica. "I'd rather just look at her and not think about the knives."
"She's a little darling, isn't she? How would you like to coax her into bed? She would probably be lively, like a seal, and about as slippery."
"Cripes! You're an evil old man, Jubal."
"And getting eviler and eviler by the year. Uh� we won't look at any others; three pieces of sculpture in an hour is more than enough - usually I don't let myself look at more than one in a day."
"Suits. I feel as if I had had three quick drinks on an empty stomach. Jubal, why isn't there stuff like this around where a person can see it?"
"Because the world has gone nutty and contemporary art always paints the spirit of its times. Rodin did his major work in the tail end of the nineteenth century and Hans Christian Andersen antedated him by only a few years. Rodin died early in the twentieth century, about the time the world started flipping its lid� and art along with it.
"Rodin's successors noted the amazing things he had done with light and shadow and mass and composition - whether you see it or not - and they copied that much. Oh, how they copied it! And extended it. What they failed to see was that every major work of the master told a story and laid bare the human heart. Instead, they got involved with 'design' and became contemptuous of any painting or sculpture that told a story - sneering, they dubbed such work 'literary' - a dirty word. They went all out for abstractions, not deigning to paint or carve anything that resembled the human world."
Jubal shrugged. "Abstract design is all right - for wall paper or linoleum. But art is the process of evoking pity and terror, which is not abstract at all but very human. What the self-styled modern artists are doing is a sort of unemotional pseudo-intellectual masturbation� whereas creative art is more like intercourse, in which the artist must seduce - render emotional - his audience, each time. These laddies who won't deign to do that - and perhaps can't - of course lost the public. If they hadn't lobbied for endless subsidies, they would have starved or been forced to go to work long ago. Because the ordinary bloke will not voluntarily pay for 'art' that leaves him unmoved - if he does pay for it, the money has to be conned out of him, by taxes or such."
"You know, Jubal, I've always wondered why I didn't give a hoot for paintings or statues - but I thought it was something missing in me, like color blindness."
"Mmm, one does have to learn to look at art, just as you must know French to read a story printed in French. But in general it's up to the artist to use language that can be understood, not hide it in some private code like Pepys and his diary. Most of these jokers don't even want to use language you and I know or can learn� they would rather sneer at us and be smug, because we 'fail' to see what they are driving at. If indeed they are driving at anything - obscurity is usually the refuge of incompetence. Ben, would you call me an artist?"
"Huh? Well, I've never thought about it. You write a pretty good stick."
"Thank you. 'Artist' is a word I avoid for the same reasons I hate to be called 'Doctor.' But I am an artist, albeit a minor one. Admittedly most of my stuff is fit to read only once� and not even once for a busy person who already knows the little I have to say. But I am an honest artist, because what I write is consciously intended to reach the customer - reach him and affect him, if possible with pity and terror� or, if not, at least to divert the tedium of his hours with a chuckle or an odd idea. But I am never trying to hide it from him in a private language, nor am I seeking the praise of other writers for 'technique' or other balderdash. I want the praise of the cash customer, given in cash because I've reached him - or I don't want anything. Support for the arts - merde! A government-supported artist is an incompetent whore! Damn it, you punched one of my buttons. Let me fill your glass, and you tell me what is on your mind."
"Uh, Jubal, I'm unhappy."
"This is news?"
"No. But I've got a fresh set of troubles." Ben frowned. "I shouldn't have come here, I guess. No need to burden you with them. I'm not even sure I want to talk about them."
"Okay. But as long as you're here, you can listen to my troubles."
"You have troubles? Jubal, I've always thought of you as the one man who had managed to beat the game, six ways from zero."
"Hmm, sometime I must tell you about my married life. But - yes, I've got troubles now. Some of them are evident. Duke has left me, you know - or did you?"
"Yeah. I knew."
"Larry is a good gardener - but half the gadgets that keep this log cabin running are failing to pieces. I don't know how I can replace Duke. Good all-around mechanics are scarce� and ones that will fit into this household, be a member of the family in all ways, are almost non-existent. I'm limping along on repairmen called in from town - every visit a disturbance, all of them with larceny in their hearts, and most of them incompetent to use a screw driver without cutting themselves. Which I am incapable of doing, too, so I have to hire help. Or move back into town, God forbid."
"My heart aches for you, Jubal."
"Never mind the sarcasm, that's just the start. Mechanics and gardeners are convenient, but for me secretaries are essential. Two of mine are pregnant, one is getting married."
Caxton looked utterly astounded. Jubal growled, "Oh, I'm not telling tales out of school; they're smug as can be - nothing secret about any of it. They're undoubtedly sore at me right now because I took you up here without giving them time to boast. So be a gent and be surprised when they tell you."
"Uh, which one is getting married?"
"Isn't that obvious? The happy man is that smooth-talking refugee from a sand storm, our esteemed water brother Stinky Mahmoud. I've told him flatly that they have to live here whenever they're in this country. Dastard just laughed and said how else? - pointed out that I had invited him to live here, permanently, long ago." Jubal sniffed. "Wouldn't be so bad if he would just do it. I might even get some work out of her. Maybe."
"You probably would. She likes to work. And the other two are pregnant?"
"Higher 'n a kite. I'm refreshing myself in O.B. because they both say they're going to have 'em at home. And what a crimp that's going to put into my working habits! Worse than kittens. But why do you assume that neither of the two turgescent tummies belongs to the bride?"
"Oh- Why, I suppose I assumed that Stinky was more conventional than that� or maybe more cautious."
"Stinky wouldn't be given a ballot. Ben, in the eighty or ninety years I have given to this subject, trying to trace out the meanderings of their twisty little minds, the only thing that I have learned for certain about women is that when a gal is gonna, she's gonna. All a man can do is cooperate with the inevitable."
Ben thought ruefully about times when he had resorted to fast footwork - and other times when he hadn't been fast enough. "Yeah, you're right. Well, which one isn't getting married or anything? Miriam? Or Anne?"
"Hold it, I didn't say the bride was pregnant� and anyhow, you seem to be assuming that Dorcas is the prospective bride. You haven't kept your eyes open. It's Miriam who is studying Arabic like mad, so she can do it right."
"Huh? Well, I'll be a cross-eyed baboon!"
"You obviously are."
"But Miriam was always snapping at Stinky-"
"And to think that they trust you with a newspaper column. Ever watch a bunch of sixth-graders?"
"Yes, but - Dorcas did everything but a nautch dance."
"That is just Dorcas's natural, normal behavior with all men. She used it toward you, too - although I suppose you were too preoccupied elsewhere to realize it. Never mind. Just be sure that when Miriam shows you her ring - the size of a roe's egg and about as scarce - be sure to be surprised. And I'm damned if I'll sort out which two are spawning, so that you'll be certain to be surprised. Just remember that they are pleased about it� which is why I tipped you off ahead of time, so that you wouldn't make the mistake of thinking that they thought they were 'caught.' They don't. They weren't. They're smug." Jubal sighed. "But I'm not. I'm getting too old to enjoy the patter of little feet when I'm busy� and contrariwise, I won it lose perfect secretaries - and kids that I love, as you know - for any reason if I can possibly induce them to stay. But I must say that this household has become steadily more disorganized ever since the night Jill kicked Mike's feet out from under him. Not that I blame her and I don't think you do, either."
"No, I don't, but - Jubal, let me get this straight. Are you under the impression that Jill started Mike on his merry rounds?"
"Huh?" Jubal looked startled, then thought back - and admitted to himself that he had never known� he had simply assumed it from the fact that when it came to a decision, Jill had been the one who had gone away with Mike. "Who was it?"
"'Don't be nosy, bub,' as you would put it. If she wants to tell you, she will. However, Jill told me - straightened me out when I made the same jumping-to-conclusions that you did. Mmm-" Ben thought. "As I understand it, which one of the four happened to score the first run was more or less chance."
"Mmm� yes. I believe you're right."
"Jill thinks so. Except that she thinks Mike was exceedingly lucky in happening to seduce, or be seduced by (if I have the proper verb) - by the one best fitted to start him off right. Which may give you some hint if you know anything about how Jill's mind works."
"Hell, I don't even know how mine works� and as for Jill, I would never have expected her to take up preaching no matter how lovestruck she was - so I certainly don't know how her mind works."
"She doesn't do much preaching - we'll get to that. Jubal, what do you read from the calendar?"
"Huh?"
"You know what I mean. You think Mike did it - in both cases. Or you think so if his visits home match up in either or both cases."
Jubal said guardedly, "Why do you say that, Ben? I've said nothing to lead you to think so."
"The hell you haven't. You said that they were smug, both of them. I know all too well the effect that goddam superman has on women."
"Hold it, son - he's your water brother."
Ben said levelly, "I know it - and I love him, too. If I ever decided to go gay, Mike would be my only choice. But that's all the more reason why I understand why they are smug."
Jubal stared at his glass. "Maybe they just hope. Ben, seems to me your name could be on the list, even easier than Mike's. Yes?"
"Jubal, you're out of your mind!"
"Take it easy. Nobody is trying to make you get married, I promise you - why, I haven't even painted my shotgun white. While I am not snoopy and I never hold a bed check around here and I really do, so help me by all the Billion Names of God, believe in not poking my nose into other people's business, nevertheless while I may be out of my mind - a 'least hypothesis' more than once, the last couple of years - I do have normal eyesight and hearing� and if a brass band parades through my home, fortissimo, I'll notice it eventually. Question: You've slept under this roof dozens of times. Did you, on at least one of those nights, sleep alone?"
"Why, you scoundrel! Uh, I slept alone the very first night I was ever here."
"Dorcas must have been off her feed. No, I remember, you were under sedative that night. You were my patient - doesn't count. Some other night? Just one?"
"Your question is irrelevant, immaterial, and beneath my notice."
"That's an adequate answer, I think. But please note that the added bedrooms are as far from my bedroom as possible. Soundproofing is never perfect."
"Jubal, it seems to me that your name is much higher up that list than mine can possibly be."
"What?"
"Not to mention Larry and Duke. But, Jubal, almost everybody who knows you assumes that you are keeping the fanciest harem since the Sultan went out of business. Oh, don't misunderstand me - they envy you. But they think you're a lecherous old goat, too."
Jubal drummed on the arm of his chair before replying. "Ben, I ordinarily do not mind being treated flippantly by my juniors. I encourage it, as you know. But in some matters I insist that my years be treated with respect. This is one of them."
"Sorry," Ben said stiffly. "I thought if it was all right for you to kick my sex life around, you would not mind my being equally frank."
"No, no, no, Ben! - you misunderstand me. Your inquiry was in order and your side comments no more than I had invited. I mean that I require the girls to treat me with respect - on this one subject."
"Oh-"
"I am, as you pointed out, old - quite old. Privately, to you alone, I am happy to say that I am still lecherous. But my lechery does not command me and I am not a goat. I prefer dignity and self-respect to indulging in pastimes which, believe me, I have already enjoyed in full measure and do not need to repeat. Ben, a man my age, who looks like a slum clearance in its most depressing stages, can attract a young girl enough to bed her - and possibly big her and thanks for the compliment; it just possibly might not be amiss - through three means only: money� or second, the equivalent of money in terms of wills and community property and the like and - pause for question: Can you imagine any of these three girls - these four, let me include Jill - bedding with a man, even a young and handsome one, for those reasons?"
"No. Categorical no - not any of them."
"Thank you, sir. I associate only with ladies; I see that you know it. The third incentive is a most female one. A sweet young girl can, and sometimes does, take an old wreck to bed because she is fond of him and sorry for him and wishes to make him happy. Would that reason apply here?"
"Uh� yes, Jubal, I think it might. With all four of them."
"I think it might, too. Although I'd hate like hell to have any of them sorry for me. But this third reason which any of these four ladies might find sufficient motivation is not sufficient motivation for me. I wouldn't put up with it. I have my dignity, sir - and I hope that I retain my reason long enough to extinguish myself if it ever appears about to slip. So please take my name off the list."
Caxton grinned. "Okay - you stiff-necked old coot. I just hope that when I am your age I won't be so all-fired hard to tempt."
Jubal smiled. "Believe me, it's better to be tempted and resist, than not to resist and be disappointed. Now about Duke and Larry: I don't know nor care. Whenever anyone has come here, to work and live as a member of the family, I have made it bluntly plain that this was neither a sweat shop nor a whore house, but a home� and, as such, it combined anarchy and tyranny without a trace of democracy, as in any well-run family, i.e., that they were utterly on their own except where I saw fit to give orders, which orders were not subject to vote or debate. My tyranny has never extended to their love life, if any. All the kids who live here have always chosen to keep their private matters reasonably private. At least-" Jubal smiled ruefully. "-until the Martian influence caused things to get a little out of hand� which includes you, too, my water brother. But Duke and Larry have been more restrained, in one sense or the other. Perhaps they have been dragging the gals behind every bush. If so, I haven't seen it - and there have been no screams."
Ben thought of adding a little to Jubal's store of facts, decided against it. "Then you think it's Mike."
Jubal scowled. "Yep, I think it's Mike. That part's all right - I told you the girls were smugly happy� and I'm not broke plus the fact that I could bleed Mike for any amount without telling the girls. Their babies won't lack. But, Ben, I'm troubled about Mike himself. Very."
"So am I, Jubal."
"And about Jill, too. I should have named Jill."
"Uh� Jubal, Jill isn't the problem - other than for me, personally. And that's my hard luck, I hold no grudge. It's Mike."
"Damn it, why can't the boy come home and quit this obscene pulpit pounding?"
"Mmm� Jubal, that's not quite what he's doing." Ben added, "I've just come from there."
"Huh? Why didn't you say so?"
Ben sighed. "First you wanted to talk art, then you wanted to sing the blues, then you wanted to gossip. What chance have I had?"
"Uh� conceded. You have the floor."
"I was coming back from covering the Cape Town conference; I squeezed out a day and visited them. What I saw worried the hell out of me - so much so that I stopped just long enough in Washington to get a few columns ahead, then came straight here. Jubal, couldn't you rig it with Douglas to shut off the faucet and close down this operation?"
Jubal shook his head. "In the first place, I wouldn't. What Mike does with his life is his business."
"You would if you had seen what I saw."
"Not I! But in the second place I can't. Nor can Douglas."
"Jubal, you know quite well that Mike would accept any decision you made about his money. He probably wouldn't even understand it - and he certainly wouldn't question it."
"Ah, but he would understand it! Ben, recently Mike made his will, drew it up himself - no attorney - and sent it to me to criticize. Ben, it was one of the shrewdest legal documents I've ever seen. He recognized that he had more wealth than his heirs could possibly need - so he used half his money to guard the other half� rigged it so that anyone who contests the will does so to his own great disadvantage. It is a very cynical document in that respect and is booby-trapped not only against possible heirsclaimants of his legal parents and his natural parents - he knows he's a bastard, though I don't know how he found out - but also the same with respect to every member of the Envoy's company� he provided a generous way to settle out of court with any possible unknown heir having a good prima-facie claim - and rigged it so that they would almost have to overthrow the government to go into court and break his will� and the will also showed that he knew exactly each stock, bond, security, and asset he owned. I couldn't find anything to criticize in it." (-including, Jubal thought, his provision for you, my brother!) "Then he went to the trouble of depositing holographic originals in several places� and Fair-Witness copies in half a dozen reliable brains. Don't tell me that I could rig his money without his understanding what I had done!"
Ben looked morose. "I wish you could."
"I don't. But that was just the starter. It wouldn't help if we could. Mike hasn't taken a dollar out of his drawing account for almost a year. I know, because Douglas called me to ask if I thought the major portion of the backlog should be reinvested? Mike hadn't bothered to answer his letters. I told him that was his headache� but that if I were steward, I would follow my principal's last instructions."
"No withdrawals? Jubal, he's spending a lot."
"Maybe the church racket pays well."
"That's the odd part about it. The Church of All Worlds is not really church."
"Then what is it?"
"Uh, primarily it's a language school."
"Repeat?"
"To teach the Martian language."
"Well, no harm in that. But I wish, then, that he wouldn't call it a church."
"Well, I guess it is a church, within the legal definition."
"Look, Ben, a roller skating rink is a church - as long as some sect claims that roller skating is essential to their faith and a part of their worship. You wouldn't even have to go that far - simply claim that roller skating served a desirable though not essential function parallel to that which religious music serves in most churches. If you can sing to the glory of God, you can skate to the same end. Believe me, this has all been threshed out. There are temples in Malaya which are nothing to an outsider but boarding houses for snakes� but the same High Court rules them to be 'churches' as protects our own sects."
"Well, Mike raises snakes, too, as well as teaching Martian. But, Jubal, isn't anything ruled out?"
"Mmm� that's a moot point. There are minor restrictions, adjudicated. A church usually can't charge a fee for fortune telling or calling up spirits of the dead but it can accept offerings� and then let custom make the 'offerings' become fees in fact. Human sacrifice is illegal everywhere - but I'm by no means sure that it is not still done in several spots around the globe - and probably right here in this former land of the free and home of the brave. The way to do anything under the guise of religion that would otherwise be suppressed is to do it in the inner sanctum and keep the gentiles out. Why, Ben? Is Mike doing something that might get him jailed or hanged?"
"Uh, I don't know. Probably not."
"Well, if he's careful - the Fosterites have demonstrated how to get by with almost anything. Certainly much more than Joseph Smith was lynched for."
"Matter of fact, Mike has lifted quite a lot from the Fosterites. That's part of what worries me."
"But what does worry you? Specifically."
"Uh, Jubal, this has got to be a 'water brother' matter."
"Okay, I had assumed that. I'm prepared to face redhot pincers and the rack, if necessary. Shall I start carrying poison in a hollow tooth? Against the possibility of cracking?"
"Uh, the members of the inner circle are supposed to be able to discorporate voluntarily any second - no poison needed."
"I'm sorry, Ben. I never got that far. Never mind, I know other adequate ways to put up the only final defense against the third degree. Let's have it."
"You can discorporate at will, they tell me - if you learn Martian first. Never mind. Jubal, I said Mike raises snakes. I meant that both figuratively and literally - the whole setup is a snake pit. Unhealthy.
"But let me describe it. Mike's Temple is a big place, almost a labyrinth. A big auditorium for public meetings, some smaller ones for invitational meetings - many smaller rooms - and living quarters - quite a lot of living quarters. Jill sent me a radiogram telling me where to go, so I was dropped at the living quarters entrance on the street the Temple backs onto. The living quarters are above the main auditorium, about as private as you can be and still live in a city."
Jubal nodded. "Makes sense. Be your acts legal or illegal, nosy neighbors are noxious."
"In this case a very good idea. A pair of outer doors let me in; I suppose I was scanned first, although I didn't spot the scanner. Through two more sets of automatic doors any one of which would slow down a raiding squad - then up a bounce tube. Jubal, it wasn't an ordinary bounce tube. It wasn't controlled by the passenger, but by someone out of sight. More evidence that they wanted privacy and meant to have it - a raiding squad would need special climbing gear to get up that way. No stairs anywhere. Didn't feel like the ordinary bounce tube, either - frankly, I avoid them when I can; they make me queasy."
"I have never used them and never shall," Jubal said firmly.
"You wouldn't have minded this. I floated up gently as a feather."
"Not me, Ben. I don't trust machinery. It bites." Jubal added, "However, I must concede that Mike's mother was one of the great engineers of all times and his father - his real father - was a number one pilot and a competent engineer, or better� and both of genius level. If Mike has improved bounce tubes until they are fit for humans, I ought not to be surprised."
"As may be. I got to the top and was landed without having to grab for it, or depend on safety nets - I didn't see any, to tell the truth. Through more doors that unlocked for me and into an enormous living room. Enormous! Very oddly furnished and rather austere. Jubal, there are people who think you run an odd household here."
"I can't imagine why. Just plain and comfortable."
"Well, your mnage is Aunt Jane's Finishing School for Refined Young Ladies compared with the weirdie Mike runs. I'm just barely inside the joint when the first thing I see I don't believe. A babe, tattooed from her chin to her toes - and not a goddam stitch otherwise. Hell, not even the home-grown fig leaf - she was tattooed everywhere. Fantastic!"
Jubal said quietly, "You're a big-city bumpkin, Ben. I knew a tattooed lady once. Very nice girl. Intense in some ways. But sweet."
"Well," Ben conceded. "I was giving you a first impression. This gal is very nice, too, once you get adjusted to her pictorial supplement - and the fact that she usually has a snake with her. She's the one who raises them, rather than Mike."
Jubal shook his head. "I was wondering if by any chance it was the same woman. Fully tattooed women are rather scarce these days. But the lady I knew, some thirty years back - too old now to be this one, I suppose - had the usual vulgar fear of snakes, to excess. However, I'm fond of snakes myself� I look forward to meeting your friend. I hope."
"You will when you visit Mike. She's sort of a majordomo for him - and a priestess, if you'll pardon the word. Patricia - but called 'Pat,' or 'Patty.'"
"Oh, yes! Jill has spoken of her� and thinks very highly of her. Never mentioned her tattoos, however. Probably didn't think it was relevant. Or perhaps none of my business."
"But she's nearly the right age to be your friend. She says. When I said 'babe' I was again giving a first impression. She looks to be in her twenties; she claims her oldest child is that old. Anyhow, she trotted up to meet me, all big smile, put her arms around me and kissed me. 'You're Ben, I know. Welcome, brother! I give you water!'
"You know me, Jubal. I've been in the newspaper racket for years - I've been around. But I had never been kissed by a totally strange babe dressed only in tattoos� who was determined to be as friendly and affectionate as a collie pup. I was embarrassed."
"Poor Ben. My heart bleeds."
"Damn it, you would have felt the same way."
"No. Remember, I've met one tattooed lady. They feel completely dressed in those tattoos - and rather resent having to put on clothes. Or at least this was true of my friend Sadako. Japanese, she was. But of course the Japanese are not body conscious the way we are."
"Well," Ben answered. "Pat isn't exactly body conscious, either - just about her tattoos. She wants to be stuffed and mounted, nude, when she dies, as a tribute to George."
"'George'?"
"Sorry. Her husband. Up in heaven, to my relief� although she talked about him as if he had just slipped out for a short beer. While she was behaving as if she expected a trial mounting and stuffing any moment. But, essentially, Pat is a lady� and she didn't let me stay embarrassed-"

XXXI

PATRICIA HAD HER ARMS around Ben Caxton and gave him the all-out kiss of brotherhood before he knew what hit him. She felt at once his unease and was herself surprised, because Michael had told her to expect him, given her Ben's face in her mind, had explained that Ben was a brother in all fullness, of the Inner Nest, and she knew that Jill was grown closer with Ben second only to that with Michael� which was always necessarily first since Michael was the fountain and source of all their knowledge of the water of life.
But the foundation of Patricia's nature was an endless wish to make other people as happy as she was; she slowed down. She invited Ben to get rid of his clothes but did so casually and did not press the matter, except to ask him to remove his shoes, with the explanation that the Nest was everywhere kind to bare feet and the unstated corollary that street shoes would not be kind to it - it was soft and clean as only Michael's powers could keep things clean, which Ben could see for himself.
Aside from that she merely pointed out where to hang any clothes he found too warm for the Nest and hurried away to fetch him a drink. She didn't ask his preferences; she knew them from Jill. She merely decided that he would choose a double martini this time rather than Scotch and soda, the poor dear looked tired. When she came back with a drink for each of them, Ben was barefooted and had removed his street jacket. "Brother, may you never thirst."
"We share water," he agreed and drank. "But there's mighty little water in that."
"Enough," she answered. "Michael says that the water could be completely in the thought; it is the sharing. I grok he speaks rightly."
"I grok. And it's just what I needed. Thanks, Patty."
"Ours is yours and you are ours. We're glad you're safely home. Just now the others are all at services or teaching. But there's no hurry; they will come when waiting is filled. Would you like to look around your Nest?"
Still puzzled but interested Ben let her lead him on a guided tour. Some parts of it were commonplace: a huge kitchen with a bar at one end - rather short on gadgets and having the same kind-to-the-feet floor covering as elsewhere, but not notable otherwise save for size - a library even more loaded than Jubal's, bathrooms ample and luxurious, bedrooms - Ben decided that they must be bedrooms although they contained no beds but simply floors that were even softer than elsewhere; Patty called them "little nests" and showed him one she said she usually slept in.
It contained her snakes.
It had been fitted on one side for the comfort of snakes. Ben suppressed his own slight queasiness about snakes until he came to the cobras. "It's all right," she assured him. "We did have glass in front of them. But Michael has taught them that they must not come past this line."
"I think I would rather trust glass."
"Okay, Ben." In remarkably short order she replaced the glass barrier, front and top. But he was relieved when they left, even though he managed to stroke Honey Bun when invited to. Before returning to the huge living room Pat showed him one other room. It was large, circular, had a floor which seemed almost as cushiony as that of the bedrooms, and no furniture. In its center was a round pool of water, almost a swimming pool. "This," she told him, "is the Innermost Temple, where we receive new brothers into the Nest." She went over and dabbled a foot in the water. "Just right," she said. "Want to share water and grow closer? Or maybe just swim?"
"Uh, not right now."
"Waiting is," she agreed. They returned to the living room and Patricia went to get him another drink. Ben settled himself on a big, very comfortable couch - then got up at once. The place was too warm for him, that first drink was making him sweat, and leaning back on a couch that adjusted itself too well to his contours made him just that much hotter. He decided it was damn silly to dress the way he would in Washington, warm as it was in here - and with Patty decked out in nothing but ink and a bull snake she had left around her shoulders during the latter part of the tour that reptile would keep him from temptation even if it wasn't already clearly evident that Patty was not trying to be provocative.
He compromised by leaving on jockey shorts and hung his other clothes in the foyer. As he did so, he noticed a sign printed on the inside of the door through which he had entered: "Did You Remember to Dress?"
He decided that, in this odd household, this gentle warning might be necessary if any were absent-minded. Then he saw something else that he had missed on coming in, his attention earlier having been seized by the sight of Patty herself. On each side of the door was a large bowl, as gross as a bushel basket - and each was tilled with money.
More than filled - Federation notes of various denominations spilled out on the floor.
He was staring at this improbability when Patricia returned. "Here's your drink, Brother Ben. Grow close in Happiness."
"Uh, thanks." His eyes returned to the money.
She followed his glance. "You must think I'm a sloppy housekeeper, Ben - and I am. Michael makes it so easy, most of the cleaning and such, that I forget." She squatted down, retrieved the money, stuffed it into the less crowded bowl.
"Patty, why in the world?"
"Oh. We keep it here because this door leads out to the street. Just for convenience. If one of us is leaving the Nest - and I do, myself, almost every day for grocery shopping - we are likely to need money. So we keep it where you won't forget to take some with you."
"You mean� just grab a handful and go?"
"Why, of course, dear. Oh, I see what you mean. But there is never anyone here but us. No visitors, ever. If any of us have friends outside - and, of course, all of us do - there are plenty of nice rooms lower down, the ordinary sort that outsiders are used to, where we can visit with them. This money isn't where it can tempt a weak person."
"Huh! I'm pretty weak, myself!"
She chuckled gently at his joke. "How can it tempt you when it's already yours? You're part of the Nest."
"Uh� I suppose so. But don't you worry about burglars?" He was trying to guess how much money one of those bowls contained. Most of the notes seemed to be larger than singles - hell, he could see one with three zeroes on it still on the floor, where Patty had missed it in her tidying up.
"One did get in, just last week."
"So? How much did he steal?"
"Oh, he didn't. Michael sent him away."
"Called the cops?"
"Oh, no, no - Michael would never turn anybody over to the cops. I grok that would be a wrongness Michael just-" She shrugged. "-made him go away. Then Duke fixed the hole in the skylight in the garden room - did I show you that? It's lovely� a grass floor. But I remember that you have a grass floor, Jill told me. That's where Michael first saw one. Is it grass all over? Every room?"
"Just my living room."
"If I ever get to Washington, can I walk on it? Lie down on it? Please?"
"Of course, Patty. Uh� it's yours."
"I know, dear. But it's not in the Nest, and Michael has taught us that it is good to ask, even when we know the answer is yes. I'll lie on it and feel the grass against me and be filled with Happiness to be in my brother's 'little nest.'
"You'll be most welcome, Patty." Ben reminded himself sharply that he didn't give a hoot in hell what his neighbors thought - but he hoped she would leave her snakes behind. "When will you be there?"
"I don't know. When waiting is filled. Maybe Michael knows."
"Well, warn me if you can, so I'll be in town. If not, Jill always knows the code for my door - I change it occasionally. Patty, doesn't anybody keep track of this money?"
"What for, Ben?"
"Uh, people usually do."
"Well, we don't. Just help yourself as you go out - then put back any you have left when you come home, if you remember to. Michael told me to keep the grouch bag filled. If it runs low I get some more from him."
Ben dropped the matter, stonkered by the simplicity of the arrangement. He already had some idea, from Mike and second-hand from Jill and Jubal, of the moneyless communism of the Martian culture; he could see that Mike had set up an enclave of it here - and these bowls of cash marked the transition point whereby one passed from Martian to Terran economy. He wondered if Patty knew that it was a fake� bolstered up by Mike's enormous fortune. He decided not to ask.
"Patty, how many are there in the Nest?" He felt a mild worry that he was acquiring too many sharing brothers without his consent, then shoved back the thought as unworthy after all, why would any of them want to sponge on him? Other than, possibly to lie on his grass rug - he didn't have any pots of gold just inside his door.
"Let me see� there are almost twenty now, counting novitiate brothers who don't really think in Martian yet and aren't ordained."
"Are you ordained, Patty?"
"Oh, yes. But mostly I teach. Beginners' classes in Martian, and I help novitiate brothers and such. And Dawn and I - Dawn and Jill are each High Priestess - Dawn and I are pretty well-known Fosterites, especially Dawn, so we work together to show other Fosterites that the Church of All Worlds doesn't conflict with the Faith, any more than being a Baptist keeps a man from joining the Masons." She showed Ben Foster's kiss, explained what it meant, and showed him also its miraculous companion placed by Mike.
"They all know what Foster's kiss means and how hard it is to win it and by then they've seen some of Mike's miracles and they are just about ripe to buckle down and sweat to climb into a higher circle."
"It's an effort?"
"Of course it is, Ben - for them. In your case and mine, and Jill's, and a few others - YOU know them all - Michael called us straight into brotherhood. But to others Michael first teaches a discipline - not a faith but a way to realize faith in works. And that means they've got to start by learning Martian. That's not easy; I'm not perfect in it myself. But it is much Happiness to work and learn. You asked about the size of the Nest - let me see, Duke and Jim and Michael and myself - two Fosterites, Dawn and myself� one circumcised Jew and his wife and four children-"
"Kids in the Nest?"
"Oh, more than a dozen. Not here, but in the nestlings' nest just off of here; nobody could meditate with kids hooting and hollering and raising Ned, Want to see it?"
"Uh, later."
"One Catholic couple with a baby boy - excommunicated I'm sorry to say; their priest found out about it. Michael had to give them very special help; it was a nasty shock to them - and so utterly unnecessary. They were getting up early every Sunday morning to go to mass just as usual - but kids will talk. One Mormon family of the new schism - that's three more, and their kids. The rest are the usual run of Protestants and one atheist� that is, he thought he was an atheist, until Michael opened his eyes. He came here to scoff; he stayed to learn� and he'll be a priest before long. Uh, nineteen grown-ups - I'm pretty sure that's right though it's hard to say, since we're hardly ever all in the Nest at once, except for our own services in the Innermost Temple. The Nest is built to hold eighty-one - that's 'three-filled,' or three times three multiplied by itself - but Michael says that there will be much waiting before we'd need a bigger nest and by then we will be building other nests. Ben? Wouldn't you like to see an outer service, see how Michael makes the pitch, instead of just listening to me ramble on? Michael will be preaching just about now."
"Why, yes, if it's not too much trouble."
"You could go by yourself. But I'd like to go with you� and I'm not busy. Just a see, dearie, while I get decent."
"Jubal, she was back in a couple of minutes in a robe not unlike Anne's Witness robe but cut differently, with angel-wing sleeves and a high neck and the trademark Mike uses for the Church of All Worlds - nine concentric circles and a conventionalized Sun-embroidered over her heart. This getup was a priestess robe, her vestments; Jill and the other priestesses wear the same sort, except that Patty's was opaque, a heavy synthetic silk, and came so high that it covered her cartoons, and was caught at both wrists for the same reason. She had put on stockings, too, or maybe bobby socks, and was carrying sandals.
"Changed the hell out of her, Jubal. It gave her great dignity. Her face is quite nice and I could see that she was considerably older than I had first guessed her although not within twenty years of what she claims to be. She has an exquisite complexion and I thought what a shame it was that anyone had ever touched a tattooing needle to such skin.
"I had dressed again. She asked me to take off just my shoes because we weren't going out the way I had come in. She led me back through the Nest and out into a corridor; we stopped to put on shoes and went down a ramp that wound down maybe a couple of floors until we reached a gallery. It was sort of a loge overlooking the main auditorium. Mike was holding forth on the platform. No pulpit, no altar, just a lecture hall, with a big All-Worlds symbol on the wall behind him. There was a robed priestess on the platform with him and, at that distance, I thought it was Jill - but it wasn't; it was another woman who looks a bit like her and is almost as beautiful. The other high priestess, Dawn - Dawn Ardent."
"What was that name?" Jubal interrupted.
"Dawn Ardent-ne Higgins, if you want to be fussy."
"I've met her."
"I know you have, you allegedly retired goat. She's got a crush on you�"
Jubal shook his head. "Some mistake. The 'Dawn Ardent' I mean I just barely met, about two years ago. She wouldn't even remember me."
"She remembers you. She gets every one of your pieces of commercial crud, on tape, under every pseudonym she has been able to track down. She goes to sleep by them, usually, and they give her beautiful dreams. She says. Furthermore there is no doubt that she knows who you are. Jubal, that big living room, the Nest proper, has exactly one item of ornamentation, if you'll pardon the word - a life-sized color copy of your head. Looks as if you had been decapitated, with your face in a hideous grin. A candid shot that Duke sneaked of you, I understand."
"Why, that brat!"
"Jill asked him to, behind your back."
"Double brat!"
"Sir, you are speaking of the woman I love - although I'm not alone in that distinction. But Mike put her up to it. Brace yourself, Jubal - you are the patron saint of the Church of All Worlds."
Jubal looked horrified. "They can't do this to me!"
"They already have. But don't worry; it's unofficial and not publicized. But Mike freely gives you credit, inside the Nest just among water brothers, for having instigated the whole show and explained things to him so well that he was finally able to figure out how to put over Martian theology to humans."
Jubal looked about to retch. Ben went on, "I'm afraid you can't duck it. But in addition, Dawn thinks you're beautiful. Aside from that quirk, she is an intelligent woman - and utterly charming. But I digress. Mike spotted us at once, waved and called out, 'Hi, Ben! Later' - and went on with his spiel.
"Jubal, I'm not going to try to quote him, you'll just have to hear it. He didn't sound preachy and he didn't wear robes - just a smart, well-tailored, white syntholinen suit. He sounded like a damned good car salesman, except that there was no doubt he was talking about religion. He cracked jokes and told parables - none of them straitlaced but nothing really dirty, either. The essence of it was a sort of pantheism� one of his parables was the oldy about the earthworm burrowing along through the soil who encounters another earthworm and at once says, 'Oh, you're beautiful! You're lovely! Will you marry me?' and is answered: 'Don't be silly! I'm your other end.' You've heard it before?"
"'Heard it?' I wrote it!"
"I hadn't realized it was that old. Anyhow, Mike made good use of it. His idea is that whenever you encounter any other grokking thing - he didn't say 'grokking' at this stage - any other living thing, man, woman, or stray cat� you are simply encountering your 'other end'� and the universe is just a little thing we whipped up among us the other night for our entertainment and then agreed to forget the gag. He put it in a much more sugar-coated fashion, being extremely careful not to tread on competitors' toes."
Jubal nodded and looked sour. "Solipsism and Pantheism. Teamed together they can explain anything. Cancel out any inconvenient fact, reconcile all theories, and include any facts or delusions you care to name. Trouble is, it's just cotton candy, all taste and no substance - and as unsatisfactory as solving a story by saying: '-and then the little boy fell out of bed and woke up; it was just a dream.'"
"Don't crab at me about it; take it up with Mike. But believe me, he made it sound convincing. Once he stopped and said, 'You must be tired of so much talk-' and they yelled back, 'No!'-I tell you, he really had them. But he protested that his voice was tired and, anyhow, a church ought to have miracles and this was a church, even though it didn't have a mortgage. 'Dawn, fetch me my miracle box.' Then he did some really amazing sleight-of-hand. Did you know he had been a magician with a carnival?"
"I knew he had been with it. He never told me the exact nature of his shame."
"He's a crackerjack magician; he did stunts for them that had me fooled. But it wouldn't have mattered if it had been only the card tricks kids learn; it was his patter that had them rolling in the aisles. Finally he stopped and said apologetically. 'The Man from Mars is supposed to be able to do wonderful things� so I have to pass a few miracles each meeting. I can't help being the Man from Mars; it's just something that happened to me. But miracles can happen for you, too, if you want them. However, to be allowed to see anything more than these narrow-gauge miracles, you must enter the Circle. Those of you who truly want to learn I will see later. Cards are being passed around,'
"Patty explained to me what Mike was really doing. 'This crowd is just marks, dear - people who come out of curiosity or maybe have been shined in by some of our own people who have reached one of the inner circles.' Jubal, Mike has the thing rigged in nine circles, like degrees in a lodge - and nobody is told that there actually is a circle farther in until they're ready to be inducted into it. 'This is just Michael's bally,' Pat told me, 'which he does as easy as he breathes - while all the time he's feeling them out, sizing them up, getting inside their heads and deciding which ones are even possible. Maybe one in ten. That's why he strings it out - Duke is up behind that grille and Michael tells him every mark who just might measure up, where he sits and everything. Michael's about to turn this tip� and spill the ones he doesn't want. Dawn will handle that part, after she gets the seating diagram from Duke.'"
"How did they work that?" asked Harshaw.
"I didn't see it, Jubal. Does it matter? There are a dozen ways they could cut from the herd the ones they wanted as long as Mike knew which they were and had worked out some way to signal Duke. I don't know. Patty says he's clairvoyant and says it with a straight face - and, do you know, I won't discount the possibility. But right after that, they took the collection. Mike didn't do even this in church style - you know, soft music and dignified ushers. He said nobody would believe that this was a church service if be didn't take a collection� so he would, but with a difference. Either take it or put it - suit yourself. Then, so help me, they passed collection baskets already loaded with money. Mike kept telling them that this was what the last crowd had left, so help themselves� if they were broke or hungry and needed it. But if they felt like giving� give. Share with others. Just do one or the other - put something in, or take something out. When I saw it, I figured he had found one more way to get rid of too much money."
Jubal said thoughtfully, "I'm not sure he would lose by it. That pitch, properly given, should result in more people giving more� while a few take just a little. And probably very few. I would say that it would be hard indeed to reach in and take out money when the people on each side of you are putting money in� unless you need it awfully badly."
"I don't know, Jubal� but I understand that they are just as casual about those collections as they are about that stack of dough upstairs. But Patty whisked me away when Mike turned the service over to his high priestess. I was taken to a much smaller auditorium where services were just opening for the seventh circle in - people who had belonged for several months at least and had made progress. If it is progress.
"Jubal, Mike had gone straight from one to the other, and I couldn't adjust to the change. That outer meeting was half popular lecture and half sheer entertainment - this one was more nearly a voodoo rite. Mike was in robes this time; he looked taller, ascetic, and intense-! swear his eyes gleamed. The place was dimly lighted, there was music that was creepy and yet made you want to dance. This time Patty and I took a double seat together, a couch that was darn near a bed. What the service was all about I couldn't say. Mike would sing out to them in Martian, they would answer in Martian - except for chants of 'Thou art God! Thou art God!' which was always echoed by some Martian word that would make my throat sore to try to pronounce it."
Jubal made a croaking noise. "Was that it?"
"Huh? I believe it was - allowing for your horrible tall-corn accent. Jubal� are you hooked? Have you just been stringing me along?"
"No. Stinky taught it to me - and he says that it's heresy of the blackest sort. By his lights I mean - I couldn't care less. It's the Martian word Mike translates as: 'Thou art God.' But our brother Mahmoud says that isn't even close to being a translation. It's the universe proclaiming its own self-awareness� or it's 'peccavimus' with a total absence of contrition or a dozen other things, all of which don't translate it. Stinky says that not only it can't be translated but that he doesn't really understand it in Martian - except that it is a bad word, the worst possible in his opinion and much closer to Satan's defiance than it is to the blessing of a benevolent God. Go on. Was that all there was to it? Just a bunch of fanatics yelling Martian at each other?"
"Uh� Jubal, they didn't yell and it wasn't fanatical. Sometimes they would barely whisper, the room almost dead quiet. Then it might climb in volume a little but not much. They did it in sort of a rhythm, a pattern, like a cantata, as if they had rehearsed it a long time� and yet it didn't feel as if they had rehearsed it; it felt more as if they were all just one person, humming to himself whatever he felt at the moment. Jubal, you've seen how the Fosterites get themselves worked up-"
"Too much of it, I'm sorry to say."
"Well, this was not that sort of frenzy at all; this was quiet and easy, like dropping off to sleep. It was intense all right and got steadily more so, but - Jubal, ever sit in on a spiritualist sance?"
"I have. I've tried everything I could, Ben."
"Then you know how the tension can grow without anybody moving or saying a word. This was much more like that than it was like a shouting revival, or even the most sedate church service. But it wasn't mild; it packed terrific wallop."
"The technical word is 'Apollonian.'"
"Huh?"
"As opposed to 'Dionysian.' And both rather Procrustean I'm sorry to say. People tend to simplify 'Apollonian' into 'mild,' and 'calm,' and 'cool.' But 'Apollonian' and 'Dionysian' are two sides of the same coin - a nun on her knees in her cell, holding perfectly still and her facial muscles relaxed, can be in a religious ecstasy more frenzied than any priestess of Pan Priapus celebrating the vernal equinox. Ecstasy is in the skull, not in the setting-up exercises." Jubal frowned. "Another common error is to identify 'Apollonian' with 'good' - merely because our most respectable sects are all rather Apollonian in ritual and precept. Mere local prejudice. Proceed."
"Well� things weren't as quiet as a nun at her devotions anyhow. They didn't just stay seated and let Mike entertain them. They wandered about a bit, swapped seats, and there was no doubt that there was necking going on; no more than necking, I believe, but the lighting was very low key and it was hard to see from one pew to another. One gal wandered over our way, started to join us, but Patty gave her some sign to let us be so she just kissed us and left." Ben grinned. "Kissed quite well, too, though she didn't dally about it. I was the only person not dressed in a robe; I was as conspicuous as a space suit in a salon. But she gave no sign of noticing.
"The whole thing was very casual� and yet it seemed as coordinated as a ballerina's muscles. Mike kept busy, sometimes out in front, sometimes wandering among the others - once he squeezed my shoulder and kissed Patty, unhurriedly but quickly. He didn't speak to me. Back of the spot where he stood when he seemed to be leading them was some sort of a dingus like a magic mirror, or possibly a big stereo tank; he used it for 'miracles,' only at this stage he never used the word - at least not in English. Jubal, every church promises miracles. But it's always jam yesterday and jam tomorrow, never jam today."
"Exception," Jubal interrupted again. "Many of them deliver as a matter of routine - exempli gratia among many: Christian Scientists and Roman Catholics."
"Catholics? You mean Lourdes?"
"The example included Lourdes, for what it may be worth. But I referred to the Miracle of Transubstantiation, called forth by every Catholic priest at least daily."
"Hmm- Well, I can't judge that subtle a miracle. To a heathen outsider like myself that sort of miracle is impossible to test. As for Christian Scientists, I won't argue - but if I break a leg, I want a sawbones."
"Then watch where you put your feet," Jubal growled. "Don't bother me with your fractures."
"Wouldn't think of it. I want one who wasn't a classmate of William Harvey."
"Harvey could reduce a fracture. Proceed."
"Yeah, but how about his classmates? Jubal, those things you cited as miracles may be such - but Mike offers splashy ones, ones the cash customers can see. He's either an expert illusionist, one who would make the fabled Houdini look clumsy� or an amazing hypnotist-"
"He might be both."
"-or he's smoothed the bugs out of closed-circuit stereovision to the point where it simply cannot be told from reality, for his special effects. Or 'I've been 'ad fer a button, dearie.'"
"How can you rule out real miracles, Ben?"
"I included them with the button. It's not a theory I like to think about. Whatever he used, it was good theater. Once the lights came up behind him and here was a black-maned lion, lying as stately and sedately as if guarding library steps, while a couple of little lambs wobbled around him. The lion just blinked and yawned. Sure, Hollywood can tape that sort of special effect any day - but it looked real, so much so that I thought I smelled the lion� and of course that can be faked, too."
"Why do you insist on fakery?"
"Damn it, I'm trying to be judicial!"
"Then don't lean over backwards so far you fall down. Try to emulate Anne."
"I'm not Anne. And I wasn't very judicial at the time. I just lounged back and enjoyed it, in a warm glow. It didn't even annoy me that I couldn't understand most of what was said; it felt as if I got the gist of it. Mike did a lot of gang-ho miracles - or illusions. Levitation and such. I wasn't being critical, I was willing to enjoy it as good showmanship Patty slipped away toward the end after whispering to me to stay where I was and she would be back. 'Michael has just told them that any who do not feel ready for the next circle should now leave,' she told me.
"I said, 'I guess I had better leave, too.'
"And she said, 'Oh, no, dear - You're already Ninth Circle - Y0U know that. Just stay seated, I'll be back.' And she left.
"I don't think anybody decided to chicken out. This group was not only Seventh Circle but Seventh Circlers who were all supposed to be promoted. But I didn't really notice for the lights came up again� and there was Jill!
"Jubal, this time it definitely did not feel like stereovision. Jill picked me out with her eyes and smiled at me. Oh, I know, if the person being photographed looks directly at the cameras, then the eyes meet yours no matter where you're seated But if Mike has it smoothed out this well, he had better patent it. Jill was dressed in an outlandish costume-priestess outfit, I suppose, but not like the others. Mike started intoning something to her and to us, partly in English� stuff about the Mother of All, the unity of many, and started calling her by a series of names� and with each name her costume changed-"
Ben Caxton came quickly alert when the lights came up behind the High Priest and he saw Jill Boardman posed, above and behind the priest. He blinked and made sure that he had not again been fooled by lighting and distance - this was Jill She looked back at him and smiled. He half listened to the invocation while thinking that he had been convinced that the space behind the Man from Mars was surely a stereo tank, or some gitumick. But he could almost swear that he could walk up those steps and pinch her. He was tempted to do so - then reminded himself that it would be a crummy trick to ruin Mike's show. Wait till it was over and Jill was free - "Cybele!" - and Jill's costume suddenly changed - again
"Frigg!"
"Gel"
"Devil"
"Ishtar!"
"Maryam"
"Mother Eve! Mater Deus Magna! Loving and Beloved, Life Undying-"
Caxton stopped hearing the words� for Jill suddenly was Mother Eve, clothed only in her own glory. The light spread and he saw that she was standing gently at rest in a Garden, beside a tree around and on which was twined a great serpent.
Jill smiled at them all, turned a little, reached up and smoothed the serpent's head turned back and opened her arms to all of them. The first of the candidates moved forward to enter the Garden. Patty returned and touched Caxton on the shoulder. "Ben, I'm back. Come with me, dear."
Caxton was reluctant, he wanted to stay and drink in the glorious vision of Jill� he wanted to do more than that; he wanted to join that procession and go where she was. But he found himself getting up and leaving with Patricia. He looked back and saw Mike about to put his arms around and kiss the first woman in the line� turned to follow Patricia outside and failed to see the candidates' robe vanish as Mike kissed her - and did not see what followed at once, when Jill kissed the first male candidate for elevation to the eighth circle�and his robe vanished.
"We have to go long way 'round," Patty explained, "to give them time to get clear and on into the Temple of the Eighth Circle. Oh, it wouldn't actually hurt to barge in, but it would waste Michael's time, getting them back in the mood - and he does work so very hard."
"Where are we going now?"
"To pick up Honey Bun. Then back to the Nest. Unless you want to take part in the initiation to the Eighth Circle. You can, you know, since you're Ninth Circle. But you haven't learned Martian yet; you'd find it very confusing."
"Well - I'd like to see Jill. When will she be free?"
"Oh. She told me to tell you that she was going to duck upstairs and see you. Down this way, Ben."
A door opened and Ben found himself in the garden he had seed. The serpent was still festooned on the tree; she raised her head as they came in. "There, there, dears" Patricia said to her. "You were Mama's good girl, weren't you?" She gently unwrapped the boa and flaked it down into a basket, tail first. "Duke brought her down for me but I have to arrange her on the tree and tell her to stay there and not go wandering off. You were lucky, Ben; a transition service from Seventh to Eighth happens very seldom - Michael won't hold it until there are enough candidates ready to build and hold the mood� although we used to supply people out of the Innermost Circle to help the first candidates from outside through."
Ben carried Honey Bun for Patty until they reached the top level and learned that a fourteen-foot snake is quite a load; the basket had steel braces and needed them. As soon as they were that high, Patricia stopped. "Put her down, Ben." She took off her robe and handed it to him, then go out the snake and draped it around her. "This is Honey Bun's reward for being a good girl; she expects to cuddle up to Mama. I've got a class starting almost at once, so I'll walk the rest of the way with her on me and let her stay on me until the last possible second. It's not a goodness to disappoint a snake; they're just like babies. They can't grok in fullness, except that Honey Bun groks Mama�and Michael, of course."
They walked the fifty yards or so to the entrance to the Nest proper and at its door Patricia let Ben take off her sandals for her after he removed his shoes, He wondered bow she could balance on one foot under such a load� and noticed, too, that she had gotten rid of her socks or stockings at some point - no doubt while she was out arranging Honey Bun's stage appearance.
They went inside and she went with him, still clothed in the big snake, while be shucked down to his jockey shorts - stalling as he did so, trying to make up his mind whether to discard the shorts, too. He had seen enough to be fairly certain that clothing, any clothing, inside the Nest was as unconventional by these conventions (and possibly as rude), as hob-nailed boots on a dance floor. The gentle warning on the exit door, the fact that there were no windows anywhere in the Nest, the womblike comfort of the Nest itself, Patricia's lack of attire plus the fact that she had suggested (but not insisted) that he do likewise - all added up to an unmistakable pattern of habitual domestic nudity� among people who were all at least nominally his own "water brothers," even though he had not met most of them.
He had seen further confirmation in addition to Patricia, whose behavior he had discounted somewhat from a vague feeling that a tattooed lady might very well have odd habits about clothing. On coming into the living room they had passed a man headed the other way, toward the baths and the note 2 - and he had worn less than Patricia by one snake and lots of pictures. He had greeted them with "Thou art God" and gone on, apparently as used to buff as Patricia was. But, Ben reminded himself, this "brother" hadn't seemed surprised that Ben was dressed, either.
There had been other such evidence in the living room: a body sprawled face down on a couch across the room - a woman, Ben thought, although he had not wanted to stare after a quick glance had shown him that this one was naked, too.
Ben Caxton had thought himself to be sophisticated about such things. Swimming without suits be considered only sensible. He knew that many families were casually naked in their own homes - and this was a family, of sorts - although he himself had not been brought up in the custom. He had even (once) let a girl invite him to a nudist resort, and it had not troubled him especially after the first five minutes or so - he had simply regarded it as a silly lot of trouble to go to for the dubious pleasures of poison ivy, scratches, and an all-over sunburn that bad put him in bed for a day.
But now he found himself balanced in perfect indecision, unable to make up his mind between the probable urbanity of removing his symbolic fig leaf� and the even stronger probability - certainty he decided - that if he did so and strangers came in who were dressed and stayed that way, he would feel all-fired silly. Hell, he might even blush!
"What would you have done, Jubal?" Ben demanded.
Harshaw lifted his eyebrows. "Axe you expecting me to be shocked, Ben? I have seen the human body, professionally and otherwise, for most of a century. It is often pleasing to the eye, frequently most depressing and never significant per se. Only in the subjective value the viewer places on the sight. I grok Mike runs his household along nudist lines. Shall I cheer? Or must I cry? Neither. It leaves me unmoved."
"Damn it man!, it's easy for you to sit there and be Olympian about it - you weren't faced with the choice. I've never seen you take off your pants in company."
"Nor are you likely to. 'Other times, other customs.' But I grok you were not motivated by modesty. You were suffering from a morbid fear of appearing ridiculous - a well-known phobia with a long, pseudo-Greek name with which I shall not bore you."
"Nonsense! I simply wasn't certain what was polite."
"Nonsense to you, sir - YOU already knew what was polite� but were afraid you might look silly� or possibly feared being trapped inadvertently in the gallant reflex. But I seem to grok that Mike had a reason for instituting this household custom - Mike always has reasons for everything he does, although some of them seem strange to me."
"Oh, yes. He has reasons. Jill told me about them."
Ben Caxton was standing in the foyer, his back to the living room and his hands on his shorts, having told himself, not very firmly, to take the plunge and get it over with - when two arms came snugly around his waist from behind. "Ben darling! How wonderful to have you here!"
He turned and had Jill in his arms and her mouth warm and greedy against his - and was very glad that he had not quite finished stripping. For she was no longer "Mother Eve"; she was wearing one of the long, all-enveloping priestess robes. Nevertheless he was happily aware that he had a double armful of live, warm, and gently squirming girl; her priestly vestment was no greater impediment than would have been a thin gown, and both kinesthetic and tactile senses told him that the rest was Jill.
"Golly!" she said, breaking from the kiss. "I've missed you, you old beast. Thou art God."
"Thou art God," he conceded. "Jill, you're prettier than ever."
"Yes," she agreed. "It does that for you. But I can't tell you what a thrill it gave me to catch your eye at the blow-off."
"'Blow-off'?"
"Jill means," Patricia put in, "the end of the service where she is All Mother, Mater Deum Magna. Kids, I must rush."
"Never hurry, Pattycake."
"I gotta rush so I won't have to hurry. Ben, I must put Honey Bun to bed and go down and take my class - so kiss me good-night now. Please?"
Ben found himself kissing good-night a woman still wrapped most thoroughly by a giant snake - and decided that he could think of better ways� say wearing full armor. But he tried to ignore Honey Bun and treat Patty as she deserved to be treated.
Jill kissed her and said, "Stop by and tell Mike to stall until I get there, pretty please."
"He will anyhow. 'Night, dears." She left unhurriedly.
"Ben, isn't she a lamb?"
"She certainly is. Although she had me baffled at first."
"I grok. But it's not because she's tattooed nor because of her snakes, I know. She baffled you - she baffles everybody - because Patty never has any doubts; she just automatically always does the right thing. She's very much like Mike. She's the most advanced of any of us - she ought to be high priestess. But she won't take it because her tattoos would make some of the duties difficult - be a distraction at least - and she doesn't want them taken off."
"How could you possibly take off that much tattooing? With a flensing knife? It would kill her."
"Not at all, dear. Mike could take them off completely, not leave a trace, and not even hurt her. Believe me, dear, he could, But he groks that she does not think of them as belonging to her; she's just their custodian - and he groks with her about it. Come sit down. Dawn will be in with supper for all three of us in a moment - I must eat while we visit or I won't have a chance until tomorrow. That's poor management with all eternity to draw from� but I didn't know when you would get here and you happen to arrive on a very full day. But tell me what you think of what you've seen? Dawn tells me you saw an outsiders' service, too."
"Yes."
"Well?"
"Mike," Caxton said slowly, "has certainly blossomed out. I think he could sell shoes to snakes."
"I'm quite sure he could. But he never would because it would be wrong - snakes don't need them. What's the matter, Ben? I grok there's something bothering you."
"No," he answered. "Certainly not anything I can put my finger on. Oh, I'm not much for churches� but I'm not against them exactly - certainly not against this one. I guess I just don't grok it."
"I'll ask you again in a week or two. There's no hurry."
"I won't be here even a week."
"You have some columns on the spike" - it was not a question.
"Three fresh ones. But I shouldn't stay even that long."
"I think you will� then you'll phone in a few� probably about the Church. By then I think you will grok to stay much longer."
"I don't think so."
"Waiting is, until fullness. You know it's not a church?"
"Well, Patty did say something of the sort."
"Let's say it's not a religion. It is a church, in every legal and moral senses - and I suppose our Nest is a monastery. But we're not trying to bring people to God; that's a contradiction in terms, you can't even say it in Martian. We're not trying to save souls, because souls can't be lost. We're not trying to get people to have faith, because what we offer is not faith but truth - truth they can check; we don't urge them to believe it. Truth for practical purposes, for here-and-now, truth as matter of fact as an ironing board and as useful as a loaf of bread� so practical that it can make war and hunger and violence and hate as unnecessary as� as - well, as clothes here in the Nest. But they have to learn Martian first. That's the only hitch-finding people who are honest enough to believe what they see, and then are willing to do the hard work - it is hard work - of learning the language it can be taught in. A composer couldn't possibly write down a symphony in English� and this sort of symphony can't be stated in English any more than Beethoven's Fifth can be." She smiled. "But Mike never hurries. Day after day he screens hundreds of people finds a few dozen� and out of those a very few trickle into the Nest and he trains them further. And someday Mike will have some of us so thoroughly trained that we can go out and start other nests, and then it can begin to snowball. But there's no hurry. None of us, even us in the Nest, are really trained. Are we, dear?"
Ben looked up, somewhat startled by Jill's last three words - then was really startled to find bending over him to offer him a plate a woman whom he belatedly recognized as the other high priestess - Dawn, yes, that was right. His surprise was not reduced by the fact that she was dressed in Patricia's fashion, minus tattoos.
But Dawn was not startled. She smiled and said, "Your supper, my brother Ben. Thou art God."
"Uh, thou art God. Thanks." He was beyond being surprised when she leaned down and kissed him, then got plates for herself and Jill, sat down on the other side of him and began to eat. He was willing to concede that, if not God, Dawn had the best attributes associated with goddesses; he was rather sorry she had not sat down across from him - he couldn't see her well without being obvious about it.
"No," Dawn agreed, between bites, "we aren't really trained yet, Jill. But waiting will fill."
"That's the size of it, Ben," Jill continued. "For example, I took a break to eat. But Mike hasn't had a bite for well over twenty-four hours and won't eat until he's not needed - you happened to bit a crowded day, because of that group making transition to Eighth Circle. Then when Mike is through, he'll eat like a pig and that will carry him as long as necessary. Besides that, Dawn and I get tired� don't we, sweet?"
"We surely do. But I'm not too tired, Gillian. Let me take this service and you can visit with Ben. Give me that robe."
"You're crazy in your little pointy head, my love - and Mama spank. Ben, she's been on duty almost as long as Mike has. We both can take that long a stretch - but we eat when we're hungry and sometimes we need sleep. Speaking of robes, Dawn, this was the last vanishing robe in the Seventh Temple. I meant to tell Patty she'd better order a gross or two."
"She has."
"I should have known. This one seems a little tight." Jill wiggled in it in a fashion that disturbed Ben more than Dawn's perfect and unrobed skin. "Are we putting on weight, Dawn?"
"I think we are, a little. No matter."
"Helps, you mean. We were too skinny. Ben, you noticed, didn't you, that Dawn and I have the same figure? Height, bust, waist, hips, weight, everything - not to mention coloration. We were almost the same when we met� and then, with Mike's help, we matched up exactly and are holding it that way. Even our faces are getting more alike - but we didn't plan that. That just comes from doing the same things and thinking about the same things. Stand up and let Ben look at us, dear."
Dawn put her plate aside and did so, in a pose that reminded Ben oddly of Jill, more so than the figure resemblance seemed to justify; then he realized it was the exact pose Jill had been in when she had first stood revealed as Mother Eve.
Invited to Stare, he did. Jill said, with her mouth full, "See, Ben? That's me."
Dawn smiled at her. "A razor's edge of difference, Gillian."
"Pooh. You're getting that control, too. I'm almost sorry we'll never have the same face. It's very handy, Ben, for Dawn and myself to look so much alike. We have to have two high priestesses; it's all two of us can do to keep up with Mike. We can trade places right in the middle of a service - and sometimes do. And besides," she added, swallowing, "Dawn can buy a fitted dress and it fits me, too. Saves me the nuisance of shopping for clothes. When we wear clothes."
"I wasn't sure," Ben said slowly, "that you still wore clothes at all. Except these priestess things."
Jill looked surprised. "Do you think we would go out dancing in these? We wear evening dresses, same as everybody else. That's our favorite way of not getting our beauty sleep, isn't it, dear? Sit back down and finish your supper; Ben has stared at us long enough for the moment. Ben, there's a man in that transition group you were just with who's a perfectly dreamy dancer and this town is loaded with good night clubs - and Dawn and I have kept the poor fellow so busy, alternated keeping him up so many nights in a row, that we've had to help him stay awake in language classes. But he'll be all right; once you reach Eighth Circle you don't need nearly so much sleep. Whatever made you think we never dressed, dear?"
"Uh-" Ben finally blurted out the embarrassing predicament he had been in.
Jill looked wide-eyed, then barely giggled - and stopped it at once, at which Ben realized that he had heard none of these people laugh only the "marks" in the outer service. "I see. But, darling, I just never got around to taking this robe off. I am wearing it because I have to gobble and git. But had I grokked that that was troubling you, I certainly would have chucked it before I said hello even though I wasn't sure there was another one handy. We're so used to dressing or not dressing according to what we need to do that I just plain forgot that I might not be behaving politely. Sweetheart, take those shorts off - or leave them on, exactly as suits you."
"Uh-"
"Just don't fret about it, either way." Jill smiled and dimpled. "Reminds me of the first time Mike tried a public beach, but in reverse. 'Member, Dawn?"
"I'll never forget it!"
"Ben, you know how Mike is about clothes. He just doesn't understand them. Or didn't. I had to teach him everything. He couldn't see any point to them as protection, until he grokked - to his great surprise - that we aren't as invulnerable as he is. Modesty - that sort of 'modesty'; he's so modest in its true sense that it hurts - body-modesty isn't a Martian concept, it couldn't be. And only lately has Mike grokked clothes as ornaments, after we started experimenting with various ways to costume our acts.
"But, Ben, while Mike was always willing to do what I told him to, whether he grokked it or not, you can't imagine how many million little things there are to being a human being. We take twenty or thirty years to learn them; Mike had to learn them almost overnight. There are gaps, even now. He does things not knowing that isn't how a human does them. We all teach him - Dawn and I especially. All but Patty, who is sure that anything that Michael does must be perfect. But he's still grokking the nature of clothes. He's groks mostly that they're a wrongness that keeps people apart - and get in the way of letting love cause them to grow closer. Lately he's come to realize that part of the time you want and need, such a barrier - with outsiders. But for a long time Mike wore clothes only because I told him to and when I told him he must.
"And I missed a gap."
"We were down in Baja California; it was just at the time we met - or remet, actually - Dawn. Mike and I checked in at night at one of those big fancy beach hotels and he was so anxious to grok the ocean, get wet all over, that he let me sleep the next morning and went down by himself for his first encounter with the ocean. And I didn't realize that Mike didn't know about swim suits. Oh, he may have seen them� but he didn't know what they were for or had some mixed-up idea. He certainly didn't know that you were supposed to wear them in the water - the idea was almost sacrilege. And you know Jubal's rigid rules about keeping his pool clean - I'm sure it's never seen a suit. I do remember one night a lot of people got tossed in with all their clothes on, but it was when Jubal was going to have it drained right away anyhow.
"Poor Mike! He got down to the beach and threw off his robe and headed for the water� looking like a Greek god and just as unaware of local conventions - and then the riot Started and I came awake fast and grabbed some clothes myself and got down there just in time to keep him out of jail� and fetched him back to the room and he spent the rest of the day in a trance."
Jill got a momentary faraway look. "And he needs me now, too, so I must run along. Kiss me good-night, Ben; I'll see you in the morning."
"You'll be gone all night?"
"Probably. It's a fairly big transition class and, truthfully, Mike has just been keeping them busy the past half hour and more while we visited. But that's all right." She stood up, pulled him gently to his feet and went into his arms.
Presently she broke from the kiss but not from his arms and murmured, "Ben darling, you've been taking lessons. Whew!"
"Me? I've been utterly faithful to you - in my own way."
"In the same way I've been to you� the nicest way. I wasn't complaining� I just think Dorcas has been helping you to practice kissing."
"Some, maybe. Nosy."
"Uh huh, I'm always nosy. The class can wait while you kiss me once more. I'll try to be Dorcas."
"You be yourself."
"I would be, anyway. Self. But Mike says that Dorcas kisses more thoroughly - 'groks a kiss more' - than anyone."
"Quit chattering."
She did, for a while, then sighed. "Transition class, here I come - glowing like a lightning bug. Take good care of him, Dawn."
"I will."
"And better kiss him right away and see what I mean!"
"I intend to."
"'Bye, darlings! Ben, you be a good boy and do what Dawn tells You." She left, not hurrying - but running.
Dawn stood up, flowed up against him, put up her arms.
Jubal cocked an eyebrow. "And now I suppose you are going to tell me that at that point, you went chicken."
"Uh, not exactly. A near miss, call it. To tell the truth I didn't have too much to say about it. I, uh, 'cooperated with the inevitable.'"
Jubal nodded. "No other possible course. You were trapped and couldn't run. Whereupon the best a man can do is try for a negotiated peace." He added, "But I'm sorry that the civilized habits of my household caused the boy to fall afoul the law of the jungles of Baja California."
"I don't think he's a boy any longer, Jubal."

XXXII

BEN CAXTON HAD AWAKENED not knowing where he was nor what time it was. It was dark around him, perfectly quiet, he was lying on something soft. Not a bed - where was he?
The night came back in a rush. The last he clearly remembered he had been lying on the soft floor of the Innermost Temple, talking quietly and intimately with Dawn. She had taken him there, they had immersed, shared water, grown closer - frantically he reached around him in the dark, found nothing.
"Dawn!"
Light swelled softly to a gentle dimness. "Here, Ben."
"Oh! I thought you had gone!"
"I didn't intend to wake you." She was wearing - to his sudden and intense disappointment - her robe of office. "I must go start the Sunrisers' Outer Service. Gillian isn't back yet. As you know, it was a fairly big class."
Her words brought back to him things she had told him last night things which, at the time, had upset him despite her gentle and quite logical explanations� and she had soothed his upset until he found himself agreeing with her. He still was not quite straight in his mind he didn't grok it all - but, yes, Jill was probably still busy with her rites as high priestess - a task, or perhaps a happy duty, that Dawn had offered to take for her. Ben felt a twinge that he really should have been sorry that Jill had refused, had insisted that Dawn get much needed rest.
But he did not feel sorry. "Dawn� do you have to leave?" He scrambled to his feet, put his arms around her.
"I must go, Ben dear� dear Ben." She melted up against him.
"Right now? In such a rush?"
"There is never," she said softly, "that much hurry." Suddenly the robe no longer kept them apart. He was too bemused to wonder what had become of it.
He woke up a second time, found that the "little nest" he was in lighted softly when he stood up. He stretched, discovered that he felt wonderful, then looked around the room for his shorts. They were not in sight and no way for them to be out of sight. He tried to recall where he had left them� and had no recollection of ever having taken them off. But he certainly had not worn them into the water. Probably beside the pool in the Innermost Temple - he made a mental note to stop back there and pick them up, then went out and found a bathroom.
Some minutes later, shaved, showered, and refreshed, he did remember to look into the Innermost Temple, failed to find his shorts and decided that somebody, Patty maybe, had noticed them and put them near the outer door where apparently everybody kept what they needed for street wear� said to hell with it and grinned at himself for having made such a jittery old-maid issue last night out of wearing them or not. He needed them, here in the Nest, the way he needed a second head.
Come to think of it, he didn't have the slightest trace of a head - a hangover head - although he recalled that he had had more than several drinks with Dawn. Hadn't got drunk, as he recalled, but certainly more than he ordinarily allowed himself - he couldn't sop up the stuff the way Jubal did without paying for it.
Dawn didn't seem to be affected by liquor at all - which was probably why he had gone over his usual quota. Dawn� what a gal, what a gal! She hadn't even seemed annoyed when, in a moment of emotional confusion, he had called her Jill - she had seemed pleased.
He found no one in the big room and wondered what time it was? Not that he gave a damn, except that his stomach told him that it was long past breakfast time. He went into the kitchen to see what he could scrounge.
A man in there looked up as he came in. "Ben!"
"Well! Hi, Duke!"
Duke gave him a bear hug and slapped him on the back. "Ben, you're a sight for sore eyes! Gosh, it's good to see you. Thou art God. How do you like your eggs?"
"Thou art God. Are you the cook?"
"Only when I can't find somebody else to do it for me - such as right now. Tony does most of it. We all do some. Even Mike unless Tony catches him and chases him out - Mike is the world's worst cook, bar none." Duke went on breaking eggs into a dish.
Ben moved in on the job. "You look after toast and coffee. Any Worcestershire sauce around here?"
"You name it, Pat's got it. Here." Duke added, "I looked in on you a half hour ago, but you were still sawing wood. I've been busy or you've been busy ever since you got here - until now."
"What do you do around here, Duke? Aside from cooking when you can't avoid it?"
"Well, I'm a deacon� and I'll be a priest someday. But I'm slow - not that it matters. I study Martian� everybody does that. And I'm the fix-it boy, same as I was for Jubal"
"Must take quite a gang to maintain a place this size."
"Ben, you'd be surprised how little it takes. Aside from keeping an eye on the plumbing - and sometime you must see Mike's unique way of dealing with a stopped toilet - I don't have to play plumber very much. Aside from plumbing, ninety percent of the gadgetry in this building is right here in the kitchen� and it's not as gadgeted as Jubal's kitchen."
"I had the impression that you have some very complicated gadgets for some of the temple ceremonies."
"Uuh uh, nary a gadget. Some lighting controls, that's all, and simple ones. Actually" Duke grinned. "-One of my most important jobs is no job at all. Fire warden"
"Huh?"
"I'm a licensed deputy fire warden, examined and everything, and same for sanitation and safety inspector - neither one takes any work. But it means that we never have to let an outsider go through the joint - and we don't. They attend outer services�but they never get any farther unless Mike gives an up check."
They transferred food to plates and sat down at a table. Duke said, "You're staying, aren't you, Ben?"
"I don't see how I can, Duke."
"Mmmm� I had hoped that you would have more sense than I had. I came for just a short visit, too� went back and moped around for nearly a month before I told Jubal I was leaving and wouldn't be back. But never mind; you'll be back. Don't make any final decisions before the water sharing tonight."
"Didn't Dawn tell you? Or Jill?"
"Uh� I don't think so."
"Then they didn't. Hmm, maybe i should let Mike explain it. No, no need to; people will be mentioning it to you all day long. Sharing water you grok, of course; you're one of the First Called."
"'First Called?' Dawn used that expression."
"That handful of us who became Mike's water brothers without learning Martian. The others ordinarily do not share water and grow closer until they pass from the Seventh Circle to the Eighth� and by that time they are beginning to think in Martian. Heck, some of them know more Martian by that stage than I do now, since I'm a 'First Called' myself and started my studies after I was already in the Nest. Oh, it's not actually forbidden to share water with someone who isn't ready for Eighth Circle. Hell, if I wanted to, I could pick up a babe in a bar, share water with her, then take her to bed - and then take her to the Temple and start her on her apprenticeship. But I wouldn't want to. That's the point; I wouldn't even want to. At the very most I might decide that it was worth while to bring her around to an outer service and let Mike look her over and find out whether any of it clicked with her. Ben, I'll make a flat-footed prediction. You've been around a lot - I'm sure you've been in some fancy beds with some fancy babes."
"Uh� some,"
"I know damn' well you have. But you will never again in your life crawl in with one who is not your water brother."
"Hmm."
"You'll see. Let's cheek it a year from now and you tell me. Now Mike may decide that someone is ready to share water before that person reaches even Seventh Circle. One couple we've got in the Nest, Mike picked, and offered them Water, when they had just entered Third Circle and now he's a priest and she's a priestess� Sam and Ruth."
"Haven't met 'em."
"You will. Tonight at the latest. But Mike is the only one who can be certain, that soon. Very occasionally Dawn, and sometimes Patty, will spot somebody for special promotion and special training� but never as far down as Third Circle and I'm pretty sure that they always consult Mike before going ahead. Not that they are required to. Anyhow, into the Eighth Circle� and sharing and growing closer starts. Then, sooner or later, into Ninth Circle, and the Nest itself - and that's the service we mean when we say 'Sharing Water' even though we share water all day long. The whole Nest attends and the new brothers - usually it's a couple - becomes forever part of the Nest. In your case you already are� but we've never held the service for you, so everything else is being pushed aside tonight while we welcome you. They did the same for me." Duke got a faraway look. "Ben, it's the most wonderful feeling in the world"
"But I still don't know what it is, Duke."
"Uh�it's a lot of things. Ever been on a real luau of a party, the kind the cops raid and usually ends up in a divorce or two?"
"Well� yes."
"Up to now, brother, you've only been on Sunday School picnics. That's one aspect of it. Have you ever been married?"
"No."
"You are married. You just don't know it yet. After tonight there will never again be any doubt in your mind about it." Duke again looked faraway, happily pensive. "Ben, I was married before� and for a short time it was pretty nice and then it was steady hell on wheels. This time I like it, all the time. Shucks, I love it! And look, Ben, I don't mean just that it's fun to be shacked up with a bunch of bouncy babes. I love them - all my brothers, both sexes. Take Patty - and you will! - Patty mothers all of us� and I don't think anybody, man or woman, gets over needing that, even if they think they've outgrown it. Patty� well, Patty is just swell! She reminds me of Jubal� and that old bastard had better get down here and get the word! My point is that it is not just that Patty is female. Oh, I'm not running down tail-"
"Who is running down tail?" The voice, a rich contralto, came from behind them.
Duke swung around. "Not me, you limber Levantine whore! Come here, babe, and kiss your brother Ben."
"Never charged for it in my life," the woman denied as she glided toward them. "Started giving it away before anybody told me." She kissed Ben carefully and thoroughly. "Thou art God, brother."
"Thou art God. Share water."
"Never thirst. And don't ever pay any mind to what Duke says - from the way he behaves he must have been a bottle baby." She leaned over Duke and kissed him even more lingeringly while he patted her ample fundament. Ben noted that she was short, plump, brunette almost to swarthiness, and had a mane of heavy blue-black hair almost to her waist "Duke, did you see anything of a Ladies' Home Journal when you got up?" She reached past his shoulder, took his fork and started eating his scrambled eggs. "Mmm� good. You didn't cook these, Duke."
"Ben did. What in the world would I want with a Ladies' Home Journal?"
"Ben, stir up a couple of dozen more exactly the same way and I'll scramble 'em in relays. There was an article in it I wanted to show Patty, dear."
"Okay," agreed Ben and got up to do it.
"Don't you two get any ideas about redecorating this dump or I'm moving out. And leave some of those eggs for me! You think us men can do our work on mush?"
"Tut, tut, Dukie darling. Water divided is water multiplied. As I was saying, Ben, Duke's complaints never mean anything - as long as he has enough women for two men and enough food for three, he's a perfect little lamb." She shoved one forkful into Duke's mouth, went on eating the rest herself. "So quit making faces, brother; I'm about to cook you a second breakfast. Or will this be your third?"
"Not even the first, yet. You ate it. Ruth, I was telling Ben how you and Sam pole-vaulted from Third to Ninth. I think he's uneasy about whether he belongs in the Sharing-Water tonight."
She pursued the last bite on Duke's plate, then moved over and started preparations to cook. "Duke, you run along and I'll send you out something other than mush. Take your coffee cup and skedaddle. Ben, I was worried, too, when my time came - but don't you be worried, dear, because Michael does not make mistakes. You belong here or you wouldn't be here. You're going to stay?"
"Uh, I can't. Ready for the first installment?"
"Pour them in. Then you'll be back. And someday you'll stay. Duke is correct - Sam and I pole-vaulted� and it was almost too fast for a middle-aged, prim and proper housewife."
"Middle-aged?"
"Ben, one of the bonuses about the discipline is that as it straightens out your soul, your body straightens out, too. That's a matter in which the Christian Scientists are precisely right. Notice any medicine bottles in any of the bathrooms?"
"Uh, no."
"There aren't any. How many people have kissed you?"
"Several, at least."
"As a priestess I kiss a lot more than 'several,' believe me. But there's never so much as a sniffle in the Nest. I used to be the sort of whiny woman who is never quite well and given to 'female complaints.'" She smiled. "Now I'm more female than ever but I'm twenty pounds lighter and years younger and have nothing to complain about - I like being female. As Duke flattered me, 'a Levantine whore' and unquestionably much more limber than I was - I always sit in the lotus position when I'm teaching a class, whereas it used to be all I could do just to squat down and straighten up again� hot flashes and dizziness.
"But it did happen fast," Ruth went on. "Sam was a professor of Oriental languages at the University here - the city U., that is. Sam started coming to the Temple because it was a way, the only way, to learn the Martian language. Strictly professional motivation, he wasn't interested in it as a church. And I went along to keep an eye on him� I had heard rumors and I was a jealous wife, even more possessive than the average.
"So we worked up to the Third Circle, Sam learning the language rapidly, of course, and myself grimly hanging on and studying hard because I didn't want to let him out of my sight. Then boom! the miracle happened. We suddenly began to think in it, just a little� and Michael felt it and had us stay after service, a Third Circle service, one night and Michael and Gillian gave us water. Afterwards, I knew that I was all the things I had despised in other women and I knew that I should despise my husband for letting me do it and hate him for what he had done himself. All this in English, with the wont parts in Hebrew. So I wept all day and moaned and made myself a stinking nuisance to Sam� and couldn't wait to get back to share more water and grow closer again that night.
"After that things were steadily easier but not easy, as we were pushed through all the inner circles just as rapidly as we could take it; Michael knew that we needed help and wanted to get us into the safety and peace of the Nest. So when it came time for our Sharing-Water, I was still unable to discipline myself without constant help. I knew that I wanted to be received into the Nest - once you start, there's no turning back - but I wasn't sure I could merge myself with seven other people. I was scared silly; on the way over I almost begged Sam to turn around and go home."
She stopped talking and looked up, unsmiling but beatific, a plump angle with a big stirring spoon in one hand. "Then we walked into the Innermost Temple and a spotlight hit me and our robes were whisked away� and they were all in the pool and calling out to us in Martian to come, come and share the water of life - and I stumbled into that pool and submerged and I haven't come up since!
"Nor ever want to. Don't fret, Ben, you'll learn the language and acquire the discipline and you'll have loving help from all of us every step of the way. You stop worrying and jump in that pool tonight; I'll have my arms out to catch you. All of us will have our arms out, welcoming you home. Now take this plate in to Duke and tell him I said he was a pig but a charming one. And take this one in for yourself - oh, of course you can eat that much! - give me a kiss and run along; Ruthie has work to do."
Ben delivered the kiss and the message and the plate, then found that he did have some appetite left� but nevertheless did not concentrate on food as he found Jill stretched out, apparently asleep, on one of the wide, soft couches. He sat down opposite her, enjoying the sweet sight of her and thinking that Dawn and Jill were even more alike than he had realized the night before.
He looked up from a bite and saw that her eyes were open and she was smiling at him. "Thou art God, darling - and that smells good."
"And you look good. But I didn't mean to wake you." He got up and sat by her, put a bite in her mouth. "My own cooking, with Ruth's help."
"I know. And good, too. Duke told me to stay out of the kitchen because Ruthie was giving you a good-for-your-soul lecture. You didn't wake me; I was just lazing until you came out. I haven't been asleep all night."
"Not at all?"
"Not a wink. But I'm not tired, I feel grand. Just hungry. That's a hint." So he fed her. She let him do so, never stirring, not using her own hands. "But did you get any sleep?" she asked presently.
"Uh, some."
"Enough? No, you got enough. But how much sleep did Dawn get? As much as two hours?"
"Oh, more than that, I'm certain."
"Then she's all right. Two hours of sleep does us as much good as eight used to. I knew what a sweet night you were going to have - both of you - but I was a teeny bit worried that she might not rest."
"Well, it was a wonderful night," Ben admitted, "although I was, uh, surprised at the way you shoved her at me."
"Shocked, you mean. I know you, Ben, maybe better than you know yourself. You arrived here yesterday with jealousy sticking out in lumps. I think it's gone now. Yes?"
He looked back at her. "I think so."
"That's good. I had a wonderful and joyous night, too - made free from any worry by knowing you were in good hands. The best hands - better than mine."
"Oh, no!"
"Hmm. I grok a few lumps still - but tonight we'll wash them away in water." She sat up, reached toward the end of the couch - and it looked to Canon as if a pack of cigarettes on the end table jumped the last few inches into her hand.
"You seemed to have picked up some sleight-of-hand tricks, too."
She seemed momentarily puzzled, then she smiled. "Some. Nothing much. Parlor tricks. 'I am only an egg,' to quote my teacher."
"How did you do that trick?"
"Why, I just whistled to it in Martian. First you grok a thing, then you grok what you want it to - Mike!" She waved. "We're over here, dear!"
"Coming." The Man from Mars came straight to Ben, took his hands, pulled him to his feet. "Let me look at you, Ben! Golly, it's good to see you!"
"It's good to see you. And to be here."
"And we're going to twist your arm to keep you here. What's this about three days? Three days indeed!"
"I'm a working man, Mike."
"We'll see. The girls are all excited, getting ready for your party tonight. Might just as well shut down services and classes for the rest of the day - they won't be worth a damn."
"Patty has already done any necessary rescheduling," Jill told Mike. "She just didn't bother you with it. Dawn and Ruth and Sam are going to take care of what's necessary. Patty decided to slough the Outer matinee - so you're through for the day."
"That's good news." Mike sat down, pulled Jill's head into his lap, pulled Ben down, put an arm around him, and sighed. He was dressed as Ben had seen him in the outer meeting, smart tropical business suit, lacking only shoes. "Ben, don't ever take up preaching. I spend my days and nights rushing from one job to another, telling people why they must never hurry. I owe you, along with Jill and Jubal, more than anyone else on this planet - yet you've been here since yesterday afternoon and this is the first time I've been able to say hello. How've you been? You're looking fit. In fact Dawn tells me you are fit."
Ben found himself blushing. "I'm okay."
"That's good. Because, believe me, the hill tribes will be restless tonight. But I'll grok close and sustain you. You'll be fresher at the end of the party than at the start - won't he, Little Brother?"
"Yes," agreed Jill. "Ben, you won't believe it until you've had it done for you, but Mike can lend you strength - physical strength, I mean, not just moral support. I can do it a little bit. Mike can really do it."
"Jill can do it quite a lot." Mike caressed her. "Little Brother is a tower of strength to everybody. Last night she certainly was." He smiled down at her, then sang:
"You'll never find a girl like Jill.
"No, not one in a billion."
"Of all the tarts who ever will "The willingest is our Gillian! - isn't that right, Little Brother?"
"Pooh," answered Jill, obviously pleased, covering his hand with her own and pressing it to her. "Dawn is exactly like me and you know it - and every bit as willing."
"Maybe. But you're here� and Dawn is downstairs interviewing the possibles out of the tip. She's busy - you ain't. That's an important difference - isn't it, Ben?"
"Could be." Caxton was finding that their unself-conscious behavior was beginning to embarrass him, even in this uniquely relaxed atmosphere - he wished that they would either knock off necking� or give him an excuse to leave.
Instead Mike went right on cuddling Jill with one hand while keeping his other arm snug around Ben's waist� and Ben was forced to admit that Jill encouraged him, rather than otherwise. Mike said very seriously, "Ben, a night like last night - helping a group to make the big jump to Eighth Circle - gets me terribly keyed up. Let me tell you something out of the lessons for Sixth, Ben. We humans have something that my former people don't even dream of. They can't. And I can tell you how precious it is� how especially precious I know it to be, because I have known what it is not to have it. The blessing of being male and female. Man and Woman created He them - the greatest treasure We-Who-Are-God ever invented. Right, Jill?"
"Beautifully right, Mike - and Ben knows it is Truth. But make a song for Dawn, too, darling."
"Okay - "Ardent is our lovely Dawn;" Ben grokked that in her glance - "She buys new dresses every morn. "But never shops for pants!" Jill giggled and squirmed. "Did you tune her in?"
"Yes, and she gave me a big Bronx cheer - with a kiss behind it for Ben. Say, isn't there anybody in the kitchen this morning? I just remembered I haven't eaten for a couple of days. Or years, maybe; I'm not sure."
"I think Ruth is," Ben said, untangling himself and standing up. "I'll go see."
"Duke can do it. Hey, Duke! See if you can find somebody who'll fix me a stack of wheat cakes as tall as you are and a gallon of maple syrup."
"Right, Mike!" Duke called back.
Ben Caxton hesitated, without an excuse to run an errand. He thought of a trumped-up excuse and glanced back over his shoulder.
"Jubal," Caxton said earnestly, "I wouldn't tell you this part at all if it weren't essential to explaining how I feel about the whole thing, why I'm worried about them - all of them, Duke and Mike as well as Jill and Mike's other victims, too. By that morning I was myself half conned into thinking everything was all right - weird as hell in spots - but jolly. Mike himself had me fascinated, too - his new personality is pretty powerful. Cocky and too much supersalesman� but very compelling. Then he - or both of them - got me rather embarrassed, so I took that chance to get up from the couch.
"Then I glanced back - and couldn't believe my eyes. I hadn't been turned away five seconds� and Mike had managed to get rid of every stitch of clothes� and so help me, they were going to it, with myself and three or four others in the room at the time - just as boldly as monkeys in a zoo!
"Jubal, I was so shocked I almost lost my breakfast."

XXXIII

"WELL," SAID JUBAL, "what did you do? Cheer?"
"Like hell. I left, at once. I dashed for the outer door, grabbed my clothes and shoes - forgot my bag and didn't go back for it - ignored the sign on the door, went on through - jumped in that bounce tube with my clothes in my arms. Blooie! Gone without saying good-by."
"Rather abrupt"
"I felt abrupt. I had to leave. In fact I left so fast that I durn near killed myself. You know the ordinary bounce tube-"
"I do not."
"Well, unless you set it to take you up to a certain level, when you get into it you simply sink slowly, like cold molasses I didn't sink, I fell and I was about six stories up. But just when I thought I had made my last mistake, something caught me. Not a safety net - a field of some sort I didn't quite splash. But Mike needs to smooth out that gadget. Or put in the regular sort of bounce tube."
Jubal said, "I'll stick to stairs and, when unavoidable, elevators"
"Well, I hadn't realized that this one was so risky. But the only safety inspector they've got is Duke� and to Duke whatever Mike says is Gospel. Jubal, that whole place is riding for a fall. They're all hypnotized by one man� who isn't right in his head. What can be done about it?"
Jubal jutted out his lips and then scowled, "Let's see first if you've got it analyzed correctly. Just what aspects of the situation did you find disquieting?"
"Why�the whole thing."
"So? In fact, wasn't it just one thing? And that an essentially harmless act which we both know was nothing new� but was, we can assume rather conclusively, initially performed in this house or on these grounds about two years ago? I did not then object - nor did you, when you learned of it, whenever that was, in fact, I have implied that you yourself have, on other occasions, joined in that same act with the same young lady - and she is a lady, despite your tale - and you neither denied my implication nor acted offended at my presumption. To put it bluntly, son - what are you belly-aching about?"
"Well, for cripe's sake, Jubal�Would you put up with it, in your living room?"
"Decidedly not - unless perhaps I have, it having taken place so clandestinely, at night perhaps, that no one noticed. In which case it would be - or has been, if such be the case - no skin off my nose. But the point is that it was not my living room� nor would I presume to lay down rules for another man's living room. It was Mike's house� and his wife - common law or otherwise, we need not inquire. So what business is it of mine? Or yours? You go into a man's house, you accept his household rules - that's a universal law of civilized behavior."
"You mean to say you don't find it shocking?"
"Ah, you've raised an entirely different issue. Public exhibition of lust I would find most distasteful, either as participant or spectator� but I grok this reflects my early indoctrination, nothing more. A very large minority of mankind - possibly a majority - do not share my taste in this matter. Decidedly not - for the orgy has a long and very widespread history. Nonetheless it is not to my taste. But shocking? My dear sir, I can be shocked only by that which offends me ethically. Ethical questions are subject to logic - but this is a matter of taste and the old saw is in point - "de gusribus non est disputandu."
"You think that a public shagging is merely 'a matter of taste?'"
"Precisely. In which respect I concede that my own taste, rooted in early training, reinforced by some three generations of habit, and now, I believe, calcified beyond possibility of change, is no more sacred than the very different taste of Nero. Less sacred - Nero was a god; I am not."
"Well, I'll be damned."
"In due course, possibly - if it is possible� a point on which I am 'neutral-against.' But, Ben, this wasn't public."
"Huh?"
"You yourself have said it. You described this group as a plural marriage - a group theogamy, to be precise. Not public but utterly private. Aint nobody here but just us gods' - so how could anyone be offended?"
"I was offended!"
"That was because your own apotheosis was less complete than theirs - I'm afraid they over-rated you� and you misled them. You invited it.''
"Me? Jubal, I did nothing of the sort"
"Tommy busted my dolly� I hitted him over the head with it.' The time to back out was the instant you got there, for you saw at once that their customs and manners were not yours. Instead you stayed, and enjoyed the favors of one goddess - and behaved yourself as a god toward her - in short, you learned the score, and they knew it. It seems to me that Mike's error lay only in accepting your hypocrisy as solid coin. But he does have the weakness - a godlike one - of never doubting his 'water brothers' - but even Jove nods - and his weakness - or is it a strength? - comes from his early training; he can't help it. No, Ben, Mike behaved with complete propriety; the offense against good manners lay in your behavior."
"Damn it, Jubal, you've twisted things again. I did what I had to do - I was about to throw up on their rug!"
"So you claim reflex. So stipulated; however, anyone over the emotional age of twelve could have clamped his jaws and made a slow march for the bathroom with at worst the hazard of clogged sinuses - instead of a panicked dash for the street door - then returned when the show was over with a euphemistic but acceptable excuse."
"That wouldn't have been enough. I tell you I had to leave!"
"I know. But not through reflex. Reflex will evacuate the stomach; it will not choose a course for the feet, recover chattels, take you through doors and cause you to jump down a hole without looking. Panic, Ben. Why did you panic?"
Caxton was long in replying. He sighed and said, "I guess when you come right down to it, Jubal - I'm a prude."
Jubal shook his head. "Your behavior was momentarily prudish, but not from prudish motivations. You are not a prude, Ben. A prude is a person who thinks that his own rules of propriety are natural laws. You are almost entirely free of this prevalent evil. You adjusted, at least with passable urbanity, to many things which did not fit your code of propriety whereas a true-blue, stiff-necked, incorrigible prude would promptly have affronted that delightful tattooed lady and stomped out. Dig deeper� Do you wish a hint?"
"Uh, maybe you'd better. All I know is that I am mixed up and unhappy about the whole Situation - on Mike's account, too, Jubal! - which is why I took a day off to see you."
"Very well. Hypothetical situation for you to evaluate: You mentioned a lady named Ruth whom you met in passing - a kiss of brotherhood and a few minutes conversation - nothing more."
"Yeah?"
"Suppose the actors had been Ruth and Mike? Gillian not even present? Would you have been shocked?"
"Huh? Hell, yes, I would have been shocked!"
"Just how shocked? Retching? Panic flight?"
Caxton looked thoughtful, then sheepish. "I suppose not. I still would have been startled silly. But I guess I would've just gone out to the kitchen or something� then found an excuse to leave. I still feel like a fool for having made that mad dash to get out."
"Would you actually have sought an excuse to leave? Or were you looking forward to your own 'welcome home' party that night?"
"Well," Caxton mused. "I hadn't made up my mind about that when this happened. I was curious, I admit - but I wasn't quite sold."
"Very well. You now have your motivation."
"Do I?"
"You name it, Ben. Haul it out and look at it - and find out how you want to deal with it."
Caxton chewed his lip and looked unhappy. "All right. I would have been startled if it had been Ruth - but I wouldn't really have been shocked. Hell, in the newspaper racket you get over being shocked by anything but - well, you expressed it: something that cuts deep about right and wrong. Shucks, if it had been Ruth, I might even have sneaked a look - even though I still think I would have left the room; such things ought to be - or at least I feel that they ought to be - private." He paused. "It was because it was Jill. I was hurt� and jealous."
"Stout fellow, Ben."
"Jubal, I would have sworn that I wasn't jealous. I knew that I had lost out - I had accepted it. It was the circumstances, Jubal. Now don't get me wrong. I would still love Jill if she were a two-peso whore. Which she is not. This hands-around harem deal upsets the hell out of me. But by her lights Jill is moral."
Jubal nodded. "I know. I feel sure that Gillian is incapable of being corrupted. She has an invincible innocence which makes it impossible for her to be immoral." lie frowned. "Ben we are close to the root of your trouble. I am afraid that you - and I, too, I admit - lack the angelic innocence to abide by the perfect morality those people live by."
Ben looked surprised. "Jubal, you think what they are doing is moral? Monkeys in the zoo stuff and all? All I meant was that Jill really didn't know that what she was doing was wrong - Mike's got her hornswoggled - and Mike doesn't know he's doing wrong either. He's the Man front Mars; he didn't get off to a fair start. Everything about us was strange to him - he'll probably never get straightened out."
Jubal looked troubled. "You've raised a hard question, Ben - but I'll give you a straight answer. Yes, I think what those people - the entire Nest, not just our own kids - are doing is moral. As you described it to me yes. I haven't had a chance to examine details - but yes: all of it. Group orgies, and open and unashamed swapping off at other times� their communal living and their anarchistic code, everything. And most especially their selfless dedication to giving their perfect morality to others."
"Jubal, you utterly astonish me." Caxton scratched his head and frowned. "Since you feel that way, why don't you join them? You're welcome, they want you, they're expecting you. They'll hold a jubilee - and Dawn is waiting to kiss your feet and serve you in any way you will permit; I wasn't exaggerating."
Jubal shook his head. "No. Had I been approached fifty years ago - But now? Ben my brother, the potential for such innocence is no longer in me - and I am not referring to sexual potency, so wipe that cynical smile off your face. I mean that I have been too long wedded to my own brand of evil and hopelessness to be cleansed in their water of life and become innocent again. If I ever was."
"Mike thinks you have this innocence - he doesn't call it that - in full measure now. Dawn told me, speaking ex officio."
"Then Mike does me great honor; I would not disillusion him. He sees his own reflection - I am, by profession a mirror."
"Jubal, you're chicken."
"Precisely, sir! The thing that troubles me most is whether those innocents can make their pattern fit into a naughty world. Oh, it's been tried before! - and every time the world etched them away like acid. Some of the early Christians - anarchy, communism, group marriage - why even that kiss of brotherhood has a strong primitive-Christian flavor to it. That might be where Mike picked it up, since all the forms he uses are openly syncretistic, especially that Earth-Mother ritual." Jubal frowned. "If he picked that up from primitive christianity - and not just from kissing girls, which he enjoys, I now - then I would expect men to kiss men, too."
Ben snorted. "I held out on you - they do. But it's not a pansy gesture. I got caught once; after that I managed to duck."
"So? It figures. The Oneida Colony was much like Mike's 'Nest'; it managed to last quite a while but in a low population density - not as an enclave in a resort city. There have been many others, all with the same sad story: a plan for perfect sharing and perfect love, glorious hopes and high idea - followed by persecution and eventual failure." Jubal sighed. "I was worried about Mike before - now I'm worried about all of them."
"You're worried? How do you think I feel? Jubal, I can't accept your sweetness and light theory. What they are doing is wrong."
"So? Ben, it's that last incident that sticks in your craw."
"Well� maybe. Not entirely."
"Mostly. Ben. the ethics of sex is a thorny problem because each of us has to find a solution pragmatically compatible with a preposterous, utterly unworkable, and evil public code of so-called 'morals.' Most of us know, or suspect, that the public code is wrong, and we break it. Nevertheless we pay Danegeld by giving it lip service in public and feeling guilty about breaking it in private. Willy-nilly, that code rides us, dead and stinking, an albatross around the neck. You think of yourself as a free soul, I know, and you break that evil code yourself - but faced with a problem in sexual ethics new to you, you unconsciously tested it against that same Judeo-Christian code which you consciously refuse to obey. All so automatically that you retched� and believed thereby - and continue to believe - that your reflex proved that you were 'right' and they were 'wrong.' Faugh! I'd as like use trial by ordeal as use your stomach to test guilt. All your stomach can reflect are prejudices trained into you before you acquired reason."
"What about your stomach?"
"Mine is as stupid as yours - but I don't let it rule my brain. I can at least see the beauty of Mike's attempt to devise an ideal human ethic and applaud his recognition that such a code must be founded on ideal sexual behavior, even though it calls for changes in sexual mores so radical as to frighten most people - including you. For that I admire him - I should nominate him for the Philosophical Society. Most moral philosophers consciously or unconsciously assume the essential correctness of our cultural sexual code - family, monogamy, continence, the postulate of privacy that troubled you so, restriction of intercourse to the marriage bed, et cetera. Having stipulated our cultural code as a whole, they fiddle with details - even such piffle as solemnly discussing whether or not the female breast is an 'obscene' sight! But mostly they debate how the human animal can be induced or forced to obey this code, blandly ignoring the high probability that the heartaches and tragedies they see all around them originate in the code itself rather than failure to abide by the code.
"Now comes the Man from Mars, looks at this sacrosanct code - and rejects it in toto. I do not grasp exactly what Mike's sexual code is, but it is clear from what little you told me that it violates the laws of every major nation on Earth and would outrage 'right-thinking' people of every major faith - and most agnostics and atheists, too. And yet this poor boy-"
"Jubal, I repeat - he's not a boy, he's a man"
"Is he a 'man?' I wonder. This poor ersatz Martian is saying, by your own report, that sex is a way to be happy together. I go along with Mike this far: sex should be a means of happiness. The worst thing about sex is that we use it to hurt each other. It ought never to hurt; it should bring happiness, or, at the very least, pleasure. There is no good reason why it should ever be anything less.
"The code says, 'Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife' - and the result? Reluctant chastity, adultery, jealousy, bitter family fights, blows and sometimes murder, broken homes and twisted children� and furtive, dirty little passes at country club dances and the like, degrading to both man and woman whether consummated or not, Is this injunction ever obeyed? The Commandment not to 'covet' I mean; I'm not referring to any physical act. I wonder. If a man swore to me on a stack of his own Bibles that he had refrained from coveting another man's wife because the code forbade it, I would suspect either self-deception or subnormal sexuality. Any male virile enough to sire a child is almost certainly so virile that he has coveted many, many women - whether he takes action in the matter or not.
"Now comes Mike and says: 'There's no need for you to covet my wife� love her! There's no limit to her love, we all have everything to gain - and nothing to lose but fear and guilt and hatred and jealousy.' The proposition is so naive that it's incredible. So far as I recall only precivilization Eskimos were ever this naive - and they were so remote from the rest of us that they almost qualified as 'Men from Mars' themselves. However, we soon gave them our virtues and instead of happy sharing they now have chastity and adultery just like the rest of us - those who survived the transition. I wonder if they gained by it? What do you think,
"I wouldn't care to be an Eskimo. thank you."
"Neither would I. Spoiled raw fish makes me bilious."
"Well, yes - but, Jubal, I had in mind hot water and soap. I guess I'm effete."
"I'm decadent in that respect, too, Ben; I was born in a house with no more plumbing than an igloo - and I've no wish to repeat my childhood. But I assume that noses hardened to the stink of rotting blubber would not be upset by unwashed human bodies. But nevertheless, despite curious cuisine and pitiful possessions, the Eskimos were invariably reported to have been the happiest people on Earth. We can never be sure why they were happy, but we can be utterly certain that any unhappiness they did suffer was not caused by sexual jealousy. They borrowed and lent spouses, both ways, both for convenience and purely for fun - and it did not make them unhappy.
"One is tempted to ask: Who's looney? Mike and the Eskimos? Or the rest of us? We can't judge by the fact that you and I have no stomach for such group sports - our canalized tastes are irrelevant. But take a look at this glum world around you - then tell me this: Did Mike's disciples seem happier, or unhappier, than other people?"
"I talked to only about a third of them, Jubal� but - yes, they're happy. So happy they seem slap-happy to me. I don't trust it. There's some catch in it."
"Mmm� maybe you yourself were the catch in it."
"How?"
"I was thinking that it was regrettable that your tastes have grown canalized so young. There it was, raining soup - and you were caught without a spoon. Even three days of what you were offered - urged on you! - would have been something to treasure when you reach my age. And you, you young idiot, let jealousy chase you away! Believe me, at your age I would have gone Eskimo in a big way, thankful that I had been given a free pass instead of having to attend church and study Martian to qualify. I'm so vicariously vexed that my only consolation is the sour one that I know you will live to regret it. Age does not bring wisdom, Ben, but it does give perspective� and the saddest perspective of all is to see far, far behind you, the temptations you've passed up. I have such regrets myself but all of them are as nothing to the whopper of a regret I am happily certain you will suffer."
"Oh, for Pete's sake, quit rubbing it in!"
"Heavens, man! - or are you a mouse? I'm not rubbing it in, I am trying to goad you into the obvious. Why are you sitting here moaning to an old man? - when you should be heading for the Nest like a homing pigeon? Before the cops raid the joint! Hell, if I were even twenty years younger, I'd join Mike's church myself."
"Let up on me, Jubal. What do you really think of Mike's church?"
"You told me it wasn't a church - just a discipline."
"Well� yes and no, It is supposed to be based on the 'Truth' with a capital "T" as Mike got it from the Martian 'Old Ones.'"
"The 'Old Ones,' eli? To me, they're still hogwash."
"Mike certainly believes in them."
"Ben, I once knew a manufacturer who believed that he consulted the ghost of Alexander Hamilton on all his business decisions. All that proves is that he believed it. However - Damn it, why must I always be the Devil's advocate?"
"What's biting you now?"
"Ben, the foulest sinner of all is the hypocrite who makes a racket of religion. But we must give the Devil his due. Mike does believe in those 'Old Ones' and he is not pulling a racket. He's teaching the truth as he sees it even though he has seen fit to borrow from other religions to illustrate his meaning. That 'All Mother' rite - little as I like it, he seems merely to have been illustrating the versatility of the Female Principle, regardless of name and form. Fair enough. As for his 'Old Ones,' of course I don't know that they don't exist - I simply find hard to swallow the idea that any planet is ruled by a hierarchy of ghosts. As for his Thou-art-God creed, to me it is neither more nor less credible than any other. Come Judgment Day, if they hold it, we may find that Mumbo Jumbo the God of the Congo was the Big Boss all along.
"All the names are still in the hat, Ben. Self-aware man is so built that he cannot believe in his own extinction� and this automatically leads to endless invention of religions. While this involuntary conviction of immortality by no means proves immortality to be a fact, the questions generated by this conviction are overwhelmingly important� whether we can answer them or not, or prove what answers we suspect. The nature of life, how the ego hooks into the physical body, the problem of the ego itself and why each ego seems to be the center of the universe, the purpose of life, the purpose of the universe - these are paramount questions Ben; they can never be trivial. Science can't, or hasn't, coped with any of them - and who am I to sneer at religions for trying to answer them, no matter how unconvincingly to me? Old Mumbo Jumbo may eat me yet; I can't rule Him out because He owns no fancy cathedrals. Nor can I rule out one godstruck boy leading a sex cult in an upholstered attic; he might be the Messiah. The only religious opinion that I feel sure of is this: self-awareness is not just a bunch of amino acids bumping together!"
"Whew! Jubal, you should have been a preacher."
"Missed it by only a razor's edge, my boy - and I'll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head. One more word in Mike's defense and I'll throw note 3 on the mercy of the court. If be can show us a better way to run this fouled-up planet, his sex life is vindicated thereby, regardless of your taste or mine. Geniuses are notoriously indifferent to the sexual customs of the culture in which they find themselves, they make their own rules; this is not opinion, it was proved by Armattoe 'way back in 1945. And Mike is a genius; he's shown it more ways than one. He can therefore be expected to ignore Mrs. Grundy and diddle to suit himself. Geniuses are justifiably contemptuous of the opinions of their inferiors.
"And from a religious standpoint Mike's sexual behavior IS as kosher as fish on Friday, as orthodox as Santa Claus. He preaches that all living creatures are collectively God� which makes him and his disciples the only self-aware gods in his pantheon which rates him a union card by the rules for godding on this planet. Those rules always permit gods sexual freedom limited only by their own judgment; mortal rules never apply. Leda and the Swan? Europa and the Bull? Osiris, Isis, and Horus? The incredible incestuous games of the Norse gods? Of course� but why stop there? Take a hard look at the family relations of the Trinity in one of the most widely respected western religion (I won't cite eastern religions; their gods do things a mink breeder wouldn't put up with!). The only way in which the odd interrelations of the various aspects of what purports to be a monotheos can be reconciled with the precepts of the religion thereto is by assuming that the rules in these matters for deity are not the rules for ordinary mortals. Of course most people don't think about it; they compartment it off in their minds and mark it: 'Holy - Do Not Disturb.'
"But an outside referee is forced to allow Mike the same dispensation granted all other gods. There are rules for this game: one god alone splits into at least two parts - male and female - and breeds. Not just Jehovah - they all do it. Look it up. Contrariwise, a group of gods will breed like rabbits, every time, and with as little regard for human formalities. Once Mike entered the godding business, those orgies of his group were as logically certain as Sunday follows Saturday. So quit using the standards of Podunk and judge them only by Olympian morals - I think you will then find that they are showing unusual restraint. Furthermore, Ben, this 'growing-closer' by sexual union, this unity-into-pluralty and plurality-back-into-unity, cannot tolerate monogamy inside the god group. Any pairing that excluded the others would be immoral, obscene, under the postulated creed. And if such mutual, shared-by-all sexual congress is essential to their creed, as I grok it has to be, then why do you expect this holy union to be hidden behind a door? Your insistence that they should hide it would have turned a holy rite - which it was - into something obscene - which it was not. You just plain did not understand what you were looking at."
"Maybe I didn't," Ben said glumly.
"I'm going to offer you one box - top premium, as an inducement. You wondered how Mike got rid of his clothes so quickly. I'll tell you how."
"How?"
"It was a miracle."
"Oh, for God's sake!"
"Could be. But one thousand dollars says that it was a miracle by the usual rules for miracles - outcome to be decided by you. Go back and ask Mike how he did it. Get him to show you. Then send me the money."
"Hell, Jubal, I don't want to take your money."
"You won't. I've got inside information. Bet?"
"No, damn it. Jubal, you go down there and see what the score is. I can't go back - not now."
"They'll take you back with open arms and not even ask why you left so abruptly. One thousand on that prediction, too. Ben, you were there less than a day - fifteen hours, about - and you spent over half that time sleeping and playing hopscotch with Dawn. Did you give them a square shake? The sort of careful investigation you give something smelly in public life before you blast it in your column?"
"But-"
"Did you, or didn't you?"
"No, but-"
"Oh, for Pete's sake yourself, Ben! You claim to be in love with Jill yet you won't give her the consideration you give a crooked politician. Not a tenth the effort she made to help you when you were kidnapped. Where would you be today if she had given it so feeble a try? Pushing up daisies! Roasting in hell! You're bitching about those kids over some friendly fornication - but do you know what I'm worried about?"
"What?"
"Christ was crucified for preaching without a police permit. Think it over."
Caxton stood up. "I'm on my way."
"After lunch."
"Now."
Twenty-four hours later Ben wired Jubal two thousand dollars.
When, after a week, Jubal had had no other message, he sent a stat care of Ben's office: "What the hell are you doing?" Ben's answer came back, somewhat delayed: "Studying Martian and the rules for hopscotch - fraternally yours - Ben."

PART FIVE: HIS HAPPY DESTINY

XXXIVFOSTER LOOKED UP from his current Work in Progress. "Junior!"
"Sir?"
"That youngster you wanted - he's available now. The Martians have released him."
Digby looked puzzled. "I'm sorry. There was some young creature toward whom I have a Duty?"
Foster smiled angelically. Miracles were never necessary - in Truth the pseudo-concept "miracle" was self-contradicting. But these young fellows always had to learn it for themselves. "Never mind," he said gently. "It's a minor job and I'll handle it myself - and Junior?"
"Sir?"
"Call me 'Fog,' please - ceremony is all right in the field but we don't need it in the studio. And remind me not to call you 'Junior' after this - you made a very nice record on that temporary duty assignment. Which name do you like to be called?"
His assistant blinked. "I have another name?"
"Thousands of them. Do you have a preference?"
"Why, I really don't recall at this eon."
"Well� how would you like to be called 'Digby'?"
"Uh, yes. That's a very nice name. Thanks."
"Don't thank me. You earned it." Archangel Foster turned back to his work, not forgetting the minor item he had assumed. Briefly he considered how this cup might be taken from little Patricia - then chided himself for such unprofessional, almost human, thought. Mercy was not possible to an angel; angelic compassion left no room for it.
The Martian Old Ones had reached an elegant and awesome trial solution to their major esthetic problem and put it aside for a few filledthrees to let it generate new problems. At which time, unhurriedly but at once and almost absent-mindedly, the alien nestling which they had returned to his proper world was tapped of what he had learned of his people and dropped, after cherishing, since he was of no further interest to their purposes.
They collectively took the data he had accumulated and, with a view to testing that trial solution, began to work toward considering an inquiry leading to an investigation of esthetic parameters involved in the possibility of the artistic necessity of destroying Earth. But necessarily much waiting would be, before fullness would grok decision.
The Daibutsu at Kamakura was again washed by a giant wave secondary to a seismic disturbance some 280 kilometers off Honshu. The wave killed more than 13,000 people and lodged a small male infant high up in the Buddha image's interior, where it was eventually found and succored by surviving monks. This infant lived ninety-seven Terran years after the disaster that wiped out his family, and himself produced no progeny nor anything of any note aside from a reputation reaching to Yokohama for loud and sustained belching. Cynthia Duchess entered a nunnery with all benefits of modern publicity and left same without fanfare three days later. Ex-Secretary General Douglas suffered a slight stroke which impaired the use of his left hand but did not reduce his ability to conserve assets entrusted to his stewardship. Lunar Enterprises, Ltd., published a prospectus on a bond issue for the wholly owned subsidiary Ares Chandler Corporation. The Lyle-Drive Exploratory Vessel Mary Jane Smith landed on Pluto. Fraser, Colorado, reported the coldest average February of its recorded history.
Bishop Oxtongue, speaking at the New Grand Avenue Temple in Kansas City, preached on the text (Matt. XXIV:24): 'For there shall arise false Christs and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect." He was careful to make clear that his diatribe did not refer to Mormons, Christian Scientists, Roman Catholics, nor Fosterites - most especially not to the last - nor to any other fellow travelers whose good works counted for more than minute and, in the final analysis, inconsequential differences in creed or ritual - but solely to recent upstart heretics who were seducing faithful contributors away from the faiths of their fathers. In a lush subtropical resort city in the southern part of the same nation three complainants swore an information charging public lewdness on the part of a pastor, three of his assistants, and Joe Doe, Mary Roe, et al., plus further charges of running a disorderly house and contributing to the delinquency of minors. The county attorney had at first only the mildest interest in prosecuting under the information as he had on file a dozen much like it - the complaining witnesses had always failed to appear at arraignment.
He pointed this out. Their spokesman said, "We know. But you'll have plenty of backing this time. Supreme Bishop Short is determined that this Antichrist shall flourish no longer."
The prosecutor was not interested in antichrists - but there was a primary coming up. "Well, just remember I can't do much without backing."
"You'll have it."
Farther north, Dr. Jubal Harshaw was not immediately aware of this incident and its consequences, but he did know of too many others for peace of mind. Against his own rules he had succumbed to that most insidious drug, the news. Thus far, he had contained his vice; he merely subscribed to a clipping service instructed for "Man from Mars," "V. M. Smith," "Church of All Worlds," and "Ben Caxton." But the monkey was crawling up his back - twice lately he had had to fight off an impulse to order Larry to set up the babble box in his study - Damn it, why couldn't those kids tape him an occasional letter? - instead of letting him wonder and worry. "Front!"
He heard Anne come in but he still continued to stare out a window at snow and an empty swimming pool. "Anne," he said without turning around, "rent us a small tropical atoll and put this mausoleum up for sale."
"Yes, Boss. Anything else?"
"But get that atoll tied down on a long-term lease before you hand this wilderness back to the Indians; I will not put up with hotels. How long has it been since I wrote any pay copy?"
"Forty-three days."
"You see? Let that be a lesson to you. Begin. 'Death Song of a Wood's Colt':
"The depths of winter longing are ice within my heart
The shards of broken covenants lie sharp against my soul
The wraiths of long-lost ecstasy still keep us two apart
The sullen winds of bitterness still keen from turn to pole.
"The scars and twisted tendons, the stumps of struck-off limbs,
The aching pit of hunger and the throb of unset bone,
My sanded burning eyeballs, as light within them dims,
Add nothing to the torment of lying here alone
"The shimmering flames of fever trace out your blessed face
My broken eardrums echo yet your voice inside my head
I do not fear the darkness that comes to me apace
I only dread the loss of you that comes when I am dead.
"There," he added briskly, "sign it 'Louisa M. Alcott' and have the agency send it to Togetherness magazine."
"Boss, is that your idea of 'pay copy'?"
"Huh? Of course it isn't. Not now. But it will be worth something later, so put it in file and my literary executor can use it to help settle the death duties. That's the catch in all artistic pursuits; the best work is always worth most after the workman can't be paid. The literary life - dreck! It consists in scratching the cat till it purrs."
"Poor Jubal! Nobody ever feels sorry for him, so he has to feel sorry for himself."
"Sarcasm yet. No wonder I don't get any work done."
"Not sarcasm, Boss. Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches."
"My apologies. All right, here's pay copy. Begin. Title: 'One for the Road,'
"There's amnesia in a hang knot,
And comfort in the ax,
But the simple way of poison will make your nerves relax.
"There's surcease in a gunshot,
And sleep that comes from racks,
But a handy draft of poison avoids the harshest tax.
"You find rest upon the hot squat,
Or gas can give you pax,
But the closest corner chemist has peace in packaged stacks.
"There's refuge in the church lot
When you tire of facing facts,
And the smoothest route is poison prescribed by kindly quacks.
"Chorus-
With an ugh! and a groan, and a kick of the heels,
Death comes quiet, or it comes with squeals-
But the pleasantest place to find your end
Is a cup of cheer from the hand of a friend."
"Jubal," Anne said worriedly, "is your stomach upset?"
"Always."
"That one's for file, too?"
"Huh? That's for the New Yorker. Their usual pen name."
"They'll bounce it."
"They'll buy it. It's morbid, they'll buy it."
And besides, there's something wrong with the scansion."
"Of course there is! You have to give an editor something to change, or he gets frustrated. After he pees in it himself, he likes the flavor much better, so he buys it. Look, my dear, I was successfully avoiding honest work long before you were born - so don't try to teach Granpaw how to suck eggs. Or would you rather I nursed Abby while you turn out copy? Hey! It's Abigail's feeding time, isn't it? And you weren't 'Front,' Dorcas is 'Front.' I remember."
"It won't hurt Abby to wait a few minutes. Dorcas is lying down. Morning sickness."
"Nonsense. If she's pregnant, why won't she let me run a test? Anne, I can spot pregnancy two weeks before a rabbit can - and you know it. I'm going to have to be firm with that girl."
"Jubal, you let her be! She's scared she didn't catch� and she wants to think she did, as long as possible. Don't you know anything about women?"
"Mmm� come to think about it - no. Not anything. All right, I won't heckle her. But why didn't you bring our baby angel in and nurse her here? You have both hands free when you take dictation."
"In the first place, I'm glad I didn't - she might have understood what you were saying-"
"So I'm a bad influence, am I?"
"She's too young to see the marshmallow syrup underneath, Boss. But the real reason is that you don't do any work at all if I bring her in with me; you just play with her."
"Can you think of any better way of enriching the empty hours?"
"Jubal, I appreciate the fact that you are dotty over my daughter; I think she's pretty nice myself. But you've been spending all your time either playing with Abby� or moping. That's not good."
"How soon do we go on relief?"
"That's beside the point. If you don't crank out stories, you get spiritually constipated. It's reached the point where Dorcas and Larry and I are biting our nails - and when you do yell 'Front!' we jitter with relief. Only it's always a false alarm."
"If there's money in the bank to meet the bills, what are you worried about?"
"What are you worried about, Boss?"
Jubal considered it. Should he tell her? Any possible doubt as to the paternity of Abigail had been settled, in his mind, in her naming; Anne had wavered between "Abigail" and "Zenobia" - and had settled it by loading the infant with both names. Anne had never mentioned the meanings of those names; presumably she did not know that he knew them.
Anne went on firmly, "You're not fooling anyone but yourself; Jubal. Dorcas and Larry and I all know that Mike can take care of himself. and you ought to know it. But because you've been so frenetic about it-"
"'Frenetic!' Me?"
"-Larry very quietly set up the stereo tank in his room and some one of us three had been catching the news, every broadcast. Not because we are worried, for we aren't - except about you. But when Mike gets into the news - and of course he does get into the news; he's still the Man from Mars - we know about it before those silly clippings ever reach you. I wish you would quit reading them."
"How do you know anything about any clippings? I went to a lot of trouble to see that you didn't. I thought."
"Boss," she said in a tired voice, "somebody has to dispose of the trash. Do you think Larry can't read?"
"So. That confounded oubliette hasn't worked right since Duke left. Damn it, nothing has!"
"All you have to do is to send word to Mike that you want Duke to come back - Duke will show up at once."
"You know I can't do that." It graveled him that what she said was almost certainly true - and the thought was followed by a sudden and bitter suspicion. "Anne! Are you still here because Mike told you to stay?"
She answered promptly, "I am here because I wish to be here."
"Mmmm� not sure that's a responsive answer."
"Jubal, sometimes I wish you were small enough to spank. May I finish what I was saying?"
"You have the floor." Would any of them be here? Would Maryam have married Stinky and gone off to Beirut if Mike had not approved it? The name "Fatima Michele" might be an acknowledgment of her adopted faith plus her husband's wish to compliment his closest friend - or it might be code almost as explicit as baby Abby's double name, one which stated that Mike was somewhat more than godfather to the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Mahmoud. If so, did Stinky wear his antlers unaware? Or with serene pride as Joseph was alleged to have done? Uh� but it must be concluded with utter certainty that Stinky knew the minutes of his houri; water brothership permitted not even diplomatic omission of any matter so important. If indeed it was important, which as a physician and agnostic Jubal doubted. But to them it would be - "You aren't listening."
"Sorry. Woolgathering." - and stop it, you nasty old man� reading meanings into names that mothers give their children indeed! Next thing you'll be taking up numerology� then astrology� then spiritualism - until your senility has progressed so far that all there is left is custodial treatment for a hulk too dim-witted to discorporate in dignity. Go to locked drawer nine in the clinic, code "Lethe" - and use at least two grains to be sure, although one is more than enough - "There's no need for you to read those clippings, because we know the public news about Mike before you do - and Ben has given us a water promise to let us know any private news we need to know at once - and Mike of course knows this. But, Jubal, Mike can't be hurt. If you would only visit the Nest, as we three have done, you would know this."
"I have never been invited."
"We didn't have specific invitations, either; we just went. Nobody has to have an invitation to go to his own home� any more than they require invitations to come here. Like 'The Death of the Hired Man.' But you are just making excuses, Jubal, and poor ones - for Ben urged you to, and both Dawn and Duke sent word to you."
"Mike hasn't invited me."
"Boss, that Nest belongs to me and to you quite as much as it does to Mike. Mike is first among equals� as you are here. Is this Abby's home?"
"Happens," he answered evenly, "that title already vests in her with lifetime tenancy for me." Jubal had changed his own will, knowing that Mike's will now made it unnecessary to provide for any water brother of Mike. But not being sure of the exact 'water' status of this nestling - save that she was usually wet - he had made redispositions in her favor and in favor of descendants, if any, of certain others. "I hadn't intended to tell you, but there is no harm in your knowing."
"Jubal� you've made me cry. And you've almost made me forget what I was saying. And I must say it. Mike would never hurry you, you know that. I grok he is waiting for fullness - and I grok that you are, too."
"Mmmm� I grok you speak rightly."
"All right. I think you are especially glum today simply because Mike has been arrested again. But that's happened many-"
"'Arrested?' I hadn't heard about this! What goes on?" He added, "Damn it, girl-"
"Jubal, Jubal! Ben hasn't called; that's all we need to know. You know how many times Mike has been arrested - in the army, as a carney, other places - half a dozen times as a preacher. He never hurts anybody; he just lets them do it. They can never convict him and he gets out as soon as he wishes - at once, if he wants to."
"What is it this time?"
"Oh, the usual nonsense - public lewdness, statutory rape, conspiracy to defraud, keeping a disorderly house, contributing to the delinquency of minors, conspiracy to evade the state truancy laws-"
"Huh?"
"That involves their own nestlings' school. Their license to operate a parochial school was canceled; the kids still didn't go back to public school. No matter, Jubal - none of it matters. The one thing on which they are technically in violation of the law - and so are you, Boss darling - can't possibly be proved. Jubal, if you had ever seen the Temple and the Nest you would know that even the F.D.S. couldn't sneak a spy-eye into it. So relax. After a lot of publicity, charges will be dropped - and the crowds at the outer services will be bigger than ever."
"Hmm! Anne, does Mike rig these persecutions himself?"
She looked startled, an expression her face was unused to. "Why, I had never considered the possibility, Jubal. Mike can't lie, you know."
"Does it involve lying? Suppose he planted perfectly true rumors about himself? But ones that can't be proved in court?"
"Do you think Michael would do that?"
"I don't know. I do know that the slickest way in the world to lie is to tell the right amount of truth at the right time - and then shut up. And it wouldn't be the first time that persecution has been courted for its headline value. All right, I'll dismiss it from my mind unless it turns out he can't handle it. Are you still 'Front'?"
"If you can refrain from chucking Abby under the chin and saying cootchy-coo and similar uncommercial noises, I'll fetch her. Otherwise I had better tell Dorcas to get up and get to work."
"Bring in Abby. I'm going to make an honest effort to make some commercial noises - a brand-new plot, known as boy-meets-girl."
"Say, that's a good one, Boss! I wonder why nobody ever thought of it before? Half a sec-" She hurried out.
Jubal did restrain himself - less than one minute of uncommercial noises and demonstrations, just enough to invoke Abigail's heavenly smile, cum dimples, then Anne settled back and let the infant nurse. "Title:" he began. "'Girls Are Like Boys, Only More So.' Begin. Henry M. Haversham Fourth had been very carefully reared, He believed that there were only two kinds of girls: those in his presence and those who were not. He vastly preferred the latter sort, especially when they stayed that way. Paragraph. He had not been introduced to the young lady who fell into his lap, and he did not consider a common disaster as equivalent to a formal intro-' What the hell do you want? Can't you see I'm working?"
"Boss-" said Larry.
"Get out of that door, close it behind you, and-"
"Boss! Mike's church has burned down!"
They made a disorderly rout for Larry's room, Jubal a half length behind Larry at the turn, Anne with eleven pounds up closing rapidly despite her handicap. Dorcas trailed the field through being late out the starting gate; the racket wakened her.
"-midnight last night. What you are now viewing is what was the main entrance of the cult's temple, as it appeared immediately after the explosion. This is your Neighborly Newsman for New World Networks with your midmorning roundup. Stay switched to this pitch for dirt that's alert, And now a moment for your local sponsor-" The scene of destruction shimmered out and med-close shot of a lovely young housewife replaced, with dolly-in.
"Damn, Larry, unplug that contraption and wheel it into the study. Anne - no, Dorcas. Phone Ben."
Anne protested, "You know the Temple never had a telephone - ever. How can she?"
"Then have somebody chase over and - no, of course not; the Temple wouldn't have anybody - uh, call the chief of police there. No, the district attorney. The last you heard Mike was still in jail?"
"That's right."
"I hope he still is - and all the others, too."
"So do I. Dorcas, take Abby. I'll do it."
But as they returned to the study the phone was signalling an incoming call and demanding hush amp; scramble. Jubal cursed and set the combo, intending to blast whoever it was off the frequency.
But it was Ben Caxton. "Hi, Jubal."
"Ben! What the hell is the situation?"
"I see you've had some of the news. That's why I called, to put your mind at rest. Everything is under control. No sweat."
"What about the fire? Anybody hurt?"
"No damage at all. Mike says to tell you-"
"No damage? I just saw a shot of it; it looked like a total-"
"Oh, that-" Ben shrugged it off. "Look, Jubal, please listen and let me talk. I've got other things and other calls after this one. You aren't the only person who needs to be reassured. But Mike said to call you first."
"Uh� very well, sir. I shall keep silent."
"Nobody hurt, nobody even scorched. Oh, a couple of million dollars in property damage, most of it uninsured. Nichevo. The place was already choked with experiences; Mike planned to abandon it soon in any case. Yes, it was fireproof - but anything will burn with enough gasoline and dynamite."
"Incendiary job, huh?"
"Please, Jubal. They had arrested eight of us - all they could catch of the Ninth Circle, John Doe warrants, mostly. Mike had all of us bailed out in a couple of hours, except himself. He's still in the hoosegow-"
"I'll be right there!"
"Take it easy. Mike says for you to come if you want to, but there is absolutely no need for it. His words. And I agree. It would just be a pleasure trip. The fire was set last night while the Temple was empty, everything canceled because of the arrests - empty, that is, except for the Nest. All of us in town, except Mike, were gathered in the Innermost Temple, holding a special Sharing-Water in his honor, when the explosion and fire were set off. So we adjourned to an emergency Nest."
"From the looks of it, you were lucky to get out at all."
"We were completely cut off, Jubal. We're all dead-"
"What?"
"We're all listed as dead or missing so far as the authorities know. You see, nobody left the building after that holocaust started� by any known exit."
"Uh� a 'priest's hole' arrangement?"
"Jubal, Mike has very special methods for dealing with such things - and I'm not going to discuss them over the phone, even scrambled."
"You said he was in jail?"
"So I did. He still is."
"But-"
"That's enough. If you do come here, don't go to the Temple. It's kaput. Our organization is busted up. We're through in this town. You could say that they've licked us, I suppose. I'm not going to tell you where we are� and I'm not calling from there, anyhow. If you must come - and I see no point in it; there's nothing you can do - just come as you ordinarily would� and we'll find you."
"That's all. Good-by. Anne, Dorcas, Larry - and you, too, Jubal, and the baby. Share water. Thou art God." The screen went blank.
Jubal swore. "I knew it! I knew it all along! That's what comes of mucking around with religion. Dorcas, get me a taxi. Anne - no, finish feeding your child. Larry, pack me a small bag. Anne, I'll want most of the iron money and Larry can go into town tomorrow and replenish the supply."
"But, Boss," protested Larry, "we're all going."
"Certainly we are," Anne agreed crisply.
"Pipe down, Anne. And close your mouth, Dorcas. This is not a time when women have the vote. That city is the front line at the moment and anything can happen. Larry, you are going to stay here and protect two women and a baby. Forget that about going to the bank; you won't need cash because none of you is to stir off the place until I'm back. Somebody is playing rough and there is enough hook up between this house and that church that they might play rough here, too. Larry, flood lights all night long, heat up the fence, don't hesitate to shoot. And don't be slow about getting everybody into the vault if necessary - better put Abby's crib in there at once. Now get with it, all of you - I've got to change clothes."
Thirty minutes later Jubal was alone, by choice, in his suite; the rest were busy at assigned tasks. Larry called up, "Boss! Taxi about to land."
"Be right down," he called back, then turned to take a last look at the Fallen Caryatid. His eyes were filled with tears. He said softly, "You tried, didn't you, youngster? But that stone was always too heavy� too heavy for anyone."
Gently he touched a hand of the crumpled figure, turned and left.

XXXV

JUBAL HAD A MISERABLE TRIP. The taxi was automatic and it did just what he expected of machinery, developed trouble in the air and homed for maintenance instead of carrying out its orders. Jubal wound up in New York, farther from where he wanted to be than when he started. There he found that he could make better time by commercial schedule than he could by any charter available. So he arrived hours later than he expected to, having spent the time cooped up with strangers (which he detested) and watching a stereo tank (which he detested only slightly less).
But it did inform him somewhat. He saw an insert of Supreme Bishop Short proclaiming a holy war against the Antichrist, i.e� Mike, and he saw too many shots of what was obviously an utterly ruined building - he failed to see how any of them had escaped alive. Augustus Greaves, in his most solemn lippmann tones, viewed with alarm everything about it but pointed out that, in every spite-fence quarrel, one neighbor supplies the original incitement - and made it plain that, in his weasel-worded opinion, the so-called Man from Mars was at fault.
At last Jubal stood on a municipal landing flat sweltering in winter clothes unsuited to the blazing sun overhead, noted that palm trees still looked like a poor grade of feather duster, regarded bleakly the ocean beyond them, thinking that it was a dirty unstable mass of water, certainly contaminated with grape fruit shells and human excrement even though he couldn't see such at this distance - and wondered what to do next.
A man wearing a uniform cap approached him. "Taxi, sir?"
"Uh, yes, I think so." At worst he could go to a hotel, call in the press, and give out an interview that would publicize his whereabouts - there was occasionally some advantage to being newsworthy.
"Over this way, sir." The cabby led him out of the crowd and to a battered Yellow Cab. As he put his bag in after Jubal, the pilot said quietly, "I offer you Water."
"Eh? Never thirst."
"Thou art God." The hack driver sealed the door and got into his own compartment.
They wound up on a private landing flat on one wing of a big beach hotel - a four-car space, the hotel's own landing flat being on another wing. The pilot set the cab to home-in alone, took Jubal's bag and escorted him inside. "You couldn't have come in too easily via the lobby," he said conversationally, "as the foyer on this floor is filled with some very badtempered cobras. So if you decide you want to go down to the street, be sure to ask somebody first. Me, or anybody - I'm Tim."
"I'm Jubal Harshaw."
"I know, brother Jubal. In this way. Mind your step." They entered the hotel suite of the large, extreme luxury sort, and Jubal was led on into a bedroom with bath; Tim said, "This is yours," put Jubal's bag down and left. On the side table Jubal found water, glasses, ice cubes, and a bottle of brandy, opened but untouched. He was unsurprised to find that it was his preferred brand. He mixed himself a quick one, sipped it and sighed, then took off his heavy winter jacket.
A woman came in bearing a tray of sandwiches. She was wearing a plain dress which Jubal took to be the uniform of a hotel chambermaid since it was quite unlike the shorts, scarves, pediskirts, halters, sarongs and other bright-colored ways to display rather than conceal that characterized most females in this resort. But she smiled at him, said, "Drink deep and never thirst, our brother," put the tray down, went into his bath and started a tub for him, then checked around by eye in bath and in bedroom. "Is there anything you need, Jubal?"
"Me? Oh, no, everything is just fine. I'll make a quick cleanup and - is Ben Caxton around?"
"Yes. But he said you would want a bath and get comfortable first. If you want anything, just say so. Ask anyone. Or ask for me. I'm Patty."
"Oh! The Life of Archangel Foster."
She dimpled and suddenly was not plain but pretty, and much younger than the thirtyish Jubal had guessed her to be. "Yes."
"I'd like very much to see it some time. I'm interested in religious art."
"Now? No, I grok you want your bath. Unless you'd like help with your bath?"
Jubal recalled that his Japanese friend of the many tattoos had been a bath girl in her teens and would have made - had, many times - the same offer. But Patty was not Japanese and he simply wanted to wash away the sweat and stink and get into clothes suited to the climate. "No, thank you, Patty. But I do want to see them, at your convenience."
"Any time. There's no hurry." She left, unhurried but moving silently and very quickly.
Jubal soaped and dunked himself and refrained from lounging as the warm water invited his tired muscles to do; he wanted to see Ben and find out the score. Shortly he was checking through what Larry had packed for him and grunted with annoyance to find no summerweight slacks. He settled for sandals, shorts, and a bright sport shirt, which made him look like a paint-splashed emu and accented his hairy, thinning legs. But Jubal had ceased worrying about his appearance several decades earlier; it was comfortable and it would do, at least until he needed to go out on the Street� or into court. Did the bar association here have reciprocity with Pennsylvania? He couldn't recall. Well, it was always possible to act with another attorney-of-record.
He found his way into a large living room, most comfortable but having that impersonal quality of all hotel accommodations. Several people were gathered near the largest stereovision tank Jubal had ever seen outside a theater. One of them glanced up, said, "Hi, Jubal," and came toward him.
"Hi, Ben. What's the situation? Is Mike still in jail?"
"Oh, no. He got out shortly after I talked to you."
"He's been arraigned then. Is the preliminary hearing set?"
Ben smiled. "That's not quite the way it is, Jubal. Mike is technically a fugitive from justice. He wasn't released on bail. He escaped."
Jubal looked disgusted. "What a silly thing to do. Now the case will be eight times as difficult."
"Jubal, I told you not to worry. All the rest of us are presumed dead - and Mike is simply missing. We're through with this city, so it doesn't matter in the least. We'll go someplace else."
"They'll extradite him."
"Never fear. They won't."
"Well� where is he? I want to talk to him."
"Oh, he's right here, a couple of rooms down from you. But he's withdrawn in meditation. He left word to tell you, when you arrived, to take no action - none. You can talk to him right now if you insist; Jill will call him out of it. But I don't recommend it. There's no hurry."
Jubal thought about it, admitted that he was damnably eager to hear from Mike himself just what the score was - and chew him out for having gotten into such a mess - but admitted, too, that disturbing Mike while he was in a trance was almost certainly much worse than disturbing Jubal himself when he was dictating a story - the boy always came out of his self-hypnosis when he had "grokked the fullness," whatever that was - and if he hadn't, then he always needed to go back into it. As pointless as disturbing a hibernating bear.
"All right, I'll wait. But I want to talk to him when he wakes up."
"You will. Now relax and be happy. Let the trip get out of your system." Ben urged him toward the group around the stereo tank.
Anne looked up. "Hello, Boss." She moved over and made room. "Sit down."
Jubal joined her. "May I ask what the devil you are doing here?"
"The same thing you're doing - nothing. Watching stereo. Jubal, please don't get heavy-handed because we didn't do what you told us. We belong here as much as you do. You shouldn't have told us not to come� but you were too upset for us to argue with you. So relax and watch what they're saying about us. The sheriff has just announced that he's going to run all us whores out of town." She smiled. "I've never been run out of town before. It should be interesting. Does a whore get ridden on a rail? Or will I have to walk?"
"I don't think there's protocol in the matter. You all came?"
"Yes, but don't fret. Jed McClintock is sleeping in the house. Larry and I made a standing arrangement with the McClintock boys for one of them to do so, more than a year ago - just in case. They know how the furnace works and where the switches are and things; it's all right."
"Hmm! I'm beginning to think I'm just a boarder there."
"Were you ever anything else, Boss? You expect us to run it without bothering you. We do. But it's a shame you didn't relax and let us all travel together. We got here more than two hours ago - you must have had some trouble."
"I did, A terrible trip. Anne, once I get home I don't intend ever to set foot off the place again in my life� and I'm going to yank out the telephone and take a sledgehammer to the babble box."
"Yes, Boss."
"This time I mean it." He glanced at the giant babble box in front of him. "Do those commercials go on forever? Where's my goddaughter? Don't tell me you left her to the mercies of McClintock's idiot sons!"
"Oh, of course not. She's here. She even has her own nursemaid, thank God."
"I want to see her."
"Patty will show her to you. I'm bored with her - she was a perfect little beast all the way down. Patty dear! Jubal wants to see Abby."
The tattooed woman checked one of her unhurried dashes through the room - so far as Jubal could see, she was the only one of the several present who was doing any work, and she seemed to be everywhere at once. "Certainly, Jubal. I'm not busy. Down this way.
"I've got the kids in my room," she explained, while Jubal strove to keep up with her, "so that Honey Bun can watch them."
Jubal was mildly startled to see, a moment later, what Patricia meant by that. The boa was arranged on one of twin double beds in squared-off loops that formed a nest - a twin nest, as one bight of the snake had been pulled across to bisect the square, making two crib-sized pockets, each padded with a baby blanket and each containing a baby.
The ophidian nursemaid raised her head inquiringly as they came in. Patty stroked it and said, "It's all right, dear. Father Jubal wants to see them. Pet her a little, and let her grok you, so that she will know you next time."
First Jubal coochey-cooed at his favorite girl friend when she gurgled at him and kicked, then petted the snake. He decided that it was the handsomest specimen of Bojdae he had ever seen, as well as the biggest - longer, he estimated, than any other boa constrictor in captivity. Its cross bars were sharply marked and the brighter colors of the tail quite showy. He envied Patty her blue-ribbon pet and regretted that he would not have more time in which to get friendly with it.
The snake rubbed her head against his hand like a cat. Patty picked up Abby and said, "Just as I thought. Honey Bun, why didn't you tell me?"- then explained, as she started to change diapers, "She tells me at once if one of them gets tangled up, or needs help, or anything, since she can't do much for them herself - no hands - except nudge them back if they try to crawl out and might fall. But she just can't seem to grok that a wet baby ought to be changed - Honey Bun doesn't see anything wrong about that. And neither does Abby."
"I know. We call her 'Old Faithful.' Who's the other cutie pie?"
"Huh? That's Fatima Michele, I thought you knew."
"Are they here? I thought they were in Beirut!"
"Why, I believe they did come from some one of those foreign parts. I don't know just where. Maybe Maryam told me but it wouldn't mean anything to me; I've never been anywhere. Not that it matters; I grok all places are alike - just people. There, do you want to hold Abigail Zenobia while I check Fatima?"
Jubal did so and assured her that she was the most beautiful girl in the world, then shortly thereafter assured Fatima of the same thing. He was completely sincere each time and the girls believed him - Jubal had said the same thing on countless occasions starting in the Harding administration, had always meant it and had always been believed. It was a Higher Truth, not bound by mundane logic.
Regretfully he left them, after again petting Honey Bun and telling her the same thing, and just as sincerely.
They left and at once ran into Fatima's mother. "Boss honey!" She kissed him and patted his tummy. "I see they've kept you fed."
"Some. I've just been in smooching with your daughter, She's an angel doll, Miriam."
"Pretty good baby, huh? We're going to sell her down to Rio - get a fancy price for her."
"I thought the market was better in Yemen?"
"Stinky says not. Got to sell her to make room." She put his hand on her belly. "Feel the bulge? Stinky and I are making a boy now - got no time for daughters."
"Maryam," Patricia said chidingly, "that's no way to talk, even in fun."
"Sorry, Patty. I won't talk that way about your baby - Aunt Patty is a lady, and groks that I'm not."
"I grok that you aren't, too, you little hellion, But if Fatima is for sale, I'll give you twice your best commercial offer."
"You'll have to take it up with Aunt Patty; I'm merely allowed to see her occasionally."
"And you don't bulge, so you may want to keep her yourself. Let me see your eyes. Mmm� could be."
"Is. And Mike has grokked it most carefully and tells Stinky he's made a boy."
"How can Mike grok that? Impossible. I'm not even sure you're pregnant-"
"Oh, she is, Jubal," Patricia confirmed.
Miriam looked at him serenely. "Still the skeptic, Boss. Mike grokked it while Stinky and I were still in Beirut, before we were sure we had caught. So Mike phoned us. And the next day Stinky told the university that we were taking a sabbatical for field work - or his resignation, if they wished. So here we are."
"Doing what?"
"Working. Working harder than you ever made me work, Boss - my husband is a slave driver."
"Doing what?"
"They're writing a Martian dictionary," Patty told him.
"Martian to English? That must be difficult."
"Oh, no, no, no!" Miriam looked almost shocked. "That wouldn't be difficult, that would be impossible. A Martian dictionary in Martian. There's never been one before; the Martians don't need such things. Uh, my part of it is just clerical; I type what they do. Mike and Stinky - mostly Stinky - worked out a phonetic script for Martian, eighty-one characters. So we had an I.B.M. typer worked over for those characters, using both upper and lower case - Boss darling, I'm ruined as a secretary; I type touch system in Martian now. Will you love me anyhow? When you shout 'Front!' and I'm not good for anything? I can still cook� and I'm told that I have other talents."
"I'll learn to dictate in Martian."
"You will, before Mike and Stinky get through with you. I grok. Eh, Patty?"
"You speak rightly, my brother."
They returned to the living room, Caxton joined them and suggested finding a quieter place, away from the giant babble box, led Jubal down a passage and into another living room. "You seem to have most of this floor"
"All of it," agreed Ben. "Four suites - the Secretarial; the Presidential, the Royal, and Owner's Cabin, opened into one and not accessible other than by our own landing fiat. except through a foyer that is not very healthy without help. You were warned about that?"
"Yes."
"We don't need so much room right now� but we may: people are flocking in."
"Ben, how can you hide from the cops as openly as this? The hotel staff alone will give you away."
"Oh, there are ways - the staff doesn't come up here. You see, Mike owns the hotel."
"So much the worse, I would think-"
"So much the better� unless our doughty police chief has Mr. Douglas on his payroll, which I doubt. Mike bought it through about four links of dummies and Douglas doesn't snoop into why Mike wants things done. Douglas doesn't despise me quite as much since Os Kilgallen took over my column, I think, but nevertheless he doesn't want to surrender control to me - he does what Mike wants. The hotel is a sound investment; it makes money but the owner of record is one of our clandestine Ninth Circle. So the owner decides he wants this floor for the season and the manager can't and doesn't and wouldn't want to inquire into why, or how many guests of his own the owner has coming or going - he likes his job; Mike is paying him more than he's worth. It's a pretty good hide-out, for the time being. 'Till Mike groks where we will go next."
"Sounds like Mike had anticipated a need for a hide-out."
"Oh, I'm sure he did. Almost two weeks ago Mike cleared out the nestlings' nest except for Maryam and her baby; Maryam is needed for the job she's on. Mike sent the parents with children to other cities - places he means to open temples, I think - and when the time came, there were just about a dozen of us to move. No sweat."
"As it was, you barely got out with your lives, I take it." Jubal wondered how they had even managed to grab clothes in view of how they probably were not dressed. "You lost all the contents of the Nest? All your personal possessions?"
"Oh, no, not anything we really wanted. Stuff like Stinky's language tapes and a trick typer that Maryam uses; even that horrible Madame Tussaud picture of you. And Mike grabbed our clothes and some cash that was on hand."
Jubal objected, "You say Mike did this? But I thought Mike was in jail when the fire broke out."
"Uh, he was and he wasn't. His body was in jail� curled up in withdrawal. But he was actually with us. You understand?"
"Uh, I don't grok."
"Rapport. He was inside Jill's head, mostly, but we were all pretty closely tied in together. Jubal, I can't explain it; you have to do it. When the explosion hit, he moved us over here. Then he went back and saved the minor stuff worth saving."
Jubal frowned. Caxton said impatiently, "Teleportation, of course. What's so hard to grok about it, Jubal? You yourself told me to come down here and open my eyes and know a miracle when I saw one. So I did and they were. Only they aren't miracles, any more than radio is a miracle. Do you grok radio? Or stereovision? Or electronic computers?"
"Me? No."
"Nor do I, I've never studied electronics. But I'm sure I could if I took the time and the hard sweat to learn the language of e1ctronics. I don't think it's miraculous - just complex. Teleportation is quite simple, once you learn the language - it's the language that is so difficult."
"Ben, you can teleport things?"
"Me? Oh, no, they don't teach that in kindergarten. Oh, I'm a deacon by courtesy, simply because I'm 'First Called' and Ninth Circle - but my actual progress is about Fourth Circle, bucking for Fifth. Why, I'm just beginning to get control of my own body. Patty is the only one of us who uses teleportation herself with any regularity� and I'm not sure she ever does it without Mike's support. Oh, Mike says she's quite capable of it, but Patty is such a curiously naive and humble person for the genius she is that she is quite dependent on Mike. Which she needn't be. Jubal, I grok this: we don't actually need Mike - Oh, I'm not running him down; don't get me wrong. But you could have been the Man from Mars. Or even me.
It's like the first man to discover fire. Fire was there all along - and after he showed that it could be used, anybody could use it� anybody with sense and savvy enough not to get burned with it. Follow me?"
"I grok, somewhat at least."
"Mike is our Prometheus - but remember, Prometheus was not God. Mike keeps emphasizing this. Thou art God, I am God, he is God that groks. Mike is a man along with the rest of us� even though he knows more. A very superior man, admittedly - a lesser man, taught the things the Martians know, probably would have set himself up as a pipsqueak god. Mike is above that temptation. Prometheus� but that's all,"
Jubal said slowly, "As I recall, Prometheus paid a high price for bringing fire to mankind."
"And don't think that Mike doesn't! He pays with twenty-four hours of work every day, seven days a week, trying to teach a few of us how to play with matches without getting burned. Jill and Patty lowered the boom on him, started making him take one night a week off, long before I joined up." Caxton smiled. "But you can't stop Mike. This burg is loaded with gambling joints, no doubt you know, and most of them crooked since it's against the law here. Mike usually spends his night off bucking crooked games - and winning. Picks up ten, twenty, thirty thousand dollars a night. They tried to mug him, they tried to kill him, they tried knock-out drops and muscle boys - nothing worked; he simply ran up a reputation as the luckiest man in town� which brought more people into the Temple; they wanted to see this man who always won. So they tried to shut him out of the games - which was a mistake. Their cold decks froze solid, their wheels wouldn't spin, their dice would roll nothing but box cars. At last they started putting up with him� and requesting him politely to please move along after he had won a few grand. Mike would always do so, if asked politely."
Caxton added, "Of course that's one more power bloc we've got against us. Not just the Fosterites and some of the other churches - but the gambling syndicate and the city political machine. I rather suppose that job done on the Temple was by professionals brought in from out of town - I doubt if the Fosterite goon squads touched it. Too professional."
While they talked, people came in, went out again, formed groups themselves or joined Jubal and Ben. Jubal found in them a most unusual feeling, an unhurried relaxation that at the same time was a dynamic tension. No one seemed excited, never in a hurry� yet everything they did seemed purposeful, even gestures as apparently accidental and unpremeditated as encountering one another and marking it with a kiss or a greeting - or sometimes not. It felt to Jubal as if each move had been planned by a master choreographer� yet obviously was not.
The quiet and the increasing tension - or rather "expectancy," he decided; these people were not tense in any morbid fashion - reminded Jubal of something he had known in the past. Surgery? With a master at work, no noise, no lost motions? A little.
Then he recalled it. Once, many years earlier when gigantic chemically powered rockets were used for the earliest probing of space from the third planet, he had watched a count-down in a block house� and he recalled now the same low voices, the same relaxed, very diverse but coordinated actions, the same rising exultant expectancy as the count grew ever smaller. They were "waiting for fullness," that was certain. But for what? Why were they so happy? Their Temple and all they had built had just been destroyed� yet they seemed like kids on the night before Christmas.
Jubal had noted in passing, when he arrived, that the nudity Ben had been so disturbed by on his abortive first visit to the Nest did not seem to be the practice in this surrogate Nest, although private enough in location. Then Jubal realized later that he had failed to notice such cases when they did appear; he had himself become so much in the unique close-family mood of the place that being dressed or not had become an unnoticeable irrelevancy.
When he did notice, it was not skin but the thickest, most beautiful cascade of black hair he had ever seen, gracing a young woman who came in, spoke to someone, threw Ben a kiss, glanced gravely at Jubal, and left. Jubal followed her with his eyes, appreciating that flowing mass of midnight plumage. Only after she left did he realize that she had not been dressed other than in her queenly crowning glory� and then realized, too, that she was not the first of his brothers in that fashion.
Ben noticed his glance. "That's Ruth," he said. "New high priestess. She and her husband have been away, clear on the other coast - their mission was to prepare a branch temple, I think. I'm glad they're back. It's beginning to look as if the whole family will be home at once - like an oldfashioned Christmas dinner."
"Beautiful head of hair. I wish she had tarried."
"Then why didn't you call her over?"
"Eh?"
"Ruth almost certainly found an excuse to come in here just to catch a glimpse of you - I suppose they must have just arrived. But haven't you noticed that we have been left pretty much alone, except for a few who sat down with us, didn't say much, then left?"
"Well� yes." Jubal had noticed and had been a touch disappointed, as he had been braced, by all that he had heard, to ward off undue intimacy - and had found that he had stepped on a top step that wasn't there. He had been treated with hospitality and politeness, but it was more like the politeness of a cat than that of an over-friendly dog.
"They are all terribly interested in the fact that you are here and are very anxious to see you� but they are a little bit afraid of you, too."
"Me?"
"Oh, I told you this last summer. You're a venerable tradition of the church, not quite real and a bit more than life size. Mike has told them that you are the only human being he knows of who can 'grok in fullness' without needing to learn Martian first. Most of them suspect that you can read minds as perfectly as Mike does."
"Oh, what poppycock! I hope you disabused them?"
"Who am I to destroy a myth? Perhaps you do read minds - I'm sure you wouldn't tell me. They are just a touch afraid of you - YOU eat babies for breakfast and when you roar the ground trembles. Any of them would be delighted to have you call them over� but they won't force themselves on you. They know that even Mike stands at attention and says 'sir' when you speak."
Jubal dismissed the whole idea with one short, explosive word.
"Certainly," Ben agreed. "Even Mike has his blind spots - I told you he was only human. But that's how it is. You're the patron saint of this church - and you're stuck with it."
"Well� there's somebody I know, just came in. Jill! Jill! Turn around, dear!"
The woman turned rather hesitantly. "I'm Dawn. But thank you." She came over, however, and Jubal thought for an instant that she was going to kiss him� and decided not to duck it. But she either had not that intention, or changed her mind. She dropped to one knee, took his hand and kissed it. "Father Jubal. We welcome you and drink deep of you."
Jubal snatched his hand away. "Oh, for heaven's sake, child! Get up from there and sit with us. Share water."
"Yes, Father Jubal."
"Uh� and call me Jubal - and pass the word around that I don't appreciate being treated like a leper. I'm in the bosom of my family - I hope."
"You are� Jubal."
"So I expect to be called Jubal and treated as a water brother - no more, no less. The first one who treats me with respect will be required to stay in after school. Grok?"
"Yes, Jubal," she answered demurely. "I've told them. They will."
"Huh?"
"Dawn means," explained Ben, "that she's told Patty, probably, since Mike is withdrawn at the moment� and that Patty is telling everybody who can hear easily - with his inner ear - and they are passing the word to any who are still a bit deaf, like myself."
"Yes," agreed Dawn, "except that I told Jill - Patty has gone outside for something Michael wants. Jubal, have you been watching any of what is showing in the stereo tank? It's very exciting."
"Eh? No."
"You mean the jail break, Dawn?"
"Yes, Ben"
"We hadn't discussed that - and Jubal doesn't like stereo. Jubal, Mike didn't merely crush out and come home when he felt like it; he gave them a dilemma to sit on. Here he has just been arrested for everything but raping the Statue of Liberty, with Bigmouth Short denouncing him as the Antichrist on the same day. So he gave 'em miracles to chew on. He threw away every bar and door in the county jail as he left� did the same at the state prison just out of town for good measure, and disarmed all the police forces, city, county, and state. Partly to keep 'em busy and interested� and partly because Mike just purely despises locking a man up for any reason at all. He groks a great wrongness in it."
"That fits," Jubal agreed. "Mike is gentle, always. It would hurt him to have anybody locked up. I agree."
Ben shook his head. "Mike isn't gentle, Jubal. Killing a man wouldn't worry him. But he's the ultimate anarchist - locking a man up is a wrongness. Freedom of self-and utter personal responsibility for self. Thou art God."
"Wherein lies the conflict, sir? Killing a man might be necessary. But confining him is an offense against his integrity - and your own."
Ben looked at him. "I grok Mike was right. You do grok in fullness - his way. I don't quite - I'm still learning." He added, "How are they taking it, Dawn?"
She giggled slightly. "Like a stirred-up hornets' nest. The mayor has been on� and he's frothing at the mouth. He's demanded help from the state and from the Federation - and he's getting it; we've seen lots of troop carriers landing. But as they pour out, Mike is stripping them - not just their weapons. even their shoes - and as soon as the troop carrier is empty, it goes, too."
Ben said, "I grok he'll stay withdrawn until they get tired and give up. Handling that many details he would almost have to stay in it and on eternal time."
Dawn looked thoughtful. "No, I don't think so, Ben. Of course I would have to, in order to handle even a tenth so much. But I grok Michael could do it riding a bicycle while standing on his head."
"Mmm� I wouldn't know, I'm still making mud pies." Ben stood up. "Sometimes you miracle workers give me a slight pain, honey child. I'm going to go watch the tank for a while." He stopped to kiss her. "You entertain old Pappy Jubal; he likes little girls." Caxton left and a package of cigarettes he had left on a coffee table got up, followed him, and placed themselves in one of his pockets.
Jubal said, "Did you do that? Or Ben?"
"Ben did. I don't smoke, unless the man I'm with wants to smoke. But he's always forgetting his cigarettes; they chase him all over the Nest."
"Hmmm� pretty fair-sized mud pies he makes these days."
"Ben is advancing much more rapidly than he will ever admit. He's a very holy person - but he hates to admit it. He's shy."
"Umph. Dawn, you are the Dawn Ardent I met at Foster Tabernacle about two and half years ago, aren't you?"
"Oh, you remember!!" She looked as if he had handed her a lollipop.
"Of course I remember. But I was slightly puzzled. You've changed some. All for the better. You seem much more beautiful."
"That's because I am more beautiful," she said simply. "You mistook me for Gillian. And she is more beautiful, too."
"Where is that child? I haven't seen her� and I expected to see her at once."
"She's been working." Dawn paused. "But I told her and she says she's coming in." She paused again. "And I am to take her place. If you will excuse me."
"Oh, certainly. Run along, child."
"There's no hurry." But she did get up and leave almost at once as Dr. Mahmoud sat down.
Jubal looked at him sourly. "You might at least have had the common courtesy to let me know that you were in this country instead of letting me meet my goddaughter for the first time through the good offices of a snake."
"Oh, Jubal, you're always in such a bloody hurry,"
"Sir, when one is of-" Jubal was interrupted by two hands placed over his eyes from behind. A well-remembered voice demanded:
"Guess who?"
"Beelzebub?"
"Try again."
"Lady Macbeth?"
"Much closer. Third guess, or a forfeit."
"Gillian, stop that and come around here and sit beside me."
"Yes, Father." She obeyed.
"And knock off calling me 'Father' anywhere but home. Sir, I was saying that when one is of my age, one is necessarily in a hurry about some things. Each sunrise is a precious jewel� for it may never be followed by its sunset. The world may end at any moment."
Mahmoud smiled at him. "Jubal, are you under the impression that if you stop cranking, the world stops going around?"
"Most certainly, sir - from my viewpoint." Miriam joined them silently, sat down on Jubal's free side; he put an arm around her. "While I might not be honing to see your ugly face again� nor even to gaze on the somewhat more acceptable one of my former secretary-"
Miriam whispered, "Boss, are you honing for a kick in the stomach? I'm exquisitely beautiful; I have it on highest authority."
"Quiet. -new goddaughters are in another category. Through your failure to drop me so much as a postcard, I might have missed seeing Fatima Michele. In which case I would have returned to haunt you."
"In which case," Miriam pointed out, "you could take a took at Micky at the same time� rubbing strained carrots in her hair. A disgusting sight."
"I was speaking metaphorically."
"I wasn't. She's a sloppy trencherman."
"Why," asked Jill quietly, "were you speaking metaphorically, Boss?"
"Eh? The concept 'ghost' is one I feel no need for, other than as a figure of speech."
"It's more than a figure of speech," insisted Jill.
"Uh� as may be. I prefer to meet baby girls in the flesh, including my own."
Dr. Malmoud said, "But that is what I was saying, Jubal. You aren't about to die; you aren't even close to it. Mike has grokked you to be certain. He says you have a long stretch of years ahead of you."
Jubal shook his head. "I set a top limit of three figures years ago. No more."
"Which three figures, Boss?" Miriam inquired innocently. "The three Methuselah used?"
He shook her shoulders. "Don't be obscene!"
"Stinky says women should be obscene but not heard."
"Your husband speaks rightly. So pipe down. The day my machine first shows three figures on its mileage meter is the day I discorporate, whether Martian style or by my own crude methods. You can't take that away from me. Going to the showers is the best part of the game."
"I grok you speak rightly, Jubal," Jill said slowly, "about its being the best part of the game. But I wouldn't count on it any time soon. Your fullness is not yet. Allie cast a horoscope on you just last week."
"A horoscope? Oh, my God! Who is 'Ailie?' And how dare she cast a horoscope on me! Show her to me! Swelp me, I'll turn her in to the Better Business Bureau."
"I'm afraid you can't, Jubal," Mahmoud put in, "just now, as she is working on our dictionary. As to who she is, she's Madame Alexandra Vesant."
Jubal sat up and looked pleased. "Becky? Is she in this nut house, too? I should have known it. Where is she?"
"Yes, Becky. But we call her 'Allie' because we've got another Becky. But you'll have to wait. And don't scoff at her horoscopes, Jubal; she has the Sight."
"Oh, balderdash, Stinky. Astrology is nonsense and you know it."
"Oh, certainly. Even Allie knows it. And a percentage of astrologers are clumsy frauds. Nevertheless Allie practices it even more assiduously than she used to, when she did it for the public - using Martian arithmetic now and Martian astronomy - much fuller than ours. But it's her device for grokking, It could be gazing into a pool of water, or a crystal ball, or examining the entrails of a chicken. The means she uses to get into the mood do not matter and Mike has advised her to go on using the symbols she is used to. The point is: she has the Sight."
"What the hell do you mean by 'the Sight,' Stinky?"
"The ability to grok more of the universe than that little piece you happen to be sitting on at the moment. Mike has it from years of Martian discipline; Allie was an untrained semi-adept. The fact that she used as meaningless a symbol as astrology is beside the point. A rosary is meaningless, too - I speak of a Muslim rosary, of course; I'm not criticizing our competitors across the street." Mahmoud reached into his pocket, got out one, started fingering it. "If it helps to turn your hat around during a poker game - then it helps. It is irrelevant that the hat has no magic powers and cannot grok."
Jubal looked at the Islamic device for meditation and ventured a question he had hesitated to put before. "Then I take it you are still one of the Faithful? I had thought perhaps that you had joined Mike's church all the way."
Mahmoud put away the beads. "I have done both."
"Huh? Stinky, they're incompatible. Or else I don't grok either one."
Mahmoud shook his head. "Only on the surface. You could say, I suppose, that Maryam took my religion and I took hers; we consolidated. But, Jubal my beloved brother, I am still God's slave, submissive to His will� and nevertheless can say: 'Thou art God, I am God, all that groks is God.' The Prophet never asserted that he was the last of all prophets nor did he claim to have said all there was to say - only fanatics after his lifetime insisted on those two very misleading fallacies. Submission to God's will is not to become a blind robot, incapable of free decision and thus of sin - and the Koran does not say that. Submission can include - and does include - utter responsibility for the fashion in which I, and each of us, shape the universe. It is ours to turn into a heavenly garden or to rend and destroy." He smiled. "'With God all things are possible,' if I may borrow for a moment - except one thing� the one Impossible. God cannot escape Himself, He cannot abdicate His own total responsibility - He forever must remain submissive to His own will. Islam remains - He cannot pass the buck. It is His - mine� yours Mike's."
Jubal heaved a sigh. "Stinky, theology always gives me the pip. Where's Becky? Can't she knock off this dictionary work and say hello to an old friend? I've seen her only once in the last twenty-odd years; that's too long."
"You'll see her. But she can't stop now, she's dictating. Let me explain the technique, so that you won't insist. Up to now, I've been spending part of each day in rapport with Mike - just a few moments although it feels like an eight-hour day. Then I would immediately dictate all that he had poured into me onto tape. From those tapes several other people, trained in Martian phonetics but not necessarily advanced students, would make long-hand phonetic transcriptions. Then Maryam would type them out, using a special typer - and this master copy Mike or I - Mike by choice, but his time is choked - would correct by hand.
"But our schedule has been disturbed now, and Mike groks that he is going to send Maryam and me away to some Shangri-la to finish the job - or, more correctly, he has grokked that we will grok such a necessity. So Mike is getting months and years of tape completed in order that I can take it away and unhurriedly break it into a phonetic script that humans can learn to read. Besides that, we have stacks of tapes of Mike's lectures - in Martian - that need to be transcribed into print when the dictionary is finished� lectures that we understood at the time with his help but later will need to be printed, with the dictionary.
"Now I am forced to assume that Maryam and I will be leaving quite soon, because, busy as Mike is with a hundred other things, he's changed the method. There are eight bedrooms here equipped with tape recorders. Those of us who can do it best - Patty, Jill, myself; Maryam, your friend Allie, some others - take turns in those rooms. Mike puts us into a short trance, pours language - definitions, idioms, concepts - into us for a few moments that feel like hours� then we dictate at once just what he has poured into us, exactly, while it's still fresh. But it can't be just anybody, even of the Innermost Temple. It requires a sharp accent and the ability to join the trance rapport and then spill out the results. Sam, for example, has everything but the clear accent - he manages, God knows how, to speak Martian with a Bronx accent. Can't use him, it would cause endless errata in the dictionary. And that is what Allie is doing now - dictating. She's still in the semi-trance needed for total recall and, if you interrupt her, she'll lose what she still hasn't recorded."
"I grok," Jubal agreed, "although the picture of Becky Vesey as a Martian adept shakes me a little. Still, she was once one of the best mentalists in show business; she could give a cold reading that would scare any mark right out of his shoes - and loosen his pocketbook. Say, Stinky, if you are going to be sent away for peace and quiet while you unwind all this data, why don't you and Maryam come home? Plenty of room for a study amp; bedroom suite in the new wing."
"Perhaps we shall. Waiting still is."
"Sweetheart," Miriam said earnestly, "that's a solution I would just plain love if Mike pushes us out of the Nest."
"If we grok to leave the Nest, you mean."
"Same thing� you grok."
"You speak rightly, my dear. But when do we eat around here? I feel a most un-Martian urgency inside. The service was better in the Nest."
"You can't expect Patty to work on your dratted old dictionary, see to it that everyone who arrives is comfortable, run errands for Mike, and still have food on the table the instant you get hungry, my love. Jubal, Stinky will never achieve priesthood - he's a slave to his stomach."
"Well, so am I."
"And you girls might give Patty a hand," her husband added.
"That sounds like a crude hint. You know we do, dear, all she will let us - and Tony will hardly allow anyone in his kitchen� even this kitchen." She stood up. "Come on, Jubal, and let's see what's cooking. Tony will be very flattered if you visit his kitchen."
Jubal went with her, was a bit bemused to see telekinesis used in preparing food, met Tony, who scowled until he saw who was with her, then was beamingly proud to show off his workshop, accompanied by a spate of invective in mixed English and Italian at the scoundrels who had destroyed "his" kitchen in the Nest. In the meantime a spoon, unassisted, continued to keel a big pot of spaghetti sauce.
Shortly thereafter Jubal declined to be jockeyed into a seat at the head of a long table, grabbed one elsewhere. Patty sat at one end; the head chair remained vacant� except for an eerie feeling which Jubal suppressed that the Man from Mars was sitting there and that everyone present but himself could see him which was true only in some cases.
Across the table from him was Dr. Nelson.
Jubal discovered that he would have been surprised only if Dr. Nelson had not been present. He nodded and said, "Hi, Sven."
"Hi, Doc. Share water."
"Never thirst. What are you around here? Staff physician?" Nelson shook his bead. "Medical student."
"So. Learn anything?"
"I've learned that medicine isn't necessary."
"If youda ast me, I coulda told yah. Seen Van?"
"He ought to be in sometime late tonight or early tomorrow. His ship grounded today."
"Does he always come here?" inquired Jubal.
"Call him an extension student. He can't spend much time here."
"Well, it will be good to see him. I haven't laid eyes on him for a year and half, about." Jubal picked up a conversation with the man on his right while Nelson talked with Dorcas on his right. Jubal noticed the same tingling expectancy at the table which he had felt before, but reinforced. Yet there was still nothing he could put his finger on, just a quiet family dinner in relaxed intimacy. Once, a glass of water was passed all around the table, but, if there was ritual of words with it, they were spoken too low to carry. When it reached Jubal's placer he took a sip and passed it along to the girl on his left - round-eyed and too awed to make chit-chat with him - and himself said in a low voice, "I offer you water."
She managed to answer, "I thank you for water, Fa- Jubal." That was almost the only word be got out of her. When the glass completed the circuit, reaching the vacant chair at the head of the table, there was perhaps a half inch of water in it. It raised itself, poured, and the water disappeared, then the tumbler placed itself on the cloth. Jubal decided, correctly, that he had taken part in a group Sharing Water of the Innermost Temple� and probably in his honour - although it certainly was not even slightly like the Bacchallalhan revels he had thought accompanied such formal welcome of a brother. Was it because they were in strange surroundings? Or had he read into unexplicit reports what his own id wanted to find in those reports?
Or had they simply toned it down to an ascetic formality out of deference to his age and opinions?
The last seemed the most likely theory - and he found that it vexed him. Of course, he told himself, he was glad to be spared the need to refuse an invitation that he certainly did not want - and would not have relished at any age, his tastes being what they were.
But just the same, damn it - "Don't anybody mention ice skating because Grandmaw is too old and frail for ice skating and it wouldn't be polite. Hulda, you suggest that we play checkers and we'll all chime in - Grandmaw likes checkers. And we'll go ice skating some other time. Okay, kids?"
Jubal resented the respectful consideration, if that was what it was - he would almost have preferred to have gone ice skating anyhow, even at the cost of a broken hip.
But he decided to forget the matter, put it entirely out of mind, which he did with the help of the man on his right, who was as talkative as the girl on his left was not. His name, Jubal learned, was Sam, and presently he learned that Sam was a man of broad and deep scholarship, a trait Jubal valued in anyone when it was not mere parrot learning - and he grokked that in Sam it was not.
"This setback is only apparent," Sam assured him. "The egg was ready to hatch and now we'll spread out. Of course we've had trouble; we'll go on having trouble - because no society, no matter how liberal its law may appear to be, will allow its basic concepts to be challenged with impunity. Which is exactly what we are doing. We are challenging everything from the sanctity of property to the sanctity of marriage."
"Property, too?"
"Property the way it rules today. So far Michael has merely antagonized a few crooked gamblers. But what happens when there are thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands and more, of people who can't be stopped by bank vaults and who have only their self-discipline to restrain them from taking anything they want? To be sure, that discipline is stronger than any possible legal restraint - but no banker can grok that until he himself travels the thorny road to achieve that discipline� and he'll wind up no longer a banker. What happens to the stock market when the illuminati know which way a stock will move - and the brokers don't?"
"Do you know?"
Sam shook his head. "Not interested. But Saul over there - that other big Hebe; he's my cousin - gives it grokking, along with Allie. Michael has them be very cautious about it, no big killings, and they use a dozen-odd dummy accounts - but the fact remains that any of the disciplined can make any amount of money at anything - real estate, stocks, horse races, gambling, you name it - when competing with the half awake. No, I don't think that money and property will disappear - Michael says that both concepts are useful - but I do say that they're going to be turned upside down and inside out to the point where people will have to learn new rules (and that means learn the hard way, just as we have) or be hopelessly outclassed. What happens to Lunar Enterprises when the common carrier between here and Luna City is teleportation?"
"Should I buy? Or sell?"
"Ask Saul. He might use the present corporation, or he might bankrupt it. Or it might be left untouched for a century or two. But besides bankers and brokers, consider any other occupation. How can a school teacher teach a child who knows more than she does and won't hold still for mistaken teaching? What becomes of physicians and dentists when people are truly healthy? What happens to the cloak amp; suit industry and to the I.L.G.W.U. when clothing isn't really needed at all and women aren't so endlessly interested in dressing up (they'll never lose interest entirely) - and nobody gives a damn if he's caught with his arse bare? What shape does 'the Farm Problem' take when weeds can be told not to grow and crops can be harvested without benefit of International Harvester or John Deere? Just name it; it changes beyond recognition when the discipline is applied. Take just one change that will shake both the sanctity of marriage - in its present form - and the sanctity of property. Jubal, do you have any idea how much is spent each year in this country on Malthusian drugs and devices?"
"I have a fairly exact idea, Sam. Almost a billion dollars on oral contraceptives alone this last fiscal year� more than half of which was for patent nostrums about as useful as corn starch."
"Oh, yes, you're a medical man."
"Only in passing. A pack rat mind."
"Either way. What happens to that big industry - and to the shrill threats of moralists - when a female can conceive only when she elects to as an act of volition, when also she is immune to disease, cares only for the approval of her own sort� and has her orientation so changed that she desires intercourse with a whole-heartedness that Cleopatra never dreamed of - but any male who tried to rape her would die so quickly, if she so grokked, that he wouldn't know what hit him? When women are free of guilt and fear - but invulnerable other than by decision of self? Hell, the pharmaceutical industry will be just a passing casualty - what other industries, laws, institutions, attitudes, prejudices, and nonsense must give way?"
"I don't grok its fullness," admitted Jubal. "It concerns a subject that has been of little direct interest to me in quite a while."
"One institution won't be damaged by it. Marriage."
"So?"
"Very much so. Instead it will be purged, strengthened, and made endurable. Endurable? Ecstatic! See that wench down there with the long black hair?"
"Yes. I was delighting in its beauty earlier."
"She knows it's beautiful and it's grown a foot and a half longer since we joined the church. That's my wife. Not much over a year ago we lived together about like bad-tempered dogs. She was jealous� and I was inattentive. Bored. Hell, we were both bored and only our kids kept us together - that and her possessiveness; I knew she would never let me go without a fight and a scandal� and I didn't have any stomach for trying to put together a new marriage at my age, anyhow. So I got a little on the side, when I could get away with it - a college professor has many temptations, few safe opportunities - and Ruth was quietly bitter. Or sometimes not so quiet. And then we joined up." Sam grinned happily. "And I fell in love with my own wife. Number-one gal friend."
Sam's words had been very quiet, an intimate conversation walled by noise of eating and cheerful company. His wife was far down the table. She looked up and said clearly, "That's an exaggeration, Jubal. I think I'm about number six."
Her husband called out, "Stay out of my mind, beautiful! - we're talking men talk. Give Larry your undivided attention." He picked up a hard roll, threw it at her.
She stopped it in mid-trajectory, threw it back at him while continuing to talk; Sam caught it and buttered it. "I'm giving Larry all the attention he wants� until later, maybe. Jubal, that brute didn't let me finish. Number-six place is wonderful! Because my name wasn't even on the list till we joined the church. I hadn't rated as high as six with Sam in the past twenty years." She did then turn her attention back to Larry.
"The real point," Sam said quietly, "is that we two are now partners, much more than we ever were even at the best period in our outside marriage - and we got that way through the training, culminating in sharing and growing closer with others who had the same training. We all wind up in twosome partnerships inside the larger group - usually, but not necessarily, with our own spouses-of-record. Sometimes not� and if not, the readjustment takes place with no heartache and a warmer, closer, better relationship between the soidisant 'divorced' couple than ever, both in bed and out. No loss and all gain. Shucks, this pairing as partners needn't even be between man and woman. Dawn and Jill for example - they work together like an acrobatic team."
"Hmm� I suppose," Jubal said thoughtfully, "that I had thought of those two as being Mike's wives."
"No more so than they are to any of us. Or than Mike is to all the rest. Mike is too busy, has been, I should say, until the Temple burned - to do more than make sure that he shared himself all the way around." Sam added, "If anybody is Mike's wife, it's Patty, although she keeps so busy herself that the relation is more spiritual than physical. Actually, you could say that both Mike and Patty are short-changed when it comes to mauling the mattress."
Patty was not quite as far away as Ruth, but far enough. She looked up and said, "Sam dear, I don't feel short-changed."
"Huh?" Sam then announced, loudly and bitterly, "The only thing wrong with this church is that a man has absolutely no privacy!"
This brought a barrage of food in his direction, all from distaff members. He handled it all and tossed it back without lifting a hand� until the complexity of it apparently got to be too much and a plateful of spaghetti caught him full in the face-thrown, Jubal noticed, by Dorcas.
For a moment Sam looked like a particularly ghastly crash victim. Then suddenly his face was clean and even the sauce that had spattered on Jubal's shirt was gone. "Don't give her any more, Tony. She wasted it; let her go hungry."
"Plenty more in the kitchen," Tony answered. "Sam, you look good in spaghetti. Pretty good sauce, huh?" Dorcas's plate sailed out to the kitchen, returned, loaded. Jubal decided that Dorcas had not been concealing talents from him - the plate was much more heavily filled than she would have chosen herself; he knew her appetite.
"Very good sauce," agreed Sam. "I salvaged some that hit me in the mouth. What is it? Or shouldn't I ask?"
"Chopped policeman," Tony answered.
Nobody laughed. For a queasy instant Jubal wondered if the joke was a joke. Then he recalled that these his water brothers smiled a lot but rarely laughed - and besides, policeman should be good healthy food. But the sauce couldn't be "long pig" in any case, or it would taste like pork. This sauce had a distinct beef flavor to it.
He changed the subject. "The thing I like best about this religion-"
"Is it a religion?" Sam inquired.
"Well, church. Call it a church. You did."
"It is a church," agreed Sam. "It fills every function of a church, and its quasi-theology does, I admit, match up fairly well with some real religions. Faiths. I jumped in because I used to be a stalwart atheist - and now I'm a high priest and I don't know what I aim"
"I understood you to say you were Jewish."
"I am. From a long line of rabbis. So I wound up atheist. Now look at me. But my cousin Saul and my wife Ruth are both Jews in the religious sense - and talk to Saul; you'll find it's no handicap to this discipline. A help, probably� as Ruth, once she broke past the first barrier, progressed faster than I did; she was a priestess quite a while before I became a priest. But she's the spiritual sort; she thinks with her gonads. Me, I have to do it the hard way, between my ears."
"The discipline," repeated Jubal. "That's what I like best about it. The faith I was reared in didn't require anybody to know anything. Just confess your sins and be saved, and there you were, safe in the arms of Jesus. A man could be too stupid to hit the floor with his hat� and yet he could be conclusively presumed to be one of God's elect, guaranteed au eternity of bliss, because he had been 'converted.' He might or might not become a Bible student; even that wasn't necessary� and he certainly didn't have to know, or even try to know, anything else. This church doesn't accept 'conversion' as I grok it-"
"You grok correctly."
"A person must start with a willingness to learn and follow it with some long, hard study. I grok that is salutary, in itself."
"More than salutary," agreed Sam. "Indispensable. The concepts can't be thought about without the language, and the discipline that results in this horn-of-plenty of benefits - from how to live without fighting to how to please your wife - all derive from the conceptual logic� understanding who you are, why you're here, how you tick - and behaving accordingly. Happiness is a matter of functioning the way a human being is organized to function� but the words in English are a mere tautology, empty. In Martian they are a complete set of working instructions. Did I mention that I had a cancer when I came here?"
"Eh? No, you didn't."
"Didn't know it myself. Michael grokked it, sent me out for the usual X rays and so forth so that I would be sure. Then we got to work on it together. 'Faith' healing. A miracle. The clinic called it 'spontaneous remission' which I grok means 'I got well.'"
Jubal nodded. "Professional double-talk. Some cancers go away, we don't know why."
"I know why this one went away. By then I was beginning to control my own body. With Mike's help I repaired the damage. Now I can do it without his help. Want to feel a heart stop beating?"
"Thanks, I have observed it in Mike, many times. My esteemed colleague, Croaker Nelson, would not be sitting across from us if what you are talking about was 'faith healing.' It's voluntary control of the body. I grok."
"Sorry. We all know that you do. We know."
"Mmm� I dislike to call Mike a liar because he isn't. But the lad happens to be prejudiced in my case."
Sam shook his head. "I've been talking with you all through dinner. I wanted to check it myself, despite what Mike said. You grok. I'm wondering what new things you could disclose to us if you troubled to learn the language?"
"Nothing. I'm an old man with little to contribute to anything."
"I insist on reserving my opinion. All the rest of the First Called have had to tackle the language to make any real progress. Even the three you've kept with you have had some powerful coaching, being kept in trance during most of the short days and the few occasions we've had them with us. All but you� and you don't really need it. Unless you want to wipe spaghetti from your face without a towel, which I grok you aren't interested in anyhow."
"Only to observe it."
Most of the others had left the table, leaving quietly and without formality when they wished. Ruth came over and stood by them. "Are you two going to sit here all night? Or shall we move you out with the dishes?"
"I'm henpecked. Come on, Jubal." Sam stopped to kiss his wife.
They stopped only momentarily in the room with the stereo tank. "Anything new?" asked Sam.
"The county attorney," someone said, "has been orating in an attempt to prove that all of today's disasters are our doing� without admitting that he doesn't have the slightest notion how any of it was done."
"Poor fellow. He's bitten a wooden leg and his teeth hurt." They went on through and found a quieter living room; Sam said, "I had been saying that these troubles can be expected - and they will get much worse before we can expect to control enough public opinion to be tolerated. But Mike is in no hurry. So we close down the Church of All Worlds - it is closed down. So we move and open the congregation of the One Faith - and we get kicked out again. Then we reopen elsewhere as the Temple of the Great Pyramid - that one will bring flocking the foolish fat and fatuous females, and some of them will end up neither fat nor foolish - and when we have the Medical Association and the local bar and the newspapers and the boss politicos snapping at our heels there - why, we open the Brotherhood of Baptism somewhere else. Each one means solid progress, a hard core of disciplined who can't be hurt - Mike started here hardly over a year ago, uncertain himself, and with only the help of three untrained priestesses-by-courtesy. Now we've got a solid Nest� plus a lot of fairly advanced pilgrims we can get in touch with later and let rejoin us. And someday, someday, we'll be too strong to persecute."
"Well," agreed Jubal, "it could work. Jesus made quite a splash with only twelve disciples. In due course."
Sam grinned happily. "A Jew boy. Thanks for mentioning Him. He's the outstanding success story of my tribe - and we all know it, even though many of us don't talk about Him. But He was a Jew boy that made good and I'm proud of Him, being a Jew boy myself. Please to note that Jesus didn't try to get it all done by next Wednesday. He was patient. He set up a sound organization and let it grow. Mike is patient, too. Patience is so much part of the discipline that it isn't even patience; it's automatic. No sweat. Never any sweat."
"A sound attitude at any time."
"Not an attitude. The functioning of the discipline. Jubal? I grok you are tired. Would you wish to become untired? Or would you rather go to bed? If you don't, our brothers will keep you up all night, talking. Most of us don't sleep much, you know."
Jubal yawned. "I think I'll choose a long, hot soak and about eight hours of sleep. I'll visit with our brothers tomorrow� and other days."
"And many other days," agreed Sam.
Jubal found his own room, was immediately joined by Patty, who again insisted on drawing his tub, then turned back his bed, neatly, without touching it, placed his setup for drinks (fresh ice cubes) by his bed, and fixed one and placed it on the shelf of the tub. Jubal did not try to hurry her out; she had arrived displaying all her pictures. He knew enough about the syndrome which can lead to full tattooing to be quite sure that if he did not now remark on them and ask to be allowed to examine them, she would be very hurt even though she might conceal it.
Nor did he display or feel any of the fret that Ben had felt on an earlier, similar occasion; he went right ahead and undressed, making nothing of it - and discovered with wryly bitter pride that it did not matter to him in the least even though it had been many years since the last time he had allowed anyone, man or woman, to see him naked. It seemed to matter not at all to Patty and even less to him. She simply made sure that the tub was just right before allowing him to step into it.
Then she remained and told him what each picture was and in what sequence to view them.
Jubal was properly awed and appropriately complimentary, while completely the impersonal art critic. But it was, he admitted to himself, the goddamdest display of virtuosity with a needle he had ever seen - it made his fully decorated Japanese friend look like a cheap carpet as compared with the finest Princess Bokhara.
"They've been changing a little," she told him. "Take the holy birth scene here - that rear wall is beginning to look curved� and the bed looks almost like a hospital table. Of course I have been changing, too, quite a lot. I'm sure George doesn't mind. There hasn't been a needle touched to me since he went to Heaven� and if some miraculous changes take place, I'm sure he knows about them and has a finger in it somehow."
Jubal decided that Patty was a little dotty but quite nice� on the whole, he preferred people who were a little dotty; "the salt of the earth" citizen left him cold. Not too dotty, he amended; Patty had let him undress himself, then had whisked his clothes into his wardrobe without coming near them. She was probably a clear proof that one didn't have to be sane, whatever that was, to benefit by this remarkable Martian discipline that the boy apparently could teach to anyone.
Presently he sensed that she was ready to leave and suggested it by asking her to kiss his goddaughters goodnight - he had forgotten to. "I was tired, Patty."
She nodded. "And I am called for dictionary work." She leaned over and kissed him, warmly but quickly. "I'll take that one to our babies."
"And a pat for Honey Bun."
"Yes, of course. She groks you, Jubal. She knows you like snakes."
"Good. Share water, brother."
"Thou art God, Jubal." She was gone. Jubal settled back in the tub, was surprised to find that he did not seem tired now and his bones no longer ached. Patty was a tonic� serene happiness on the hoof. He wished that he himself had no doubts - then admitted that he didn't want to be anybody but himself, old and cranky and self-indulgent.
Finally he soaped and showered and decided to shave so that he wouldn't have to before breakfast. After a leisurely time he bolted the door of his room, turned out the overhead light, and got into bed.
He had looked around for something to read, found nothing to his annoyance, being addicted to this vice above all else and not wishing to go out again and scare up something. He sipped part of a drink instead and turned out the bed light.
He did not go right to sleep. His pleasant chat with Patty seemed to have wakened and rested him. He was still awake when Dawn came in.
He called out, "Who's there?"
"It's Dawn, Jubal."
"It can't be dawn yet; it was only- Oh."
"Yes, Jubal. Me."
"Damn it, I thought I bolted that door. Child, march straight out of - Hey! Get out of this bed. Git!"
"Yes, Jubal. I will. But I want to tell you something first."
"Huh?"
"I have loved you a long time. Almost as long as Jill has."
"Why, the very- Quit talking nonsense and shake your little fanny out that door."
"I will, Jubal," she said very humbly. "But I want you to listen to something first. Something about women."
"I don't want to hear it now. Tell me in the morning."
"Now, Jubal."
He sighed. "Talk. Stay where you are."
"Jubal� my beloved brother. Men care very much how we women look. So we try to be beautiful and that is a goodness. I used to be a peeler, as I know you know. It was a goodness, too, to let men enjoy the beauty I was for them. It was a goodness for me, to know that they needed what I had to give.
"But, Jubal, women are not men. We care about what a man is. It can be something as silly as: Is he wealthy? Or it can be: Will he take care of my children and be good to them? Or, sometimes, it can be: Is he good? - as you are good, Jubal. But the beauty we see in you is not the beauty you see in us. You are beautiful, Jubal."
"For God's sake!"
"I think you speak rightly. Thou art God and I am God - and I need you. I offer you water. Will you let me share and grow closer?"
"Now, look, little girl, if I understood what you are offering-"
"You grokked, Jubal. To share together all that we have. Ourselves. Selves."
"I thought so. My dear, you have plenty to share - but� myself - well, you arrived some years too late. I am sincerely regretful, believe me. Thank you. Deeply. Now go away and let an old man get his sleep."
"You will sleep, when waiting is filled. Jubal� I could lend you strength. But I grok clearly that it is not necessary."
(Goddamit - it wasn't necessary!) "No, Dawn. Thank you, dear."
She got to her knees and bent over him. "Just one more word, then. Jill told me, that if you argued, I was to cry. Shall I get my tears all over your chest? And share water with you that way?"
"I'm going to spank Jill!"
"Yes, Jubal. I'm starting to cry." She made no sound, but in only a second or two a warm, full tear splashed on his chest - was followed quickly by another� and another - and still more. She sobbed almost silently.
Jubal cursed and reached for her� and cooperated with the inevitable.

XXXVI

JUBAL WOKE UP ALERT, rested, and happy, realized that he felt better before breakfast than he had in years. For a long, long time he had been getting through that black period between waking and the first cup of coffee by comforting himself with the thought that tomorrow might be a little easier.
This morning he found himself whistling, which he did very badly. He noticed it, stopped himself, forgot it and started up again.
He saw himself in the mirror, smiled wryly, then grinned openly. "You incorrigible old goat. They'll be sending the wagon for you any minute now." He noticed a white hair on his chest, plucked it out, didn't bother with many others just as white, went on making himself ready to face the world.
When he went outside his door Jill was there. Accidentally? No, he no longer trusted any "coincidence" in this mnage; it was as organized as a computer. She came straight into his arms. "Jubal - Oh, we love you so! Thou art God."
He returned her kiss as warmly as it was given, grokking that it would be hypocritical not to - and discovering that kissing Jill differed from kissing Dawn only in some fashion unmistakable but utterly beyond instrument or description.
Presently he held her away from him without letting her go. "You baby Messalina� you framed me."
"Jubal darling� you were wonderful!"
"Uh� how the hell did you know I was able?"
She gave him back a gaze of clear-eyed innocence. "Why, Jubal, I've been certain of that ever since Mike and I first lived at home. You see, even then, when Mike was asleep - in trance - he could see around him quite a distance and sometimes he would look in on you - a question to ask you or something - to see if you were asleep."
"But I slept alone! Always."
"Yes, dear. But that wasn't quite what I meant. And I always had to explain things to Mike that he didn't understand."
"Hrrrmph!" He decided not to pursue the inquiry. "Just the same, you shouldn't have framed me."
"I grok you don't mean that in your heart, Jubal� and you grok that I speak rightly. We had to have you in the Nest. All the way in. We need you. Since you are shy and humble in your goodness, we did what was needful to welcome you without hurting you. And we did not hurt you, as you grok."
"What's this 'we' stuff?"
"It was a full Sharing-Water of all the Nest, as you grok - you were there. Mike stopped what he was doing and woke up for it� and grokked with you and kept us all together."
Jubal hastily abandoned this line of inquiry, too. "So Mike is awake at last. That's why your eyes are shining so."
"Only partly. Of course, we are always delighted when Mike isn't withdrawn, it's jolly� but he's never really away. Jubal, I grok that you have not grokked the fullness of our way of Sharing-Water. But waiting will fill. Nor did Mike grok it, at first - he thought it was only for quickening of eggs, as it is on Mars."
"Well� that's the primary purpose, the obvious purpose. Babies. Which makes it rather silly behavior on the part of a person, namely me, who has no intention and no wish, at my age, to cause such increase."
She shook her head. "Babies are the obvious result� but not the primary purpose at all. Babies give meaning to the future, and that is a great goodness. But only three or four or a dozen times in a woman's life is a baby quickened in her� out of the thousands of times she can share herself - and that is the primary use for what we can do so often but would need to do so seldom if it were only for reproduction. It is sharing and growing closer, forever and always. Jubal, Mike grokked this because on Mars the two things - quickening of eggs, and sharing-closer - are entirely separate� and he grokked, too, that our way is best. What a happy thing it is not to have been hatched a Martian� to be human and a woman!"
He looked at her closely. "Child, are you pregnant?"
"Yes, Jubal. I grokked at last that waiting had ended and I was free to be. Most of the Nest have not needed to wait - but Dawn and I have been quite busy. But when we grokked this cusp coming, I grokked that there would be a waiting after the cusp - and you can see that there will certainly be. Mike will not rebuild the Temple overnight - so this high priestess will be unhurried in building a baby. Waiting always fills."
From this high-flown mishmash Jubal abstracted the central fact or Jill's belief concerning such a possible fact. Well, she no doubt had had plenty of opportunity. He resolved to keep an eye on the matter and try to bring her home for it, if possible. Mike's superman methods were all very well, but it wouldn't hurt to have the best modern equipment and techniques at hand, too. Losing Jill to eclampsia or some other mishap was something he did not intend to let happen, even if he had to get tough with the kids.
He wondered about another such possibility, decided not to mention it. "Where's Dawn? And where's Mike? The place seems awfully quiet." No one had come through the hail they were in and he heard no voices and yet that odd feeling of happy expectancy was even stronger than it had been the night before. He would have expected a certain release from tension after the ceremony he had apparently joined in himself - unbeknownst - but the place was more charged up than ever. It suddenly reminded him of how he had felt, as a very small boy, when waiting for his first circus parade� and someone had called out: "There come the elephants!"
Jubal felt as if, were he just a little taller, he could see the elephants, past the excited crowd. Yet there was no crowd.
"Dawn told me to give you a kiss for her; she'll be busy for the next three hours, about. And Mike is busy, too - he went back into withdrawal."
"Oh."
"Don't sound so disappointed; he'll be free soon. He's making a special effort so that he will be free on your account� and to let all of us be free, too. Duke spent all night scouring the city for the high-speed tape recorders we use for the dictionary and now we've got everybody who can possibly do it being jammed full of Martian phonic symbols and then Mike will be through and can visit. Dawn has just started dictating; I finished one session, ducked out to say good-morning to you� and am about to go back and get poured full of my last part of the chore, so I'll be gone just a little longer than Dawn will be. And here's Dawn's kiss - the first one was just from me." She put her arms around his neck and again put her mouth greedily to his - at last said, "My goodness! Why did we wait so long? 'Bye for a little!"
Jubal found a sparse few in the big dining room. Duke looked up, smiled and waved, went back to hearty eating. He did not look as if he had been up all night - nor had he; he had been up two nights.
Becky Vesey looked around when Duke waved and said happily, "Hi, you old goat!" - grabbed his ear, pulled him down, and whispered into it:
"I've known it all along - but why weren't you around to console me when the Professor died?" She added aloud, "Sit down here beside me and we'll get some food into you while you tell me what devilment you've been plotting lately."
"Just a moment, Becky." Jubal went around the table. "Hi, Skipper. Good trip?"
"No trouble. It's becoming a milk run. I don't believe you've ever met Mrs. van Tromp. My dear, the founder of this feast, the one and only Jubal Harshaw - two of him would be too many."
The Captain's wife was a tall, plain woman with the calm eyes of one who has watched from the Widow's Walk. She stood up, kissed Jubal. "Thou art God."
"Uh, thou art God." Jubal decided that he might as well relax to the ritual - hell, if he said it often enough, he might lose the rest of his buttons and believe it� and it did have a friendly ring to it with the arms of the Skipper's wife firmly around him. He decided that she could even teach note 4 something about kissing. She - how was it Anne had once described it? - she gave it her whole attention; she wasn't going anywhere.
"I suppose, Van," he said, "that I really shouldn't be surprised to find you here."
"Well," answered the spaceman, "a man who commutes to Mars ought to be able to palaver with the natives, don't you think?"
"Just for powwow, huh?"
"There are other aspects." Van Tromp reached for a piece of toast; the toast cooperated. "Good food, good company."
"Um, yes."
"Jubal," Madame Vesant called out, "soup's on!"
Jubal returned to his place, found eggs-on-horseback, orange juice, and other choice comestibles waiting for him. Becky patted his thigh. "A fine prayer meeting, me bucko."
"Woman, back to your horoscopes!"
"Which reminds me, dearie, I want to know the exact instant of your birth."
"Uh, I was born on three successive days, at various hours. I was too big a boy - they had to handle me in sections."
Becky made a rude answer. "I'll find out."
"The courthouse burned down when I was three. You can't."
"There are ways. Want to make a small bet?"
"You go on heckling me and you'll find you're not too big to spank. How've you been, girl?"
"What do you think? How do I look?"
"Healthy. A bit spread in the butt. You've touched up your hair."
"I have not. I quit using henna months ago. Get with it, pal, and we'll get rid of that white fringe you've got. Replace it with a real lawn."
"Becky, I refuse to grow any younger for any reason. I came by my decrepitude the hard way and I propose to enjoy it. Quit prattling and let a man eat."
"Yes, sir. You old goat."
Jubal was just leaving the table as the Man from Mars came in. "Father! Oh, Jubal!" Mike hugged and kissed him.
Jubal gently unwound himself from the embrace. "Be your age, son. Sit down and enjoy your breakfast. I'll sit with you."
"I didn't come here looking for breakfast, I came looking for you. We'll find a place and talk."
"All right."
They went to the living room of one of the suites, Mike pulling Jubal by the hand like an excited small boy welcoming his favorite grandparent. Mike picked a big comfortable chair for Jubal and sprawled himself on a couch opposite and close to him. This room was on the side of the wing having the private landing flat; there were high French windows opening to it. Jubal got up and shifted his chair slightly so that he would not be facing so directly into the light in looking at his foster son; not to his surprise but mildly to his annoyance the heavy chair shifted as if it had been no more massive than a child's balloon, his hand merely guided it.
Two men and a woman were in the room when they arrived. These left shortly, leisurely, severally, and unostentatiously. After that they were alone, except that they were both served with Jubal's favorite brandy - by hand, to Jubal's pleasure; he was quite ready to agree that the remote control these people had over objects around them was a labor-saver and probably a money-saver (certainly on laundry! - his spaghetti-splashed shirt had been so fresh that he had put it on again today), and obviously a method much to be preferred for household convenience to the blind balkiness of mechanical gadgets. Nevertheless he was not used to telecontrol done without wires or waves; it startled Jubal the way horseless carriages had disturbed decent, respectable horses about the time Jubal was born.
Duke served the brandy. Mike said, "Hi, Cannibal. Thanks. Are you the new butler?"
"De nada, Monster. Somebody has to do it and you've got every brain in the place slaving away over a hot microphone."
"Well, they'll all be through in a couple of hours and you can revert to your useless, lecherous existence. The job is done, Cannibal. Pau. Thirty. Ended."
"The whole damn Martian language all in one lump? Monster, I had better check you for burned-out capacitors."
"Oh, no, no! Only the primer knowledge that I have of it - had of it, my brain's an empty sack. But highbrows like Stinky will be going back to Mars for a century to fill in what I never learned. But I did turn out quite a job - about six weeks of subjective time since around five this morning or whenever it was we adjourned the meeting - and now the stalwart steady types can finish it and I'm free to visit with Jubal with nothing on my mind." Mike stretched and yawned. "Feels good. Finishing a job always feels good."
"You'll be slaving away at something else before the day is out. Boss, this Martian monster can't take it or leave it alone. I know for a fact that this is the first time he has simply relaxed and done nothing for over two months. He ought to sign up with 'Workers Anonymous.' Or you ought to visit us more often. You're a good influence on him."
"God forbid that I should ever be a good influence on anybody."
"And you get out of here, Cannibal, and quit telling lies about me."
"Lies, hell. You turned me into a compulsive truth-teller� and it's a great handicap in some of the joints where I hang out." Duke left them.
Mike lifted his glass. "Share water, my brother Father Jubal"
"Drink deep, son."
"Thou art God."
"Take it easy, Mike. I'll put up with that from the others and answer it politely. But don't you come godding at me. I knew you when you were 'only an egg'."
"Okay, Jubal."
"That's better. When did you start drinking in the morning? Do that at your age and you'll ruin your stomach. You'll never live to be a happy old soak, like me."
Mike looked at his partly emptied glass. "I drink when it's a sharing to do so. It doesn't have any effect on me, nor on most of the others, unless we want it to. Once I let it have its effect without stopping it, until I passed out. It's an odd sensation. Not a goodness, I grok. Just a way to discorporate for a while without discorporating. I can get a similar effect, only much better and with no damage to be repaired afterwards, by withdrawing."
"Economical, at least."
"Uh huh, our liquor bill isn't anything. Matter of fact, running that whole Temple hasn't cost what it costs you to keep up our home. Except for the initial investment and replacing some of the props, coffee and cakes was about all - we made our own fun. We were happy. We needed so little that I used to wonder what to do with all the money that came in."
"Then why did you take collections?"
"Huh? Oh, you have to charge 'em, Jubal. The marks won't pay serious attention to anything that's free."
"I knew that, I just wondered if you did."
"Oh, yes, I grok marks, Jubal. At first I did try to preach free - just give it away. I had plenty of money, I thought it was all right. It didn't work. We humans have to make considerable progress before we can accept a free gift, and value it. Usually I never let them have anything free until about Sixth Circle. By then they can accept� and accepting is much harder than giving."
"Hmm� son, I think maybe you should write a book on human psychology."
"I have. But it's in Martian. Stinky has the tapes." Mike looked again at his glass, took a slow sybaritic sip. "We do use some liquor. A few of us - Saul, myself, Sven, some others - like it. And I've learned that I can let it have just a little effect, then hold it right at that point, and gain a euphoric growing-closer much like trance without having to withdraw. The minor damage is easy to repair." He sipped again. "That's what I'm doing this morning - letting myself get just the mildest glow and be happy with you."
Jubal studied him closely. "Son, you aren't drinking entirely to be sociable; you've got something on your mind."
"Yes, I have."
"Do you want to talk it out?"
"Yes. Father, it's always a great goodness to be with you, even if nothing is troubling me. But you are the only human I can always talk to and know that you will grok and that you yourself won't be overwhelmed by it, too. Jill� Jill always groks - but if it hurts me, it hurts her still more. Dawn the same. Patty� well, Patty can always take my hurt away, but she does it by keeping it herself. All three of them are too easily hurt for me to risk sharing in full with them anything I can't grok and cherish before I share it." Mike looked very thoughtful. "Confession is needful. The Catholics know that, they have it - and they have a corps of strong men to take it. The Fosterites have group confession and pass it around among themselves and thin it out. I need to introduce confession into this church, as part of the early purging - oh, we have it now, but spontaneously, after the pilgrim no longer really needs it. We need strong men for that - 'sin' is hardly ever concerned with a real wrongness but sin is what the sinner groks as sin - and when you grok it with him, it can be very disturbing. I know."
Mike went on earnestly, "Goodness is not enough, goodness is never enough. That was one of my first mistakes, because among Martians goodness and wisdom are the same thing, identical. But not with us. Take Jill. Her goodness was perfect when I met her. Nevertheless she was all mixed up inside - and I almost destroyed her, and myself too - for I was just as mixed up - before we got squared away. Her endless patience (not very common on this planet) was all that saved us� while I was learning to be a human and she was learning what I knew.
"But goodness alone is never enough. A hard, cold wisdom is required, too, for goodness to accomplish good. Goodness without wisdom invariably accomplishes evil." He smiled and his face lit up. "And that's why I need you, Father, as well as loving you. I need to make confession to you.,'
Jubal squirmed. "Oh, for Pete's sake, Mike, don't make a production out of it. Just tell me what's eating you. We'll find a way out."
"Yes, Father."
But Mike did not go on. Finally Jubal said, "Do you feel busted up by the destruction of your Temple? I wouldn't blame you. But you aren't broke, you can build again."
"Oh, no, that doesn't matter in the slightest!"
"Eh?"
"That temple was a diary with all its pages filled. Time for a new one, rather than write over and deface the filled pages. Fire can't destroy the experience in it� and strictly from a standpoint of publicity and practical church politics, being run out of it in so spectacular a fashion will be helpful, in the long run. No, Jubal, the last couple of days have simply been an enjoyable break in a busy routine. No harm done." His expression changed. "Father� lately I learned that I was a spy."
"What do you mean, son? Explain yourself."
"For the Old Ones. They sent me here to spy on our people."
Jubal thought about it. Finally he said, "Mike, I know that you are brilliant. You obviously possess powers that I don't have and that I have never seen before. But a man can be a genius and still fall ill with delusions."
"I know. Let me explain and you can decide whether or not I'm crazy. You know how the surveillance satellites used by the Security Forces operate."
"No."
"I don't mean the details that would interest Duke; I mean the general scheme. They orbit around the globe, picking up data and storing it. At a particular point, the Sky-Eye is keyed and it pours out in a spate all that it has seen. That is what was done with me. You know that we of the Nest use what is called telepathy."
"I've been forced to believe it."
"We do. By the way, this conversation is completely private - and besides that, no one of us would ever attempt to read you; I'm not sure we could. Even last night the link was through Dawn's mind, not yours."
"Well, that is some slight comfort."
"Uh, I want to get to that later. I am 'only an egg' in this art; the Old Ones are past masters. They stayed linked with me but left me on my own, ignored me - then they triggered me and all that I had seen and heard and done and felt and grokked poured out of me and became part of their permanent records. I don't mean that they wiped my mind of my experiences; they simply played the tape, so to speak, made a copy. But the triggering I was aware of - and it was over before I could possibly do anything to stop it. Then they dropped me, cut off the linkage; I couldn't even protest."
"Well� it seems to me that they used you pretty shabbily-"
"Not by their standards. Nor would I have objected - I would have been happy to volunteer - had I known about it before I left Mars. But they didn't want me to know; they wanted me to see and grok without interference."
"I was going to add," Jubal said, "that if you are free of this damnable invasion of your privacy now, then what harm has been done? It seems to me that you could have had a Martian at your elbow all these past two and a half years, with no harm other than attracting stares."
Mike looked very sober. "Jubal, listen to a story. Listen all the way through." Mike told him of the destruction of the missing Fifth Planet of Sol, whose ruins are the asteroids. "Well, Jubal?"
"It reminds me a little of the myths about the Flood."
"No, Jubal. The Flood you aren't sure about. Are you sure about the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum?"
"Oh, yes. Those are established historical facts."
"Jubal, the destruction of the Fifth Planet by the Old Ones is as historically certain as that eruption of Vesuvius - and it is recorded in much greater detail. No myth. Fact."
"Uh, stipulate it as such. Do I understand that you fear that the Old Ones of Mars will decide to give this planet the same treatment? Will you forgive me if I say that is a bit hard for me to swallow?"
"Why, Jubal, it wouldn't take the Old Ones to do it. It merely takes a certain fundamental knowledge of physics, how matter is put together - and the same sort of control that you have seen me use time and again. Simply necessary first to grok what you want to manipulate. I can do it unassisted, right now. Say a piece near the core of the planet about a hundred miles in diameter - much bigger than necessary but we want to make this fast and painless, if only to please Jill. Feel out its size and place, then grok carefully how it is put together-" His face lost all expression as he talked and his eyeballs started to turn up.
"Hey!" broke in Harshaw. "Cut it out! I don't know whether you can or you can't but I'm certain I don't want you to try!"
The face of the Man from Mars became normal. "Why, I would never do it. For me, it would be a wrongness - I am human."
"But not for them?"
"Oh, no. The Old Ones might grok it as beauty. I don't know. Oh, I have the discipline to do it� but not the volition. Jill could do it - that is, she could contemplate the exact method. But she could never will to do it; she is human too; this is her planet. The essence of the discipline is, first, self-awareness, and then, self-control. By the time a human is physically able to destroy this planet by this method - instead of by clumsy things like cobalt bombs - it is not possible, I grok fully, for him to entertain such a volition. He would discorporate. And that would end any threat; our Old Ones don't hang around the way they do on Mars."
"Mmmm� son, as long as we are checking you for bats in your belfry, clear up something else. You've always spoken of these 'Old Ones' as casually as I speak of the neighbor's dog - but I find ghosts hard to swallow. What does an 'Old One' look like?"
"Why, just like any other Martian� except that there is more variety in the appearance of adult Martians than there is in us."
"Then how do you know it's not just an adult Martian? Doesn't he walk through walls, or some such?"
"Any Martian can do that. I did, just yesterday."
"Uh� shimmers? Or anything?"
"No. You see, hear, feel them - everything. It's like an image in a stereo tank, only perfect and put right into your mind. But - Look, Jubal, the whole thing would be a silly question on Mars, but I realize it isn't, here. But if you had been present at the discorporation - death - of a friend, then you helped eat his body� and then you saw his ghost, talked with it, touched it, anything - would you then believe in ghosts?"
"Well, either ghosts, or I myself had slipped my leash."
"All right. Here it would be an hallucination� if I grok correctly that we don't stay here when we discorporate. But in the case of Mars, there is either an entire planet with a very rich and complex civilization all run by mass hallucination - or the straightforward explanation is correct the one I was taught and the one all my experience led me to believe. Because on Mars the 'ghosts' are by far the most important and most powerful and much the most numerous part of the population. The ones still alive, the corporate ones, are the hewers of wood and drawers of water, servants to the Old Ones."
Jubal nodded. "Okay. I'll never boggle at slicing with Occam's razor. While it runs contrary to my own experience, my experience is limited to this planet - provincial. All right, son, you're scared that they might destroy us?"
Mike shook his head. "Not especially. I think - this is not a grokking but a mere guess - that they might do one of two things: either destroy us or attempt to conquer us culturally, make us over into their own image."
"But you're not fretted that they might blow us up? That's a pretty detached viewpoint, even for me."
"No. Oh, I think they might reach that decision. You see, by their standards, we are a diseased and crippled people - the things that we do to each other, the way we fail to understand each other, our almost complete failure to grok with one another, our wars and diseases and famines and cruelties - these will be complete idiocy to them. I know. So I think they may very probably decide on a mercy killing. But that's a guess, I'm not an Old One. But, Jubal, if they decide to do this, it will be-" Mike stopped and thought for quite a long time. "-an utter minimum of five hundred years, more likely five thousand, before anything would be done."
"That's a long time for a jury to be out."
"Jubal, the most different thing about the two races is that Martians never hurry - and humans always do. They would much rather think about it an extra century or half a dozen, just to be sure that they have grokked all the fullness."
"In that case, son, I suggest that you not worry about it. If, in another five hundred or a thousand years, the human race can't handle its neighbors, you and I can't help it. However, I suspect that they will be able to."
"So I grok, but not in fullness. But I said I wasn't worried about that. The other possibility troubled me more, that they might move in and try to make us over. Jubal, they can't do it. An attempt to make us behave like Martians would kill us just as certainly but much less painlessly. It would all be a great wrongness."
Jubal took time to answer. "But, son, isn't that exactly what you have been trying to do?"
Mike looked unhappy. "Yes and no. It was what I started out to do. It is not what I am trying to do now. Father, I know that you were disappointed in me when I started this."
"Your business, son."
"Yes. Self. I must grok and decide at each cusp myself alone. And so must you� and so must each self. Thou art God."
"I don't accept the nomination."
"You can't refuse it. Thou art God and I am God and all that groks is God, and I am all that I have ever been or seen or felt or experienced. I am all that I grok. Father, I saw the horrible shape this planet is in and I grokked, though not in fullness, that I could change it. What I had to teach couldn't be taught in schools or colleges; I was forced to smuggle it into town dressed up as a religion - which it is not - and con the marks into tasting it by appealing to their curiosity and their desire to be entertained. In part it worked exactly as I knew it would; the discipline and the knowledge was just as available to others as it was to me, who was raised in a Martian nest. Our brothers get along together - you've seen us, you've shared - live in peace and happiness with no bitterness, no jealousy.
"That last alone was a triumph that proved I was right. Male-femaleness is the greatest gift we have - romantic physical love may be unique to this planet. I don't know. If it is, the universe is a much poorer place than it could be� and I grok dimly that we-who-are-God will save this precious invention and spread it. The actual joining and blending of two physical bodies with simultaneous merging of souls in shared ecstasy of love, giving and receiving and delighting in each other - well, there's nothing on Mars to touch it, and it's the source, I grok in fullness, of all that makes this planet so rich and wonderful. And, Jubal, until a person, man or woman, has enjoyed this treasure bathed in the mutual bliss of having minds linked as closely as bodies, that person is still as virginal and alone as if he had never copulated. But I grok that you have; your very reluctance to risk a lesser thing proves it� and, anyhow, I know it directly. You grok. You always have. Without even needing the aid of the language of grokking. Dawn told us that you were as deep into her mind as you were into her body."
"Unh� the lady exaggerates."
"It is impossible for Dawn to speak other than rightly about this. And - forgive me - we were there. In her mind but not in yours� and you were there with us, sharing."
Jubal refrained from saying that the only times he had ever felt even faintly that he could read minds was precisely in that situation� and then not thoughts, but emotions. He simply regretted without bitterness that he was not half a century younger - in which case he knew that Dawn would have had that "Miss" taken off the front of her name and he would have boldly risked another marriage, in spite of his scars. Also that he would not trade the preceding night for all the years that might be left to him. In essence, Mike was dead right. "Go on, sir."
"That's what it should be. But that's what I slowly grokked it rarely was. Instead it was indifference and acts mechanically performed and rape and seduction as a game no better than roulette but with poorer odds and prostitution and celibacy by choice and by no choice and fear and guilt and hatred and violence and children brought up to think that sex was 'bad' and 'shameful' and 'animal' and something to be hidden and always distrusted. This lovely perfect thing, male-femaleness, turned upside down and inside out and made horrible.
"And every one of those wrong things is a corollary of 'jealousy.' Jubal, I couldn't believe it. I still don't grok 'jealousy' in fullness, it seems an insanity to me, a terrible wrongness. When I first learned what this ecstasy was, my first thought was that I wanted to share it, share it at once with all my water brothers - directly with those female, indirectly by inviting more sharing with those male. The notion of trying to keep this never-failing fountain to myself would have horrified me, had I thought of it. But I was incapable of thinking of it. And in perfect corollary I had not the slightest wish to attempt this miracle with anyone I did not already love and trust - Jubal, I am physically unable even to attempt love with a female who has not already shared water with me. And this same thing runs all through the Nest. Psychic impotence unless our spirits blend as our flesh blends."
Jubal had been listening and thinking mournfully that it was a fine system - for angels - when a sky car landed on the private landing flat diagonally in front of him. He turned his head to see and, as its skids touched, it disappeared, vanished.
"Trouble?" he said.
"No trouble," Mike denied. "It's just that they are beginning to suspect that we are here - that I am here, rather. They think the rest are dead. The Innermost Temple, I mean. The other circles aren't being bothered especially� and many of them have left town until it blows over." He grinned. "We could get a good price for these hotel rooms; the city is filling up 'way past capacity with Bishop Short's shock troops."
"Well? Isn't it about time to get the family elsewhere?"
"Jubal, don't worry about it. That car never had a chance to report, even by radio. I'm keeping a close watch. It's no trouble, now that Jill is over her misconceptions about 'wrongness' in discorporating persons who have wrongness in them. I used to have to go to all sorts of complicated expedients to protect us. But now Jill knows that I do it only as fullness is grokked." The Man from Mars grinned boyishly. "Last night she helped me with a hatchet job� nor was it the first time she has done so."
"What sort of a job?"
"Oh, just a follow-up on the jail break. Some few of those in jail or prison I couldn't release; they were vicious. So I got rid of them before I got rid of the bars and doors. But I have been slowly grokking this whole city for many months now� and quite a few of the worst were not in jail. Some of them were even in public office. I have been waiting, making a list, making sure of fullness in each case. So, now that we are leaving this city - they don't live here anymore. Missing. They needed to be discorporated and sent back to the foot of the line to try again. Incidentally, that was the grokking that changed Jill's attitude from squeamishness to hearty approval: when she finally grokked in fullness that it is utterly impossible to kill a man - that all we were doing was much like a referee removing a man from a game for 'unnecessary roughness.'"
"Aren't you afraid of playing God, lad?"
Mike grinned with unashamed cheerfulness. "I am God. Thou art God� and any jerk I remove is God, too. Jubal, it is said that God notes each sparrow that falls. And so He does. But the proper closest statement of it that can be made in English is that God cannot avoid noting the sparrow because the Sparrow is God. And when a cat stalks a sparrow both of them are God, carrying out God's thoughts."
Another sky car started to land and vanished just before touching; Jubal hardly thought it worth comment. "How many did you find worthy of being tossed out of the game last night?"
"Oh, quite a number. About a hundred and fifty. I guess - I didn't count. This is a large city, you know. But for a while it is going to be an unusually decent one. No cure, of course - there is no cure, short of acquiring a hard discipline." Mike looked unhappy. "And that is what I must ask you about, Father. I'm afraid I have misled the people who have followed me. All our brothers."
"How, Mike?"
"They're too optimistic. They have seen how well it has worked for us, they all know how happy they are, how strong and healthy and aware - how deeply they love each other. And now they think they grok that it is just a matter of time until the whole human race will reach the same beatitude. Oh, not tomorrow - some of them grok that two thousand years is but a moment for such an experiment. But eventually.
"And I thought so, too, at first. I led them to think so. But, Jubal, I had missed a key point: Humans are not Martians. I made this mistake again and again - corrected myself� and still made it. What works perfectly for Martians does not necessarily work for humans. Oh, the conceptual logic which can be stated only in Martian does work for both races. The logic is invariant� but the data are different. So the results are different."
"I couldn't see why, if people were hungry, some of them didn't volunteer to be butchered so that the rest could eat� on Mars this is obvious - and an honor. I couldn't understand why babies were so prized. On Mars our two little girls in there would simply be dumped outdoors, to live or to die - and on Mars nine out of ten nymphs die their first season. My logic was right but I had misread the data: here babies do not compete but adults do; on Mars adults don't compete at all, they've been weeded out as babies. But one way or another, competing and weeding has to take place� or a race goes down hill.
"But whether or not I was wrong in trying to take the competition out at both ends, I have lately begun to grok that the human race won't let me, no matter what."
Duke stuck his head into the room. "Mike? Have you been watching outside? There is quite a crowd gathering around the hotel."
"I know," agreed Mike. "Tell the others that waiting has not filled." He went on to Jubal, "'Thou art God.' It's not a message of cheer and hope, Jubal. It's a defiance - and an unafraid unabashed assumption of personal responsibility." He looked sad. "But I rarely put it over. A very few, so far just these few here with us today, our brothers, understood me and accepted the bitter half along with the sweet, stood up and drank it - grokked it. The others, the hundreds and thousands of others, either insisted on treating it as a prize without a contest - a 'conversion'� or ignored it entirely. No matter what I said they insisted on thinking of God as something outside themselves. Something that yearns to take every indolent moron to His breast and comfort him. The notion that the effort has to be their own� and that all the trouble they are in is of their own doing� is one that they can't or won't entertain."
The Man from Mars shook his head. "And my failures are so much more numerous than my successes that I am beginning to wonder if full grokking will show that I am on the wrong track entirely - that this race must be split up, hating each other, fighting each other, constantly unhappy and at war even with their own individual selves� simply to have that weeding out that every race must have. Tell me, Father? You must tell me."
"Mike, what in hell ever led you to believe that I was infallible?"
"Perhaps you are not. But every time I have needed to know something, you have always been able to tell me - and fullness always showed that you spoke rightly."
"Damn it, I refuse this apotheosis! But I do see one thing, son. You are the one who has urged everyone else never to be in a hurry - 'waiting will fill,' you say."
"That is right."
"And now you are violating your own prime rule. You have waited only a little while - a very short while by Martian standards, I take it - and already you want to throw in the towel. You've proved that your system can work for a small group - and I'm glad to confirm it; I've never seen such happy, healthy, cheerful people. That ought to be enough to suit you for the short time you've put in. Come back when you have a thousand times this number, all working and happy and unjealous, and we'll talk it over again. Fair enough?"
"You speak rightly, Father."
"But I ain't through. You've been fretting that maybe the fact that you failed to hook more than ninety-nine out of a hundred was because the race couldn't get along without its present evils, had to have them for weeding out. But damn it, lad, you've been doing the weeding out - or rather, the failures have been doing it to themselves by not listening to you. Had you planned to eliminate money and property?"
"Oh, no! Inside the Nest we don't need it, but-"
"Nor does any family that's working well. Yours is just bigger. But outside you need it in dealing with other people. Sam tells me that our brothers, instead of getting unworldly, are slicker with money than ever. Is that right?"
"Oh, yes. Making money is a simple trick, once you grok."
"You've just added a new beatitude: 'Blessed is the rich in spirit, for he shall make dough.' How do our people stack up in other fields? Better or worse than average?"
"Oh, better, of course - if it's anything worth grokking at all. You see, Jubal, it's not a faith; the discipline is simply a method of efficient functioning at any activity you try."
"That's your whole answer, son. If what you say is true - and I'm not judging; I'm asking, you're answering - then that's all the competition you need� and a fairly one-sided race, too. If one tenth of one percent of the population is capable of getting the news, then all you have to do is show them - and in a matter of some generations all the stupid ones will die out and those with your discipline will inherit the Earth. Whenever that is - a thousand years from now, or ten thousand - will be plenty soon enough to worry about whether some new hurdle is necessary to make them jump higher. But don't go getting faint-hearted because only a handful have turned into angels overnight. Personally, I never expected any of them to manage it. I simply thought you were making a damn fool of yourself by pretending to be a preacher."
Mike sighed and smiled. "I was beginning to be afraid I was - worrying that I had let my brothers down."
"I still wish you had called it 'Cosmic Halitosis' or some such. But the name doesn't matter. If you've got the truth, you can demonstrate it. Show people. Talking about it doesn't prove it."
The Man from Mars stood up. "You've got me all squared away, Father. I'm ready now. I grok the fullness." He looked toward the doorway. "Yes, Patty. I heard you. The waiting is ended."
"Yes, Michael."

XXXVII

JUBAL AND THE MAN FROM MARS strolled slowly into the living room with the big stereo tank. Apparently the entire Nest was gathered, watching it. It showed a dense and turbulent crowd, somewhat restrained by policemen. Mike glanced at it and looked serenely happy. "They come. Now is the fullness." The sense of ecstatic expectancy Jubal had felt growing ever since his arrival swelled greatly, but no one moved.
"It's a mighty big tip, sweetheart," Jill agreed.
"And ready to turn," added Patty.
"I'd better dress for it," Mike commented. "Have I got any clothes around this dump? Patty?"
"Right away, Michael."
Jubal said, "Son, that mob looks pretty ugly to me. Are you sure this is any time to tackle them?"
"Oh, sure," said Mike. "They've come to see me� so now I go down to meet them." He paused while some clothing got out of the way of his face; he was being dressed at break-neck speed with the unnecessary help of several women - unnecessary as each garment seemed to know where to go and how to drape itself. "This job has its obligations as well as its privileges - the star has to show up for the show� grok me? The marks expect it."
Duke said, "Mike knows what he's doing, Boss."
"Well� I don't trust mobs."
"That crowd is mostly curiosity seekers, they always are. Oh, there are some Fosterites and some others with grudges - but Mike can handle any crowd. You'll see. Right, Mike?"
"Keerect, Cannibal. Pull in a tip, then give 'em a show. Where's my hat? Can't walk in the noonday sun without a hat." An expensive Panama with a sporty colored band glided out and settled itself on his head; he cocked it jauntily. "There! Do I look all right?" He was dressed in his usual outer-services mufti, a smartly tailored, sharply creased, white business suit, shoes to match, snowy shirt, and luxurious dazzling scarf.
Ben said, "All you lack is a brief case."
"You grok I need one? Patty, do we have one?"
Jill stepped up to him. "Ben was kidding, dear. You look just perfect." She straightened his tie and kissed him - and Jubal felt kissed. "Go talk to them."
"Yup. Time to turn the tip. Anne? Duke?"
"Ready, Mike." Anne was wearing her floor-length Fair Witness, cloak, wrapping her in dignity; Duke was just the opposite, being sloppily dressed, with a lighted cigarette dangling from his face, an old hat on the back of his head with a card marked "PRESS" stuck in its band, and himself hung about with cameras and kit.
They headed for the door to the foyer common to the four penthouse suites. Only Jubal followed; all the others, thirty and more, stayed around the stereo tank. Mike paused at the door. There was a hall table there, with a pitcher of water and glasses, a dish of fruit and a fruit knife. "Better not come any farther," he advised Jubal, "or Patty would have to escort you back through her pets."
Mike poured himself a glass of water, drank part of it. "Preaching is thirsty work." He handed the glass to Anne. then took the fruit knife and sliced off a chunk of apple.
It seemed to Jubal that Mike sliced off one of his fingers� but his attention was distracted as Duke passed the glass to him. Mike's hand was not bleeding and Jubal had grown somewhat accustomed to legerdemain. He accepted the glass and took a sip, finding that his own throat was very dry.
Mike gripped his arm and smiled. "Quit fretting. This will take only a few minutes. See you later, Father." They went out through the guardian cobras and the door closed. Jubal went back to the room where the others were, still carrying the glass. Someone took it from him; he did not notice, as he was watching images in the big tank.
The mob seemed denser, surging about and held back by police armed only with night sticks. There were a few shouts but mostly just the unlocalized muttering of crowd.
Someone said, "Where are they now, Patty?"
"They've just dropped down the tube. Michael is a little ahead, Duke stopped to catch Anne. They're entering the lobby. Michael has been spotted, pictures are being taken."
The scene in the tank resolved into enormous head and shoulders of a brightly cheerful newscaster: "This is NWNW New World Networks' mobile newshound on the spot while it's hot - your newscaster, Happy Holliday. We have just learned that the fake messiah, sometimes known as the Man from Mars, has crawled out of his hide-out in a hotel room here in beautiful St. Petersburg, the City that Has Everything to Make You Sing. Apparently Smith is about to surrender to the authorities. He crushed out of jail just yesterday, using high explosives smuggled in to him by his fanatic followers. But the tight cordon placed around this city seems to have been too much for him. We don't know yet - I repeat, we don't know yet - so stay with the chap who covers the map - and now a word from your local sponsor who has given you this keyhole peep at the latest leap-"
"Thank you, Happy Holliday and all you good people watching via NWNW! What Price Paradise? Amazingly Low! Come out and see for yourself at Elysian Fields, just opened as homesites for a restricted clientele. Land reclaimed from the warm waters of the glorious gulf and every lot guaranteed to be at least eighteen inches above mean high water and only a small down payment on a Happy - oh, oh, later, friends-phone Gulf nine-two eight two eight!"
"And thank you, Jick Morris and the developers of Elysian Fields! I think we've got something, folks! Yes, sir, I think we do-"
("They're coming out the front entrance," Patty said quietly. "The crowd hasn't spotted Michael yet.")
"Maybe not yet� but soon. You are now looking at the main entrance of the magnificent Sans Souci Hotel, Gem of the Gulf, whose management is in no way responsible for this hunted fugitive and who have cooperated with the authorities throughout according to a statement just issued by Chief of Police Davis. And while we're waiting to see what will happen, a few high lights in the strange career of this half-human monster raised on Mars-"
The live scene was replaced by quick cuts of stock shots: The Envoy blasting off years earlier, the Champion floating upwards silently and effortlessly under Lyle Drive, Martians on Mars, the triumphant return of the Champion, a quick of the first faked interview with the "Man from Mars"-"What do you think of the girls here on Earth?" "Gee!"-a quicker shot of the conference in the Executive Palace and the much publicized awarding of a doctorate in philosophy, all with rapid-fire commentary.
"See anything, Patty?"
"Michael is at the top of the steps, the crowd is at least a hundred yards away, being kept off the hotel grounds. Duke has grabbed some pix and Mike is waiting to let him change lenses. No hurry."
Happy Holliday Went on, as the tank shifted to the crowd, semi-close and panning: "You understand, friends, that this wonderful community is in a unique condition today. Something strange has been going on and these people are in no mood to trifle. Their laws have been flouted, their security forces treated with contempt, they are angry, righteously so. The fanatic followers of this alleged antichrist have stopped at nothing to create turmoil in a futile effort to let their leader escape the closing net of justice. Anything can happen-anything!"
The announcer's voice climbed: "Yes, he's coming out now - he's walking toward the people!" The scene cut to reverse; Mike was walking directly toward another camera. Anne and Duke were behind him and dropping farther behind. "This is it! This is it! This is the blow-off'."
Mike continued to walk unhurriedly toward the crowd until he loomed up in the stereo tank in life size, as if he were in the room with his water brothers. He stopped on the grass verge in front of the hotel, a few feet from the crowd. "You called me?"
He was answered with a growl.
The sky held scattered clouds; at that instant the sun came out from behind one and a shaft of golden light hit him.
His clothes vanished. He stood before them, a golden youth, clothed only in his own beauty - beauty that made Jubal's heart ache, thinking that Michelangelo in his ancient years would have climbed down from his high scaffolding to record it for generations unborn. Mike said gently, "Look at me. I am a son of man."
The scene cut for a ten-second plug, a line of can-can dancers singing:
"Come on, ladies, do your duds!
In the smoothest, yummiest suds!
Lover Soap is kind to hands-
But be sure you save the bands!"
The tank filled completely with foamy suds amid girlish laughter and the scene cut back to the newscast: "God damn you!" A half brick caught Mike in the ribs. He turned his face slightly toward his assailant. "But you yourself are God. You can damn only yourself� and you can never escape yourself."
"Blasphemer!" A rock caught him just over his left eye and blood welled forth.
Mike said calmly, "In fighting me, you fight yourself� for Thou art God and I am God� and all that groks is God - there is no other."
More rocks hit him, from various directions; he began to bleed in several places. "Hear the Truth. You need not hate, you need not fight, you need not fear. I offer you the water of life-" Suddenly his hand held a tumbler of water, sparkling in the sunlight. "-and you may share it whenever you so will� and walk in peace and love and happiness together."
A rock caught the glass and shattered it. Another struck him in the mouth.
Through bruised and bleeding lips he smiled at them, looking straight into the camera with an expression of yearning tenderness on his face. Some trick of sunlight and stereo formed a golden halo back of his head. "Oh my brothers, I love you so! Drink deep. Share and grow closer without end. Thou art God."
Jubal whispered it back to him. The scene made a five-second cut:
"Cahuenga Cave! The night club with real Los Angeles smog, imported fresh every day. Six exotic dancers."
"Lynch him! Give the bastard a nigger necktie!" A heavy-gauge shotgun blasted at close range and Mike's right arm was struck off at the elbow and fell. It floated gently down, then came to rest on the cool grasses, its hand curved open in invitation.
"Give him the other barrel, Shortie - and aim closer!" The crowd laughed and applauded. A brick smashed Mike's nose and more rocks gave him a crown of blood.
"The Truth is simple but the Way of Man is hard. First you must learn to control yourself. The rest follows. Blessed is he who knows himself and commands himself, for the world is his and love and happiness and peace walk with him wherever he goes." Another shotgun blast was followed by two more shots. One shot, a forty-five slug, hit Mike over the heart, shattering the sixth rib near the sternum and making a large wound; the buckshot and the other slug sheered through his left tibia five inches below the patella and left the fibula sticking out at an angle, broken and white against the yellow and red of the wound.
Mike staggered slightly and laughed, went on talking, his words clear and unhurried. "Thou art God. Know that and the Way is opened."
"God damn it - let's stop this taking the Name of the Lord in vain!"- "Come on, men! Let's finish him!" The mob surged forward, led by one bold with a club; they were on him with rocks and fists, and then with feet as he went down. He went on talking while they kicked his ribs in and smashed his golden body, broke his bones and tore an ear loose. At last someone called out, "Back away a little so we can get the gasoline on him!"
The mob opened up a little at that warning and the camera zoomed to pick up his face and shoulders. The Man from Mars smiled at his brothers, said once more, softly and clearly, "I love you." An incautious grasshopper came whirring to a landing on the grass a few inches from his face; Mike turned his head, looked at it as it stared back at him. "Thou art God," he said happily and discorporated.

XXXVIII

FLAME AND BILLOWING SMOKE came up and filled the tank. "Golly!" Patty said reverently. "That's the best blow-off ever used."
"Yes," agreed Becky judicially, "the Professor himself never dreamed up a better one."
Van Tromp said very quietly, apparently to himself: "In style. Smart and with style - the lad finished in style."
Jubal looked around at his brothers. Was he the only one who felt anything? Jill and Dawn were seated each with an arm around the other - but they did that whenever they were together; neither one seemed disturbed. Even Dorcas was dry-eyed and calm.
The inferno in the tank cut to smiling Happy Holiday who said, "And now, folks, a few moments for our friends at Elysian Fields who so graciously gave up their-" Patty cut him off.
"Anne and Duke are on their way back up," she said. "I'll let them through the foyer and then we'll have lunch." She started to leave.
Jubal stopped her. "Patty? Did you know what Mike was going to do?"
She seemed puzzled. "Huh? Why, of course not, Jubal. It was necessary to wait for fullness. None of us knew." She turned and left.
"Jubal-" Jill was looking at him. "Jubal our beloved father please stop and grok the fullness. Mike is not dead. How can he be dead when no one can be killed? Nor can he ever be away from us who have already grokked him. Thou art God."
"'Thou art God,'" he repeated dully.
"That's better. Come sit with Dawn and me - in the middle."
"No. No, just let me be." He went blindly to his own room, let himself in and bolted the door after him, leaned heavily with both hands gripping the foot of the bed. My son, oh my son! Would that I had died for thee! He had had so much to live for� and an old fool that he respected too much had to shoot off his yap and goad him into a needless, useless martyrdom. If Mike had given them something big-like stereo, or bingo - but he gave them the Truth. Or a piece of the Truth. And who is interested in Truth? He laughed through his sobs.
After a while he shut them off, both heart-broken sobs and bitter laugh, and pawed through his traveling bag. He had what he wanted with him; he had kept a supply in his toilet kit ever since Joe Douglas's stroke had reminded him that all flesh is grass.
Well, now his own stroke had come and he couldn't take it. He prescribed three tablets for himself to make it fast and certain, washed them down with water, and lay quickly on the bed. Shortly the pain went away.
From a great distance the voice reached him. "Jubal-"
"'M resting, Don' bother me."
"Jubal! Please, Father!"
"Uh� yes, Mike? What is it?"
"Wake up! Fullness is not yet. Here, let me help you."
Jubal sighed. "Okay, Mike" He let himself be helped and led into the bath, let his head be held while he threw up, accepted a glass of water and rinsed out his mouth.
"Okay now?"
"Okay, son. Thanks."
"Then I've got some things to attend to. I love you, Father. Thou art God."
"I love you, Mike. Thou art God." Jubal puttered around for a while longer, making himself presentable, changing his clothes, taking one short brandy to kill the slightly bitter taste still in his stomach, then went out to join the others.
Patty was alone in the room with the babble tank and it was switched off. She looked up. "Some lunch now, Jubal?"
"Yes, thanks."
She came up to him. "That's good. I'm afraid most of them simply ate and scooted. But each of them left a kiss for you. And here it is, all in one package." She managed to deliver in full all the love placed in her proxy cemented together with her own; Jubal found that it left him feeling strong, with her own serene acceptance shared, no bitterness left.
"Come out into the kitchen," she said. "Tony's gone so most of the rest are there - not that his growls ever really chased anybody out anyhow." She stopped and tried to stare down the back of her neck. "Isn't that final scene changing a little? Sort of smoky, maybe?"
Jubal solemnly agreed that he thought it was. He couldn't see any change himself� but he was not going to argue with Patty's idiosyncrasy. She nodded. "I expected it. I can see around me all right - except myself. I still need a double mirror to see my back clearly. Mike says my Sight will include that presently. No matter."
In the kitchen perhaps a dozen were lounging at a table and elsewhere; Duke was standing at the range, stirring a small sauce pan. "Hi, Boss. I ordered a twenty-place bus. That's the biggest that can land on our little landing flat� and we'll need one almost that big, what with the diaper set and Patty's pets. Okay?"
"Certainly. Are they all coming home now?" If they ran out of bedrooms, the girls could make up dosses that would do in the living room and here and there - and this crowd would probably double up mostly anyhow. Come to think of it, he might not be allowed to sleep solo himself and he made up his mind not to fight it. It was friendly to have a warm body on the other side of the bed, even if your intentions weren't active. By God, he had forgotten how friendly it was! Growing closer- "Not everybody. Tim will pilot us, then turn in the bus and go to Texas for a while. The Skipper and Beatrix and Sven we're simply going to drop off in New Jersey."
Sam looked up from the table. "Ruth and I have got to get back to our kids. And Saul is coming with us."
"Can't you stop by home for a day or two first?"
"Well, maybe. I'll talk it over with Ruth."
"Boss," put in Duke, "how soon can we fill the swimming pool?"
"Well, we never filled it earlier than the first of April before - but with the new heaters I suppose we could fill it anytime." Jubal added, "But we'll still have some nasty weather - snow still on the ground yesterday."
"Boss, lemme clue you. This gang can walk through snow hip deep on a tall giraffe and not notice it - and will, to swim. Besides that, there are cheaper ways of keeping that water from freezing than with those big oil heaters."
"Jubal!"
"Yes, Ruth?"
"We'll stop for a day or maybe more. The kids don't miss me - and I'm not aching to take over being motherly without Patty to discipline them anyhow. Jubal, you've never really seen me until you've seen me with my hair floating around me in the water - looking like Mrs. DoAsYouWouldBeDoneBy."
"It's a date. Say, where is the Squarehead and the Dutchman? Beatrix has never been home - they can't be in such a hurry."
"I'll tell 'em, Boss."
"Patty, can your snakes stand a clean, warm basement for a while? Until we can do better? I don't mean Honey Bun, of course; she's people. But I don't think the cobras should have the run of the house."
"Of course, Jubal."
"Mmm-" Jubal looked around. "Dawn, can you take shorthand?"
"She doesn't need it," put in Anne, "anymore than I do."
"I see. I should have known. Use a typewriter?"
"I will learn, if you wish it," Dawn answered.
"Consider yourself hired - until there's a vacancy for a high priestess somewhere. Jill, have we forgotten anybody?"
"No, Boss. Except that all those who have left feel free to camp on you anytime, too. And they will."
"I assumed that. Nest number two, when and as needed." He went over to the range and joined Duke, glanced into the pan he was stirring. It held a small amount of broth. "Hmm� Mike?"
"Yup." Duke dipped out a little in the spoon, tasted it. "Needs a little salt."
"Yes, Mike always did need a little seasoning." Jubal took the spoon and tasted the broth. Duke was correct; the flavor was sweet and could have used salt. "But let's grok him as he is, Who's left to share?"
"Just you. Tony left me here with strict instructions to stir by hand, add water as needed, and wait for you. Not to let it scorch."
"Then grab a couple of cups. We'll share it and grok together."
"Right, Boss." Two cups came sailing down and rested by the sauce pan. "This is a joke on Mike - he always swore that he would outlive me and serve me up for Thanksgiving. Or maybe the joke's on me - because we had a bet on it and now I can't collect."
"You won only by default. Split it evenly."
Duke did so. Jubal raised his cup. "Share!"
"Grow ever closer."
Slowly they drank the broth, stretching it out, savoring it, praising and cherishing and grokking their donor. Jubal found, to his surpriser that although he was overflowing with emotion, it was a calm happiness that did not bring tears. What a quaint and gawky puppy his son had been when first he saw him� so eager to please, so naive in his little mistakes - and what a proud power he had become without ever losing his angelic innocence. I grok you at last, son - and would not change a line!
Patty had his lunch waiting for him; he sat down and dug in, hungry and feeling that it had been days since breakfast. Sam was saying, "I was telling Saul that I grok no need to make any change in plans. We go on as before. If you've got the right merchandise, the business grows, even though the founder has passed on."
"I wasn't disagreeing," Saul objected. "You and Ruth will found another temple - and we'll found others. But we'll have to take time now to accumulate capital. This isn't a street corner revival, nor yet something to set up in a vacant shop; it requires staging and equipment. That means money - not to mention such things as paying for a year or two on Mars for Stinky and Maryam� and that's just as essential."
"All right already! Who's arguing? We wait for fullness� and go ahead."
Jubal said suddenly, "Money's no problem."
"How's that, Jubal?"
"As a lawyer I shouldn't tell this� but as a water brother I do what I grok. Just a moment - Anne."
"Yes, Boss."
"Buy that spot. The one where they stoned Mike. Better get about a hundred-foot radius around it."
"Boss, the spot itself is public parkway. A hundred-foot radius will cut off some public road and a piece of the hotel grounds."
"Don't argue."
"I wasn't arguing, I was giving you facts."
"Sorry. They'll sell. They'll reroute that road. Hell, if their arms are twisted properly, they'll donate the mind-twisting done through Joe Douglas, I think. And have Joe Douglas claim from the morgue whatever was left when those ghouls got through with him and we'll bury him right on that spot - say a year from now� with the whole city mourning and the cops that didn't protect him today standing at attention." What to put over him? The Fallen Caryatid? No, Mike had been strong enough for his stone. The Little Mermaid would be better - but it wouldn't be understood. Maybe one of Mike himself, just as he was when he had said, "Look at me. I am a Son of Man." If Duke didn't catch a shot of it, New World did - and maybe there was a brother, or would be a brother, with the spark of Rodin in him to do it right and not fancy it up.
"We'll bury him there," Jubal went on, "unprotects and let the worms and the gentle rain grok him. I grok Mike will like that. Anne, I want to talk to Joe Douglas as soon as we get home."
"Yes, Boss. We grok with you."
"Now about that other." He told them about Mike's will. "So you see, each one of you is at least a millionaire - just how much more than that I haven't estimated lately� but much more, even after taxes. No strings on it at all� but I grok that you will spend as needed for temples and similar stuff. But there's nothing to stop you from buying yachts if you wish. Oh, yes! Joe Douglas stays on as manager for any who care to let the capital ride, same pay as before� but I grok Joe won't last long, whereupon management devolves on Ben Caxton. Ben?"
Caxton shrugged. "It can be in my name. I grok I'll hire me a real business man, name of Saul."
"That wraps it then. Some waiting time but nobody will dare really fight this will; Mike rigged it. You'll see. How soon can we get out of here? Is the tab settled?"
"Jubal," Ben said gently, "we own this hotel."
Not long thereafter they were in the air, with no trouble from police - the town had quieted down as fast as it had flared up. Jubal sat forward with Stinky Mahmoud and relaxed - discovered that he was not tired, not unhappy, not even fretting to get back to his sanctuary. He discussed with Mahmoud his plans to go to Mars to learn the language more deeply after, Jubal was pleased to learn, completing the work on the dictionary, which Mahmoud estimated at about a year more for his own part in checking the phonetic spellings.
Jubal said grumpily, "I suppose I shall be forced to learn the pesky stuff myself, just to understand the chatter going on around me."
"As you grok, brother."
"Well, damn it, I won't put up with assigned lessons and regular school hours! I'll work as suits me, just as I always have."
Mahmoud was silent a few moments. "Jubal, we used classes and schedules at the Temple because we were handling groups. But some got special attention."
"That's what I'm going to need."
"Anne, for example, is much, much farther along than she ever let you know. With her total-recall memory, she learned Martian in nothing flat, hooked in rapport with Mike."
"Well, I don't have that sort of memory - and Mike's not available."
"No, but Anne is. And, stubborn as you are, nevertheless Dawn can place you in rapport with Anne - if you'll let her. And you won't need Dawn for the second lesson; Anne will then be able to handle it all. You'll be thinking in Martian inside of days, by the calendar - much longer by subjective time, but who cares?" Mahmoud leered at him. "You'll enjoy the warming-up exercises."
Jubal bristled. "You're a low, evil, lecherous Arab - and besides that you stole one of my best secretaries."
"For which I am forever in your debt. But you haven't lost her entirely; she'll give you lessons, too. She'll insist on it."
"Now go 'way and find another seat. I want to think."
Somewhat later be shouted, "Front!"
Dorcas came forward and sat down beside him, steno gear ready.
He glanced at her before he started to work. "Child, you look even happier than usual. Glowing."
Dorcas said dreamily, "I've decided to name him 'Dennis.'" Jubal nodded. "Appropriate. Very appropriate." Appropriate meaning even if she were mixed up about the paternity, he thought to himself. "Do you feel like working?"
"Oh, yes! I feel grand."
"Begin. Stereoplay. Rough draft. Working title: 'A Martian Named Smith.' Opener: zoom in on Mars, using stock or bonestelled shots, unbroken sequence, then dissolving to miniature matched set of actual landing place of Envoy. Space ship in middle distance. Animated Martians, typical, with stock as available or rephotographed. Cut to close: Interior space ship. Female patient stretched on-"

XXIX

THE VERDICT TO BE PASSED on the third planet around Sol was never in doubt. The Old Ones of the fourth planet were not omniscient and in their way were as provincial as humans. Grokking by their own local values, even with the aid of vastly superior logic, they were certain in time to perceive an incurable "wrongness" in the busy, restless, quarrelsome beings of the third planet, a wrongness which would require weeding, once it had been grokked and cherished and hated.
But, by the time that they would slowly get around to it, it would be highly improbable approaching impossible that the Old Ones would be able to destroy this weirdly complex race. The hazard was slight that those concerned with the third planet did not waste a split eon on it.
Certainly Foster did not. "Digby!"
His assistant looked up. "Yes, Foster?"
"I'll be gone a few eons on a special assignment. Want you to meet your new supervisor." Foster turned and said, "Mike, this is Archangel Digby, your assistant. He knows where everything is around the studio and you'll find him a very steady straw boss for anything you conceive."
"Oh, we'll get along," Archangel Michael assured him, and said to Digby, "Haven't we met before?"
Digby answered, "Not that I remember. Of course, out of so many when - wheres." He shrugged.
"No matter. Thou art God."
"Thou art God," Digby responded.
Foster said, "Skip the formalities, please. I've left you a load of work and you don't have all eternity to fiddle with it. Certainly 'Thou art God' - but who isn't?"
He left, and Mike pushed back his halo and got to work. He could see a lot of changes he wanted to make-
The End