"I"m beginning to see. I didn"t think you had anything like that in your chilled-steel carca.s.s. And I want to apolo...."
"Don"t do it, boy. If the time ever comes when _you_ go so soft on me as to quit laying it on the line and start sifting out your language...."
Garlock paused. For one of the very few times in his life, he was at a loss for words. He thrust his hands into his pockets and shrugged his shoulders. "h.e.l.l, I don"t want to get maudlin, either ... so ... well, how many men, do you think, could have gone the route with me on this h.e.l.lish job without killing me or me killing them?"
"Oh, that"s not...."
"Lay it on the line, Jim. I know what I am. Just one. You. One man in six thousand million. Okay; how many women could live with me for a year without going crazy?"
"Lots of "em; but, being m.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.ts, they"d probably drive _you_ nuts.
And you can"t stand "stupidity"; which, by definition, lets _everybody_ out. Nope, it"s a tough order to fill."
"Check. She"d have to be strong enough and hard enough not to be afraid of me, by any trace. Able and eager to stand up to me and slug it out.
To pin my ears back flat against my skull whenever she thinks I"m off the beam. Do it with skill and precision and nicety, with power and control; yet without doing herself any damage and without changing her basic feeling for me. In short, a female Jim James Nine."
"Huh? h.e.l.l"s blowtorches! You think _I"m_ like Belle Bellamy?"
"Not by nine thousand megacycles. Like Belle Bellamy could be and should be. Like I hope she will be. I"d have to give, too, of course--maybe we can make Christians out of each other. It"s quite a dream, I admit, but it"ll be Belle or n.o.body. But I"m not used to slopping over this way--let"s go."
"I"m glad you did, big fellow--once in a lifetime is good for the soul.
I"d say you were in love with her right now--except that if you were, you couldn"t possibly dissect her like a specimen on the table, the way you"ve just been doing. Are you or aren"t you?"
"I"ll be d.a.m.ned if I know. You and Brownie believe that the poets"
concept of love is valid. In fact, you make a case for its validity. I never have, and don"t now ... but under certain conditions ... I simply don"t know. Ask me again sometime; say in about a month?"
"That"s the surest thing you know. Oh, _brother! This_ is a thing I"m going to watch with my eyes out on stalks!"
For the next week, Belle locked her door every night. For another few nights, she did not lock it. Then, one night, she left it ajar. The following evening, the two again walked together to their doors.
"I left my door open last night."
"I know you did."
"Well?"
"And have you scream to high heaven that I opened it? And put me on a tape for willful inurbanity? For deliberate inters.e.xual invasion of privacy?"
"Blast and d.a.m.n! You know perfectly well, Clee Garlock, I wouldn"t pull such a dirty, lousy trick as that."
"Maybe I should apologize, then, but as a matter of fact I have no idea whatever as to what you wouldn"t do." He stared at her, his face hard in thought. "As you probably know, I have had very little to do with women.
That little has always been on a logical level. You are such a completely new experience that I can"t figure out what makes you tick."
"So you"re afraid of me," she sneered. "Is that it?"
"Close enough."
"And I suppose it"s you that cartoonist what"s-his-name is using as a model for "Timorous Timmy"?"
"Since you"ve guessed it, yes."
"You ... you _weasel_!" She took three quick steps up the corridor, then back. "You say my logic is c.o.c.keyed. What system are you using now?"
"I"m trying to develop one to match yours."
"Oh ... I invited that one, I guess, since I know you aren"t afraid of G.o.d, man, woman, or devil ... and you"re big enough so you don"t have to be proving it all the time." She laughed suddenly, her face softening markedly. "Listen, you big lug. Why don"t you ever knock me into an outside loop? If I were you and you were me, I"d"ve busted me loose from my front teeth long ago."
"I"m not sure whether I know better or am afraid to. Anyway, I"m not rocking any boat so far from sh.o.r.e."
"Says you. You"re wonderful, Clee--simply priceless. Do you know you"re the only man I ever met that I couldn"t make fall for me like a rock falling down a cliff? And that the falling is altogether too apt to be the other way?"
"The first, I have suspected. The second is chemically-pure rocket-oil."
"I _hope_ it is.... I wish I could be as certain of it as you are....
You see, Clee, I really expected you to come in, last night, and there really _wasn"t_ any bone in it. Surely, you don"t think I"m going to _invite_ you into my room, do you?"
"I can"t see why not. However, since no valid system of logic seems to apply, I accept your decision as a fact. By the same reasoning--however invalid--if I ask you again you will again refuse. So all that"s left, I guess, is for me to drag you into my room by force."
He put his left arm around her and applied a tiny pressure against her side; under which she began to move slowly toward his door.
"You admit that you"re using force?" she asked. Her face was unreadable; her mental block was at its fullest force. "That I"m being coerced?
Definitely?"
"Definitely," he agreed. "At least ten dynes of sheer brute force. Not enough to affect a tape, but enough, I hope, to affect you. If it isn"t, I"ll use more."
"Oh, ten dynes is enough. Just so it"s force."
She raised her face toward his and threw both arms around his neck. His right arm went into action with his left, and Cleander Garlock forgot all about dynes and tapes.
After a time she disengaged one arm; reached out; opened his door. He gathered her up and, lips still locked to lips, carried her over the threshold.
A few jumps later they met their first really old Arpalone. This Inspector was so old that his skin, instead of the usual bright, clear cobalt blue, was dull and tending toward gray. The old fellow was strangely garrulous, for a Guardian; he wanted them to pause a while and gossip.
"Yes, I am lonesome," he admitted. "It has been a long time since I exchanged thoughts with anyone. You see, n.o.body has visited this planet--Groobe, its name is--since almost all our humanity was killed, a few periods ago...."
"Killed? How?" Garlock asked sharply. "Not Dilipic?"
"Oh, you have seen them? I never have, myself. No, nothing nearly that bad. Merely the Ozobes. The world itself was scarcely harmed at all.
Rehabilitation will be a simple matter, so there"s no real reason why some of those Engineers...."
"The beast!" Lola shot a tight-beam thought at her husband. "Who cares anything about the rock and dirt of a _planet_? It"s the people that count and his are dead and he"s perfectly _complaisant_ about it--just _lonesome_!"
"Don"t let it throw you, pet," James soothed. "He"s an Arpalone, you know; not a sociological anthropologist."