Part 18 (1/2)

Hilton did not bother to maneuver his ”big, husky carca.s.s” around the desk, but simply hurdled it, straight toward her.

Temple Bells was a tall, lithe, strong woman; and all the power of her arms and torso went into the ensuing effort to crack Hilton's ribs.

Those ribs, however, were highly capable structural members; and furthermore, they were protected by thick slabs of hard, hard muscle.

And, fortunately, he was not trying to fracture _her_ ribs. His pressures were distributed much more widely. He was, according to promise, doing his very best to flatten her whole resilient body out flat.

And as they stood there, locked together in sheerest ecstasy, Theodora Blake began openly and unashamedly to cry.

It was Temple who first came up for air. She wriggled loose from one of his arms, felt of her hair and gazed unseeingly into her mirror. ”That was _wonderful_, sweetheart,” she said then, shakily. ”And I can _never_ thank you enough, Teddy. But we can't do this very often ... can we?”

The addendum fairly begged for contradiction.

”Not too often, I'm afraid,” Hilton said, and Theodora agreed....

”Well,” the man said, somewhat later, ”I'll leave you two ladies to your knitting, or whatever. After a couple of short ones for the road, that is.”

”Not looking like that!” Teddy said, sharply. ”Hold still and we'll clean you up.” Then, as both girls went to work:

”If anybody ever sees you coming out of this office looking like _that_,” she went on, darkly, ”and Bill finds out about it, he'll think it's _my_ lipstick smeared all over you and I'll strangle you to death with my bare hands!”

”And that was supposed to be kissproof lipstick, too,” Temple said, seriously--although her whole face glowed and her eyes danced. ”You know, I'll never believe another advertis.e.m.e.nt I read.”

”Oh, I wouldn't go so far as to say that, if I were you.” Teddy's voice was gravity itself, although she, too, was bubbling over. ”It probably _is_ kissproof. I don't think 'kissing' is quite the word for the performance you just staged. To stand up under such punishment as you gave it, my dear, anything would have to be tattooed in, not just put on.”

”Hey!” Hilton protested. ”You promised to be deaf and blind!”

”I did no such thing. I said 'could', not 'would'. Why, I wouldn't have missed that for _anything_!”

When Hilton left the room he was apparently, in every respect, his usual self-contained self. However, it was not until the following morning that he so much as thought of the sheaf of papers lying unread in the drawer of Theodora Blake's desk.

VII

Knowing that he had done everything he could to help the most important investigations get under way, Hilton turned his attention to secondary matters. He made arrangements to decondition Javo, the Number Two Oman Boss, whereupon that worthy became Javvy and promptly ”b.u.mped” the Oman who had been shadowing Karns.

Larry and Javvy, working nights, deconditioned all the other Omans having any contact with BuSci personnel; then they went on to set up a routine for deconditioning all Omans on both planets.

a.s.sured at last that the Omans would thenceforth work with and really serve human beings instead of insisting upon doing their work for them, Hilton knew that the time had come to let all his BuSci personnel move into their homes aground. Everyone, including himself, was fed up to the gozzel with s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p life--its jam-packed crowding; its flat, reprocessed air; its limited variety of uninteresting food. Conditions were especially irksome since everybody knew that there was available to all, whenever Hilton gave the word, a whole city full of all the room anyone could want, natural fresh air and--so the Omans had told them--an unlimited choice of everything anyone wanted to eat.

Nevertheless, the decision was not an easy one to make.

Living conditions were admittedly not good on the s.h.i.+p. On the other hand, with almost no chance at all of solitude--the few people who had private offices aboard were not the ones he worried about--there was no danger of s.e.xual trouble. Strictly speaking, he was not responsible for the morals of his force. He knew that he was being terribly old-fas.h.i.+oned. Nevertheless, he could not argue himself out of the conviction that he was morally responsible.

Finally he took the thing up with Sandra, who merely laughed at him.

”How long have you been worrying about _that_, Jarve?”

”Ever since I okayed moving aground the first time. That was one reason I was so glad to cancel it then.”