He sighed again. "But if Jilka wanted a _snoll doper_," he said after a
while, "why in the world didn't she call you up and say so?"
"Regulations." She pulled over to the curb in front of a brick
apartment building. "This is where Jilka lives. I'll explain when I get
back."
He watched her get out, walk up the walk to the entrance and let
herself in. He leaned his head back on the seat, lit a cigarette and
exhaled a mixture of smoke and relief. On the way to meet her folks.
So it was just an ordinary secret society after all. And here he'd
been thinking that she was the key figure in a Martian plot to blow up
Earth--
Her _folks_!
Abruptly the full implication of the words got through to him, and he
sat bolt-up-right on the seat. He was starting to climb out of the car
when he saw Kay coming down the walk. Anyway, running away wouldn't
solve his problem. A complete disappearing act was in order, and a
complete disappearing act would take time. Meanwhile he would play
along with her.
* * * * *
A station wagon came up behind them, slowed, and matched its speed
with theirs. "Someone's following us," Quidley said.
"Probably Jilka."
Five minutes later the station wagon turned down a side street and
disappeared. "She's no longer with us," Quidley said.
"She's got to pick someone up. She'll meet us later."
"At your folks'?"
"At the ship."
The city was thinning out around them now, and a few stars were visible
in the night sky. Quidley watched them thoughtfully for a while. Then:
"What ship?" he said.
"The one we're going to _Fieu Dayol_ on."
"_Fieu Dayol?_"
"Persei 17 to you. I said I was going to take you home to meet my
folks, didn't I?"
"In other words, you're kidnapping me."
She shook her head vehemently. "I most certainly am not! Neither
according to interstellar law or your own. When you compromised me, you
made yourself liable in the eyes of both."
"But why pick on me? There must be plenty of men on _Fieu Dayol_. Why
don't you marry one of them?"
"For two reasons: one, you're the particular man who compromised
me. Two, there are _not_ plenty of men on _Fieu Dayol_. Our race is
identical to yours in everything except population-balance between the
sexes. At periodic intervals the women on _Fieu Dayol_ so greatly
outnumber the men that those of us who are temperamentally and
emotionally unfitted to become spinsters have to look for _wotnids_--or
mates--on other worlds. It's quite legal and quite respectable. As a
matter of fact, we even have schools specializing in alien cultures
to expedite our activities. Our biggest problem is the Interstellar
statute forbidding us the use of local communications services and
forbidding us to appear in public places. It was devised to facilitate
the prosecution of interstellar black marketeers, but we're subject to
it, too, and have to contrive communications systems of our own."
"But why were all the messages addressed to you?"
"They weren't messages. They were requisitions. I'm the ship's stock
girl."
* * * * *
April fields stretched darkly away on either side of the highway.
Presently she turned down a rutted road between two of them and they
bounced and swayed back to a black blur of trees. "Here we are," she
said.
Gradually he made out the sphere. It blended so flawlessly with its
background that he wouldn't have been able to see it at all if he
hadn't been informed of its existence. A gangplank sloped down from an
open lock and came to rest just within the fringe of the trees.
Lights danced in the darkness behind them as another car jounced down
the rutted road. "Jilka," Kay said. "I wonder if she got him."
Apparently she had. At least there was a man with her--a rather
woebegone, wilted creature who didn't even look up as they passed.
Quidley watched them ascend the gangplank, the man in the lead, and
disappear into the ship.
"Next," Kay said.