Forrester turned, knowing exactly what to expect, and disliking it in
advance. The bluff over-heartiness of the voice was matched by the gross
and hairy figure that confronted him. In some disarray, and managing to
look as if he needed simultaneously a bath, a shave, a disinfecting and
a purgative, the figure approached Forrester with a rolling walk that
was too flat-footed for anything except an elephant.
"How's the Owl-boy today?" said the voice, and the body stuck out a
flabby, hairy white hand.
Forrester winced. "I'm fine," he said evenly. "And how's the
winebibber?"
"Good for you," the figure said. "A little wine for your Stomach's sake,
as good old Bacchus always says. Only we make it a lot, eh?" He winked
and nudged Forrester in the ribs.
"Sure, sure," Forrester said. He wished desperately that he could take
the gross fool and tear him into tastefully arranged pieces. But there
was always Gerda. And since this particular idiot happened to be her
younger brother, Ed Symes, anything in the nature of violence was
unthinkable.
Gerda's opinion of her brother was touching, reverent, and--Forrester
thought savagely--not in the least borne out by any discoverable facts.
And a worshipper of Bacchus! Not that Forrester had anything against the
orgiastic rites indulged in by the Dionysians, the Panites, the
Apollones or even the worst and wildest of them all, the Venerans. If
that was how the Gods wanted to be worshipped, then that was how they
should be worshipped.
And, as a matter of fact, it sounded like fun--if, Forrester considered,
entirely too public for his taste.
If he preferred the quieter rites of Athena, or of Juno, Diana or
Ceres--and even Ceresians became a little wild during the spring
fertility rites, especially in the country, where the farmers depended
on her for successful crops--well, that was no more than a personal
preference.
But the idea of Ed Symes involved in a Bacchic orgy was just a little
too much for the normal mind, or the normal stomach.
"Hey," Ed said suddenly. "Where's Gerda? Still in the Temple?"
"I didn't see her," Forrester said. There _had_ been a woman who'd
looked like her. But that hadn't been Gerda. _She'd_ have waited for him
here.