"Now, if I were a betting man," Vulcan began in a thoughtful bass,
"I'd--"
"We all know what you'd do, Gimpy," Mars roared. "But you won't do it,
so shut up about it."
"Please," Hera said. "Order." Her voice was like chilled steel. The
others settled back. "I think we're ready. Shall we begin, dear?" She
looked at Zeus, who got ready to start. But before he could get a word
out, there was a flicker of blue energy in the room, a couple of yards
away from Forrester and Venus. The flicker expanded to a Veil, and a man
stepped out of it.
He was a short, fat individual wearing a _chiton_ as if he had slept in
it for three or four weeks. His face was puffy and his golden hair was
ruffled. His eyelids seemed to have acquired a permanent half-mast, and
beneath them the eyes were bleary and disinterested.
Forrester needed no introductions to Morpheus, the God of Sleep.
The God looked around at the assembled company with a kindly little
smile on his tired face. Then, slowly and luxuriously, he yawned. When
his mouth closed again, after a view of caverns measureless to man, he
rubbed at his eyes with his knuckles, and then heaved a great sigh and,
apparently, resigned himself to the terrible effort of speech.
"I'm late," he said. "But it's really not my fault."
"Oh?" Hera said in a nasty tone of voice.
Morpheus shook his head slowly from side to side. "It really isn't." His
voice was terribly calm. It was obvious, Forrester thought, that he did
not give a damn. "The alarm just didn't seem to go off again. Or else I
didn't hear it."
"Now, Morpheus," Hera said. "I should think you'd get some kind of alarm
that really worked, after all this time."
"Why bother?" Morpheus said, and shrugged ponderously. "Anyhow, I'm
here." He yawned again. "The thing's tiresome, but I did say I'd be
here, and here I am. Now, does that satisfy everybody? Because if it
doesn't, I do have some sleep to catch up on."
"It satisfies us all," Hera said with some asperity. "Go sit down."
Morpheus shambled quietly over to a couch near Mars. He lowered himself
onto it, and slowly slipped from a sitting position to a reclining one.
"Well," Hera said to Zeus, "we're ready, dear."
"Oh," Zeus said. "Oh. Certainly. I declare this meeting--I declare this
meeting fully met." He cleared his throat with a rumble that shook the
air. "We're here, as I suppose you all know, to consider the problem of
William Forrester. But first, I am reminded of a little story I picked
up on Earth, and in the hopes that some of you here might not have heard
it, I--"
"We've heard it," Hera said, "and, anyhow, this is neither the time nor
the place."
Zeus turned to look at her. He shrugged. "Very well," he said equably.
"Let us return to William Forrester, as a possible substitute for
Dionysus. The first consideration ought to be the psychological records,
wouldn't you say?"
"I would," Hera said through her teeth.
"I believe Athena is in charge of that department, and if she is ready
to report--"
"Of course she's ready," Hera said, "dear."