* * * * *
Steve Coran was conscious of the girl merely as an obstacle between
him and the ticket window. She was young, expensively dressed and too
well-groomed, with blue-white hair, a haughty manner, and an icy stare
in her violet eyes.
"I was here first," she said coldly.
Coran bowed mockingly. "I don't like you either. Besides, I never hit
a lady in public. I hope this won't lead to one of those shipboard
romances."
The beehive activity of the ticket office slackened as take-off time
drew near. Coran studied her back as she stood ahead of him in the line
and repressed a desire to pinch her and find out if she were real. The
weasel-faced clerk was tired and his tone of long-suffering patience
had worn to a thread of annoyance.
"I've told you before, miss. I can't sell single tickets--the company
rules do not permit any but married couples aboard an emigrant
transport. We feel that unattached women are trouble makers in a
frontier society."
The girl made an arrogant gesture. "It's important. I must get to
Venus. I don't care what it costs."
"Don't tell me. See the manager. I don't make the rules. Third office
on the left. But you'd better hurry. I've only one double passage left."
Coran tapped the girl on her shoulder. She glared at him. "Take a tip
from me, babe. See the boss. If he's a man, you'll get the tickets."
As she left the line, he pushed to the window. "I'll take those two
tickets, bud."
"Do you have your marriage certificate?"
Coran reached through the window, snagged a coat lapel and had the man
dragged half through the window in a flash. "Now I'll talk, punk, and
you listen. Because I don't have a ring in my nose, don't get the idea
I'm not married. Do I get those tickets, or do you give up mirrors for
the next six weeks?"
The clerk looked at the gnarled fist under his nose and gave a wild nod
of his head. "You get them."
The steel fingers relaxed and the clerk slid back inside his cage.
"I'll report this," he stormed, shaking himself like a wet animal.
"You'd better have your papers when you try to get past the purser." He
handed out the tickets.
The girl followed Coran from the office. "I'll give you a thousand
vikdals for those tickets."