There has been a sudden change. As on the Planet Hecube, where full
summer turns into the dead of the winter in minutes, to the destruction
of many travelers, so was it here. My world is threatened!
It is tottering, all that I have built up. I will fight. I will have
the best lawyers on the planet. I am not done. But I am threatened....
Later. This may be the end. The appeal court has given its decision. A
blob may not own property in Florida. A blob is not a person.
Of course I am not a person. I never pretended to be. But I am a
_personage_! I will yet fight this thing....
Later. I have lost everything. The last appeal is gone. By definition,
I am an animal of indeterminate origin, and my property is being
completely stripped from me.
I made an eloquent appeal and it moved them greatly. There were tears
in their eyes. But there was greed in the set of their mouths. They
have a vested interest in stripping me. Each will seize a little.
And I am left a pauper, a vassal, an animal, a slave. This is always
the last doom of the marooned, to be a despised alien at the mercy of
a strange world.
Yet it should not be hopeless. I will have Margaret. Since my contract
with Billy Wilkins and Blackjack Bracken, long since bought up, is
no longer in effect, Margaret should be able to handle my affairs
as a person. I believe that I have great earning powers yet, and I
can win as much as I wish by gambling. We will treat this as only a
technicality. We shall acquire new fortune. I will reestablish control
over my environment. I will bring back the golden days. A few of my old
friends are still loyal to me, Margaret, Pete the python, Eustace....
Later. The world has caved in completely. Margaret has thrown me over.
"I'm sorry, blobby," she said, "but it just won't work. You're still
nice, but without money you are only a blob. How could I marry a blob?"
"But we can earn more money! I am talented."
"No, you're box-office poison now. You were a fad, and fads die
quickly."
"But, Margaret, I can win as much as I wish by gambling."
"Not a chance, blobby. Nobody will gamble with you any more. You're
through, blob. I will miss you, though. There will be a new blue note
in my ballads when I sing for my supper, after the mink coats are all
gone. 'By now."
"Margaret, do not leave me! What of all our golden days together?"