"When she's finished her turn, ask her to come to my table." The Jovian
shrugged and moved off.
The houselights dimmed suddenly. A shower of colored lights played upon
the raised stage. Soft nostalgic music poured from an unseen source.
Soundlessly, a series of colored crystal screens slid back. At the back
of the stage was a shadowy figure half-concealed by clouds of gossamer
stuff blown wildly by concealed fans. Slowly, with infinite insolence,
the figure moved to the point of the triangular stage. She stood
motionless, waiting, while the babel of unearthly tongues died away in
silence. The music grew louder. Veil by veil she flung off the filmy
draperies until she stood revealed. Klathgar....
She wore the conventional garb of a woman of the ancient desert
dwellers, jewelled copper breast-plates, a circlet of beaten bronze
binding her wealth of red-violet hair, her eyes glittering like emerald
fire; and the long divided skirt concealed little of her shapely body.
Leashed, beside her, was the restless, slithering shadow of a red
sand-leopard.
Against the wavering, eerie melody, and a patterned off-beat throb
of tom-toms, she began to sing. Her voice was rich, throaty, and
the song a poignant love song of the ancient desert people. For a
moment Heydrick forgot where he was and who _she_ was. The hopeless
yearning and infinite tragedy of the music played unpleasantly with
his soul-memories. The weird denizens of the Spacerat's Roost sat
enthralled.
The song ended upon a note of earth-sick despair, a haunting melancholy
for things that will never again be as they were, never, if the planets
swing round a dead sun in an empty sky.
The singer bowed, half-contemptuously, to the storm of applause, then
retired.
Heydrick drew the identification space-photo from his pocket and
studied it. There was no doubt. Despite the heavy make-up, the features
were the same. Ria Tarsen and Klathgar were the same.
In moments the girl was back. She had shed her glamor-costume and was
nearly naked in the briefest of skirts, legs shimmering in painted
stockings, high-breasts caught in a tight sheen of semi-translucent
material. This time she sang a bawdy song, "If Asteroids were
Asterisks," about a girl who went for a rocket-ride with an octopus
man, and had to hitch-hike home from the Moons of Jupiter.
The crowd went wild. The number finished with a rowdy burlesque dance
which went considerably beyond the bounds of good taste, but was
screamingly funny.
* * * * *
The girl ducked out the wings, and Heydrick nodded to the waiter. The
octopus man winked one of his three eyes and vanished. He came back
through the door to the dressing rooms, and the girl was with him. He
pointed to Heydrick. Klathgar looked at him insolently. A puzzled frown
wrinkled her face.
Lithe as a sand-leopard, she moved among the crowded tables, still clad
in the gaudy costume of her last number.
Heydrick looked closely at her. Could this be the same girl who sang
the love song so full of fiery passion that it was madness set to
music? The uncanny warble of flutes and the triple throb of bone-drums
still echoed in his ears. But this girl was tired; strain and
unutterable weariness lurked behind her eyes.
"Why did you send for me?" she asked.
"I wanted to talk to you--is that so unusual?"
"Men always want to talk to me," she said, sneering. "I don't have to
associate with the customers--not even those who can buy Moonfoam."
Heydrick noticed suddenly that the sand-leopard was with her. The
animal's tail swished savagely back and forth. Its lips curled and a
snarling burr of sound came from the ugly rows of teeth. It seemed like
an echo of the girl's sneer. Klathgar put down one hand to stroke the
beast's spade-shaped head. It rubbed against her in silent ecstasy.
"Perhaps I can change your mind," suggested Heydrick. "Won't you sit
down?"
"You flatter yourself," she snapped. "I can hear what you have to say
standing up."
"I wonder if you can," Heydrick mused aloud. "First, who are you?" The
ghost of fear trembled behind her mask.