"Not many people figure it out that fast," she said. "Stick to one-word sentences and you're okay."
"The Wacky Dust scrambles the sentence-making capability of the brain," Montgomery said. He was sounding almost enthusiastic. Cooper knew from experience that the man was speaking of one of the few things that could excite him, that being his current ten-minute's wonder, the thing that everyone of any importance was doing today and would forget about tomorrow. "Complex thoughts are no longer—"
Cooper slammed his fist on the table and got the expected silence. Montgomery's eyes glazed and he looked away, bored by poor sportsmanship. Cooper stood.
"You," he said, pointing at all of them. "Stink."
"Quarter-meter!" Galloway shouted, pointing at Cooper. "Quarter-meter Cooper! Silver medal in Rio, bronze at Shanghai, 1500-meter freestyle, competed for United N.A., then for Ryancorp." She was grinning proudly, but when she looked around her face fell. "What's wrong?"
Cooper walked away from them. She caught him when he was almost out of sight around the curved promenade floor.
"Quarter-meter, please don't—"
"Don't me call that!" he shouted, jerking his arm away from her touch, not caring how the words came out. Her hand sprang back poised awkwardly, each joint of her fingers twinkling with its own golden band.
"Mr. Cooper, then." She let her hand fall, and her gaze with it, looked at her booted feet. "I want to apologize for her. She had no right to do that. She's drunk, if you hadn't—"
"I no... ticed."
"You'll be all right now," she said, touching his arm lightly, remembering, and pulling it away with a sheepish smile.
"There are no lasting effects?"
"We hope not. There haven't been so far. It's experimental."
"And illegal."
She shrugged. "Naturally. Isn't everything fun?"
He wanted to tell her how irresponsible that was, but he sensed she would be bored with him if he belabored it and while he did not care if Montgomery was bored with him, he did not want to be tiresome with her. So when she offered another tentative smile, he smiled back, and she grinned, showing him that gap between her front teeth which had made a fortune for the world's dentists when one hundred million girls copied it.
She had one of the most famous faces in the world, but she did not closely resemble herself as depicted on television. The screen missed most of her depth, which centered on her wide eyes and small nose, was framed by her short blonde curls. A faint series of lines around her mouth betrayed the fact that she was not twenty, as she looked at first glance, but well into her thirties. Her skin was pale, and she was taller than she seemed in pictures, and her arms and legs were even thinner.
"They compensate for that with camera angles," she said, and he realized she was not reading his mind but merely noticing where he was looking. He had given her a stock reaction, one she got every day, and he hated that. He resolved not to ask any questions about her sidekick. She had heard them all and was surely as sick of them as he was of his nickname.
"Will you join us?" she asked. "I promise we won't misbehave again."
He looked back at the three, just visible at their table before the curved roof cut off his view of the corridor promenade, gee/1 level.
"I'd rather not. Maybe I shouldn't say this, but those are pretty stock types. I always want to either sneer at them or run away from them."
She leaned closer.
"Me too. Will you rescue me?"
"What do you mean?"
"Those three could teach limpets a thing or two about clinging. That's their job, but the hell with them."
"What do you want to do?"
"How should I know? Whatever people do around here for a good time. Bob for apples, ride on the merry-go-round, screw, play cards, see a show."
"I'm interested in at least one of those."
"So you like cards, too?" She glanced back at her crew. "I think they're getting suspicious."
"Then let's go." He took her arm and started to walk away with her. Suddenly she was running down a corridor. He hesitated only a second, then was off after her.
He was not surprised to see her stumble. She recovered quickly, but it slowed her enough for him to catch her.
"What happened?" she said. "I thought I was falling—" She pulled back her sleeve and stared at the world's most complicated wristwatch. He realized it was some sort of monitor for her sidekick.
"It isn't your hardware," he said, leading her at a fast walk. "You were running with the spin. You got heavier. You should bear in mind that what you're feeling isn't gravity."
"But how will we get away if we can't run?"
"By going just a little faster than they do." He looked back, and as he had expected, Lopez was already down. Coco was wavering between turning back to help and following Montgomery, who was still coming, wearing a determined expression. Cooper grinned. He had finally succeeded in getting the man's attention. He was making off with the star.
Just beyond stairwell C Cooper pulled Galloway into an elevator whose door was closing. He had a glimpse of Montgomery's outraged face.
"What good will this do us?" Galloway wanted to know. "He'll just follow us up the stairs. These things are slow as the mid-town express."
"They're slow for a very good reason, known as coriolis force," Cooper said, reaching into his pocket for his keys. He inserted one in the control board of the elevator. "Since we're on the bottom level, Montgomery will go up. It's the only direction the stairs go." He twisted the key, and the elevator began to descend.
The two "basement" levels were the parts of the Champagne Hotel complex nearest hard vacuum.
The car stopped on B level and he held the door for her. They walked among exposed pipes, structural cables, and beams not masked by the frothy decorations of the public levels. The only light came from bare bulbs spaced every five meters. The girders and the curved floor made the space resemble the innards of a zeppelin.
"How hard will they look for you?"
She shrugged. "They won't be fooling around. They'll keep it up until they find me. It's only a question of time."
"Can they get me in trouble?"
"They'd love to. But I won't let them."
"Thanks."
"It's the least I could do."
"So my room is out. First place they'd look."
"No, they'd check my room first. It's better equipped for playing cards."
He was mentally kicking himself. She was playing games with him, he knew that, but what was the game? If it was just sex, that was okay. He'd never made love with a woman in a sidekick.
"About your nickname..." she said, leaving the sentence unfinished to see how he would react. When he said nothing, she started over. "Is it your favorite swimming distance? I seem to recall you were accused of never exerting yourself more than the situation required."
"Wouldn't it be foolish if I did?" But the label still rankled. It was true he had never turned in a decent time just swimming laps, and that he seldom won a race by more than a meter. The sports media had never warmed to him because of that, even before he failed to win the gold. For some reason, they thought of him as lazy, and most people assumed his nickname meant he would prefer to swim races of no more than a quarter of a meter.
"No, that's not it," was all he would say, and she dropped the subject.
The silence gave him time to reflect, and the more he did, the less happy he was. She had said she could keep him out of trouble, but could she? When it came to a showdown, who had more clout with BCE? The Golden Gypsy, or her producers? He might be risking a lot, and she was risking nothing at all. He knew he should ditch her but, if he spurned her now, she might withdraw what protection she could offer.
"I sense you don't care for your nickname," she said, at last. "What should I call you? What's your real name?"
"I don't like that, either. Call me Q.M."