I blinked at her. "Gosh, lady, that was selfish of you, wasn't it? But you could varnish me and keep me in the bedroom. Like your aunt."
She made a face. "You're a nasty man. She didn't varnish them."
"Star, I haven't seen any of those keepsake corpses around here."
She looked surprised. "But that's on the planet where I was born. This universe, another star. Very pretty place. Didn't I ever say?"
"Star, my darling, mostly you've never said."
"I'm sorry. Oscar, I don't want to hand you surprises. Ask me. Tonight. Anything."
I considered it. One thing I had wondered about, a certain lack. Or perhaps the women of her part of the race had another rhythm. But I had been stopped by the fact that I had married a grandmother—how old? "Star, are you pregnant?"
"Why, no, dear. Oh! Do you want me to be? You want us to have children?"
I stumbled, trying to explain that I hadn't been sure it was possible—or maybe she was. Star looked troubled. "I'm going to upset you again. I had best tell it all. Oscar, I was no more brought up to luxury than you were. A pleasant childhood, my people were ranchers. I married young and was a simple mathematics teacher, with a hobby research in conjectural and optional geometries. Magic, I mean. Three children. My husband and I got along well...until I was nominated. Not selected, just named for examination and possible training. He knew I was a genetic candidate when he married me—but so many millions are. It didn't seem important.
"He wanted me to refuse. I almost did. But when I accepted, he—well, he ‘tossed my shoes.' We do it formally there; he published a notice that I was no longer his wife."
"He did, eh? Mind if I look him up and break his arms?"
"Dear, dear! That was many years ago and far away; he is long dead. It doesn't matter."
"In any case he's dead. Your three kids—one of them is Rufo's father? Or mother?"
"Oh, no! That was later."
"Well?"
Star took a deep breath. "Oscar, I have about fifty children."
That did it. Too many shocks and I guess I showed it, for Star's face reflected deep concern. She rushed through the explanation.
When she was named heir, changes were made in her, surgical, biochemical, and endocrinal. Nothing as drastic as spaying and to different ends and by techniques more subtle than ours. But the result was that about two hundred tiny bits of Star—ova alive and latent—were stored near absolute zero.
Some fifty had been quickened, mostly by emperors long dead but "alive" in their stored seed—genetic gambles on getting one or more future emperors. Star had not borne them; an heir's time is too precious. She had never seen most of them; Rufo's father was an exception. She didn't say, but I think Star liked to have a child around to play with and love—until the strenuous first years of her reign and the Quest for the Egg left her no time.
This change had a double purpose: to get some hundreds of star-line children from a single mother, and to leave the mother free. By endocrine control of some sort, Star was left free of Eve's rhythm but in all ways young—not pills nor hormone injections; this was permanent. She was simply a healthy woman who never had "bad days." This was not for her convenience but to insure that her judgment as the Great Judge would never be whipsawed by her glands. "This is sensible," she said seriously. "I can remember there used to be days when I would bite the head off my dearest friend for no reason, then burst into tears. One can't be judicial in that sort of storm."
"Uh, did it affect your interest? I mean your desire for—"
She gave me a hearty grin. "What do you think?" She added seriously, "The only thing that affects my libido—changes it for the worse, I mean—are...is? -- English has the oddest structure—is-are those pesky imprintings. Sometimes up, sometimes down—and you'll remember one woman whose name we won't mention who affected me so carnivorously that I didn't dare come near you until I had exorcised her black soul! A fresh imprint affects my judgment as well, so I never hear a case until I have digested the latest one. I'll be glad when they're over!"
"So will I."
"Not as glad as I will be. But, aside from that, darling, I don t vary much as a female and you know it. Just my usual bawdy self who eats young boys for breakfast and seduces them into jumping over swords."
"How many swords?"
She looked at me sharply. "Since my first husband kicked me out I have not been married until I married you, Mr. Gordon. If that is not what you meant, I don't think you should hold against me things that happened before you were born. If you want details since then, I'll satisfy your curiosity. Your morbid curiosity, if I may say so."
"You want to boast. Wench, I won't pamper it."
"I do not want to boast! I've little to boast about. The Crisis of the Egg left me almost no time in which to be a woman, damn it! Until Oscar the Rooster came along. Thank you, sir."
"And keep a civil tongue in your head."
"Yes, sir. Nice Rooster! But you've led us far from our muttons, dear. If you want children—yes, darling! There are about two hundred and thirty eggs left and they belong to me. Not to posterity. Not to the dear people, bless their greedy little hearts. Not to those God-playing genetic manipulators. Me! It's all I own. All else is ex offico. But these are mine...and if you want them, they are yours, my only dear."
I should have said, "Yes!" and kissed her. What I did say was, "Uh, let's not rush it."
Her face fell. "As milord Hero husband pleases."
"Look, don't get Nevian and formal. I mean, well, it takes getting used to. Syringes and things, I suppose, and monkeying by technicians. And, while I realize you don't have time to have a baby yourself—"
I was trying to say that, ever since I got straightened out about the Stork, I had taken for granted the usual setup, and artificial insemination was a dirty trick to play even on a cow—and that this job, subcontracted on both sides, made me think of slots in a Horn & Hardart, or a mail-order suit. But give me time and I would adjust. Just as she had adjusted to those damned imprints—
She gripped my hands. "Darling, you needn't!"
"Needn't what?"
"Be monkeyed with by technicians. And I will take time to have your baby. If you don't mind seeing my body get gross and huge—it does, it does, I remember—then happily I will do it. All will be as with other people so far as you are concerned. No syringes. No technicians. Nothing to offend your pride. Oh, I'll have to be worked on. But I'm used to being handled like a prize cow; it means no more than having my hair shampooed."
"Star, you would go through nine months of inconvenience—and maybe die in childbirth—to save me a few moments' annoyance?"
"I shall not die, Three children, remember? Normal deliveries, no trouble."
"But, as you pointed out, that was ‘many years ago.' "
"No matter."
"Uh, how many years?" ("How old are you, woman?" The question I never dared ask.)
She looked upset. "Does it matter, Oscar?"
"Uh, I suppose not. You know more about medicine than I do—"
She said slowly, "You were asking how old I am, were you not?"
I didn't say anything. She waited, then went on, "An old saw from your world says that a woman is as young as she feels. And I feel young and I am young and I have zest for life and I can bear a baby—or many babies—m my own belly. But I know—oh, I know! -- that your worry is not just that I am too rich and occupy a position not easy for a husband. Yes, I know that part too well; my first husband rejected me for that. But be was my age. The most cruel and unjust thing I have done is that I knew that my age could matter to you—and I kept still. That was why Rufo was so outraged. After you were asleep that night in the cave of the Forest of Dragons he told me so, in biting words. He said he knew I was not above enticing young boys but he never thought that I would sink so low as to trap one into marriage without first telling him. He's never had a high opinion of his old granny, he said, but this time—"