"Golly!" she said in admiration. Or, as it came out, "gelly."
"Fortunately, my mates saw me go up and sent a sonogram to the surface. When the boat finally picked me up, I was doubled over from decompression, had my head wrapped down around my knees, and was blue all over. I had effectively drowned."
"But you're alive now."
"Yes, but most of my brain, or at least the cerebral cortex, was killed off by the combination of carbon monoxide poisoning and then oxygen deprivation. Like you, I've got a head full of gadgetry"
"And you solve computer problems with it?"
"Well..." Orthis hesitated. "The knack still seems to be there. I really don't like computers, though."
"Me neither."
"It's not just having the damn thing inside your skull—"
"—it's knowing they caused the trouble in the first place."
"Exactly!" he said. "They're just not infallible."
"I don't think they ever were." And she grinned at him.
So they did have something in common after all. Orthis was amazed at Cuneos insight. Like any good agent, she had the hard intelligence on everyone at her fingertips. He suddenly wondered what else Cuneo had been able to ferret out about Alvin Bertrand's prettiest granddaughter. Or maybe Harry would find out for himself.
"Buy you a drink?" he asked.
"Sure, whatever you're having."
That night, when Demeter finally got back to her hotel, she found a message from Gregor Weiss waiting for her on the room terminal. Luckily the text was in clear language, because she no longer had Sugar to break his fancy codes. Her bangle was squashed somewhere in the residential corridors up on the second level; by now someone had probably picked it up for the value of the metal.
"Sorry, Demeter, we just can't comply with your request to have a change of scene." He was using publicly acceptable terminology to refuse her application for immediate removal and reassignment. "G'dad says he can't get you on anything coming back to Earth sooner than your scheduled return flight. So why don't you just relax, do some sightseeing" —another euphemism— "and enjoy it."
That was all. No commiseration. No chucks under the chin. Just "do your job"—with a slight edge to his voice as Gregor conveyed it. That tone implied he was tired of her whining about having to complete a plum assignment with a gold-leaf expense account while other agents, better than her by far, had to sweat it out in places like New York or Mexico City.
Anyway, Demeter didn't care now. She was well over the blues from the day before. In the past twenty-four hours, in fact, she had recruited a living legend as her new agent, snared a dinner date with the most attractive unattached man in Tharsis Montes, and made a solid conquest of the head of the North Zealand trade delegation.
Things were definitely looking up.
Chapter 12
Valhalla
Demeter Coghlan debated wearing her new party dress for the dinner date with Lole.
On the one hand, the garment was not all that new, after its one wearing. She might have acquired a stain on it somewhere. Not to mention wrinkles.
On the other hand, she could wash it easily in the sink. That would take all of two minutes, with three more for it to dry.
On the other hand, the dress was a hard thing to wear. Every moment inside it—or as much inside as she could get—Demeter had to be careful of how she moved and sat, had to keep her legs together and hold her stomach in.
On the other hand, her usual coveralls were a whole lot more comfortable, as well as easier on the mind.
On the other hand, Lole Mitsuno had already seen those, several times, in fact. He had seen the jumpers in all the colors of her wardrobe—which were violet, lavender, and gray—both with and without her warpaint. It was time to give him something new. And it would be a shame to wear that cute little dress just the once and then forget it.
The bottom line, however, was that Demeter just wasn't sure she wanted the reaction the garment was likely to provoke.
Or maybe she did.
In the end, she wore the dress.
Lole Mitsuno had felt a palpable weakness in his stomach and through the knees from the first moment he saw Demeter that evening. He had known all along that she was an attractive young woman, smart and bouncy in a rough, up-country sort of way Demeter had none of the poise, the reserved grace that had originally drawn him to Ellen Sorbel. Demeter was all candor and wisecracks, practically one of the boys. So he had thought of her as a friend, more like a sister— until she stepped out into the golden light of the hotel foyer.
She had been wearing next to nothing in shiny silk or satin or whatever they called it. The pinkish-purplish material brought up the color of her lips, which were a stunning red, and contrasted them with her white skin. Berry colored, that was what they were. And her green eyes were like the delicate little leaves attached to a berry's stem.
Hell, she was making Mitsuno feel like a poet already!
He had taken her to the best restaurant Tharsis Montes, or Mars itself, had to offer. The tables had white cloths on them that were pressed to resemble linen. The utensils were real silver, shipped from Earth at forty Alt-marks per gram. The wineglasses, although a polymer, were cut and polished just like crystal. The cuisine was Hispano-French: the sauces were smeared on the plate under the food—that was the French part; and they were spiced with vat-grown chilies and cilantro—that was the Spanish contribution. The rest of the menu was just regular commissary foods, dolled up to look foreign.
Mitsuno couldn't taste any of it, even though the bill would make a big dent against his weekly stipend. His brain only had room for Demeter Coghlan. Her face and creamy, bare shoulders filled his eyes and dimmed the gleams of silver and crystal from the table's finery. She entirely eclipsed the hand-painted, eighteenth-century miniatures reproduced on the white stucco wall next to her head. The one whiff of her exotic perfume that reached Lole had chased away all scents of food and wine. Her voice and laugh so filled his ears that, if other women had been dancing naked across the room, he would hardly have noticed.
She ate sparingly but praised everything, bite for bite. She sipped at her red wine, and the drop that stayed on her lower lip added to its color. She laughed at the right places in his fumbling conversation, and her teeth sparkled in the glow from the amber bulb sprouting from a slim, white-plastic tube on the table.
When she had spooned up the last of the dessert— sweet cheese paste inside a crackling, hollow shell of pastry—and pushed her plate away, Demeter turned her smile on him again.
"Well... it's been a lovely evening."
"It... doesn't have to end, does it?"
"No."
Just the one word. Spoken in quiet, reasonable agreement. Accompanied by a gentle smile and a knowing look. No. Meaning yes.
Lole decided in that instant to violate a trust and take her—an offworlder and a self-proclaimed spy, someone over whom he had no hold, no power for retribution—to a place reserved for the select few.
"Come on." He stood up and gently took her hand.
Demeter turned in her chair but made no motion to rise.
"Where are we going?"
"Someplace you'll like."