But Uncle Tom had talked to her just before we had gone to the Cunha cottage the day before, asked her specifically if she had seen Clark-and she hadn't. Not as recently as we had.
I didn't have any trouble reaching Dom Pedro-not the Dom Pedro I met the night I met Dexter but the Dom Pedro of that shift. However, by now all the Dom Pedros know who Poddy Fries is; she's the girl that is seen with Mr. Dexter. He told me at once that Girdle had gone off shift half an hour earlier and I should try her hilton. Unless-he stopped and made some inquiries; somebody seemed to think that Girdle had gone shopping.
As may be. I already knew that she was not at the little hilton she had moved to from the stylish (and expensive) Tannhäuser; a message I had already recorded there was guaranteed to fetch a call back in seconds, if and when.
That ended it. There was no one left for me to turn to, nothing at all left for me to do, save wait in the suite until Uncle returned, as he had ordered me to do.
So I grabbed my purse and a coat and left.
And got all of three meters outside the door of the suite. A tall, wide, muscular character got in my way. When I tried to duck around him, he said, "Now, now,
- Miss Fries. Your uncle left orders."
I scurried the other way and found that he was awfully quick on his feet, for such a big man. So there I was, arrested! Shoved back into our own suite and held in durance vile. You know, I don't think Uncle entirely trusts me.
I went back to my room and closed the door and thought about it. The room was still not made up and still cluttered with dirty dishes because, despite the language barrier, I have made clear to Maria and Maria that Miss Fries becomes quite vexed if anybody disturbs my room until I signal that I no longer want privacy by leaving the door open.
The clumsy, two-decker, roll-around table that had fetched my breakfast was still by my bed, looking like a plundered city.
I took everything off the lower shelf, stowed it here and there in my bath, covered the stuff on top of the table with the extra cloth used to shield the tender eyes of cash customers from the sight of dirty dishes.
Then I grabbed the house phone and told them I wanted my breakfast dishes cleared away immediately.
I'm not very big. I mean you can fit forty-nine mass kilos only one hundred fifty-seven centimeters long into a fairly small space if you scrunch a little. That lower shelf was hard but not too cramped. It had some ketchup on it I hadn't noticed.
Uncle's orders (or perhaps Mr. Cunha's) were being followed meticulously, however. Ordinarily a pantry boy comes to remove the food wagon; this time the two Marias took it out the service entrance and as far as the service lift-and in the course of it I learned something interesting but not really surprising. Maria
said something in Portuguese; the other Maria answered her in Ortho as glib as mine: '~She's probably soaking in the tub, the lazy brat."
I made a note not to remember her on birthdays and at Christmas.
Somebody wheeled me off the lift many levels down and shoved me into a corner. I waited a few moments, then crawled out. A man in a well-spotted apron was looking astonished. I said, "Obrigado!" handed him a deuce note and walked out the service entrance with my nose in the air. Two minutes later I was in a taxi.
I've been catching up on this account while the taxi scoots to South Gate in order not to chew my nails back to the elbows. I must admit that I feel good even though nervous. Action is better than waiting. No amount of bad can stonker me, but not knowing drives me nuts.
The spool is almost finished, so I think I'll change spools and mail this one back to Uncle at South Gate. I should have left a note, I know-but this is better than a note. I hope.
XIII
Well, I can't complain about not having seen fairies. They are every bit as cute as they are supposed to be-but I don't care greatly if I never see another one.
Throwing myself bravely into the fray against fearful odds, by sheer audacity I overcameIt wasn't that way at all. I fubbed. Completely. So
here I am, some nowhere place out in the bush, in a room with no windows, and only one door. That door isn't much use to me as there is a fairy perched over
it. She's a cute little thing and the green part of her fur looks exactly like a ballet tutu. She doesn't look quite like a miniature human with wings-but they do say that the longer you stay here the more human they look. Her eyes slant up, like a cat's, and she has a very pretty built-in smile.
I call her "Titania" because I can't pronounce her real name. She speaks a few words of Ortho, not much because those little skulls are only about twice the brain capacity of a cat's skull-actually, she's an idiot studying to be a moron and not studying very hard.
Most of the time she just stays perched and nurses her baby-the size of a kitten and twice as cute. I call it "Ariel" although I'm not sure of its sex. I'm not dead sure of Titania's sex; they say that both males and females do this nursing thing, which is not quite nursing but serves the same purpose; they are not mammahans. Ariel hasn't learned to fly yet, but Titania is teaching it-tosses it into the air and it sort of flops and glides to the floor and then stays there, mewing piteously until she comes to get it and flies back to her perch.
I'm spending most of my time a) thinking, b) bringing this journal up to date, c) trying to persuade Titania to let me hold Ariel (making some progress; she now lets me pick it up and hand it to her-the baby isn't a bit, afraid of me), and d) thinking, which seems to be a futile occupation.
Because I can go anywhere in the room and do anything as long as I stay a couple of meters away from that door. Guess why? Give up? Because fairies
have very sharp teeth and claws; they're carnivorous. I have a nasty bite and two deep scratches on my left arm to prove it-red and tender and don't seem to want to heal. If I get close to that door, she dives on me.
Completely friendly otherwise- Nor do I have anything physically to complain about. Often enough a native comes in with a tray of really quite good food. But I never watch him come in and I never watch him take it away-because Venerians look entirely too human to start with and the more you look at them the worse it is for your stomach. No doubt you have seen pictures but pictures don't give you the smell and that drooling loose mouth, nor the impression that this thing has been dead a long time and is now animated by obscene arts.
I call him "Pinhead" and to him that is a compliment.
No doubt as to its being a "him" either. It's enough to make a girl enter a nur1nery.
I eat the food because I feel sure Pinhead didn't cook it. I think I know who does. She would be a good cook.
Let me back up a little. I told the news vendor:
"Better give me two-it's quite dark where I'm going." He hesitated and looked at me and I repeated it.
So pretty soon I am in another air car and headed out over the bush. Ever make a wide, sweeping turn in smog? That did it. I haven't the slightest idea where I am, save that it is somewhere within two hours' flight of Venusberg and that there is a small colony of fairies nearby. I saw them flying shortly before we landed and was so terribly interested that I didn't really get a good look at the spot before the car stopped and the door opened. Not that it would have done any good- I got out and the car lifted at once, mussing me up
with its fans . .. and here was an open door to a house and a familiar voice was saying, "Poddy! Come in, dear, come in!"