The place was overrun with people. I'd brought Thais, of course, resplendent in red and silver paint. Lyra Yves appeared in a solid coat of gilt, with that one breast and her left arm sheathed in flexible vinyl. Thais nudged me. "Look at that. I think it's disgusting." I did look. I couldn't help myself. That shiny vinyl caught the eye of every man in the room. "Depraved," Thais sniffed. Honest Pancho came in with an older man who was pointed out to me as an ethnologist from the University of California across the bay. A Professor Cripps. Pancho, dressed in his customary green and orange enamel and embroidered cowboy boots, stumped across the room to give me the big hello. "Jose, my boy! Good to see you...." He glanced up at the Eyespy. "Trouble with the Witch Hunters? Tsk tsk--" "As if you didn't know," I snapped. "You think I'd do a thing like that to a _friend_?" "Yes." He grinned a big toothy smile at me. "As a matter of fact, you're right. I hear you've got a big case. Non-terrie. Worth a lot to a Legal Eagle to be the first with a non-terrie case--" "You're too late, you vulture," I said. "Interlocutory decree granted." I tapped my pouch. "Right here." He shrugged. "Hope nothing happens to void it, old sport." He winked at his silent companion, the staid and seemingly dumb professor. He turned back to me. "Sorry. Should have introduced you. Prof Cripps--this is my friend and competitor, Jose Obanion." "Pleased," the Professor said, looking fearfully at the Government Eyespy over my head. His fingers went automatically to the engraved tablet he wore on a chain round his neck--a validated Loyalty Oath--as though to show the unseen TBI observers he wasn't _really_ a friend of this Joe Mac's. "The Prof," Honest Pancho said softly, "is a specialist in Venerian ethnology. He'd like to meet your clients." That gave me a start. "He'll meet them. They're going to sing tonight." The Professor's eyes widened. They looked shocked in his yellow painted face. "And dance?" I smirked happily at Pancho. "And dance. At 1,000 prots each." If Pancho had any reply for that, I don't know, for Gleda came in. She was wearing her hair blue and she wore a really striking pattern of iridescent blue paint with a double snake pattern coiling up her legs and torso. The party got under way very quickly. Gleda supplied the alkie and treacle and everyone nibbled their own synthetic protein out of their pouches. The combination soon had an hilarious effect on the gathering and a couple that I didn't know, a boy and girl in particolored green and blue, starting throwing small articles of furniture at the Eyespy over my head. Couldn't hurt the Eye, of course, but I was kept pretty busy dodging. Then Thais suggested a quick game of Clobber. I must confess, not without satisfaction, that I cheated a little and peeked through the bandage so I could land a real lulu on Pancho's long pointed nose.