“So that’s how come my brother got into the act. The hospital called the cops, of course, so he was there with the meat-wagon and climbed aboard. He was all set to pinch the jane and throw her in the can, but when he got the whole story, and especially when she says she’s changed her mind about circulating around so much—it ain’t worth it, she says, she’d rather be an out-and-out hermit than have to have even one more fight with anybody who smelled like that—of course he let her go.” “Let her _go_!” Cloud exclaimed. “How _could_ he?” “Why, sure, boss.” Vesta, wide-eyed, gazed innocently at her captain. “The ape didn’t _die_, you know, and she wasn’t going to do it again, and he wasn’t a Vegian, so didn’t have any relatives or friends to go to the mat for him, and besides, anybody with one-tenth of one percent of a brain would know better than to keep on making passes at a frail after she warned him how bad he stunk. What _else_ could he do, chief?” “What else, indeed?” Cloud said, in English. “I live; and—occasionally—I learn. Come on, Joan, let’s go and devote the imponderable force of our massed intellects to the multifarious problems of loose atomic vortices.” On the way, Joan asked: “Our little Vesta surprised you, Storm?” “Didn’t she you? She had me gasping like a fish.” “Not so much. I know them pretty well and I used to breed cats. Scent: hearing—they can hear forty thousand cycles: the fact that they mature both mentally and physically long before they do sexually: some of their utterly barbarous customs: it’s quite a shock to learn how—‘queer,’ shall I say?—some of the Vegian mores are to us of other worlds.” “‘Queer’ is certainly the word—as queer as a nine-credit bill. But confound it, Joan, I _like_ ’em!” “So do I, Storm,” she replied quietly. “They _aren’t_ human, you know, and by Galactic standards they qualify. And now we’ll go and whack those vortices right on their center of impact.” “We’ll do that, chum,” he said. Then, in perfect silence he went on in thought: “Chum? Sweetheart, I meant. . . . My God, _what_ a sweetheart you’d. . . .” “Storm!” Joan half-shrieked, eyes wide in astonishment. “You’re _sending_!” “I’m not either!” he declared, blushing furiously. “I can’t—you’re _snooping_!” “I’m not snooping—I haven’t snooped a lick since I started talking. You _got_ it back there, Storm!” She seized both his hands and squeezed. “You _did_ it, and neither of us realized it ’til just this minute!” _Chapter 13_ ▂▂▂▂▂▂GAMES WITHIN GAMES