"If they all wear that metal ornament, how can they hope to hide out?" He glanced at her own bare bosom. "They appear by night--slip through the streets like ghosts...." She looked in turn at Murphy's loose shirt. "You will notice persons brushing up against you, feeling you," she laid her hand along his breast, "and when this happens you will know they are agents of the Sultan, because only strangers and the House may wear shirts. But now, let me sing to you--a song from the Old Land, old Java. You will not understand the tongue, but no other words so join the voice of the _gamelan_." * * * * * "This is the gravy-train," said Murphy. "Instead of a garden suite with a private pool, I usually sleep in a bubble-tent, with nothing to eat but condensed food." Soek Panjoebang flung the water out of her sleek black hair. "Perhaps, Weelbrrr, you will regret leaving Cirgamesç?" "Well," he looked up to the transparent roof, barely visible where the sunlight collected and refracted, "I don't particularly like being shut up like a bird in an aviary.... Mildly claustrophobic, I guess." After breakfast, drinking thick coffee from tiny silver cups, Murphy looked long and reflectively at Soek Panjoebang. "What are you thinking, Weelbrrr?" Murphy drained his coffee. "I'm thinking that I'd better be getting to work." "And what do you do?" "First I'm going to shoot the palace, and you sitting here in the garden playing your _gamelan_." "But Weelbrrr--not _me_!" "You're a part of the universe, rather an interesting part. Then I'll take the square...." "And the sjambak?" A quiet voice spoke from behind. "A visitor, Tuan Murphy." Murphy turned his head. "Bring him in." He looked back to Soek Panjoebang. She was on her feet. "It is necessary that I go." "When will I see you?" "Tonight--at the Barangipan." * * * * * The quiet voice said, "Mr. Rube Trimmer, Tuan." Trimmer was small and middle-aged, with thin shoulders and a paunch. He carried himself with a hell-raising swagger, left over from a time twenty years gone. His skin had the waxy look of lost floridity, his tuft of white hair was coarse and thin, his eyelids hung in the off-side droop that amateur physiognomists like to associate with guile. "I'm Resident Director of the Import-Export Bank," said Trimmer. "Heard you were here and thought I'd pay my respects." "I suppose you don't see many strangers." "Not too many--there's nothing much to bring 'em. Cirgamesç isn't a comfortable tourist planet. Too confined, shut in. A man with a sensitive psyche goes nuts pretty easy here." "Yeah," said Murphy. "I was thinking the same thing this morning. That dome begins to give a man the willies. How do the natives stand it? Or do they?" Trimmer pulled out a cigar case. Murphy refused the offer.