York shrugged. “So?”
“If so, he lives on Luna now. He’s not from Earth any more.”
Nodding slowly, York thought this over. “That might be an interesting slant. They’re keeping jobs for their own people. Jobs that we desperately need here on Earth. His taxes get paid to Crisium, instead of Washington… our government runs ever deeper in the hole…” He smiled warmly at her. “Thanks, Sue.”
Jake arrived, clutching five tickets. “They’re already punched. We can go”
At the threshold of the Door, York paused. “Bob, go ahead. Get a shot of me coming across. Brigitte, Sue, Jake, stay clear.”
“What if we just go on over?” Sue asked.
York nodded. “You be the guinea pigs. I’ll bring up the rear.”
Sue, Bob, and Jake crossed under their own power. Brigitte, as befitted her status as York’s current paramour, was handed over with exaggerated care. They were all careful stepping into Luna’s lower gravity; none fell.
Bob took several quick paces back, then turned to catch Trevor York as he majestically swept over the diagonal red and yellow lines demarcating the Door singularity, with its attendant six to one gravity ratio.
York fell.
Instantly, all four of his followers were at his side, helping him to his feet. Without a change in expression, he said, “Bob, I’d like to try that again.”
“Ready.” His cameraman’s expression was neutral.
Careful not to appear afraid, York cautiously recrossed the threshold of the Door, turned, and crossed back. The second crossing was successful. He looked like a pro.
“See? Nothing to it.”
No one mentioned that they had crossed the first time without problems.
The handler stood watching this from the freight desk on the New York side of the Door. The man behind the counter asked, “You didn’t offer him a mat?” He gestured at the stack of thick blue foam mats they spread across the threshold so pedestrians would not hurt themselves if they fell.
“He wouldn’t have used one,” Mike Ordner said, shaking his head. “It wouldn’t fit his image. Besides, his ego’s so puffed up I’m surprised he ever touched the floor. I’d have thought it would work like a crash bag.”
The man behind the counter chuckled. “I’ve always heard that those things inflate pretty easily.”
Ordner smiled appreciatively, still watching York and his entourage. “I know my ego would be pretty inflated if I had either one of those women with me. That dark-haired one is something else.”
“Wanna see her up close?”
Ordner raised an eyebrow.
“They’ve got some luggage that needs to be carried across.”
“Consider it done. Maybe they’ll want it taken to their rooms. Maybe the brunette will—”
“Dream on, bud. If you don’t get your ass in motion, they’re going to take off without you.”
Without taking his eyes off of the woman, Ordner groped for the leather gloves lying next to his elbow on the counter. “If I’m not back in ten minutes, don’t send anyone after me.”
Anne Lister’s face popped magically into being across the desk from her husband’s. He did not notice, being engrossed in pawing through a drawer, trying to find something, obviously unsuccessfully.
She watched him silently for a few moments, then said softly, “Other side, middle drawer.”
Startled, he straightened so quickly that he overbalanced and nearly fell backwards. “Heavens, woman! I thought I told you not to do that! You nearly gave me a heart attack.”
She grinned. “It’s one of the few perks to being married to a famous man. I get to see the human side of him from time to time.”
“Famous!”
“Being Commissioner of Crisium has made your name a household word on two planets. That’s fame enough for most.”
“Infamy is more like it. Don’t think for a moment that I’m not aware that they hang me in effigy twenty times a day down on Earth.”
She see-sawed a hand. “Fame… infamy, two sides of the same coin.”
“Maybe so, but it’s a coin that tarnishes easily,” he grumbled.
She pretended to pout. “Since you’re in such a good mood, I think I’ll just save my news for later.”
“OK, OK… with head properly bowed in abject humility, I stand corrected. What, lovely wife, is it that you wished to tell me?”
She brightened immediately. “Do you want the good news first or the bad news?”
Alan shuddered. “Not that again. Somehow, the bad news always seems to outweigh the good.”
Her image grinned at him. “Maybe not this time,” she teased.
Curiosity piqued, he raised one eyebrow. “Really, now? Well, let’s dispense with the bad news first, rather than poison the good news.”
“Trevor York has singled you out for his attentions. He wants an exclusive interview.”
“Trevor who?”
“You have a right to know….” she intoned, managing to catch a small hint of the man’s self-important air.
Alan frowned. “Wait a minute.
He… wasn’t he…” He snapped his fingers. “Got it! He was the guy down on Earth who ran a thing saying that I was a—”
“Shrewd political manipulator, who cold-bloodedly, and with malice aforethought, did single-handedly cause the collapse and ruin of the economy of the entire United States, along with Canada, Mexico, and by implication, the entire world. Yup, that’s him.”
“All without ever bothering to talk to me.”
“Well, the Door was closed at the time. Because of you. Something that he was quick to remind everyone. He claimed that he would have talked to you if he could.”
“Huh! Radio waves still work. He could have called.”
His wife clucked and wagged a finger. “Naughty, naughty. Mustn’t wreck the nice man’s image as the defender of the downtrodden.”
Alan spat a carefully chosen Anglo-Saxon monosyllable.
“Shall I tell him that your schedule is full?”
Lister pursed his lips and thought. “It’s tempting. No, let me face this guy down. Tell you what. We’ll trip him at his own game. While I’m talking to him, let’s make our own recording of the interview. It might prove interesting to compare his edited version with ours.”
“I take it that you want our recording made on the sly?”
Alan bit his lip and looked thoughtful. “I may tell him about it, or I may not. It all depends on his attitude. That other piece was rather uncalled for.”
She grinned maliciously at him. “The hard copy report on utility installation in the new level is in the middle drawer on your left, not the right.”
Confused by the non sequitur, Alan involuntarily glanced down at the drawer in question. His head popped back up. “Hey!” he yelped. “Waitaminnit! You said you had some good news—”
He broke off when he found that her image had dwindled to the size of his palm. Like the Cheshire Cat, all that remained was her smile.
“Anne?” he began.
“I’m pregnant,” she said. And her smile winked out of existence, leaving him gaping at empty air.
The worse things got, the better, as far as Conner’s Corner was concerned. A small bar in Detroit, it had prospered as out of work people began to congregate there to drown their sorrows in a mug of beer.
Hank and Carol Willis arrived early, the better to stake out their traditional booth near the end of the bar. They smiled and nodded at the bartender as they passed, slipping between stools and tables already occupied by people they did not know.
Carol frowned as she looked around. “Jeez, I’m not so sure but what this isn’t too much of a good thing. I mean, look at all these people.”