"But I'll operate the papoola," Luke said. "By remote. I'm a little more skilled than you; after all, I built them."
"Sure," Al said. "I'll have my hands full playing anyhow."
"Yes," Luke said, "you'll need both hands for that bottle."
Something in Luke's tone made Ian Duncan uneasy. What's he up to? he wondered. But in any case he and his brother had no choice; they had to have the papoola working for them. And no doubt Luke could do a good job of operating it; he had already proved his superiority over Al, just now, and as Luke said, Al would be busy blowing away on his jug. But still -
"Loony Luke," Ian said, "have you ever met Nicole?" It was a sudden thought on his part, an unexpected intuition.
"Sure," Luke said steadily. "Years ago. I had some hand puppets; my Dad and I traveled around putting on puppet shows. We finally played the White House."
"What happened there?" Ian asked.
Luke, after a pause, said, "She didn't care for us. Said something about our puppets being indecent."
And you hate her, Ian realized. You never forgave her. "Were they?" he asked Luke.
"No," Luke answered. "True, one act was a strip show; we had follies girl puppets. But nobody ever objected before. My Dad took it hard but it didn't bother me." His face was impassive.
Al said, "Was Nicole the First Lady that far back?"
"Oh yes," Luke said. "She's been in office for seventy-three years; didn't you know that?"
"It isn't possible," both Al and Ian said, almost together.
"Sure it is," Luke said. "She's a really old woman, now. A grandmother. But she still looks good, I guess. You'll know when you see her."
Stunned, Ian said, "On TV -"
"Oh yeah," Luke agreed. "On TV she looks around twenty. But look in the history books yourself; figure it out. The facts are all there."
The facts, Ian realized, mean nothing when you can see with your own eyes that she's as young-looking as ever. And we see that every day.
Luke, you're lying, he thought. We know it; we all know it. My brother saw her; Al would have said, if she was really like that. You hate her; that's your motive. Shaken, he turned his back to Luke, not wanting to have anything to do with the man, now. Seventy-three years in office – that would make Nicole almost ninety, now. He shuddered at the idea; he blocked it out of his thoughts. Or at least he tried to.
"Good luck, boys," Luke said, chewing on his toothpick.
In his sleep Ian Duncan had a terrible dream. A hideous old woman with greenish, wrinkled claws scrabbled at him, whining for him to do something – he did not know what it was because her voice, her words, blurred into indistinction, swallowed by her broken-toothed mouth, lost in the twisting thread of saliva which found its way to her chin. He struggled to free himself…
"Chrissake," Al's voice came to him. "Wake up; we have to get the lot moving; we're supposed to be at the White House in three hours."
Nicole, Ian realized as he sat up groggily. It was her I was dreaming about; ancient and withered, but still her. "Okay," he muttered as he rose unsteadily from the cot. "Listen, Al," he said, "suppose she is old, like Loony Luke says? What then? What'll we do?"
"We'll perform," Al said. "Play our jugs."
"But I couldn't live through it," Ian said. "My ability to adjust is just too brittle. This is turning into a nightmare; Luke controls the papoola and Nicole is old – what's the point of our going on? Can't we go back to just seeing her on the TV and maybe once in our lifetime at a great distance like you did in Shreveport? That's good enough for me, now. I want that, the image; okay?"
"No," Al said doggedly. "We have to see this through. Remember, you can always emigrate to Mars."
The lot had already risen, was already moving toward the East Coast and Washington, D.C.
When they landed, Slezak, a rotund, genial little individual, greeted them warmly; he shook hands with them as they walked toward the service entrance of the White House. "Your program is ambitious," he bubbled, "but if you can fulfill it, fine with me, with us here, the First Family I mean, and in particular the First Lady herself who is actively enthusiastic about all forms of original artistry. According to your biographical data you two made a thorough study of primitive disc recordings from the early nineteen hundreds, as early as 1920, of jug bands surviving from the U.S. Civil War, so you're authentic juggists except of course you're classical, not folk."
"Yes sir," Al said.
"Could you, however, slip in one folk number?" Slezak asked as they passed the guards at the service entrance and entered the White House, the long, carpeted corridor with its artificial candles set at intervals. "For instance, we suggest 'Rockabye My Sarah Jane.' Do you have that in your repertoire? If not -"
"We have it," Al said shortly. "We'll add it toward the end."
"Fine," Slezak said, prodding them amiably ahead of him. "Now may I ask what this creature you carry is?" He eyed the papoola with something less than enthusiasm. "Is it alive?"
"It's our totem animal," Al said.
"You mean a superstitious charm? A mascot?"
"Exactly," Al said. "With it we assuage anxiety." He patted the papoola's head. "And it's part of our act; it dances while we play. You know, like a monkey."
"Well I'll be darned," Slezak said, his enthusiasm returning. "I see, now. Nicole will be delighted; she loves soft, furry things." He held a door open ahead of them.
And there she sat.
How could Luke have been so wrong? Ian thought. She was even lovelier than on TV, and much more distinct; that was the main difference, the fabulous authenticity of her appearance, its reality to the senses. The senses knew the difference. Here she sat, in faded blue-cotton trousers, moccasins on her feet, a carelessly-buttoned white shirt through which he could see – or imagined he could see – her tanned, smooth skin… how informal she was, Ian thought. Lacking in pretense or show. Her hair cut short, exposing her beautifully-formed neck and ears. And, he thought, so darn young. She did not look even twenty. And the vitality. The TV could not catch that, the delicate glow of color and line all about her.
"Nicky," Slezak said, "these are the classical juggists."
She glanced up, sideways; she had been reading a newspaper. Now she smiled. "Good morning," she said. "Did you have breakfast? We could serve you some Canadian bacon and butterhorns and coffee if you want." Her voice, oddly, did not seem to come from her; it materialized from the upper part of the room, almost at the ceiling. Looking that way, Ian saw a series of speakers and he realized that a glass barrier separated Nicole from them, a security measure to protect her. He felt disappointed and yet he understood why it was necessary. If anything happened to her -
"We ate, Mrs. Thibodeaux," Al said. "Thanks." He, too, was glancing up at the speakers.
We ate Mrs. Thibodeaux, Ian thought crazily. Isn't it actually the other way around? Doesn't she, sitting here in her blue-cotton pants and shirt, doesn't she devour us?
Now the President, Taufic Negal, a slender, dapper, dark man, entered behind Nicole, and she lifted her face up to him and said, "Look, Taffy, they have one of those papoolas with them – won't that be fun?"
"Yes," the President said, smiling, standing beside his wife.
"Could I see it?" Nicole asked Al. "Let it come here." She made a signal, and the glass wall began to lift.
Al dropped the papoola and it scuttled toward Nicole, beneath the raised security barrier; it hopped up, and all at once Nicole held it in her strong hands, gazing down at it intently.
"Heck," she said, "it's not alive; it's just a toy."
"None survived," Al said. "As far as we know. But this is an authentic model, based on remains found on Mars." He stepped toward her -