They drank to clear skies and bright stars. They drank to success and more promotions. They drank to a not-thinly-veiled "mission." They drank to Hightee's next play.
Heller ordered another round of red bubblebrew! Two hundred and twenty credits!
They all sat back now, watching the other guests perform. Some were good, some were bad, some got a little applause, some got quite a bit.
I had just settled into a kind of stupor. The inevitability of my two choices weighed me down. It couldn't be any worse.
And then it was!
A light was flash-flash-flashing at our table. Hightee poked me in the shoulder. "You're first from this table."
"Me?"
"Of course," said Hightee with a smile. "And you'd better put on a good act!" She laughed. "If you don't perform, they double the bill!" The whole table thought this screamingly funny. It must have been the red bubblebrew! To me it was sheer tragedy.
I nervously rose to my feet to go out and be slaughtered by the mob.
Chapter 4
I had been impelled into this action by the threat of a doubled bill. Three-quarters of the way to the stage, I realized that it was a double of something I couldn't pay the single of. What was I doing here?
Bravery in the face of mobs is something I do not understand. How an actor or singer or dancer can actually stand up there aloneand look at an audience that is looking at him is quite beyond my comprehension.
On the stage, I turned to look. A huge, glaring spotlight was practically putting my eyes out. Adrift and disembodied were the masks, masks, masks, all pointed in my direction. And below it were the boots, boots, boots, stamping in a colored rippling haze of lights, ready, I was sure, to kick the daylights out of me.
What if they all rushed at me at once and started mangling me?
In other words, I had stage fright.
It had been half-formed in my mind that I would recite a poem. When I was a child, I had been taught some poems. "The Brave Hec at the Battle of the Blim" was one of them I had been praised for when I was six. I opened my mouth. For the life of me I couldn't think of the first line!
Hastily, I reviewed, all in a flash, any anecdotes I knew. There was one about two Apparatus agents who each thought the other one was a female until they wound up in bed. I opened my mouth to start to tell it.
Ulp, the last thing I could mention here was the Apparatus!
My knees shook. The audience was getting restive. The huge spotlight glared pitilessly. My buck-toothed Demon mask seemed to be melting.
Abruptly, I had an inspiration. Naturally, a hunter of songbirds uses their calls. I was pretty good at it. I could lure them within a few feet before I shot them.
In a voice I intended to sound bold, but which came out quivering, I said, "The mountain thriller!" My mouth was awfully dry. But I got my lips pursed. I actually got the birdcall going.
Silence from the audience.
"The meadow warbler!" I said. And I gave the call of that bird.
Silence from the audience.
"The marsh hen!" I said. And I gave the somewhat raucous squawk of the marsh hen.
Silence from the audience. Not even a patter of applause. Nothing!
I thought furiously. I could not remember any more calls. Either the audience thought there were more or were waiting for me to do handstands or backflips or something.
Suddenly their silence made me very cross. I glared at them. I said, accusatively, "Well, the birds like it!" There was an instant stormof laughter! They pounded their boots, they held their sides. They laughed and laughed and laughed!
I scuttled back to our table. The audience was still laughing. Hightee patted my sleeve, "I thought you were very brave." The next person on had a sonic-light drum and juggled it while playing it. When he got through, the audience shouted at him, "Did the birds like it?" There were screams of laughter.
A girl, a singer, was on next and when she finished, the audience again called out, "Did the birds like it?" And more screams of laughter.
A man who rolled a barrel with his feet finished and the audience also asked him, "Did the birds like it?"
"You were a hit," said Hightee.
I began to realize I must have been and was even starting to feel cocky. A new round of bubblebrew didn't even make me wince.
But ah, how short-lived are the infrequent moments of happiness in life. I tipped my head back to drink and I saw it!
A press balcony!
It was up above the crowd, jutting out into the room. There were three reporters there and, oh Gods, a Home-view camera crew!
Hightee followed my riveted stare. "Oh," she said, shrugging it off, "they cover this club a lot. They are spotting talent, looking for something new. They also pick up what we call filler time: they never use it unless the event day has been totally dead." She laughed, "I think the newssheets just hang around here so they won't have to go to work!" Any cheer I had been feeling was gone. If there is anything detested in the Apparatus, it is reporters and if there is anything more detested than that, it is reporters with cameras! Lombar was quite violent on the subject. "The victims have no right to know," was one of his favorite sayings. His specter seemed to loom closer in the outside dark.
And then the light beam which designated the next performer was on our table again. Hightee shrank back.
Heller touched the Countess on the arm and they rose.
Lightly, they trotted toward the open dance floor, the Countess in her shimmering pale orange and lepertige mask, Heller in a glittering powder blue evening suit and steelman stars huge over his eyes. The spotlight shifted and picked them up.
The Countess held up her hand. To her right there was a serving table. It had tall bubblebrew bottles on it. It was cluttered with frail canisters. These all sat on a big square of white glittercloth. She moved to this rickety display. She took one corner of the cloth. I thought she was going to pull the table over! With a flip of her wrist, she gave an expert yank!
The cloth simply came out from under with a swish. It was dangling in her hand. Not one bottle or canister had even quivered!
The audience must have thought that was the act. They applauded lightly.
But it sure wasn't the act. The Countess called something to the band. The pair had reached the center of the dance floor now. The Countess floated the big square of white glittercloth in the air: it was about a yard from corner to corner, diagonally. She folded it with an expert flip. She stuck one corner of it between Heller's teeth and took the opposite corner in her own. Their faces were now about six inches apart.
The band began a frivolous, folksy tune. Heller and the Countess put their hands behind their backs and with an intricate pattern of footwork, began to dance.
"The Manco Mancho!" said Hightee with delight. She patted her hands together in a little girl's expression of joy. "Watch this," she nudged me. "It's the nursery folk dance of Manco! They would both know it of course!" Each of them biting a corner of the cloth, they gravely executed the geometric steps in perfect unison and time.
Suddenly at the end of a music bar, their teeth dropped a fold in the cloth and their faces were a foot apart. The music continued. But now they weren't following each other's steps. In sweeping foot motions, alternately, one seemed to be kicking the feet out from under the other one but the other one was in the air when the foot passed under. Back and forth.
Hightee was looking a little bewildered. The dance was suddenly much more complex. "That isn't the Manco Mancho!" And indeed, it wasn't. It was the first elementary exercise of foot combat, timed and made to look like a dance! I thought, they better not get too good. That Homeview camera up there is right on them! The last thing we wanted here was an identified Heller, much less the Countess Krak!