Betty turned to a mirror. 'Like it? It's called 'Cosmic Contouring' and it's the latest thing."
"Makes you look like a zebra with the pip."
"Why, you country oaf. Ed, you like it. Don't you?"
Ed Cowen looked up from the checker board and said hastily, "I wouldn't know. My wife says I have no taste."
"Most men haven't. Johnnie, Myra and I have come to invite you two to go out on the town. How about it?"
Cowen answered, "I don't favor that, Myra."
"It was her idea," Miss Holz answered.
John Thomas said to Cowen, "Why not? I'm sick of checkers."
"Well... I'm supposed to keep in touch with the office. They might want you any time now."
"Pooh!" put in Betty. "You carry a bodyphone. Anyhow Myra does."
Cowen shook his head. "Let's play it safe."
"Am I under arrest?" Betty persisted. "Is Johnnie?"
"Mmm... no. It's more protective custody."
'Then you can protectively cuss him wherever be is. Or stay here and play checkers with yourself. Come on, Johnnie."
Cowen looked at Miss Holtz; she answered slowly, "I suppose it's all right, Ed. We'll be with them."
Cowen shrugged and stood up. Johnnie said to Betty, "I'm not going out in public with you looking like that. Wash your face."
"But Johnnie! It took two hours to put it on."
"The taxpayers paid for it, didn't they?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Wash your face. Or we go nowhere. Don't you agree, Miss Holtz?"
Special Operative Holtz had only a flower pattern adorning her left cheek, aside from the usual tinting. She said thoughtfully, "Betty doesn't need it. Not at her age."
"Oh, you're a couple of Puritans!" Betty said bitterly, stuck her tongue at Johnnie and slouched into the bath. She came out with her face glowing pink from scrubbing. "Now I'm stark naked. Let's go."
There was another tussle at the lift, which Ed Cowen won. They went to the roof to take an air taxi for sightseeing, instead of going down to the streets. "Both you kids have had your faces spread around the papers the past few days. And this town has more crackpots than a second-hand shop. I don't want any incidents."
"If you hadn't let them bully me, my face wouldn't be recognizable."
"But his would."
"We could paint him, too. Any male face would be improved with make-up." But she entered the lift and they took an air taxi.
"Where to, Chief?"
"Oh," said Cowen, "cruise around and show us sights. Put it on the hourly rate."
"You're the doctor. I can't fly across the Boulevard of Suns. Some parade, or something."
"I know."
"Look," put in Johnnie, "take us to the space port."
"No," Cowen corrected. "Not out there."
"Why not, Ed? I haven't seen Lummox yet. I want to look at him. He may not be well."
"That's one thing you can't do," Cowen told him. "The Hroshii ship is out of bounds."
"Well, I can see him from the air, can't I?"
"No!"
"But..."
"Never mind him," Betty advised. "We'll get another taxi. I've got money, Johnnie. So long, Ed."
"Look," complained the driver. "I'll take you to Timbuctu. But I can't hang around over a landing flat. The cops get rude about it."
"Head for the space port," Cowen said resignedly. There was a barricade around the many acres assigned to the Hroshii except where it had been broken to let their delegation enter the Boulevard of Suns, and even then the barricade joined others carrying on down the avenue toward the administrative group. Inside the enclosure the landing craft of the Hroshii sat squat and ugly, almost as large as a terrestrial star ship. Johnnie looked at it and wondered what it was going to be like to be on Hroshijud. He was uncomfortable at the thought, not because he was fearful but because he had not yet told Betty that he was going. He had started a couple of times but it had not worked out right.
Since she had not raised the subject he assumed that she did not know.
There were other sightseers in the air, and a crowd, not very thick, outside the barricade. No single wonder lasted long in Capital; its residents prided themselves on being blas‚ and in fact, the Hroshii were not fantastic compared with a dozen other friendly races, some of them members of the Federation.
The Hroshii swarmed around the base of their ship, doing unexplained things with artifacts they had erected. Jo'hnnie tried to estimate their number, found it like guessing beans in a bottle. Dozens, surely... how many more?
The taxi cruised just outside the point patrol of police air cars. Johnnie suddenly called out, "Hey! There's Lummie!"
Betty craned her neck. "Where, Johnnie?"
"Corning into sight on the far side of their ship. There!" He turned to the driver. "Say, mister, could you put us around on the far side as close in as they'll let you?"
The driver glanced at Cowen, who nodded. They swung around, the police sentries and came in toward the Hroshij craft from the far side. The driver picked a point between two police cars and back a little. Lummox could be seen clearly now, closely attended by a group of Hroshii and towering over them.
"I wish I had binox," Johnnie complained. "I can't really see."
"Pair in the glove compartment," offered the driver. Johnnie got them out. They were a simple optical type, without electronic magnification, but they brought Lummox up much closer. He stared into his friend's face.
"How does Lummie look, Johnnie?"
"Okay. Kind of skinny, though. I wonder if they are feeding him right?"
"Mr. Greenberg tells me they aren't feeding Lummie at all. I thought you knew?"
"What? They can't do that to Lummie!"
"I don't see what we can do about it."
"Well..." John Thomas lowered the window and tried to get a better look. "Say, can't you take it in closer? And lower maybe? I want to give him a good checking over."
Cowen shook his head. The driver grumbled, "I don't want no words with the cops." But he did move in a little closer until he was lined up with the police cars.
Almost at once the speaker in the car's overhead blared, "Hey, you! Number four eighty-four! Where do you think you're going with that can? Drag it out of there!"
The driver muttered and started to obey. John Thomas, still with the glasses to his eyes, said, "Aw!"... then added, "I wonder if he can hear me? Lummie!" he shouted into the wind. "Oh Lummox!"
The Hroshia raised her head and looked wildly around.
Cowen grabbed John Thomas and reached for the window closure; But Johnnie shook free. "Oh, you go fry eggs!" he said angrily. "I've been pushed around long enough. Lummox! It's Johnnie, boy! Over here! Come over this way..."
Cowen dragged him inside and slammed the window shut. "I knew we shouldn't have come out. Driver, let's get out of here."
"Only too happy!"
"But hold it just back of the police lines. I want to check on this."
"Make up your mind."
It needed no binoculars to see what was happening. Lummox headed straight for the barrier, on a bee line with the taxi, scattering other Hroshii right and left. On reaching the barrier no attempt was made to flow over it; Lummox went through it.
"Jumping jeepers!" Cowen said softly. "But the tanglefoot will stop her."
It did not. Lummox slowed down, but one mighty foot followed another, as if the charged air had been deep mud. With the persistence of a glacier the Hroshia was seeking the point most closely under the taxi.
And more Hroshii were pouring out the gap. They made still heavier weather of the immobilizing field, but still they came. As Cowen watched, Lummox broke free of the zone and came on at a gallop, with people scattering ahead of her.