Somebody was pushing my hand to sign. All of a sudden I saw what I was writing:

Sultan Bey!

I was not writing "Inkswitch"! I was writing the name I really bore on Earth!

"Wait!" I screamed.

How could this be? Pinch didn't know that name. She thought my name was Inkswitch.

The clerk and everybody was looking.

"That's the wrong name!" I screamed.

They stared at me.

"He thought he was in Boston," said Pinch.

They all laughed.

With the sharp ends of the bouquet wires penetrating the flesh of my side, I was gotten back on the street.

"I thought I would be married in the name of Ink-switch!" I wailed.

"You've got a crooked streak in you," said Pinch. "If you wanted us to think your Fed cover name was your real name, you shouldn't babble some outlandish tongue that could be Turkish in your sleep and you shouldn't leave your most-used passport and birth certificate around. For convenience, we will continue to call you Inkswitch. But don't try to pull something like that again! You're very legally married, Sultan Bey."

Something inside me snapped. I began to babble. I heard myself saying, "My real name is Jettero Heller."

"Nonsense," said Candy, laughing. "Next you'll be telling us you're that other name you scream in your sleep, 'Officer Gris.'"

"No, Sultan Bey," said Mrs. Bey nee Pinch. "Make up your mind to it. You are our lawfully wedded husband, for better or for worse, and even though you aren't

much, we'll have to get used to it and so will you. Become accustomed to the fact that you are now probably the most married man on the entire eastern seaboard. The knots are irrevocably tied. Let's have some hamburgers and go home."

In the early dusk of spring, we drew up at last before the apartment which I had left, only that dawn, a free man.

We went inside. A new surprise had been readied. Already shocked, I had not been prepared to behold anything else new.

The whole place was garlanded. The symbols of Aphrodite-doves, swans, myrtle, pomegranate, clamshells and sea foam-had had added to them arches of orange blossoms.

And there were two new people there: a girl named Curly with brown eyes and brown hair, a not bad-looking thirty in a combat jacket; the other a very pale willowy thing with a pretty face and soft lips named Sippy, dressed in absolutely transparent gauze.

They had "The Wedding March" going on the record player and they showered us with rice and did a rather mincing dance and kissed everybody, crying, "Happy weddings to you!"

It was disconcerting. What were they doing there?

I was tired after the long drive and showing signs of

strain. I edged over to Mrs. Bey nee Pinch. "Give me my money now," I said.

"Oh my, dear husband," Mrs. Bey nee Pinch said. "There's cake and other things."

"Here," said Sippy, holding out a glass, "try some of this champagne."

Ex-Pinch and the late Miss Licorice, now Mrs. Candy Bey, had their capes off. Curly rolled out a wedding cake on a tea trolley. With elaborate gestures quite like a sexual approach, she gesticulated with a knife.

She put my hand on the hilt. She put Candy's on mine. She put Mrs. Bey nee Pinch's fingers gripping ours and all three of us cut the wedding cake. It had TWO brides on it! The man, at the very first thrust of the knife, fell over. An omen?

Then they played some pop music and everybody ate cake and danced with one another. I was thirsty and drank quite a bit of champagne. The cake kept sticking in my throat and I kept having to wash it down.

Inevitably, they broke out the marijuana. The joints circulated. Blue smoke began to haze the air. It didn't help my throat a bit.

They were getting quite drunk and stoned. Curly did an impersonation of Rockecenter at his last personnel inspection, making sure that Sippy was still a virgin and when Curly produced a limp dishrag, for some reason it sent them all rolling on the floor with glee, holding their sides.

I took another drag on the joint I was smoking and frowned. I didn't get it. But then, I philosophized, drunks will guffaw at anything, especially when they're high on pot.

Gaily laughing, quite giddy, Candy rummaged in the record cabinet, told Curly and Sippy the joke and

then played "Sweet Little Woman, Please Marry Me." It was torture to listen to.

I pulled Mrs. Bey nee Pinch to the side. I said, "Miss Pinch, give me my money now."

"Adora," she said, drunkenly. "You must learn to call me Adora now, dear husband. I am no longer Miss Pinch."

"Whatever your name is," I said. "Give me my money now."

"Oh, dear husband," she said. "A marriage isn't legal unless it is consummated. Don't you want to consummate the marriage?"

"No," I said.

"Aha!" cried Mrs. Bey nee Pinch, and I saw she had become more than a little tipsy. "Trying to give yourself a legal out, are you?" She thrust her face into mine. "You know very well that a marriage that isn't consummated can be annulled." She turned, "Hey, you girls, listen to this (bleep)! He's trying to give himself lepl grounds to cancel out his marriages!"

Four faces, close to, glared at me.

"No, no!" I cried, quite frightened. "You told me that if you had sex you might miscarry!"

"You think I didn't think of that?" snarled Mrs. Bey nee Pinch. "I knew you'd try to weasel out! We've got two virgins here, just for the purpose of consummation!"

"Wait a minute," I begged, "this is crazy!"

"Now he's trying to annul it by accusing us of insanity!" shouted Mrs. Bey nee Pinch.

Candy shook her head. "The courts won't uphold that, dear husband," she hiccupped.

"This guy doesn't know his law," said Curly.

"No, no," I cried, distractedly. "I'm not trying to get out of anything. I just want my money."

"Oh," said Sippy, in blear-eyed shock. "Did he just marry you girls for your money?"

"And how will THAT look in the newspapers?" cried Mrs. Bey nee Pinch.

"He trifled with their affections," slurred Curly. "A monster!"

A vision of Crobe's cellological freaks went spinning around my head. "I've had enough of monsters!" I shouted.

"Call us monsters, will you?" shouted Mrs. Bey nee Pinch. "You CREEP!" And she threw a glass of champagne in my face.

"No, no," I cried, spluttering. "This is all a misunderstanding!"

"Oh, yeah?" said Mrs. Bey nee Pinch, "Well, do you admit you're married or don't you?"

She looked so ferocious, reeling there, that I got down on my knees, clasped my hands before my face and said, "Please, please. Please believe me. I admit, so help me Gods and hope to die, that I am married!"

"Good," said Mrs. Bey nee Pinch. "You heard him, girls. He knows now he is thoroughly married. Drink up so we can get on with this 'consummation'!"

The champagne gurgled into mugs, overspilling.

The four of them stood and raised their drinks which clinked together in an apex of arms.

"To a happy married life!" cried Mrs. Bey nee Pinch.

They guzzled down the whole of their mugs, glug, glug, glug, glug!

They threw their glasses at me!

I ducked amidst the splintering crash.

When I dared to look up from the floor where I had been protecting my head, I was hit by Curly's combat jacket.

A pair of pants went sailing past my hair. A shoe hit me.

I crawled under the sofa for better protection. Another version of the wedding march was booming out:

Here comes the bride,

Fit to be tied.

To how many boyfriends,

Has this chick spread wide?

Here comes the groom,

A relic from a tomb,

All the guests are laughing

As he meets his doom.

I dared to peek out.

I could see the bottom of the bed.