‘Boss, take that silly toy right back to Sears Roebuck and demand your money back! Or I'll, I'll - I'll flush it down the pot, that's what I'll do!'

‘You do and you'll pay the plumber's bill. Look, Dagmar, I'm ing to wear it home and I want you to snap a pic of Zenobia's face when she sees it. Then I'll take it off... unless Zenobia decides she wants me to wear it to the Mayor's orgy. Now get into your costume; we still have to pick up Daffy and his assistant. His goose, although he claims otherwise. Move. Shake your tail, frail.'

‘Pee on you, Boss.'

‘Has the sun gone down so soon? Maureen, if I understood you earlier, you have not eaten today. Come have dinner with us and we can discuss what to do with you later; my wife is the best cook in town. Right, Dagmar?'

‘Correct, Boss. That makes twice this week you've been right.'

‘When was the other time? Did you find something for Cinderella to wear?'

‘It's a problem, Boss. Ali I have here are jumpsuit uniforms, cut for me. On Maureen they would fit too soon in one direction, too late in the other.' (She meant that I'm shaped like a pear while she is shaped more like a celery.)

Dr Ridpath looked at me, then at her, decided that Dagmar was right. ‘Maureen, we'll see what my wife has that you can wear. It won't matter between here and there; you'll be in a robocab. Pixel! Dinner time, boy!'

‘Now? Wow!'

So we had dinner at the home of the Ridpaths. Zenobia Ridpath is indeed a good cook. Pixel and I appreciated her, and she appreciated Pixel and was warmly hospitable to me. Zenobia is a dignified matron, beautiful, about forty-five, with premature white hair tinted with a blue rinse. Her face did not change when she saw the mechanical monstrosity her husband was sporting.

He said, ‘What do you think this is, Zen?'

She answered, ‘Oh, at last! You promised it to me as a wedding present all these many years ago! Well, better late than never - I think.' She stooped and looked at it. ‘Why does it have "Made in Japan" printed on it?' She straightened up and smiled at us. ‘Hello, Dagmar, good to see you. Happy festival!'

‘Bumper crops!'

‘Big babies! Mrs Johnson, it was sweet of you to come. May I call you Maureen? And may I offer you some crab legs? Flown in from Japan, like my husband's new peepee.

And what would yon like to drink?' A polite little machine rolled up with crab legs and other tasty titbits, and took my drink order - Cuba Libre but omit the rum.

Mrs Ridpath congratulated Dagmar on her costume: a black, sheer body-stocking covering even her head - but missing wherever presence of garment would get in the way at a saturnalia: cutaway crotch, breasts bare, mouth bare. The result was glaringly obscene.

Zenobia's costume was provocative but pretty - a blue fog that matched her eyes and did not hide much. Daffy Weisskopf climbed right up her front, making jungle noises. She just smiled at him. ‘Have something to eat first, Doctor. And save some of your strength for after midnight.'

I think Dr Eric's suspicions about Dr Daffy's assistant, Freddie, were justified; he did not smell right to me and I apparently did not smell right to him - and I was beginning to be whiff, as I was starting to get into a party mood. As I had requested, that Cuba Libre had no rum in it, but I had half of it inside me before I realised that it was loaded with vodka - one hundred proof, I feel certain. Vodka is tricky; it has no odour and no taste... and now I lay me down to sleep -

I think some of those appetisers had aphrodisiacs concealed in them... and Maureen does not need aphrodisiacs. Has never needed them.

There were three sorts of wine at dinner and endless toasts that rapidly progressed from suggestive to outrageous. The little robot that waited on my sector of the table kept the wine glasses filled but was not programmed to understand ‘water' - and Mama Maureen got potted.

No use pretending anything else. I had too little to eat and too much to drink and too little sleep and I never have learned to drink like a lady. I had simply learned how to pretend to drink while avoiding alcohol. But on Carolita's night I let my guard down.

I had planned to ask Zenobia to permit me to stay overnight in her house... then on the morrow, festival over, I could tackle a city restored to its senses. First I needed a minimum of money and clothes... and there are ways to get both without actually stealing. A female can often wangle an unsecured loan if she hits a mate for it who shows a tendency to pat her in a friendly fashion. She can hint pretty strongly as to the interest she is willing to pay... and every female Time Corps field agent has done something like that on occasion. We aren't nervous virgins; we don't leave Boondock without being vaccinated against pregnancy and nineteen other things you might catch if a trouser worm bit you. If you are too tender-minded for such emergency measures, you do belong in the profession. Females are better than males as Time Corps scouts because they can get away with such things. My co-wife Gwen/Hazel could steal the spots off a leopard and never disturb his sleep. If she were sent after the Rheingold, Fafnir and his flaming halitosis would not stand a chance.

Having acquired that minimum of local money and local clothing, my next move would be a preliminary study to determine: 1)how to get more money in this culture without going to jail; 2)where, if anywhere, is the Time Corps message drop; 3)if the second point is null, where is the dummy front for Hilda's crosstime black-marketers? Most of this can be researched unobtrusively either at a public library or in a telephone directory.

All very professional - Instead I got snagged by the proctors and did not do any of it.

Zenobia insisted that I go with them to the Mayor's orgy, and by then I lacked the judgement to refuse. She selected a costume for me, too, from her clothes: long sheer hose, green round garters, high heels, and a cape... and somehow it seemed to me the perfect costume, just right, although I could not remember why I thought so.

I recall only vignettes of the Mayor's party. Perhaps it will help to think of a party given jointly by Caligula and Nero, as directed by Cecil B. de Mille in gorgeous Technicolor. I remember telling some oaf (I can't remember his face; I'm not sure he had a face) that it was not impossible to lay me - many have tried and most succeeded - but it had to be approached romantic like, not like a man grabbing a bite standing up at a fast-food joint.

That party and the rest of that night was rape, rape, rape, all around me... I do not care for rape; one does not meet a better class of people that way.

I escaped from that party and found myself out in the park. My leaving had to do with a pompous ass dressed in a long robe (a cope?) of white silk heavily embroidered in cardinal and gold. It was open down the front with his Flaggenstange sticking out. He was so self-important that he had four acolytes to help him with the chore.

He grabbed me as I was trying to slide past - stuck his tongue in my mouth. I kneed him and ran, and jumped out an open window. Ground floor, yes-but I did not stop to find out.

Pixel caught up with me in about fifty yards, then slowed me somewhat as he criss-crossed ahead of me. He went into that big park and I slowed down to a walk. I was still wearing the cape but I had lost one slipper going out the window, then had kicked the other off at once, being unable to run one shoe off, one shoe on. It did not matter as I had gone barefooted so habitually in Boondock that my feet were as tough as shoe leather.

I wandered around the park for a while, watching the action (amazing!) and wondering where I could go. I did not want to risk the Mayor's palace again; my pompous boyfriend with the fancy vestment might still be there. I did not know where the Ridpaths lived even though I had been there. It seemed to me that I must wait for dawn, then locate Grand Hotel Augustas (should be easy), go to Dr Eric's office on the mezzanine, and hit him for a small loan. Hobson's choice, no other option - but not too unlikely as he had brailled me quite thoroughly during dinner. He wasn't being rude; similar things or more so were going on all around the table. And I had been warned.