"Mmm—I'm afraid that the Court must concede that this is a case of Mahomet and the Mountain. Very well, we will not recess at the usual hour."

"Witness will stand down. Do Petitioners offer more witnesses?"

"No, Your Honor."

"Counsel?"

"Miss Johann Smith offers no further evidence."

"Mr. Salomon, is it your intention to present an argument or summary?"

"No, Your Honor. The facts speak for themselves."

"Petitioners?"

"Your Honor, is it your intention to bring this to a terminus today?"

"That's what I am trying to find out. We've been at this for many weary days and I find myself in sympathy with Dr. Boyle's attitude: Let's sweep up the mess and go home. Both sides agree that there are no more witnesses, no more questions, no more exhibits. Counsel for Miss Smith states that he will not offer an argument. If Petitioners' counsel, wishes to argue, he may do so—in which case Miss Smith, in person or through counsel or both, is privileged to rebut. What I had in mind, Counsel, was a recess... then, if you have your thoughts in order, you can say what you wish. If you can't, we can let it go over till tomorrow morning. You may at that time argue for a postponement, but I warn you that a lengthy postponement will not be tolerated; the Court has become impatient with delaying tactics and red herrings, not to mention language and attitudes flavored with contempt. What is your wish?"

"May it please the Court, if we continue ‘this evening, how long a recess does the Court contemplate?"

"—and rebuttal having been concluded, we are ready to rule. But first a statement by the Court. Inasmuch as a novel point in Constitutional Law is involved in this matter, if an appeal is made, the Court will, under the Declaratory Relief Act of 1984, on its own motion send the matter directly to Federal Appellate Court with recommendation that it be referred at once to the Supreme Court. We cannot say that this will happen but there are aspects which lead us to believe that it could happen; this matter is not trivial.

"We have heard the petition, we have heard witnesses and seen exhibits. It is possible to rule in one of four ways:

"That both Johann Sebastian Bach Smith and Eunice Evans Branca are alive;

"That Eunice is alive and Johann is dead;

"That Eunice is dead and Johann is alive;

"That both Eunice and Johann are dead.

"The Court rules—please stand up, Miss Smith—that this person before us is a physiological composite of the body of Eunice Evans Branca and the brain of Johann Sebastian Bach Smith and that in accordance with the equitable principle set forth in ‘Estate of Henry M. Parsons v. Rhode Island' this female person is Johann Sebastian Bach Smith."

22

"—take it that you are offering me your lovely body. Sorry, m'dear. I have no interest in women. Nor in men. Nor in rubber garments or high heels or other toys. I'm a sadist, Miss Smith. A genius sadist who realized quite young that he must become a surgeon to stay out of the clutches of Jack Ketch. Sublimation, y'know. Thanks just the same. A pity, you do have a magnificent body." (Well, Boss, you got turned down. It's a lesson every woman must learn. So you brush your hair and start all over again.)

(Eunice, I'm relieved. But he was entitled to the lagniappe if he wanted it.) "I'm your Galatea, Dr. Boyle; I owe you anything you care to name—short of sawing off my skull. The debt remains on the books. All I was offering was symbolic down-payment. But you don't respond like a typical Australian—nor sound like one, either."

"Oh, that. I'm a fake, dear. From the Sydney slums into a sadists' finishing school—a stylish British boarding school, a ‘public' school right out of the second drawer. Then on to the University of London and the best surgeons in the world. Put your pretty robe on and I'll be going. I say, would you mind having that extraordinary slow-motion somersault filmed in stereocinema for my archives?"

"Where shall I send it, Doctor?"

"Jake Salomon knows. Keep your pecker up, m'dear, and try to live a long time; you're my masterpiece."

"I'll certainly try."

"Do. Ta ta!"

An unidentified flying object roughly disc-shaped was reported to have landed in Pernambuco and its humanoid crew to have visited with local yokels; the report was denied officially almost faster than it reached the news services. The number of licensed private police in the United States reached triple the number of ‘public peace officers. Miss Joan née Johann Smith received over two thousand proposals of marriage, more than that number of less formal proposals, one hundred eighty-seven death threats, an undisclosed number of extortion notes, and four bombs—not any of which she received in person as they were diverted to Mercury Private Courier Service under procedures set up years earlier. The waldoes of one package-opening bunker had to be replaced; the other bombs were disarmed.

The Postmaster General died from an overdose of barbiturates; the career Assistant Postmaster General declined an interim appointment and put in for retirement. A woman in Albany gave birth to a "fàun" which was baptized, dead, and cremated in eighty-seven minutes. No flowers. No photographs. No interviews—but the priest wrote a letter to his seminary roommate. The F.B.I. reported that recidivism was up to 71%, while the same rate figured only on major felonies—armed robbery, rape, assault with a deadly weapon, murder, and attempted murder—had climbed to 84%. The paralysis at Harvard University continued.

"Jake, the last time you refused to marry me, you did promise me a night on the town if we won."

Mr. Salomon put down his cup. "A delightful lunch, my dear. As I recall, you told me at the time that a nightclub check was no substitute for a marriage license."

"Nor is it. But I haven't nagged you about marrying me since you accorded me the honor of first concubine. Uh... erase ‘first.' I have no idea what you do with your time when you're not here. Well, I don't have to be ‘first.'"

(Twin, never crowd a man about sex. He'll lie.) (Pussy cat, ‘I'm not crowding Jake about sex; I'm confusing the issue. He's going to take us nightclubbing and we're going to wear that lush blue-and-gold job—it's meant to be seen, not just modeled for Winnie and put away.)

"Eunice, surely you don't think I have anyone else?"

"It would be presumptuous of me to have an opinion, sir. Jake, I've stayed close to home all during this hearing—a little shopping, mostly with Winnie along. But now we've won and I see no reason to be a prisoner. Look, dear, we can make it a party of four—a girl for you and a boy for me—and you can come home early and not lose any sleep you don't want to."

"You surely don't think that I would go home and leave you at a nightclub?"

"I surely think I can stay up all night and celebrate if I want to. I'm free, over twenty-one—my God, am I over twenty-one!—and can afford a licensed escort. But there is no reason to keep you up all night. We'll call Gold Seal Bonded Escorts and fill out our party. Winnie's been teaching me what the kids call dancing—and I've been teaching her real dancing. Say, maybe you'd rather escort Winnie than some dollikin picked out of a catalog? Winnie thinks you're wonderful."

"Eunice, are you seriously proposing to hire a gigolo?"

"Jake, I'm not going to marry him, I'm not even going to sleep with him. I expect him to dance with me, smile, and make polite conversation—at about what a plumber charges. This is doom?"