A Bluebird Special. HEAVEN NOW! Couple seeks couple to share safe house & loving friendship 3 br, 2 bths, Mercserv, all util, nr lic pvt schl, atrium garden.Comptr types (Rankin program) ♂690047, ♀890047—any 85%-plus match considered. "One for All, All for One!" No deposit but please send stereopix with notarized Rankin Reports—bx 69 Bluebird, Ltd.
On the basis of evidence submitted by the Chinese delegation the U.N.A.E.C. eased the tolerance levels for strontium-90 for whole milk. The Reverend Thomas Barker of Long Beach, California, in an Equal-Time-for-God videosermonette declared that the World had ended at midnight December 31st 1999 PCI, and that all since that time was "illusion of the Devil, without forth, substance, or reality."
Miss Smith greeted O'Neil and asked him to have Dabrowski and Fred fetch upstairs with her two big flat packages, one so large that it had to be tilted to get it through the door of the lift. When packages, mobile guards, and she herself- were fitted inside, she locked -the door and pressed the "Hold" touchplate without signaling a floor, then dropped her cape. "Let me kiss you thank-you-goodbye, boys, but for Heaven's sake don't get paint on you or muss it. Better just hold my face in your hands—but no need to hurry."
Shortly thereafter she looked at herself in the lift's mirror, decided that makeup and hairdo had suffered only minor wear and tear, let Dabrowski lay her cape around her, then punched for her floor and fastened all the cape's frogs so that she was again fully covered. When the lift stopped she hooked up her veil.
"These go in your boudoir, Miss? Or your lounge?"
"First let's see if Mr. Salomon is receiving." They followed her down the long hail to the Green Suite. Joan noted that the please-don't-disturb ruby light was not burning over the door of Jake's lounge, so she touched the door signal.
The speaker above it bellowed, "Come in!" The door opened; she went in. "Put them inside and that will be all."
"Very good, Miss."
As they left and the door closed Jake came out of his bedroom, looking tousled. He stopped abruptly. "Well!'
Where the hell have you been?"
"Out."
"Hrrrmph! Five days. Five whole days!"
"So? Chickens fed? Hogs slopped? Cows milked?"
"That's not the point. I—"
"That is the point, Jake. Nothing has been neglected through my being away. You won't marry me, so I am not answerable to you when I come and go. Though as a courtesy I did leave a note with Cunningham telling you where I had gone. Did you receive it?
"Yes, but—"
"Then you knew 1 was safe—and in emergency could have sent me a message. Or joined me; you would have been welcome. You know Joe would have made you welcome—and Gigi is friendly as a puppy."
"‘Gigi'?"
"You know her. You've met her, I mean. Mrs. Joe Branca."
"What?"
"Why the Surprise, Jake? People do remarry—especially if an earlier marriage was happy. Joe's was, and now he has, and I'm happy for him—and certain that Eunice is happy for him, too." (Sure I am, Boss. But let's not be too ‘noble.' Being ‘noble' is a male prerogative. So they think.)
"I can't believe it."
"What's odd about a widower remarrying?"
"I can't imagine anyone who had been married to Eunice ever marrying some other woman." (My fan! Twin, we're going to be especially nice to Jake tonight.) (If he doesn't start being nice to me, he's going to sleep alone tonight! But 1 shan't. I wonder if Anton and Fred have left the house?)
(Calm down, Boss. And get Jake calmed down.) (Not yet, I won't! He's wrong and I'm right.) (Twin honey, how long is it going to take you to learn that being ‘right' has nothing to do with getting along with a man? Men aren't logical, their minds don't work that way. But it's ‘the only game in town,' so when a man is wrong and you are right, it's time to apologize. Tell him you're sorry—and mean it. Om Mani Padme Hum.)
(Om Mani Padme Hum—sometimes I find being a woman just too frimping difficult. If it weren't so darned much fun. Okay, sweetheart, watch me take him.) "Jake dearest, I'm sorry it upsets you that Joe has remarried—but why not wait before deciding that he has made a mistake? Joe needs a wife—even if she's not Eunice. And I'm terribly sorry that I worried you by not being here when you got home...and sorry on my own account; I expected to welcome you—with open arms and a happy smile. But I didn't expect you to be away less than a week and I had an impression that you expected it to take longer—possibly much longer."
"Well, yes, I did think I might have to sit it out quite a while. But I got in to see the Chief Justice the second day and he assured me that he would put it at the top of the calendar... and that he had seen—unofficially—an advance transcript of the record. And that was that."
"Hm! Campaign contributions are sometimes worthwhile."
"Joan Eunice, don't ever talk that way. Especially in reference to the Chief Justice of the United States. Yes, this is your house. Nevertheless it might be bugged."
"I'm sorry, Jake. It was a thoughtless remark. My appreciation really goes where it belongs. To you."
"To Mac more than to me, my dear; that boy has been on the ball. How he got an advance copy to, uh, the right man so quickly is something I don't want to inquire into."
"I appreciate Mac's efforts, I appreciate Alec's efforts—but mostly I appreciate my darling, always dependable, utterly wonderful Jake." (Is that too thick, Eunice?) (Boss, I keep telling you: it's impossible for a woman to lay it on too thick with a man. If you tell a man he's eight feet tall and say it often enough, with your eyes wide and a throb in your voice, he'll start stooping to go through seven-foot doors.)
Jake looked pleased, so Joan went on: "I suppose it will all be settled soon, then?"
"Little one, don't you ever listen to the news?"
"Not if I can avoid it."
"Well, you should. It is over. You've won, finally and completely."
"Really? I never doubted that we would win, Jake, the wonderful way you've handled everything. My surprise is solely that it has happened so fast. Yes, I suppose I should follow the news. But I haven't been able to, these last few days. Had this difficult job to do—Joe, I mean—and while you were away seemed the best time... so I gritted my teeth and tackled it."
"Joan Eunice, I told you never to go near Joe. I told you. If this new marriage of his ever stood a chance—yes, intellectually I know that a man should remarry—if it ever did stand a chance, you must have put a horrible strain on it. Too much strain, probably. Uh... how did he take it? Badly?"
"Jake, I stayed five days. If it had gone badly, would I have been there even one day? I accomplished the mission; everything is all right."
Jake looked surprised, then thoughtful. "Hmmm! That's a one-room studio... and if I follow your meaning, you stayed right there the whole five days. My dear, just how did you ‘accomplish your mission'? Or have I no right to ask?"
She looked up at him and spoke seriously. "Jake, I owe you so much that you will always have the right to ask me anything. Including my comings and goings and I should not have given you a snippy answer." (Didn't quite tell him he had a right to a truthful answer, did you, Boss honey? Devious little bitch.) (Eunice, I don't lie to Jake—) (Oh, what a whopper!) (—more than is necessary to his happiness.)
"Jake, I accomplished my mission—I set Joe's mind at rest about Eunice—through a ‘prayer meeting.' With Gigi's utterly necessary help, which is only part of why I feel sure that she's good for him. But if you mean I offered him a zombie—his dead wife's reanimated body—I knew that was not the way to do it. Joe hasn't touched me. Oh, he does touch me now, easily and without strain, the way he might touch his sister." (Any incest in Joe's family, twin? I've never been sure.) (Oh, shut up!) "He even kisses me the same way. But, Jake—"