“Reckon I better check my shootin’ arns, podner,” he explained, adapting his hillbilly accent to cowboy lingo. Moe accepted them, tested one by shooting out a light in the ceiling, and put them away. Likewise Carstairs gave up his weapons, with the added injunction that Moe was to sell them and use the money to buy more liquor when the bar gave out.
Juno, with a smacking big whiskey in front of her, leaned across Phil and assured Mary, “From now on, I’ll believe every word nuts tell me, especially you and Sash.”
“And I’ll always tell you when we’re lying,” Mary assured her back, rather mumblingly, since Dion was nuzzling her.
As customers drifted into the bar by ones and twos, Brimstine called them to join the party. As soon as they did, they became as friendly and glowing as anyone else. After a time there was a small crowd and Moe did nothing but pour, shake and serve. Shortly he quit the shaking part.
Mary broke away from Dion and picked up the Brimstine doll and hugged and kissed it, saying, “You dear, dear man.” Moe paused for a moment in his bartending to shut his eyes and quake ecstatically.
Then Lucky came out from under the bar and jumped on it and walked up and down in a very lordly way but with a definite lurch. After a bit he jumped down in front of the bar and the crowd parted for him. The drunken green creature zigzagged with dignity toward an exit.
Moe heaved himself over the bar, spilling several drinks, and called out, “Come on, everyone, let’s have fun! Everything at Double AP is free!”
And so a bacchanalian procession began to weave through All Pleasures Amusement Park, with Moe serving as Bacchus, Lucky as a leopard, and, thought Phil, if the others only knew about Dion.
There were nymphs a-plenty, as Moe invited each girl to leave her concession after everybody that wanted had a turn and Moe had explained how the games were gimmicked and all the prizes had been distributed or at least offered.
Once or twice concession owners bleated indignantly at Moe’s rallying cry, “It’s all free, folks!” But their objections always dissolved at Lucky’s arrival.
The procession grew steadily larger. Occasionally groups would leave it to go on free rides, but there weren’t as many of these groups as might have been expected and they always seemed to be happy to get back.
Moe was enjoying himself with godlike capacity. He skipped like a lamb on the rubberized surfacing. He had a word and a joke for everyone and could always think of a new stunt to cap his last. Perhaps he reached his high point when he loosed a tiger and two black panthers from the animal show. Arousing no fear, they wove in and out of the procession happily, accepting caresses from everyone but apparently getting the most pleasure out of lowering their necks to rub Lucky’s.
Phil was enjoying himself thoroughly, especially while romping hand in hand with a cute red head from the “Visit Vicious Venus” show, but every now and then the thought of neglected dangers and duties returned to nag him. On one of these occasions, Juno threw a big arm around his neck, almost knocking his head off, and said, “Got troubles, Phil? Give ’ em to Mama Juno and she’ll throw ’ em away. Oh boy, do I love that green monkey! He’s got the best little formula for living there is. Hey, looka that!”
She was pointing at Carstairs and Buck, who had discovered a concession titled in flaming red phospho-flare KICK THE LOVELY LADY INTO YOUR ARMS and were happily struggling for the possession of a very large mallet which apparently had something to do with the game. After some puzzling, Phil understood. The game was the age old one of striking a target on the ground which caused an indicator to jump up a pole – with the typical late twentieth-century addition that, if the indicator reached the top of the pole, not only did a bell ring and lights flare, but a huge hinged lower leg with a cushioned boot swung down and rudely lifted a lovely lady off a perch some three feet above the winner and into his arms, if he were ready to catch her.
This last couldn’t have been any too sure, since the lovely lady was one of the glamor girls pushing fifty rather than forty. At present she was glowering cynically at Carstairs and Buck, as if certain they were infinitely more interested in the mallet than in her. She wasn’t yet under Lucky’s influence, as the green cat had momentarily romped off with the black panthers to the tail end of the procession.
The two happy hep-jerks got things settled between them and took many mighty thumps at the target. The indicator jumped high but always hesitated just heartbreakingly short of the top. The onlookers sighed sympathetically. By this time most of the bacchanalian procession had gathered around the “kick the lady” concession. It was strategically located between two bars and opposite the “Mind Clearers,” as they chastely labeled themselves in blinking red fluorescents, and a dismal cavern mouth called “Pluto’s Palace,” beside which was an inaccurate model of the solar system with the planets revolving jerkily.
Moe Brimstine was refreshing himself with a pitcher of beer his attendant nymphs had rushed him from one of the bars. Two black shapes came undulating in from the outskirts in pursuit of a green flash, as Lucky returned to his proper position, bringing the other felines with him.
Then, as Carstairs started to toss aside the mallet with an amiable grin of defeat, Dion da Silva came charging up and grabbed it. He stripped off his jacket and shirt, revealing an extremely hairy chest and back.
“That Dion man is sure male looking,” Mary murmured to Phil appreciatively, eyeing her hero “With those cute ears, he’s just like a little old satyr.”
Dion flexed his impressive muscles, took up the mallet, and crashed it down with a force which the spectators felt with their back teeth. The bell clanged, the light flashed and the big foot started its descent.
At the same time, Dora Pannes pushed out of the crowd from the direction of Pluto’s Palace and walked haughtily past Dion with never a glance at him or anyone else. She was moving toward Lucky with the single-purposeness of a sleep walker.
Disregarding the kicked lovely lady, Dion sprang upon Dora Pannes, crushed her to his hairy chest, and started suffocating her with kisses. Phil gallantly stepped forward and caught the lovely lady. His knees sagged. She was now within range of Lucky’s influence and pursed her lips invitingly at Phil, but he quickly set her down, aghast at something else.
With a sudden howl of furious anger, Dion had pushed Dora Pannes away from him, so that she fell down heavily. Before anyone could stop him, Dion snatched up the mallet and brought it down with a titanic crash on the head of the gorgeous violet blonde.
“I in love with thing like that!” he screamed. “Aah!” And he continued to batter the beautiful head and body so that it bounced up and down on the rubber.
Phil was doubly shocked because this was occurring in Lucky’s presence. In fact, the green cat, sitting calmly in front of Phil, seemed to be looking on with approval.
Dora Pannes began to writhe crippledly and lasciviously between blows and to sing “Slap Me Silly Honey” in a hideously gay voice. Then her head, flattened by repeated blows, split open. But instead of brains there spilled out fragments of glass, plastic and metal, some of them with wires attached. Her voice rose in a final meaningless duck quack and she stopped moving.
A number of realizations fitted themselves together in Phil’s mind at this proof that Dora Pannes was not a human being, but the most advanced of mannequins operating by scanners and instruction tapes. Why, even her name was a pun from Greek mythology, a rough anagram of Pandora, the metal maiden constructed, if Phil remembered Dr. Romadka correctly, at the command of Zeus.