JOB: A Comedy of Justice. Robert A. Heinlein, 1984. A Puke (TM) Audiobook

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JOB: A Comedy of Justice.
Robert Anson Heinlein.
Copyright 1984.
Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth:
Therefore despise not thou the chastening of The Almighty.
Job Chapter 5, verse 17.
Chapter One.
When thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned.
Isaiah Chapter forty three, verse two.
THE FIRE pit was about twenty-five feet long by ten feet wide, and perhaps two feet deep. The fire had been burning for hours. The bed of coals gave off a blast of heat almost unbearable even back where I was seated, fifteen feet from the side of the pit, in the second row of tourists.
I had given up my front-row seat to one of the ladies from the ship, delighted to accept the shielding offered by her well-fed carcass. I was tempted to move still farther back, but I did want to see the fire walkers close up. How often does one get to view a miracle?
“It’s a hoax,” the Well-Traveled Man said. “You’ll see.”
“Not really a hoax, Gerald,” the Authority-on-Everything denied. “Just somewhat less than we were led to expect. It won’t be the whole village, probably none of the hula dancers and certainly not those children. One or two of the young men, with calluses on their feet as thick as cowhide, and hopped up on opium or some native drug, will go down the pit at a dead run.
The villagers will cheer and our kanaka friend there who is translating for us will strongly suggest that we should tip each of the fire walkers, over and above what we’ve paid for the luau and the dancing and this show.
“Not a complete hoax,” he went on. “The shore excursion brochure listed a “demonstration of fire walking”. That’s what we’ll get. Never mind the talk about a whole village of fire walkers.
Not in the contract. “The Authority looked smug.
“Mass hypnosis,” the Professional Bore announced.
I was tempted to ask for an explanation of mass hypnosis, but nobody wanted to hear from me; I was junior, not necessarily in years but in the cruise ship Konge Knut. That’s how it is in cruise ships: Anyone who has been in the vessel since port of departure is senior to, anyone who joins the ship later. The Medes and the Persians laid down this law and nothing can change it. I had flown down in the Count Von Zeppelin, at Papeete I would fly home in the Admiral Moffett, so I was forever junior and should keep quiet while my betters pontificated.
Cruise ships have the best food and, all too often, the worst conversation in the world. Despite this I was enjoying the islands; even the Mystic and the Amateur Astrologer and the Parlor Freudian and the Numerologist did not trouble me, as I did not listen.
“They do it through the fourth dimension,” the Mystic announced. “Isn’t that true, Gwendolyn!”
“Quite true, dear,” the Numerologist agreed. “Oh, here they come now! It will be an odd number, you’ll see.”
“You’re so learned, dear.”
“Humph,” said the Skeptic.
The native who was assisting our ship’s excursion host raised his arms and spread his palms for silence. “Please, will you all listen! Mauruuru roa. Thank you very much. The high priest and priestess will now pray the Gods to make the fire safe for the villagers. I ask you to remember that this is a religious ceremony, very ancient; please behave as you would in your own church. Because.”
An extremely old kanaka interrupted; he and the translator exchanged words in a language not known to me Polynesian, I assumed; it had the right liquid flow to it. The younger kanaka turned back to us.
“The high priest tells me that some of the children are making their first walk through fire today, including that baby over there in her mother’s arms. He asks all of you to keep perfectly silent during the prayers, to insure the safety of the children. Let me add that I am a Catholic. At this point I always ask our Holy Mother Mary to watch over our children, and I ask all of you to pray for them in your own way. Or at least keep silent and think good thoughts for them. If the high priest is not satisfied that there is a reverent attitude, he won’t let the children enter the fire, I’ve even known him to cancel the entire ceremony.
“There you have it, Gerald,” said the Authority-on-Everything in a third-balcony whisper. “The build-up. Now the switch, and they’ll blame it on us.” He snorted.
The Authority, his name was Cheevers, had been annoying me ever since I had joined the ship. I leaned forward and said quietly into his ear, “If those children walk through the fire, do you have the guts to do likewise?”
Let this be a lesson to you. Learn by my bad example. Never let an oaf cause you to lose your judgement. Some seconds later I found that my challenge had been turned against me and, somehow!, all three, the Authority, the Skeptic, and the Well-Traveled Man, had each bet me a hundred that I would not dare walk the fire pit, stipulating that the children walked first.
Then the translator was shushing us again and the priest and priestess stepped down into the fire pit and everybody kept very quiet and I suppose some of us prayed. I know I did. I found myself reciting what popped into my mind:
Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
Somehow it seemed appropriate.
The priest and the priestess did not walk through the fire; they did-something quietly more spectacular and (it seemed to me) far more dangerous. They simply stood in the fire pit, barefooted, and prayed for several minutes. I could see their lips move. Every so often the old priest sprinkled something into the pit. Whatever it was, as it struck the coals it burst into sparkles.
I tried to see what they were standing on, coals or rocks, but I could not tell, and could not guess which would be worse. Yet this old woman, skinny as gnawed bones, stood there quietly, face placid, and with no precautions other than having tucked up her lava-lava so that it was almost a diaper. Apparently she fretted about burning her clothes but not about burning her legs.
Three men with poles had been straightening out the burning logs, making sure that the bed of the pit was a firm and fairly even footing for the fire walkers. I took a deep interest in this, as I expected to be walking in that pit in a few minutes, if I didn’t cave in and forfeit the bet. It seemed to me that they were making it possible to walk the length of the fire pit on rocks rather than burning coals. I hoped so!
Then I wondered what difference it would make recalling sun-scorched sidewalks that had blistered my bare feet when I was a boy in Kansas. That fire had to be at least seven hundred degrees; those rocks had been soaking in that fire for several hours. At such temperatures was there any real choice between frying pan and fire?
I Meanwhile the voice of reason was whispering in my ear that forfeiting three hundred was not much of a price to pay to get out of this bind, or would I rather walk the rest of my life on two barbecued stumps?
Would it help if I took an aspirin?
The three men finished fiddling with the burning logs and went to the end of the pit at our left; the rest of the villagers gathered behind them, including those darned kids! What were their parents thinking about, letting them risk something like this? Why weren’t they in school where they belonged?
The three fire tenders led off, walking single file down the center of the fire, not hurrying, not dallying. The rest of the men of the village followed them, a slow, steady procession. Then came the women, including the young mother with a baby on her hip.
When the blast of heat struck the infant, it started to cry. Without varying her steady pace, its mother swung it up and gave it suck; the baby shut up.
The children followed, from pubescent girls and adolescent boys down to the kindergarten level. Last was a little girl, nine? Eight? Who was leading her round-eyed little, brother by, the hand. He seemed to be about four and was dressed only in his skin.
I looked at this kid and knew with mournful certainty that I was about to be served up rare; I could no longer back out. Once the baby boy stumbled; his sister kept him from falling. He went on then, short sturdy steps. At the far end someone reached down and lifted him out.
And it was my turn.
The translator said to me, “You understand that the Polynesia Tourist Bureau takes no responsibility for your safety? That fire can burn you, it can kill you. These people can walk it safely because they have faith.”
I assured him that I had faith, while wondering how I could be such a barefaced liar. I signed a release he presented.
All too soon I was standing at one end of the pit, with my trousers rolled up to my knees. My shoes and socks and hat and wallet were at the far end, waiting on a stool. That was my goal, my prize, if I didn’t make it, would they cast lots for them? Or would they ship them to my next of kin?
He was saying: “Go right down the middle. Don’t hurry but don’t stand still.” The high priest spoke up; my mentor listened, then said, “He says not to run, even if your feet burn. Because you might stumble and fall down. Then you might never get up. He means you might die. I must add that you probably would not die, unless you breathed flame. But you would certainly be terribly burned. So don’t hurry and don’t fall down. Now see that flat rock under you? That’s your first step. Que le bon Dieu vous garde. Good luck.”
“Thanks.” I glanced over at the Authority-on-Everything, who was smiling ghoulishly, if ghouls smile. I gave him a mendaciously jaunty wave and stepped down.
I had taken three steps before I realized that I didn’t feel anything at all. Then I did feel something: scared. Scared silly and wishing I were in Peoria. Or even Philadelphia. Instead of alone in this vast smoldering waste. The far end of the pit was a city block away. Maybe farther. But I kept plodding toward it while hoping that this numb paralysis would not cause me to collapse before reaching it.
I felt smothered and discovered that I had been holding my breath. So I gasped, and regretted it. Over a fire pit that vast there is blistering gas and smoke and carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide and something that may be Satan’s halitosis, but not enough oxygen to matter.” I chopped off that gasp with my eyes watering and my throat raw and tried to estimate whether or not I could reach the end without breathing.
Heaven help me, I could not see the far end! The smoke had billowed up and my eyes would barely open and would not focus. So I pushed on, while trying to remember the formula by which one made a deathbed confession and then slid into Heaven on a technicality.
Maybe there wasn’t any such formula. My feet felt odd and my knees were becoming unglued,
“Feeling better, Mister Graham?”
I was lying on grass and looking up into a friendly, brown face. “I guess so,” I answered. “What happened? Did I walk it?”
“Certainly you walked it. Beautifully. But you fainted right at the end. We were standing by and grabbed you, hauled you out. But you tell me what happened. Did you get your lungs full of smoke?”
“Maybe. Am I burned?”
“No, Oh, you may form one blister on your right foot. But you held the thought perfectly. All but that faint, which must have been caused by smoke.”
“I guess so.” I sat up with his help. “Can you hand me my shoes and socks? Where is everybody?”
“The bus left. The high priest took your pulse and checked your breathing but he wouldn’t let anyone disturb you. If you force a man to wake up when his spirit is still walking about, the spirit may not come back in. So he believes and no one dares argue with him.”
“I won’t argue with him; I feel fine. Rested. But how do I get back to the ship?” Five miles of tropical paradise would get tedious after the first mile. On foot. Especially as my feet seemed to have swelled a bit. For which they, had ample excuse.
“The bus will come back to take the villagers to the boat that takes them back to the island they live on. It then could take you to your ship. But we can do better. My cousin has an automobile. He will take you.”
“Good. How much will he charge me?” Taxis in Polynesia are always outrageous, especially when the drivers have you at their mercy, of which they have none. But it occurred to me that I could afford to be robbed as I was bound to show a profit on this jape. Three hundred minus one taxi fare. I picked up my hat. “Where’s my wallet?”
“Your wallet?”
“My billfold. I left it in my hat. Where is it? This isn’t funny; my money was in it. And my cards.”
“Your money? Oh! Votre portefeuille. I am sorry; my English is not perfect. The officer from your ship, your excursion guide, took care of it.”
“That was kind of him. But how am I to pay your cousin? I don’t have a franc on me.”
We got that straightened out. The ship’s excursion escort, realising that he would be leaving me strapped in rescuing my billfold, had prepaid my ride back to the ship. My kanaka friend took me to his cousin’s car and introduced me to his cousin, not too effectively, as the cousin’s English was limited to “Okay, Chief!” and I never did get his name straight.
“His automobile was a triumph of baling wire and faith. We went roaring back to the dock at full throttle, frightening chickens and easily outrunning baby goats. I did not pay much attention as I was bemused by something that had happened just before we left. The villagers were waiting for their bus to return; we walked right through them. Or started to. I got kissed. I got kissed by all of them. I had already seen the Polynesian habit of kissing where we would just shake hands, but this was the first time it had happened to me.
My friend explained it to me: “You walked through their fire, so you are an honorary member of their village. They want to kill a pig for you. Hold a feast in your honor.”
I tried to answer in kind while explaining that I had to return home across the great water but I would return someday, God willing. Eventually we got away.
But that was not what had me most bemused. Any unbiased judge would have to admit that I am reasonably sophisticated. I am aware that some places do not have America’s high moral standards and are careless about indecent exposure. I know that Polynesian women used to run around naked from the waist up until civilization came along, shucks, I read the National Geographic.
But I never expected to see it.
Before I made my fire walk the villagers were Dressed just as you would expect: grass skirts but with the women’s bosoms covered.
But when they kissed me hello-goodbye they were not. Not covered, I mean. Just like the National Geographic.
Now I appreciate feminine beauty. Those delightful differences, seen under proper circumstances with the shades decently drawn, can be dazzling. But forty-odd (no, even) of them are intimidating. I saw more human feminine busts than I had ever seen before, total and cumulative, in my entire life. The Methodist Episcopal Society for Temperance and Morals would have been shocked right out of their wits.
With adequate warning I am sure that I could have enjoyed the experience. As it was, it was too new, too much, too fast. I could appreciate it only in retrospect.
Our tropical Rolls-Royce crunched to a stop with the aid of hand brake, foot brake, and first-gear compression; I looked up from bemused euphoria. My Driver announced, “Okay, Chief!”
I said, “That’s not my ship.”
“Okay, Chief?”
“You’ve taken me to the wrong dock. Uh, it looks like the right dock but it’s the wrong ship.” Of that I was certain. M.V. Konge Knut has white sides and superstructure and a rakish false funnel. This ship was mostly red with four tall black stacks. Steam, it had to be, not a motor vessel. As well as years out of date. “No, No!”
“Okay, Chief. Votre vapeur! Voila!”
“Non!”
“Okay, Chief.” He got out, came around and opened the door on the passenger Side, grabbed my arm, and pulled.
I’m in fairly good shape, but his arm had been toughened by swimming, climbing for coconuts, hauling in fishnets, and pulling tourists who don’t want to go out of cars. I got out.
He jumped back in, called out, “Okay, Chief! Merci bien! Au voir!” and was gone.
I went, Hobson’s choice, up the gangway of the strange vessel to learn, if possible, what had become of the Konge Knut. As I stepped aboard, the petty officer on gangway watch saluted and said, “Afternoon, sir. Mister Graham, Mister Nielsen left a package for you. One moment.” He lifted the lid of his watch desk, took out a large manila envelope. “Here you are, sir.”
The package had written on it: A L Graham, cabin C109. I opened it, found a well-worn wallet.
“Is everything in order, Mister Graham?”
“Yes, thank you. Will you tell Mister Nielsen that I received it? And give him my thanks.”
“Certainly, sir.”
I noted that this was D deck, went up one flight to find cabin C109.
All was not quite in order. My name is not “Graham”.

Chapter Two.
The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be, and that which is done is that which shall be done, and there is no new thing under the sun.
Ecclesiastes Chapter one, verse nine.
THANK HEAVEN ships use a consistent numbering system. Stateroom C109 was where it should be: on C deck, starboard side forward, between C107 and C111; I reached it without having to speak to anyone. I tried the door; it was locked, Mister Graham apparently believed the warnings pursers give about locking doors, especially in port.
The key, I thought glumly, is in Mister Graham’s pants pocket. But where is Mister Graham? About to catch me snooping at his door? Or is the trying my door while I am trying his door?
There is a small but not zero chance that a given key will fit a strange lock. I had in my own pocket my room key from the Konge Knut. I tried it.
Well, it was worth trying. I stood there, wondering whether to sneeze or Drop dead, when I heard a sweet voice behind me:
“Oh, Mister Graham!”
A young and pretty woman in a maid’s costume, Correction: stewardess’ uniform. She came bustling toward me, took a pass key that was chained to her belt, opened C109, while saying, “Margrethe asked me to watch for you. She told me that you had left your cabin key on your desk. She let it stay but told me to watch for you and let you in.”
“That’s most kind, of you, Miss, uh.”
“I’m Astrid. I have the matching rooms on the port side, so Marga and I cover for each other. She’s gone ashore this afternoon.” She held the door for me. “Will that be all, sir?”
I thanked her, she left. I latched and bolted the door, collapsed in a chair and gave way to the shakes.
Ten minutes later I stood up, went into the bathroom, put cold water on my face and eyes. I had not solved anything and had not wholly calmed down, but my nerves were no longer snapping like a flag in a high wind. I had been holding myself in ever since I had begun to suspect that something was seriously wrong, which was, when? When nothing seemed quite right at the fire pit? Later? Well, with utter certainty when I saw one 20,000-ton ship substituted for another.
My father used to tell me, “Alex, there is nothing wrong with being scared, as long as you don’t let it affect you until the danger is over. Being hysterical is okay, too, afterwards and in private. Tears are not unmanly, in the bathroom with the door locked. The difference between a coward and a brave man is mostly a matter of timing.”
I’m not the man my father was but I try to follow his advice. If you can learn not to jump when the firecracker goes off, or whatever the surprise is, you stand a good chance of being able to hang tight until the emergency is over.
This emergency was not over but I had benefited by the catharsis of a good case of shakes. Now I could take stock.
Hypotheses:
a) Something preposterous has happened to the world around me, or b) Something preposterous has happened to Alex Hergensheimer’s mind; he should be locked up and sedated.
I could not think of a third hypothesis; those two seemed to cover all bases. The second hypothesis I need not waste time on. If, I were raising snakes in my hat, eventually other people would notice and come around with a straitjacket and put me in a nice padded room.
So let’s assume that I am sane, or nearly so; being a little bit crazy is helpful. If I am okay, then the world is out of joint. Let’s take stock.
That wallet. Not mine. Most wallets are generally similar to each other and this one was much like mine. But carry a wallet for a few years and it fits you; it is distinctly yours. I had known at once that this one was not mine. But I did not want to say so to a ship’s petty officer who insisted on, recognizing me as Mister Graham.
I took out Graham’s wallet and opened it.
Several hundred francs, count it later.
Eighty-five dollars in paper, legal tender of “The United States of North America.”
A Driver’s license issued to A L Graham.
There were more items but I came across a window occupied by a typed notice, one that stopped me cold:
Anyone finding this wallet may keep any money in it as a reward if he will be so kind as to return the wallet to A L Graham, cabin C109, S S KONGE KNUT, Danish American Line, or to any purser or agent of the line. Thank you. A L G.
So now I knew what had happened to the Konge Knut; she had undergone a sea change.
Or had I? Was there truly a changed world and therefore a changed ship? Or were there two worlds and had I somehow walked through fire into the second one? Were there indeed two men and had they swapped destinies? Or had Alex Hergensheimer metamorphized into Alec Graham while M V Konge Knut changed into S S Konge Knut? While the North American Union melted into the United States of North America?
Good questions. I’m glad you brought them up. Now, class, are there any more questions When I was in middle school there was a spate of magazines publishing fantastic stories, not alone ghost stories but weird yarns of every sort. Magic ships plying the ether to other stars. Strange inventions. Trips to the centre of the earth. Other “Dimensions”. Flying machines. Power from burning atoms. Monsters created in secret laboratories.
I used to buy them and hide them inside copies of Youth’s Companion and of Young Crusaders knowing instinctively that my parents would disapprove and confiscate. I loved them and so did my outlaw chum Bert.
It couldn’t last. First there was an editorial in Youth’s Companion: “Poison to the Soul, Stamp it Out!” Then our pastor, Brother Draper, preached a sermon against such mind-corrupting trash, with comparisons to the evil effects of cigarettes and booze. Then our state outlawed such publications under the standards of the community doctrine even before passage of the national law and the parallel executive order.
And a cache I had hidden Perfectly in our attic disappeared. Worse, the works of Mister H G Wells and M Jules Verne and some others were taken out of our public library.
You have to admire the motives of our spiritual leaders and elected officials in seeking to protect the minds of the young. As Brother Draper pointed out, there are enough exciting and adventurous stories in the Good Book to satisfy the needs of every boy and girl in the world; there was simply no need for profane literature. He was not urging censorship of books for adults, just for the impressionable young. If persons of mature years wanted to read such fantastic trash, suffer them to do so, although he, for one, could not see why any grown man would want to.
I guess I was one of the “Impressionable young”, I still miss them.
I remember particularly one by Mister Wells: Men like Gods. These people were driving along in an automobile when an explosion happens and they find themselves in another world, much like their own but better. They meet the people who live there and there is explanation about parallel universes and the fourth dimension and such.
That was the first installment. The Protect-Our-Youth state law was passed right after that, so I never saw the later installments.
One of my English professors who was bluntly opposed to censorship once said that Mister Wells had invented every one of the basic fantastic themes, and he cited this story as the origin of the multiple-universes concept. I was intending to ask this prof if he knew where I could find a copy, but I put it off to the end of the term when I would be legally “Of mature years”, and waited too long; the academic senate committee on faith and morals voted against tenure for that professor, and he left abruptly without finishing the term.
Did something happen to me like that which Mister Wells described in Men like Gods? Did Mister Wells have the holy gift of prophecy? For example, would men someday actually fly to the moon? Preposterous!
But was it more preposterous than what had happened to me?
As may be, here. I was in Konge Knut, even though she was not my, Konge Knut, and the sailing board at the gangway showed her getting underway at 6 p.m. It was already late afternoon and high time for me to decide.
What to do? I seemed to have mislaid my own ship, the Motor Vessel Konge Knut. But the crew, some of the crew, of the Steamship Konge Knut seemed ready to accept me as Mister Graham, passenger.
Stay aboard and try to brazen it out? What if Graham comes aboard (any minute now!) and demands to know what I am doing in his room?
Or go ashore, as I should, and go to the authorities with my problem?
Alex, the French colonial authorities will love you. No baggage, only the clothes on your back, no money, not a soul, no passport! Oh, they will love you so much they’ll give you room and board for the rest of your life, in an oubliette with a grill over the top.
There’s money in that wallet.
So? Ever heard of the Eighth Commandment? That’s his money.
But it stands to reason that he walked through the fire at the same time you did but on this side, this world or whatever, or his wallet would not have been waiting for you. Now he has your wallet. That’s logical.
Listen, my retarded friend, do you think logic has anything to do with the predicament we are in?
Well Speak up!
No, not really. Then how about this? Sit tight in this room. If Graham shows up before, the ship sails, you get kicked off the ship, that’s sure. But you would be no worse off than you will be if you leave now. If he does not show up, then you take his place at least as far as Papeete. That’s a big city; your chances of coping with the situation are far better there. Consuls and such.
You talked me into it.
Passenger ships usually publish a daily newspaper for the passengers, just a single or double sheet filled with thrilling items such as “There will be a boat drill at ten o’clock this morning. All passengers are requested, and “Yesterday’s mileage pool was won by Missus Ephraim Glutz of Bethany, Iowa and, usually, a few news items picked up by the wireless operator. I looked around for the ship’s paper and for the “Welcome Aboard!” This latter is a booklet, perhaps with another name, intended to make the passenger newly aboard sophisticated in the little world of the ship: names of the officers, times of meals, location of barber shop, laundry, dining room, gift shop, notions, magazines, toothpaste, and how to place a morning call, plan of the ship by decks, location of life preserver, how, to find your lifeboat station, where to get your table assignment.
Table assignment! Ouch! A passenger who has been aboard even one day does not have to ask how to find his table in the dining room. It’s the little things that trip you. Well, I’d have to bull it through.
The welcome-aboard booklet was tucked into Graham’s desk. I thumbed through it, with a mental note to memorize all key facts before I left this room, if I was still aboard when the ship sailed, then put it aside, as I had found the ship’s newspaper:
The King’s Skald it was headed and Graham, bless him, had saved all of them from the day he had boarded the ship, at Portland, Oregon, as I deduced from the place and date line of the, earliest issue. That suggested that Graham was ticketed for the entire cruise, which could be important to me. I had expected to go back as I had arrived, by airship, but, even if the dirigible liner Admiral Moffett existed in this world or dimension or whatever, I no longer had a ticket for it and no money with which to buy one. What do these French colonials do to a tourist who has no money? Burn him at the stake? Or merely draw and quarter him? I did not want to find out. Graham’s roundtrip ticket, if he had one, might keep me from having to find out.
If he didn’t show up in the next hour and have me kicked off the ship.
I did not consider remaining in Polynesia. Being a penniless beachcomber on Bora-Bora or Moorea may have been practical a hundred years ago but today the only thing free in these islands is contagious disease.
It seemed likely that I would be just as broke and just as much a stranger in America but nevertheless I felt that I would be better off in my native land. Well, Graham’s native land.
I read some of the wireless news items but could not make sense of them, so I put them aside for later study. What little I had learned from them was not comforting. I had cherished deep down an illogical hope that this would turn out to be just a silly mixup that would soon be straightened out, don’t ask me how. But those news items ended all hoping.
I mean to say, what sort of world is it in which the “President” of Germany visits London? In my world Kaiser Wilhelm the fourth rules the German Empire, a “President” for Germany sounds as silly as a “King” for America.
This might he a pleasant world, but it was not the world I was born into. Not by those weird news items.
As I put away Graham’s file of The King’s Skald I noted on the top sheet today’s prescribed Dress for dinner: “Formal”.
I was not surprised; the Konge Knut in her other incarnation as a motor vessel was quite formal. If the ship was underway, black tie was expected. If you didn’t wear it, you were made to feel that you really ought to eat in your stateroom.
I don’t own a tuxedo; our church does not encourage vanities. I had compromised by wearing a blue serge suit at dinners underway, with a white shirt and a snap-on black bow tie.
Nobody said anything. It did not matter, as I was below the salt anyhow, having come aboard at Papeete.
I decided to see if Mister Graham owned a dark suit. And a black tie.
Mister Graham owned lots of clothes, far more than I did. I tried on a sports jacket; it fit me well enough. Trousers? Length seemed okay; I was not sure about the waistband, and too shy to try on a pair and thereby risk being caught by Graham with one leg in his trousers. What does one say? Hi, there! I was just waiting for you and thought I would pass the time by trying on your pants. Not convincing.
He had not one but two tuxedos, one in conventional black and the other in dark red, I had never heard of such frippery.
But I did not find a snap-on bow tie.
He had black bow ties, several. But I have never learned how to tie a bow tie.
I took a deep breath and thought about it.
There came a knock at the door. I didn’t jump out of my skin, just almost. “Who’s there!” Honest, Mister Graham, I was just waiting for you!
“Stewardess, sir.”
“Oh. Come in, come in!”
I heard her try her key, then I jumped to turn back the bolt. “Sorry. I had forgotten that I had used the dead bolt. Do come in.”
Margrethe turned out to be about the age of Astrid, youngish, and even prettier, with flaxen hair and freckles across her nose. She spoke textbook-correct English with a charming lilt to it.
She was carrying a short white jacket on a coat hanger. “Your mess jacket, sir. Karl says the other one will be ready tomorrow.”
“Why, thank you, Margrethe! I had forgotten all about it.
I thought you might. So I came back aboard a little early, the laundry was just closing. I’m glad I did; it’s much too hot for you to wear black.”
“You shouldn’t have come back early; you’re spoiling me.”
“I like to take good care of my guests. As you know.” She hung the jacket in the wardrobe, turned to leave. “I’ll be back to tie your tie. Six-thirty as usual, sir?”
“Six-thirty is fine. What time is it now?” Tarnation, my watch was gone wherever Motor Vessel Konge Knut had vanished; I had not worn it ashore.
“Almost six o’clock.” She hesitated. “I’ll lay out your clothes before I go; you don’t have much time.”
“My dear girl! That’s no part of your duties.”
“No, it’s my pleasure.” She opened a Drawer, took out a Dress shirt, placed it on my, Graham’s bunk. “And you know why.” With the quick efficiency of a person who knows exactly where everything is, she opened a small desk Drawer that I had not touched, took out a leather case, from it laid out by the shirt a watch, a ring, and shirt studs, then inserted studs into the shirt, placed fresh underwear and black silk socks on the pillow, placed evening pumps by the chair with shoe horn tucked inside, took from the wardrobe that mess jacket, hung it and black Dress trousers, braces attached, and dark red cummerbund on the front of the wardrobe. She glanced over and refreshed the layout, added a wing collar, a black tie, and a fresh handkerchief to the stack on the pillow, cast her eye over it again, placed the room key and the wallet by the ring and the watch, glanced again, nodded. “I must run or I’ll miss dinner. I’ll be back for the tie.” And she was gone, not running but moving very fast.
Margrethe was so right. If she had not laid out everything, I would still be struggling to put myself together. That shirt alone would have stopped me; it was one of the dive-in-and-button-up-the-back sort. I had never worn one.
Thank heaven Graham used an ordinary brand of safety razor. By six-fifteen I had touched up my morning shave, showered, necessary! And washed the smoke out of my hair.
His shoes fit me as if I had broken them in myself. His trousers were a bit tight in the waist, a Danish ship is no place to lose weight and I had been in the Motor Vessel Konge Knut for a fortnight. I was still struggling with that consarned backwards shirt when Margarethe let herself in with her pass key.
She came straight to me, said, “Hold still,” and quickly buttoned the buttons I could not reach. Then she fitted that fiendish collar over its collar buttons, laid the tie around my neck. “Turn around, please.”
Tying a bow tie properly involves magic. She knew the spell.
She helped me with the cummerband, held my jacket for me, looked me over and announced, “You’ll do. And I’m proud of you; at dinner the girls were talking about you.” I wish I had seen it. You are very brave.”
“Not brave. Foolish. I talked when I should have kept still.”
“Brave. I must go, I left Kristina guarding a cherry tart for me. But if I stay away too long someone will steal it.”
“You run along. And thank you loads. Hurry and save that tart.”
“Aren’t you going to pay me?”
“Oh. What payment would you like?”
“Don’t tease me!” She moved a few inches closer, turned her face up. I don’t know much about girls, who does? But some signals are large print. I took her by her shoulders, kissed both cheeks, hesitated just long enough to be certain that she was neither displeased nor surprised, then placed one right in the middle”. Her lips were full and warm.
“Was that the payment you had in mind?”
“Yes, of course. But you can kiss better than that. You know you can.” She pouted her lower lip, then dropped her eyes.
“Brace Yourself.”
Yes, I can kiss lots better than that. Or could by the time we had used up that kiss. By letting Margrethe lead it and heartily cooperating in whatever way she seemed to think a better kiss should go I learned more about kissing in the next two minutes than I had learned in my entire life up to then.
My ears roared.
For a moment after we broke she held still in my arms and looked up at me most soberly. “Alec,” she said softly, “That’s the best you’ve ever kissed me. Goodness. Now I’m going to run before I make you late for dinner.” She slipped out of my arms and left as she did everything, quickly.
I inspected myself in the mirror. No marks. A kiss that emphatic ought to leave marks.
What sort of person was this Graham? I could wear his clothes, but could I cope with his woman? Or was she his? Who knows? I did not. Was he a lecher, a womanizer? Or was I butting in on a perfectly nice if somewhat indiscreet romance?
How do you walk back through a fire pit?
And did I want to?
Go aft to the main companionway, then down two decks and go aft again, that’s what the ship’s plans in the booklet showed.
No problem. A man at the door of the dining saloon, Dressed much as I was but with a menu under his arm, had to be the head waiter, the chief dining-room steward. He confirmed it with a big professional smile. “Good evening, Mister Graham.”
I paused. “Good evening. What’s this about a change in seating arrangements? Where am I to sit tonight?” If you grab the bull by the horns, you at least confuse him.
“It’s not a permanent change, sir. Tomorrow you will be back at table fourteen. But tonight the Captain has asked that you sit at his table. If you will follow me, sir.”
He led me to an oversize table amidships, started to seat me on the Captain’s right, and the Captain stood up and started to clap, the others at his table followed suit, and shortly everyone in the dining room, it seemed, was standing and clapping and some were cheering.
I learned two things at that dinner. First, it was clear that Graham had pulled the same silly stunt I had, but it still was not clear whether there was one of us or two of us, I tabled that question.
Second, but of major importance: Do not Drink ice-cold Aalborg akvavit on an empty stomach, especially if you were brought up White Ribbon as I was.

Chapter 3.
Wine is a mocker, strong Drink is raging.
Proverbs. Chapter twenty, verse one.
I am not blaming Captain Hansen. I have heard that Scandinavians put ethanol into their blood as antifreeze, against their long hard winters, and consequently cannot understand people who cannot take strong Drink. Besides that, nobody held my arms, nobody held my nose, nobody forced spirits down my throat. I did it myself.
Our church doesn’t hold with the doctrine that the flesh is weak and therefore sin is humanly understandable and readily forgiven. Sin can be forgiven but just barely and you are surely going to catch it first. Sin should suffer.
I found out about some of that suffering. I’m told it is called a hangover.
That is what my Drinking uncle called it. Uncle Ed maintained that no man can cope with temperance who has not had a full course of intemperance, otherwise when temptation came his way, he would not know how to handle it.
Maybe I proved Uncle Ed’s point. He was considered a bad influence around our house and, if he had not been Mother’s brother, Dad would not have allowed him in the house. As it was, he was never pressed to stay longer and was not urged to hurry back.
Before I even sat down at the table, the Captain offered me a glass of akvavit. The glasses used for this are not large; they are quite small, and that is the deceptive part of the danger.
The Captain had a glass like it in his hand. He looked me in the eye and said, “To our hero! Skaal!”, threw his head back and tossed it down.
There were echoes of “Skaal!” all around the table and everyone seemed to gulp it down just like the Captain.
So I did. I could say that being guest of honor laid certain obligations on me. ”When in Rome” and all that. But the truth is I did not have the requisite strength of character to refuse. I told myself, “One tiny glass can’t hurt,” and gulped it down.
No trouble. It went down smoothly. One pleasant ice-cold swallow, then a spicy aftertaste with a hint of licorice. I did not know what I was Drinking but I was not sure that it was alcoholic. It seemed not to be.
We sat down and somebody put food in front of me and the Captain’s steward poured another glass of schnapps for me. I was about to start nibbling the food, Danish hors d’oeuvres and delicious, smorgasbord tidbits, when someone put a hand on my shoulder.
I looked up. The Well-Traveled Man.
With him were the Authority and the Skeptic.
Not the same names. Whoever, Whatever? was playing games with my life had not gone that far. “Gerald Fortescue” was now “Jeremy Forsyth”, for example. But despite slight differences I had no trouble recognizing each of them and their new names were close enough to show that someone, or something, was continuing the joke.
Then why wasn’t my new name something like Hergensheimer? Hergensheimer has dignity about it, a rolling grandeur. Graham is a so-so name.
“Alec,” Mister Forsyth said, “we misjudged you. Duncan and I and Pete are happy to admit it. Here’s the three thousand we owe you, and,” He hauled his right hand out from behind his back, held up a large bottle. “The best champagne in the ship as a mark of our esteem.”
“Steward!” said the Captain.
Shortly, the wine steward was going around, filling glasses at our table. But before that, I found myself again standing up, making Skaal! in akvavit three times, once to each of the losers, while clutching three thousand dollars States of North America dollars. I did not have, lime then to wonder why three hundred had changed to three thousand, besides, it was not as odd as what had happened to the Konge Knut. Both of her. And my wonder circuits were overloaded anyhow.
Captain Hansen told his waitress to place chairs at the table for Forsyth and company, but all three insisted that their wives and table mates expected them to return. Nor was there room.
Not that it would have mattered to Captain Hansen. He, is a Viking, half again as big as a house; hand him a hammer and he would be mistaken for Thor, he has muscles where other men don’t even have places. It is very hard to argue with him.
But he jovially agreed to compromise. They could go back to their tables and finish their dinners but first they must join him and me in pledging Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, guardian angels of our shipmate Alec. In fact the whole table must join in. “Steward!”
So we said, “Skaal!” three more times, while bouncing Danish antifreeze off our tonsils.
Have you kept count? That’s seven, I think. You can stop counting, as that is where I lost track. I was beginning to feel a return of the numbness I had felt halfway through the fire pit.
The wine steward had completed pouring champagne, having renewed his supply at a gesture from the Captain. Then it was time to toast me again, and I returned “The compliment to the three losers, then we all toasted Captain Hansen, and then we toasted the good ship Konge Knut.
The Captain toasted the United States and the whole room stood and Drank with him, so I felt it incumbent to answer by toasting the Danish Queen, and that got me toasted again and the Captain demanded a speech from me. “Tell us how it feels to be in the fiery furnace!”
I tried to refuse and there were shouts of “Speech! Speech!” from all around me.
I stood up with some difficulty, tried to remember the speech I had made at the last foreign missions fund-raising dinner. It evaded me. Finally I said, “Aw, shucks, it wasn’t anything. Just put your ear to the ground and your shoulder to the wheel, and your eyes on the stars and you can do it too. Thank you, thank you all and next, time you must come to my house.”
They cheered and we skaaled again, I forget why, and the lady on the Captain’s left got up and came around and kissed me, whereupon all the ladies at the Captain’s table clustered around and kissed me. That seemed to inspire the other ladies in the room, for there was a steady procession coming up to claim a buss from me, and usually kissing the Captain while they were about it, or perhaps the other way around.
During this parade someone removed a steak from in front of me, one I had had plans for. I didn’t miss it too much, because that endless orgy of osculation had me bewildered, plus bemusement much like that caused by the female villagers of the fire walk.
Much of this bemusement started when I first walked into the dining room. Let me put it this way: My fellow passengers, female, really should have been in the National Geographic.
Yes. Like that. Well, maybe not quite, but what they did wear made them look nakeder than those friendly villagers. I’m not going to describe those, “Formal evening Dresses” because I’m not sure I could, and I am sure I shouldn’t. But none of them covered more than twenty percent of what ladies usually keep covered at fancy evening affairs in the world I grew up in.
Above the waist I mean. Their skirts, long, some clear to the, floor, were nevertheless cut or slit in most startling ways.
Some of the ladies had tops to their Dresses that covered everything, but the material was transparent as glass. Or almost.
And some of the youngest ladies, girls really, actually, did belong in the National Geographic, just like my villagers. Somehow, these younger ladies did not seem quite as immodest as their elders.
I had noticed this display almost the instant I walked in. But, I tried not to stare and the Captain and others kept me so busy at first that I really did not have time to sneak glances at the incredible exposure. But, look, when a lady comes up and puts her arms around you and insists on kissing you, it is difficult not to notice that she isn’t wearing enough to ward off pneumonia. Or other chest complaints.
But I kept a tight rein on myself despite increasing dizziness and numbness.
Even bare skin did not startle me as much as bare words, language I had never heard in public in my life and extremely seldom even in private among men only. Men, I said, as gentlemen don’t talk that way even with no ladies present, in the world I knew.
The most shocking thing that ever happened to me in my boyhood was one day crossing the town square, noticing a crowd on the penance side of the courthouse, joining it to see who was catching it and why, and finding my Scoutmaster in the stocks. I almost fainted.
His offence was profane language, so the sign on his chest told us. The accuser was his own wife; he did not dispute it and had thrown himself on the mercy of the court, the judge was Deacon Brumby, who didn’t know the word.
Mister Kirk, my Scoutmaster, left town two weeks later and nobody ever saw him again, being exposed, in the stocks was likely to have that effect on a man. I don’t know what the bad language was that Mister Kirk had used, but it couldn’t have been too bad, as all Deacon Brumby could give him was one dawn-to-dusk.
That night at the Captain’s table in the Konge Knut I heard a sweet lady of the favorite-grandmother sort address her husband in a pattern of forbidden words involving blasphemy and certain criminal sensual acts. Had she spoken that way in public in my home town she would have received maximum exposure in stocks followed by being ridden out of town. Our town did not use tar and feathers; that was regarded as brutal.
Yet this dear lady in the ship was not even chided. Her husband simply smiled and told her that she worried too much.
Between shocking speech, incredible immodest exposure, and effects of two sorts of strange and deceptive potions lavishly administered, I was utterly confused. A stranger in a strange land, I was overcome by customs new and shocking. But through it all I clung to the conviction that I must appear to be sophisticated, at home, unsurprised. I must not let anyone suspect that I was not Alec Graham, shipmate, but instead Alexander Hergensheimer, total stranger, or something terrible might happen.
Of course I was wrong; something terrible had already happened. I was indeed a total stranger in an utterly strange and confusing land, but I do not think, in retrospect, that I would have made my condition worse had I simply blurted out my predicament.
I would not have been believed.
How else? I had trouble believing it myself.
Captain Hansen, a hearty no-nonsense man, would have bellowed with laughter at my “Joke” and insisted on another toast. Had I persisted in my “Delusion” he would have had the ship’s doctor talk to me.
Still, I got through that amazing evening easier by holding tight to the notion that I must concentrate on acting the part of Alec Graham while never letting anyone suspect that I was a changeling, a cuckoo’s egg.
There had just been placed in front of me a slice of princess cake, a beautiful multilayered confection I recalled from the other Konge Knut, and a small cup of coffee, when the Captain stood up. “Come, Alec! We go to the lounge now; the show is ready to start, but they can’t start till I get there. So come on! You don’t want all that sweet stuff; it’s not good for you. You can have coffee in the lounge. But before that we have some man’s Drinks, henh? Not these joke Drinks. You like Russian vodka?”
He linked his arm in mine. I discovered that I was going to the lounge. Volition did not enter into it.
That lounge show was much the mixture I had found earlier in M V Konge Knut, a magician who did improbable things but not as improbable as what I had done, or been done to?, a standup comedian who should have sat down, a pretty girl who sang, and dancers. The major differences were two I had already been exposed to: bare skin and bare words, and by then I was so numb from earlier shock and akvavit that these additional proofs of a different world had minimal effect.
The girl who sang just barely had clothes on and the lyrics of her songs would have caused her trouble even in the underworld of Newark, New Jersey. Or so I think; I have no direct experience with that notorious sink of iniquity. I paid more attention to her appearance, since here I need not avert my eyes; one is expected to stare at performers.
If one admits for the sake of argument that customs in Dress can be wildly different without destroying the fabric of society (a possibility. I do not concede but will stipulate), then it helps, I think, if the person exhibiting this difference is young and healthy and comely.
The singer was young and healthy and comely. I felt a twinge of regret when she left the spotlight The major event was a troupe of Tahitian dancers, and I was truly not surprised that they were costumed bare to the waist save for flowers or shell beads, by then I would have been surprised had they been otherwise. What was still surprising, although I suppose it should not have been, was the subsequent behavior of my fellow passengers.
First the troupe, eight girls, two men, danced for us, much the same dancing that had preceded the fire walk today, much the same as I had seen when a troupe had come aboard M V Konge Knut in Papeete. Perhaps you know that the hula of Tahiti differs from the slow and graceful hula of the Kingdom of Hawaii by being at a much faster beat and is much more energetic. I’m no expert on the arts of the dance but at least I have seen both styles of hula in the lands where each was native.
I prefer the Hawaiian hula, which I had seen when the Count von Zeppelin had stopped at Hilo for a day on her way to Papeete. The Tahitian hula strikes me as an athletic accomplishment rather than an art form. But its very energy and speed make it still more startling in the Dress or undress these native girls wore.
There was more to come. After a long dance sequence, which included paired dancing between girls and each of the two young men, in which they did things that would have been astonishing even among barnyard fowl. I kept expecting Captain Hansen to put a stop to it), the ship’s master of ceremonies or cruise director stepped forward.
“Ladeez and gentlemen,” he announced, “And the rest of you intoxicated persons of irregular birth, I am forced to amend his language. Most of you setters and even a few pointers have made good use of the four days our dancers have been with us to add the Tahitian hula to your repertoire. Shortly you’ll be given a chance to demonst rate what you’ve learned and to receive diplomas as authentic Papeete papayas. But what you don’t know is that others in the good ole knutty Knut have been practicing, too. Maestro, strike up the band!”
Out from behind the lounge stage danced a dozen more hula dancers. But these girls were not Polynesian; these girls were Caucasian. They were Dressed authentically, grass skirts and necklaces, a flower in the hair, nothing else. But instead of warm brown, their skins were white; most of them were blondes, two were redheads.
It makes a difference. By then I was ready to concede that Polynesian women were correctly and even modestly Dressed in their native costume. Other places, other customs. Was not Mother Eve modest in her simplicity before the Fall?
I But white women are grossly out of place in South Seas garb.
However, this did not keep me from watching the dancing. I was amazed to see that these girls danced that fast and complex dance as well (to my untutored eye) as did the island girls. Remarked on it to the Captain. “They learned to dance that precisely in only four days?”
He snorted. “They practice every cruise, those who ship with us before. All have practiced at least since San Diego.”
At that point I recognized one of the dancers, Astrid, the sweet young woman who had let me into “My” stateroom, and I then understood why they had had time and incentive to practice together: These girls were ship’s crew. I looked at her, stared, in fact, with more interest. She caught my eye and smiled. Like a dolt, a bumpkin, instead of smiling back I looked away and blushed, and tried to cover my embarrassment by taking a big sip of the Drink I found in my hand.
One of the kanaka dancers whirled out in front of the white girls and called one of them out for a pair dance. Heaven save me, it was Margrethe!
I choked up and could not breathe. She was the most blindingly beautiful sight I had ever seen in all my life.
Behold, thou art fair, my, love; behold, thou art fair; thou hast doves’ eyes within thy locks: thy hair is as a flock of goats, that appear from Mount Gilead.
Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor: thy belly is like a heap of wheat set about with lilies.
Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins.
Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee.

Chapter Four.
Although affliction cometh not forth of the dust, neither doth trouble spring out of the ground; yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward.
Job Chapter five, verses six to seven.
I SLOWLY became aware of myself and wished I had not; a most terrible nightmare was chasing me. I jammed my eyes shut against the light and tried to go back to sleep.
Native Drums were beating in my head; I tried to shut them out by covering my ears.
They got louder.
I gave up, opened my eyes and lifted my head. A mistake, my stomach flip-flopped and my ears shook. My eyes would not track and those infernal drums were tearing my skull apart.
I finally got my eyes to track, although the focus was fuzzy. I looked around, found that I was in a strange room, lying on top of a bed and only half Dressed.
That began to bring it back to me. A party aboard ship. Spirits. Lots of spirits. Noise. Nakedness. The Captain in a grass skirt, dancing heartily, and the orchestra keeping step with him.
Some of the lady passengers wearing grass skirts and some wearing even less. Rattle of bamboo, boom of drums.
Drums.
Those weren’t drums in my head; that was the booming of the worst headache of my life. Why in Ned did I let them.
Never mind “Them”. You did it yourself, chum.
Yes, but.
“Yes, but.” Always “Yes, but.” All your life it’s been “Yes, but.” When are you going to straighten up and take full responsibility for your life and all that happens to you?
Yes, but this isn’t my fault. I’m not A L Graham. That isn’t my name. This isn’t my ship.
It isn’t? You’re not?
Of course not.
I sat up to Shake off this bad Dream. Sitting up was a mistake; my head did not fall off but a stabbing pain at the base of my neck added itself to the throbbing inside my skull. I was wearing black Dress trousers and apparently nothing else and I was in a strange room that was rolling slowly.
Graham’s trousers. Graham’s room. And that long, slow roll was that of a ship with no stabilizers.
Not a dream. Or if it is, I can’t shake myself out of it. My teeth itched, my feet didn’t fit. Dried sweat all over me except where I was clammy. My armpits, don’t even think about armpits!
My mouth needed to have lye dumped into it.
I remembered everything now. Or almost. The fire pit. Villagers. Chickens scurrying out of the way. The ship that wasn’t my ship, but was. Margrethe.
Margrethe!
“Thy two breasts are like two doves, thou art all fair, my love!”
Margrethe among the dancers, her bosom as bare as her feet. Margrethe dancing with that villainous kanaka, and shaking her.
No wonder I got Drunk!
Stow it, chum! You were drunk before that. All you’ve got against that native lad is that it was he instead of you. You wanted to dance with her yourself. Only you can’t dance.
Dancing is a snare of Satan.
And don’t you wish you knew how!
Like two roes! Yes I do!
I heard a light tap at the door, then a rattle of keys. Margrethe stuck her head in. “Awake? Good.” She came in, carrying a tray, closed the door, came to me. “Drink this.”
“What is it?”
“Tomato juice, mostly. Don’t argue, Drink it!”
“I don’t think I can.”
“Yes, you can. You must. Do it.”
I sniffed it, then I took a small sip. To my amazement it did not nauseate me. So I Dranksome more. After one minor quiver it went down smoothly and lay quietly inside me. Margrethe produced two pills. “Take these. Wash them down with the rest of the tomato juice.”
“I never take medicine.”
She sighed, and said something I did not understand. Not English. Not quite. “What did you say?”
“Just something my grandmother used to say when grandfather argued with her. Mister Graham, take those pills. They are just aspirin and you need them. If you won’t cooperate, I’ll stop trying to help you. I’ll, I’ll swap you to Astrid, that’s what I’ll do.”
“Don’t do that.”
“I will if you keep objecting. Astrid would swap, I know she would. She likes you, she told me you were watching her dance last night.”
I accepted the pills, washed them down with the rest of the tomato juice, ice-cold and very comforting. “I did until I spotted you. Then I watched you.”
She smiled for the first time. “Yes? Did you like it?”
“You were beautiful.” And your dance was obscene. Your immodest Dress and your behaviour shocked me out of a year’s growth. I hated it, and I wish I could see it all over again this very instant! “You are very graceful.”
The smile grew dimples. “I had hoped that you would like it, sir.”
“I did. Now stop threatening me with Astrid.”
“All right. As long as you behave. Now get up and into the shower. First very hot, then very cold. Like a sauna.”
She waited. “Up, “I said. I’m not leaving until that shower is running and steam is pouring out.”
“I’ll shower. After you leave.”
“And you’ll run it lukewarm, I know. Get up, get those trousers off, get into that shower. While you’re showering, I’ll fetch your breakfast tray. There is just enough time before they shut down the galley to set up for lunch, so quit wasting time. Please!”
“Oh, I can’t eat breakfast! Not today. No, “Food, what a disgusting thought.”
“You must eat. You Dranktoo much last night, you know you did. If you don’t eat, you will feel bad all day. Mister Graham, I’ve finished making up for all my other guests, so I’m off watch now.
I’m fetching your tray, then I’m going to stay and see that you eat it.” She looked at me. “I should have taken your trousers off when I put you to bed. But you were too heavy.”
“You put me to bed?”
“Ori helped me. The boy I danced with.” My face must have given me away, for she added hastily, “Oh, I didn’t let him come into your room, sir. I undressed you myself. But I did have to have help to get you up the stairs.”
“I wasn’t criticizing.” Did you go back to the party then? Was he there? Did you dance with him again? jealousy is cruel as the grave; the coals thereof are coals of fire “I have no right. “I thank you both. I must have been a beastly nuisance.”
“Well, brave men often Drink too much, after danger is over. But it’s not good for you.”
“No, it’s not.” I got up off the bed, went into the bathroom, said, “I’ll turn it up hot. Promise.” I closed the door and bolted it, finished undressing. So I got so stinking, rubber-limp Drunk that a native boy had to help get me to bed. Alex, you’re a disgusting mess! And you haven’t any right to be jealous over a nice girl. You don’t own her, her behavior is not wrong by the standards of this place, wherever this place is, and all she’s done is mother you and, take care of you. That does not give you a claim on her.
I did turn it up hot, though it durn near kilt poor old Alex. But I left it hot until the nerve ends seemed cauterized, then suddenly switched it to cold, and screamed.
I let it stay cold until it no longer felt cold, then shut it off and dried down, having opened the door to let out the moisture-charged air. I stepped out into the room, and suddenly realized that I felt wonderful. No headache. No feeling that the world is ending at noon. No stomach queasies. Just hunger. Alex, you must never get drunk again, but if you do, you must do exactly what Margrethe tells you to. You’ve got a smart head on her shoulders, boy, appreciate it.
I started to whistle and opened Graham’s wardrobe.
I heard a key in the door, hastily grabbed his bathrobe, managed to cover up before she got the door open. She was slow about it, being hampered by a heavy tray. When I realized this I held the door for her. She put down the tray, then arranged dishes and food on my desk.
“You were right about the sauna-type shower,” I told her. “It was just what the doctor ordered. Or the nurse, I should say.”
“I know, it’s what my grandmother used to do for my grandfather.”
“A smart woman. My, this smells good!” Scrambled eggs, bacon, lavish amounts of Danish pastry, milk, coffee, a side dish of cheeses, fladbrod, and thin curls of ham, some tropic fruit I can’t name. “What was that your grandmother used to say when your grandfather argued?”
“Oh, she was sometimes impatient.”
“And you never are. Tell me.”
“Well, She used to say that God created men to test the souls of women.”
“She may have a point. Do you agree with her?”
Her smile produced dimples. “I think they have other uses as well.”
Margrethe tidied my room and cleaned my bath (okay, okay, Graham’s room, Graham’s bath, satisfied?) while I ate. She laid out a pair of slacks, a sport shirt in an island print, and sandals for me, then removed the tray and dishes while leaving coffee and the remaining fruit. I thanked her as she left, wondered if I should offer “Payment” and wondered, too, if she performed such valet services for other passengers. It seemed unlikely. I found I could not ask.
I bolted the door after her and proceeded to search Graham’s room.
I was wearing his clothes, sleeping in his bed, answering to his name, and now I must decide whether or not I would go whole hawg and be “A L Graham”, or should I go to some authority. American consul? If not, whom? Admit the impersonation, and ask for help?
Events were crowding me. Today’s King Skald showed that S S Konge Knut was scheduled to dock at Papeete at 3 p.m. and sail for MazatIan, Mexico, at 6 p.m. The purser notified all passengers wishing to change francs into dollars that a representative of the Bank of Papeete would be in the ship’s square facing the purser’s office from docking until fifteen minutes before sailing. The purser again wished to notify passengers that shipboard indebtedness such as bar and shop b