tinued to treat
him like a baby. She had never got over examining his face and his ears
and his fingernails to make sure that he had cleaned them properly. He
couldn't so much as comb his hair to suit her; all through his abortive
attempt at college, and later at a job, she had done it for him.

But she had been a lioness in his defense later on, when he had given
way to that first irresistible impulse to dip his fingers in the till
and get away with what he thought would be unnoticed petty cash. It had
been her fault that the thing had happened, of course. She could have
given him a decent amount of spending money, instead of doling it out to
him from his own wages as if she were giving money for candy to a
schoolboy. She could have treated him more like the man he was supposed
to be.

Still, he couldn't complain. She had stuck to him all the way through,
whatever the charges against him. When that lug of a traveling salesman
had accused her Georgie of picking his pockets, and that female refugee
from a TV studio had charged poor harmless Georgie with slugging her, it
was his mother who had stood up in court and denounced them, and
solemnly told judge and jury what a sweet, kind, helplessly innocent
lamb her Georgie was. It wasn't her fault if no one had quite believed
her.

Now he was on his own, without any possibility of help from her. And in
what the ads called a "responsible position" that she had never so much
as dreamed he could fill.

Unfortunately, now that he had reached so exalted a level, there seemed
to be few possibilities of promotion. There appeared only the chance, on
the one hand, that the natives would find him out and slaughter him, and
on the other that Malevski would track him down and bring him back to
Earth for the punishment he dreaded.

* * * * *

It was a good thing he had put on his helmet. Not far away, a group of
the natives was approaching, laden with more food and flowers. It was
larger than the previous group. Evidently, as he had anticipated, they
were showing him off to newcomers.

He came to a stately halt and waited for them to approach. He could see
the surprise on their faces as they noted his change of costume, and he
watched nervously as they stopped to whisper among themselves. It would
be too bad for him if they didn't like it.

But they didn't seem to mind. One of them, a very impressive old man
with green hair flecked with red, steppe