atch up on and after
enduring nearly two hours of conversation about people and happenings
of which she knew nothing, Martha gave up and headed for the stairs.

"You two can talk all night if you want," she announced over her
shoulder, "but I'm going to bed. Breakfast on the patio about nine or
so, Lee."

"I'll be there, Marty. Sleep tight."

"Not as tight as you will, I'll bet," she grinned. "There's another
jug in the kitchen if you think you may need it."

* * * * *

We heard her bedroom door hiss as it slid closed and sat for a moment
looking into the fire and listening to it whispering secrets to
itself.

"She's a pretty nice wife, Sam," he told me.

"Thanks. I like her, too."

"Not at all like Prunella."

"Prunella?" I said. "I don't think--"

"Well, that's what the boys at the station began calling her a couple
of days after she landed. Behind her back, of course."

"I still don't know who--"

"You know, the niece of that windbag in World Congress that you
featherheads in the front office sent out to replace Pop Jensen when
he fell out of that tree and had to be sent back to Earth for
hospitalization."

"Oh, _that_ one. Look, Lee, I didn't have anything to do with her
selection. She was appointed by the Old Man himself. Understand there
was some kind of pressure on him from the top."

"I forgive you, Sam, but I rather doubt if some of the other people of
the group will for a while."

"How come she didn't stay?" I asked. "Political pressure or not, I
can't imagine the supervisors sending out an incompetent replacement."

"Incompetent?" he almost snorted. "Prunella was the most belligerently
competent female that it has ever been my misfortune to run across.
Prunella was efficiency personified, make no mistake about that. She
was--or is--a top-flight botanist and had led several expeditions here
on Earth, but she couldn't realize that Xenon wasn't Earth. She tried
to live by the book as she had here, but in spite of the general
excellence of the _Spaceman's Handbook_, her methods didn't work so
well."

I primed him with another two fingers out of the bottle and sat back
to listen.

"Good brandy," he said. "I made some once on Xenon, but Prunella put a
halt to that in a hurry, just as she did a lot of other things. The
trouble with her was that she was always insufferably right. Every
blasted time! And she was right again when she pointed out that if we
were t