Just
start down the hall to your left and ..."

"My dear sir," she cried, "just wait a minute! I can't come visiting in
my robe, you know; I'll have to change. But while I dress, you must take
your spying little thoughts away. If I detect you peeking in here at the
wrong moment, I'll run straight to Captain Blake and have him prepare
his special lead-lined cell for one unhappy telepath. So you just run
along. When I'm ready, I'll call you and you can lead me to your lair."

He thought only the one word, "Hurry," but in the silence after he was
gone she fancied she heard her heart echoing him, loud in the stillness.

* * * * *

She laughed gaily to herself. "Now stop acting like a schoolgirl before
the Junior Prom. You've got to get busy and wash and dress and comb and
brush." And then to her reflection in the mirror: "Aren't you a lucky
girl? You're still millions and billions of miles from Earth and it's
starting already, and he's going to do research there for some time, and
maybe at the university in your home town if you tell him just how nice
it is, and he doesn't know any other girls, you'd have an inside track.
Now you'd better get going or you'll never be ready.

"For reading poetry, don't you think this dress is just the thing, this
nice soft blue one that goes so well with your tan and shows your legs,
which are really quite pretty, you know.... And your silver sandals and
those silver pins ... just a touch of perfume.... That's right; and now
a little lipstick. You do have a pretty smile.... There, that's right.
Now stop admiring yourself and let's go."

She moved to the bookshelf, frowning now, considered, selected and
rejected. Finally she settled on three slim books bound in russet
leather, in glossy plastic, in faded cloth. She took a little purse from
the table, put the cigarette case into it. Then, with a laugh, she took
one cigarette and slipped it into a tiny pocket on her skirt.

"I really meant to bring you one," she whispered to the empty air, "but
wasn't I mean to tease?"

In the corridor, she walked quickly past the rows of closed doors to the
tiny refreshment stand at the foot of the dining room stairs. The
attendant rose from his stool as she approached, and came to the
counter.

"I'd like two frosted starlights, please," she said, "on a tray."

"Two," said the attendant, and nothing more, but his eyebrow climbed up
his forehead, hung for a second, the