Marune Alastor 933

Destian looked around the table. "I think we'd better return to the hotel.

Haven't we seen enough of New Town?"

"Go, if you like," said Efraim. "I'm in no hurry."

"I'll wait with Efraim," said Maerio.

Matho Lorcas spoke to Sthelany. "I hope you'll wait too. Will you not?"

"Why?"

"I want to explain something which I believe you want to hear."

Sthelany languidly rose to her feet and without a word moved off. Destian, with a dubious look back at Efraim and Maerio, followed.

"A pity," said Lorcas. "I found her extremely attractive."

"Sthelany and Destian are both most stately," said Maerio.

Lorcas asked with a sly smile, "And what of you? Aren't you stately too?"

"When ceremony makes demands on me. Sometimes I find Rhune ways rather tiresome.

If Efraim weren't here I'd try that punch. I'm not ashamed of my i

Efraim laughed. "Very well. If you will, I will too. But wait until Destian and Sthelany are out of sight."

Matho Lorcas ordered rum punch for all. Efraim and Maerio drank first behind the screens, then spluttering with embarrassed laughter, brought the goblets into the open and drank.

"Bravo!" declared Lorcas soberly. "You have taken a long step on the road to emancipation."

"It doesn't amount to all that much," said Efraim, "I'll buy another round.

Lorcas, what about you?"

"With pleasure. Still, it wouldn't do for the two of you to stagger into the hotel drunk, would it?"

Maerio clasped her head. "My father would turn purple. Of all the folk alive he is the most rigid."

"My father would simply look the other way," said Efraim. "He seems rigid, and of course he is, but essentially he is quite reasonable."

"So, you two are not related?"

"Not at all."

"But you're fond of each other?"

Efraim and Maerio looked sidewise at each other. Efraim laughed uncomfortably.

"I won't deny it." He looked again at Maerio, whose face was twisting. "Have I offended you?"

"No."

"Then why do you look so doleful?"

"Because we must come to Port Mar to tell each other such things."

"I suppose it is absurd," said Efraim. "But Port Mar is so much different from Eccord and Scharrode. Here I can touch you, and it is not mirk." He took her hand.

Matho Lorcas heaved a sigh. "Ah me. I should leave you two alone. Excuse me a moment; for a fact there is someone I wish to see."

Efraim and Maerio sat together. She leaned her head against his shoulder; he bent down, kissed her forehead. "Efraim! It is not even mirk!"

"Are you angry?"

Lorcas appeared beside the table. "Your friend Destian is here."

Efraim and Maerio drew apart. Destian approached and looked curiously from one to the other. He addressed Maerio. "The Kaiark Rianlle has asked me to conduct you back to the hotel."

Efraim stared up at Destian, who, so he knew, was not above misrepresenting facts. Maerio, sensing friction, jumped to her feet. "Yes. I'll welcome some rest, and look! with umber and the overcast and the shade from these enormous trees it is almost like mirk!"

Destian and Maerio departed. With a debonair gesture Lorcas settled into the seat beside Efraim. "And that is the way things go, my friend."

"I am embarrassed," said Efraim. "What will she think of me?"

"Get her alone somewhere and find out."

"That is impossible! Here in Port Mar perhaps we lost our equilibrium. In our realms we could never consider such display." He rested his chin on his hands and looked gloomily across the restaurant.

"Come along," said Lorcas. "Let's move down the avenue. I'm due at the Three Lanterns presently; first I'll show you a bit of the town."

Lorcas took Efraim to a cabaret frequented by students. They listened to music, drank light beer. Efraim explained to Lorcas how life went in the Realms. "A

place like this by comparison seems a zoo of fecund animals. The Kraike Singhalissa, at least, would adopt this view."

"And you respect her judgment?"

"To the contrary; this is the principal reason I am here. I hope to discover benefits and redemptions in what I confess seems sickening behavior. Look at that couple yonder. Sweating, panting, shameless as dogs in rut. At the very least their activity is unhygienic."

"They are relaxed. Still, yonder other folk sit quite decorously, and none seem offended by the antics of the two reprobates."

"I am confused," admitted Efraim. "Trillions inhabit Alastor Cluster; not all can be deluded. Perhaps anything and everything is i

"What you see here is relatively i

"No. I will come with you, as long as I do not have to breathe too much fetid air."

"When you've seen enough, just say the word." He glanced at his watch. "I have just an hour to spare, then I must go to work at the Three Lanterns."

The two walked up the Street of Limping Children, then turned along the Avenue of Haune, Lorcas pointing out the more disreputable places of the tower - an expensive bordello, bars frequented by sexual deviates, and a dim establishment, purportedly a tea shop which operated illegal nerve machines in the upper rooms; other sordid places offering even more questionable entertainment.

Efraim observed all with a stony face. He found himself not so much shocked as detached, as if what he saw were intended as a grotesque stage-setting. At last they reached the Three Lanterns, a rambling old structure from which issued the sound of fiddles with banjos playing merry jigs after the style of the Tinsdale Wayfarers.

Singhalissa was right, thought Efraim, when she declared music no more than symbolic sebalism - well, perhaps "sebalism" was not quite the right word.

"Passion," perhaps, which encompassed sebalism and all the other strong emotions as well. At the Three Lanterns, Lorcas took his leave of Efraim. "Remember, I'd be enchanted for the opportunity to visit the Realms. Perhaps someday - who knows?"

Efraim, thinking of the frigid reception Lorcas would certainly receive at the hands of Singhalissa, retrained an invitation. "Perhaps some day. At the moment it might not be convenient."

"Good-by then. Remember, directly back down the avenue of Haune, turn south on any of the side streets to the Estrada, and along to the bridge. Then up the Street of Brass Boxes to your hotel."

"I am exactly oriented; I will not get lost."

Somewhat reluctantly Lorcas went into the Three Lanterns; at the entrance he waved farewell. Efraim turned back the way they had come.

Clouds hung heavy; the time was yet umber, though very dull. Furad hung low behind Jibberee Hill, and both Maddar and Cirse were obscured by overcast Gloom almost as dense as mirk shrouded Port Mar, and colored lights invested the Avenue of Haune with a tipsy gaiety.

As Efraim walked, his thoughts returned to Maerio; how he wished she were with him now! But futile to counter the will of the Kaiark Rianlle, whose rectitude was matched only by that of Singhalissa.

Efraim at this moment was passing the expensive bordello, and even as he reflected upon the character of the Kaiark Rianlle, out the door of the bordello, his face blurred and clothes disheveled, stepped the Kaiark Rianlle himself.

Efraim stared, unbelievingly. He began to laugh first incredulously, then with the intoxication of total mirth.

Rianlle stood with his mouth first open, then closed; first swelling with purple wrath, then trying to achieve a comradely grin. Under the circumstances neither could be convincing or effective. Ridicule to a Rhune was insupportable; when Efraim told the story, as surely he must - the episode was too good to keep; even Rianlle realized this - the Kaiark Rianlle would thereafter be a figure of fun, and furtive snickers would accompany him through life.