"I was considering the memory of the 'shlunk!' that Martian murderer's skull made when it finally gave in, that day at Klamugra. Do you remember, hard-headed Yankee?" Kim's eyes followed the blonde ecdysiast across the stage more from habit than present interest.

"Why did you have to remember that? 'Shlunk!'—ugh!"

"We're going to have to squirm out of this, Barnaby-sunsang," Kim said. "We'll have to beat that rap at Klamugra. It's not that I wish to avoid putting my head in a vise; it's only that it hurts me to see the Extraterrestrial Service made a monkey of this way. In a way it will even be a shame if we get off. Think of all the Marties who will miss the opportunity to see your punkin head smashed."

"You orientals have noble souls, Kim."

The blonde stripper, having uncovered as much of herself as she could without resorting to dissection, jumped down from the stage and walked over to the two EXTS officers. "Would you gentlemen like to buy me a drink?" she asked.

Kim's eyes roved abroad in a brief anatomy lesson, but Barnaby said, "I'll buy you one a couple of weeks from now, if I'm not laid up somewhere with a splitting headache." He stood unsteadily and tossed a ten-credit certificate on the table. "If you're really thirsty, get a drink out of that."

Kim reluctantly followed his superior officer from the bar. At the door he turned and called back to the blonde, "Don't catch cold, child. I'll be back."

The dawn jetoff was miserable, as jetoffs always are. Four days brought the ship within falling-distance of Mars; soon the jets thundered as it backed into a pocket of hills outside Klamugra. The air-pumps hammered to bring the air pressure inside the hull gradually down to that of the outside, so that instruments and equipment wouldn't be subjected to a sudden lowering of pressure. The men inside the ship slipped plastic helmets over their heads, checked the tiny air-pumps on their shoulders, and drew on heavy gloves and boots.

When the port swung open Kim and Barnaby climbed down the ladder to the blast-blackened sand. The sergeant of EXTS Provost Marshall who had accompanied them walked with the officers to a hill overlooking the ancient Martian city of Klamugra, which stood on a terrace about five kilometers to the north. The red adobe walls of the city, testimony of the ancient days when Mars had enough water to allow its use for brick-making, blended with the 

 Prev. P 4/16 next