The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (37 page)

“You fed me.”

“No. I did not interfere with the professionals.” My cane had slipped to the grass; Hazel leaned down, handed it to me. “By the way, I reloaded your cane.”

“Thank you. Hey! It was loaded. Fully.”

“It was loaded when they jumped us—and a good thing, too. Or I would be dead. You, too, I think. Me for certain, though.”

We spent the next ten minutes confusing each other. I’ve already recounted how that fight outside the Raffles Hotel looked to me. I’ll tell briefly how Hazel said it looked to her. There is no possible way to reconcile the two.

She says that she did not use her handbag as a weapon. (“Why, that would be silly, dear. Too slow and not lethal. You took out two of them at once and that gave me time to get at my little Miyako. After I had used my scarf, I mean.”)

According to her, I shot four of them, while she worked around the edges, cooling those I missed. Until they brought me down with that slice into my thigh (knife? She tells me they picked bits of bamboo out of the wound) and they hit me with an aerosol—and that gave her the instant she needed to finish off the man who sprayed me.

(“I stepped on his face and grabbed you and dragged you out of there. No, I didn’t expect to see Gretchen. But I knew I could count on her.”)

Her version does explain a little better how we won…except that by my recollection it is dead wrong. There is no point in picking at it; it can’t be straightened out.

“How did Gretchen get there? That Xia and Choy-Mu were waiting isn’t mysterious, in view of the messages we left for them. And Hendrik Schultz, too, if he grabbed a shuttle as soon as he heard from me. But Gretchen? You talked to her just before lunch. She was home, at Dry Bones.”

“At Dry Bones, with the nearest tubeway being far south at Hong Kong Luna. So how did she get to L-City so fast? Not by rolligon. No prize is offered for the correct answer.”

“By rocket.”

“Of course. A prospector’s jumpbug being the type of rocket. You remember that Jinx Henderson was planning to return that fez for you via some friend of his who was jumping his bug to L-City?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Gretchen went with that friend and returned the fez herself. She dropped it at lost-and-found in Old Dome just before she came to the Raffles to find us.”

“I see. But why?”

“She wants you to paddle her bottom, dear, and turn it all pink.”

“Oh, nonsense! I meant, ‘Why did her daddy let her hitchhike to L-City with this neighbor?’ She’s much too young.”

“He let her do so for the usual reason. Jinx is a big, strong,
macho
man who can’t resist the wheedling of his daughter. Forbidden to satisfy his suppressed incestuous yearnings he lets her have anything she wants if she teases him long enough.”

“That’s ridiculous. And inexcusable. A father’s duty toward his daughter requires that—”

“Richard. How many daughters do you have?”

“Eh? None. But—”

“So shut up about something you know nothing about. No matter what Jinx should have done, the fact is that Gretchen left Dry Bones about as we were having lunch. Counting time of flight, that put her at City Lock East around the time we left the Warden’s Complex…and she arrived at the Raffles just seconds before we did—and a good thing, too, or you and I would be dead. I think.”

“Did she get into the fight?”

“No, but by carrying you she freed me to cover our retreat. And all because she wants you to paddle her bottom. God moves in mysterious ways, dear; for every masochist He creates a sadist; marriages are made in Heaven.”

“Wash out your mouth with soap! I am not a sadist.”

“Yes, dear. I may have some details wrong, but not the broad picture. Gretchen has proposed formally to me, asking your hand in marriage.”

“
What?
”

“That’s right. She’s thought about it, and she has discussed it with Ingrid. She wants me to allow her to join our family, instead of starting a new line or group of her own. I found nothing surprising about it; I know how charming you are.”

“My God. What did you say to her?”

“I told her that it had my approval but that you were ill. So wait. And now you can answer her yourself…for there she is, across the pool.”

“Do not put off till tomorrow What can be enjoyed today.”

JOSH BILLINGS
1818-1885

“I’m going straight back to my room. I feel faint.” I squinted, staring across the sun-speckled water. “I don’t see her.”

“Straight across, just to the right of the water slide. A blonde and a brunette. Gretchen is the blonde.”

“I didn’t expect her to be brunette.” I continued to stare; the brunette waved at us. I saw that it was Xia, and waved back.

“Let’s join them, Richard. Leave your cane and stuff on the bench; no one will touch it.” Hazel stepped out of her sandals, laid her handbag by my cane.

“Shower?” I asked.

“You’re clean; Minerva bathed you this morning. Dive? Or walk in?”

We dived in together. Hazel slid between the molecules like a seal; I left a hole big enough for a family. We surfaced in front of Xia and Gretchen, and I found myself being greeted.

I have been told that on Tertius the common cold has been conquered, as well as periodontitis and other disorders that gather in the mouth and throat, and, of course, that group once called “venereal diseases” because they are so hard to catch that they require most intimate contact for transmission.

Just as well—On Tertius.

Xia’s mouth tastes sort of spicy; Gretchen’s has a little-girl sweetness although (I discovered) she is no longer a little girl. I had ample opportunity to compare flavors; if I let go of one, the other grabbed me. Again and again.

Eventually they got tired of this (I did not) and we four moved to a shallow cove, found an unoccupied float table, and Hazel ordered tea—tea with calories: little cakes and sandwiches and sweet orange fruits somewhat like seedless grapes. And I opened the attack:

“Gretchen, when I first met you, less than a week ago, you were as I recall ‘going on thirteen.’ So how dare you be five centimeters taller, five kilos heavier, and at least five years older? Careful how you answer, as anything you say will be taken down by Teena and held against you at another time and place.”

“Did someone mention my name? Hi, Gretchen! Welcome home.”

“Hi, Teena. It’s great to be back!”

I squeezed Xia. “You, too. You look five years younger and you’ve got to explain it.”

“No mystery about me. I’m studying molecular biology just as I was in Luna—but here they know far more about it—and paying my way by working in Howard Clinic doing unprogrammed ‘George’ jobs—and spending every spare minute in this pool. Richard, I’ve learned to swim! Why, back Loonie side I didn’t know anyone who knew anyone who knew how to swim. And sunshine, and fresh air! In Kongville I sat indoors, breathing canned air under artificial light, and dickered with dudes over bundling bins.” She took a deep breath, raising her bust past the danger point, and sighed it out. “I’ve come alive! No wonder I look younger.”

“All right, you’re excused. But don’t let it happen again. Gretchen?”

“Grandma Hazel, is he teasing? He talks just like Lazarus.”

“He’s teasing, love. Tell him what you’ve been doing and why you are older.”

“Well…the morning we got here I asked Grandma Hazel for advice—”

“No need to call me ‘Grandma,’ dear.”

“But that’s what Cas and Pol call you and I’m two generations junior to them. They require me to call them ‘Uncle.’”

“I’ll make them say ‘Uncle’! Pay no attention to Castor and Pollux, Gretchen; they’re a bad influence.”

“All right. But I think they’re kind o’ nice. But teases. Mr. Richard—”

“And no need to call me ‘Mister.’”

“Yes, sir. Hazel was busy—you were so terribly ill!—so she turned me over to Maureen, who assigned me to Deety, who got me started on Galacta and gave me some history to read and taught me basic six-axes space-time theory and the literary paradox. Conceptual metaphysics—”

“Slow down! You lost me.”

Hazel said, “Later, Richard.”

Gretchen said, “Well…the essential idea is that Tertius and Luna—our Luna, I mean—are not on the same time line; they are at ninety degrees. So I decided I wanted to stay here—easy enough if you are healthy; most of this planet is still wilderness; immigrants are welcome—but there was the matter of Mama and Papa; they would think I was dead.

“So Cas and Pol took me back to Luna—our Luna; not the Luna on this time line—and Deety went with me. Back to Dry Bones, that is, early on the afternoon of July fifth, less than an hour after I left in Cyrus Thorn’s jumpbug. Startled everybody. It was a good thing I had Deety with me to explain things, although our p-suits convinced Papa as much as anything. Have you seen the sort of pressure suits they have here?”

“Gretchen, I have seen one hospital room and one drop tube and this swimming pool. I don’t even know my way to the post office.”

“Mmm, yes. Anyhow, pressure suits here are two thousand years more advanced than those we use in Luna. Which isn’t surprising…but surely surprised Papa. Eventually Deety made a deal for me. I could stay on Tertius…but visit back home every year or two if I could find someone to bring me. And Deety promised to help with that. Mama made Papa agree to it. After all, almost anyone in Luna would emigrate to a planet like Tertius if he could…except those who just have to have low gravity. Speaking of that, sir, how do you like your new foot?”

“I’m just now getting used to it. But two feet are eight hundred and ninety-seven times better than one foot.”

“I guess that means you like it. So I came back and enlisted in the Time Corps—”

“Slow down! I keep hearing ‘Time Corps.’ Rabbi Ezra says that he has joined it. This baggage with the streaky red hair claims to be a major in it. And now you say you enlisted in it. At thirteen? Or at your present age? I’m confused.”

“Grandma? I mean, ‘Hazel?’”

“She was allowed to enroll as a cadet in W.E.N.C.H.E.S. auxiliary because I said she was old enough. That got her sent to school on Paradox. When she graduated, she transferred to the Second Harpies and went through basic training followed by advanced combat school—”

“And when we dropped at Solis Lacus on time line four to change the outcome there—then, and that’s where I picked up this scar on my ribs—see?—and was made corporal in the field. And now I’m nineteen but officially twenty to let me be promoted to sergeant—after we fought at New Brunswick. Not this time line,” she added.

“Gretchen is a natural for a military career,” Hazel said quietly. “I knew she would be.”

“And I’ve been ordered to officer’s school but that’s been placed on hold until I have this baby and—”

“
What
baby?” I looked at her belly. Baby fat all gone—not plumped the way it was four days ago by my reckoning…six years ago by the wild tale I was hearing. Not pregnant so far as I could see. Then I looked at her eyes and under her eyes. Well, maybe. Probably.

“Doesn’t it show? Hazel spotted it at once. So did Xia.”

“Not to me, it doesn’t.” (Richard old son, time to bite the bullet; you’re going to have to change your plans. She’s knocked up and, while you didn’t do it, your presence changed her life. Skewed her Karma. So get with it. No matter how stiff-lipped and brave a youngster appears to be, when she’s going to have a baby she needs a husband in sight, or she can’t be relaxed about it. Can’t be happy. A young mother must be happy. Hell, man, you’ve written this plot for the confession books dozens of times; you know what you have to do. So do it.)

I went on, “Now look here, Gretchen, you can’t get away from me that easily. Last Wednesday night in Lucky Dragon—well, it was last Wednesday night to me, but you’ve been gallivanting around strange time lines—and kicking up your heels, apparently. Last Wednesday night, by my calendar, in Dr. Chan’s Quiet Dreams in Lucky Dragon Pressure, you promised to marry me…and if Hazel had stayed asleep, we would have started that baby right then. As we both know. But Hazel woke up and made me get back on her other side.” I looked at Hazel. “Spoilsport.”

I went on, “But don’t think for one second that you can get out of marrying me merely by getting yourself knocked up while I’m sick-abed. You can’t. Tell her. Hazel. She can’t get out of it. Can she?”

“No, she can’t. Gretchen, you are going to marry Richard.”

“But, Grandma, I
didn’t
promise to marry him. I didn’t!”

“Richard says you did. One thing I’m sure of: When I woke up, you two were about to start a baby. Perhaps I should have played possum.” Hazel went on, “But why the fuss, darling girl? I’ve already told Richard how you proposed to me for him…and how I agreed, and now he has confirmed it. Why do you refuse Richard now?”

“Uh—” Gretchen took a grip on herself. “That was back when I was thirteen years old. At that time I did not know that you were my great great grandmother—I called you ‘Gwen,’ remember? And I still thought like a Loonie then, too—a most conservative mob. But here on Tertius if a woman has a baby but no husband, nobody pays it any mind. Why, in the Second Harpies most of the birds have chicks but only a few of them are married. Three months ago we fought at Thermopylae to make sure the Greeks won this time and our reserve colonel led us because our regular colonel was about to hatch one. That’s the way we old pros do things—no itch. We have our own crèche on Barrelhouse, Richard, and we take care of our own; truly we do.”

Hazel said stiffly, “Gretchen, my great great great granddaughter will not be raised in a crèche. Damn it, daughter, I was raised in a crèche; I won’t let you do that to this child. If you won’t marry us, you must at least let us adopt your baby.”

“
No!
”

Hazel set her mouth. “Then I must discuss it with Ingrid.”

“No! Ingrid is not my boss…and neither are you. Grandma Hazel, when I left home I was a child and a virgin and timid and knew nothing of the world. But now I am no longer a child and I have not been virgin for years and I am a combat veteran who cannot be frightened by anything.” She looked squarely into my eyes. “I will not use a baby to trap Richard into marriage.”