Robert Heinlein - The Cat Who Walked Through Walls

"You do that once more and there ainta gonna be no wedding. Dear one, what sort of a wedding do you want?"

"Richard, I don't need a wedding ceremony, I don't need witnesses. I just want to promise you everything a wife should promise."

"You're sure, Gwen? Aren't you being hasty?" Confound it, promises a woman makes in bed should not be binding.

"I am not being hasty. I decided to marry you more than a year ago."

"You did? Well, I'll be- Hey' We met less than a year ago. At the Day One Ball. July twentieth. I remember."

"True."

"Well?"

"'Well* what, dear? I decided to many you before we met. Do you have a problem with that? I don't. I didn't."

"Mmm. I had better tell you some things. My past contains episodes I don't boast about. Not exactly dishonest but somewhat shady. And Ames is not the name I was bom with."

"Richard, I will be proud to be addressed as 'Mrs. Ames.* Or as... 'Mrs. Campbell'... Colin."

I said nothing, loudly-then added, "What more do you know?"

She looked me firmly in the eye, did not smile. "All I need to know. Colonel Colin Campbell, known as 'Killer' Campbell to his troops... and in the dispatches. A rescuing angel to the students of Percival Lowell Academy. Richard, or Colin, my oldest daughter was one of those students."

"I'll be eternally damned."

"I doubt it."

"And because of this you intend to marry me?"

"No, dear man. That reason sufficed a year ago. But now I've had many months to discover the human being behind the storybook hero. And... I did hurry you into bed last night but neither of us would marry for that reason alone. Do you want to know about my own tarnished past? I'll tell."

"No." I faced her, took both her hands. "Gwendolyn, I want you to be my wife. Will you have me as your husband?"

"I will."

"I, Colin Richard, take thee, Gwendolyn, to be my wife, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, as long as you will have me."

"I, Sadie Gwendolyn, take thee, Colin Richard, to be my husband, to care for and love and cherish for the rest of my lif&."

"Whew! I guess that does it."

"Yes. But kiss me."

I did. "When did 'Sadie' show up?"

"Sadie Lipschitz, my family name. I didn't like it so I changed it. Richard, the only thing left to make it official is to publish it. That ties it down. And I do want to tie it down while you're still groggy."

"All right. Publish it how?"

"May I use your terminal?"

"Our terminal. You don't have to ask to use it."

" 'Our terminal.' Thank you, dear." She got up, went to the terminal, keyed for directory, then called the Golden Rule Herald, asked for the society editor. "Please record. Dr. Richard

Ames and Mistress Gwendolyn Novak are pleased to announce their marriage this date. No presents, no flowers. Please confirm." She switched off. They called back at once; I answered and confirmed.

She sighed. "Richard, I hurried you. But I had to. Now I can no longer be required to testify against you in any jurisdiction anywhere. I want to help in any way that I can. Why did you kill him, dear? And how?"

"In waking a tiger, use a long stick.**

MAO TSE-TUNG 1893-1976

I stared thoughtfully at my bride. "You are a gallant lady, my love, and I am grateful that you do not want to testify against me. But I am not sure that the legal principle you cited can be applied in this jurisdiction."

"But that's a general rule of justice, Richard. A wife can't be forced to testify against her husband. Everyone knows that."

"The question is: Does the Manager know it? The Company asserts that the habitat has only one law, the Golden Rule, and claims that the Manager's regulations are merely practical interpretations of that law, just guidelines subject to change-change right in the middle of a hearing and retroactive, if the Manager so decides. Gwen, I don't know. The Manager's Proxy might decide that you are the Company's star witness."

"I won't do it! I won't!"

"Thank you, my love. But let's find out what your testimony would be were you to be a witness in-what shall we call it? Eh, suppose that I am charged with having wrongfully caused the death of, uh, Mr. X... Mr. X being the stranger who came to our table last night when you excused yourself to visit the ladies' lounge. What did you see?"

"Richard, I saw you kill him. I saw it!"

"A prosecutor would require more details. Did you see him come to our table?"

"No. I didn't see him until I left the lounge and was headed for our table... and was startled to see someone sitting in my chair."

"All right, back up a little and tell me exactly what you saw."

"Uh, I came out of the ladies' room and turned left, toward our table. Your back was toward me, you'll remember-"

"Never mind what I remember; you tell what you remember. How far away were you?"

"Oh, I don't know. Ten meters, maybe. I could go there and measure it. Does it matter?"

"If it ever does, you can measure it. You saw me from about ten meters. What was I doing? Standing? Sitting? Moving?"

"You were seated with your back to me."

"My back was toward you. The light wasn't very good. How did you know it was I?"

"Why- Richard, you're being intentionally difficult."

"Yes, because prosecutors are intentionally difficult. How did you recognize me?"

"Uh- It was you. Richard, I know the back of your neck just as I know your face. Anyhow, when you stood up and moved, I did see your face."

"Was that what I did next? Stand up?"

"No, no. I spotted you, at our table-then I stopped short when I saw someone seated across from you, in my chair. I just stood there and stared."

"Did you recognize him?"

"No. I don't think I ever saw him before."

"Describe him."

"Uh, I can't, very well."

"Short? Tall? Age? Bearded? Race? How dressed?"

"I never saw him standing up. He wasn't a youngster but he wasn't an old man, either. I don't think he wore a beard."

"Moustache?"

"I don't know." (I did know. No moustache. Age about thirty.)

"Race?"

"White. Light skin, anyhow, but not blond like a Swede. Richard, there wasn't time to catch all the details. He threatened you with some sort of weapon and you shot him and you jumped up as the waiter came over-and I backed up and waited until they took him away."

"Where did they take him?"

"I'm not sure. I backed into the ladies' lounge and let the door contract. They could have taken him into the gentlemen's room just across the passage. But there's another door at the end of the passage marked 'Employees Only.'"

"You say he threatened me with a weapon?"

"Yes. Then you shot him and jumped up and grabbed his weapon and shoved it into your pocket, just as our waiter came up on the other side."

(Oho!) "Which pocket did I put it in?"

"Let me think. I have to turn myself that way in my mind. Your left pocket. Your left outside jacket pocket."

"How was I dressed last night?"

"Evening dress, we had come straight from the ballet. White turtleneck, maroon jacket, black trousers."

"Gwen, because you were asleep in the bedroom, I undressed last night here in the livingroom and hung the clothes I was wearing in that wardrobe by the outer door, intending to move them later. Will you please open that wardrobe, find the jacket I wore last night, and get from its left outside pocket the 'weapon' you saw me place in it?"

"But-" She shut up and, solemn-faced, did as I asked.

In a moment she returned. "This is all there was in that pocket." She handed me the stranger's wallet.

I accepted it. "This is the weapon with which he threatened me." Then I showed her my right forefinger, bare. "And this is the weapon I used to shoot him when he pointed this wallet at me."