Robert Heinlein - The Cat Who Walked Through Walls

I answered, "Blert," and attempted to lift a hand to pet him, found I could not because I still had a head on each shoulder, a warm body against each side of me.

I turned my head to the right to speak to Xia-I needed to get up and find her refresher-and teamed that it was not Xia but Minerva who was now using my starboard shoulder.

I made a hasty situation assessment and found that I lacked sufficient data. So, instead of using an honorific to Minerva that may or may not have been appropriate, I simply kissed her. Or let myself be kissed, after showing willingness. Being pinned down from both sides and with a small cat creature standing on my chest I was almost as helpless as Gulliver, hardly able to be active as initiator of a kiss.

However, Minerva does not need help. She can manage.

Talent.

After she turned me loose, kissed for keeps, I heard a voice from my left: "Don't I get a kiss, too?"

Gretchen is a soprano; this voice was tenor. I turned my head.

Galahad. I was in bed with my doctor. Well... with both my doctors.

When I was a lad in Iowa, I was taught that, if I ever found myself in this or an analogous situation, the proper gambit was to run screaming for the hills to save my "honor" or its hom-ologue for males. A girl could sacrifice her "honor" and most of them did. But, if she was reasonably discreet about it and eventually wound up married with nothing worse than a seven-months child, her "honor" soon grew back and she was officially credited with having been a virgin bride, entitled to look with scorn on sinful women.

But a boy's "honor" was more delicate. If he lost it to another male (i.e., if they got caught at it), he might, if lucky, wind up in the State Department-or, if unlucky, he would move to California. But Iowa had no place for him.

This flashed through my mind in an instant-and was followed by a suppressed memory: a Boy Scout hike when I was a high school freshman, a pup tent shared with our assistant Scoutmaster. Just that once, in the dark of night and in silence broken only by a hoot owl- A few weeks later that Scout leader went away to Harvard... so of course it never happened.

0 tempora, o mores-that was long ago and far away. Three years later I enlisted and eventually bucked for officer and made it... and was always extremely circumspect, as an officer who can't resist playing with his privates cannot maintain discipline. Not until the Walker Evans affair did I ever have any reason to worry about blackmail.

I tightened my left arm a little. "Certainly. But be careful; I seem to be inhabited."

Galahad was careful; the kitten was not disturbed. It is possible that Galahad kisses as well as Minerva does. Not better. But just as well. Once I decided to enjoy the inevitable I did enjoy it. Tertius is not Iowa, Boondock is not Grinnell; there was no longer any reason to be manacled by the customs of a long-dead tribe.

"Thank you," I said, "and good morning. Can you de-cat me? If he stays where he is, I am likely to drown him."

Galahad surrounded the kitten with his left hand. "This is Pixel. Pixel, may I present Richard? Richard, we are honored to have been joined by Lord Pixel, cadet feline in residence."

"How do you do. Pixel?"

"Blert." "Thank you. And what's become of the refresher? I need it!"

Minerva helped me up from the bed and put my right arm around her shoulders, steadied me while Galahad fetched my cane, then both of them took me to the refresher. We were not in Xia's rooms; the refresher had moved to the other side of the bedroom and was larger, as was the bedroom.

And I learned something else about Tertius: The equipment of a refresher was of a complexity and variety that made the sort of plumbing I was used to, in Golden Rule and Luna City and so forth, look as primitive as the occasional back country backhouse one can still find in remote parts of Iowa.

Neither Minerva nor Galahad let me feel embarrassed over never having been checked out on Tertian plumbing. When I was about to pick the wrong fixture for my most pressing need, she simply said, "Galahad, you had better demonstrate for Richard; I'm not equipped to." So he did. Well, I'm forced to admit that I'm not equipped the way Galahad is, either. Visualize Michelangelo's David (Galahad is fully that pretty) but equip this image with coupling gear three times as large as Michelangelo gave David; that describes Galahad.

I have never understood why Michelangelo-in view of his known bias-invariably shortchanged his male creations.

When we three had completed after-sleep refreshment, we came out into the bedroom together and I was again surprised- without yet having worked up my nerve to inquire where we were, how we got there, and what had become of others- especially my necessary one... who, when last heard, was tossing around galaxies in reckless gambling. Or gamboling.

Or both.

One wall had vanished from that bedroom, the bed had become a couch, the missing wall framed a gorgeous garden- and, seated on the couch, playing with the kitten, was a man I had met briefly in Iowa two thousand years ago. Or so everyone said; I still was unsure about that two-thousand-year figure;

I was having trouble enough with Gretchen's having aged five years. Or six. Or something.

I stared. "Dr. Hubert." "Howdy." Dr. Hubert put the kitten aside. "Over here. Show me that foot."

"Um-" Damn his arrogance. "You must speak to my doctor first."

He looked at me abruptly. "Goodness. Aren't we regulation? Very well."

From behind me Galahad said quietly, "Please let him examine your transplant, Richard. If you will."

"If you say so." I lifted my new foot and shoved it right into Hubert's face, missing his big nose by a centimeter.

He failed to flinch, so my gesture was wasted. Unhurriedly he leaned his head a little to the left. "Rest it on my knee, if you will. That will be more convenient for both of us."

"Right. Go ahead." Braced with my cane, I was steady enough.

Galahad and Minerva kept quiet and out of the way while Dr. Hubert looked over that foot, by sight and touch, but doing nothing that struck me as really professional-I mean, he had no instruments; he used bare eyes and bare lingers, pinching the skin, rubbing it, looking closely at the healed scar, and at last scratching the sole of that foot hard and suddenly with a thumbnail. What is that reflex? Are your toes supposed to curl or the reverse? I have always suspected that doctors do that one out of spite.

Dr. Hubert lifted my foot, indicated that I could put it back on the floor, which I did. "Good job," he said to Galahad.

"Thank you. Doctor."

"Siddown, Colonel. Have you folks had breakfast? I did but I'm ready for some more. Minerva, would you shout for us; that's a good girl. Colonel, I want to get you signed up at once. What rank do you expect? Let me point out that it doesn't matter as the pay is the same and, no matter what rank you select, Hazel is going to be one rank higher; I want her in charge, not the other way around."

"Hold it. Sign me up for what? And what makes you think I want to sign up for anything?"

"The Time Corps, of course. Just as your wife is. For the purpose of rescuing the computer person known as 'Adam Selene,' also of course. Look, Colonel, don't be so dumed obtuse;

I know Hazel has discussed it with you; I know that you are committed to helping her." He pointed at my foot. "Why do you think that transplant was done? Now that you have both feet you need some other things. Refresher training. Orientation with weapons you haven't used. Rejuvenation. And all of these things cost money and the simple way to pay for them is to sign you up in the Corps. That foot alone would be too expensive for a stranger from a primitive era... but not for a member of the Corps. You can see that. How long do you need to think over anything so obvious? Ten minutes? Fifteen?" (This fast-talker ought to sell used campaign promises.)