Walworth looked puzzled. “I’m not sure I understand, Mister . . .”
“Er, Balmer. Dr. Balmer.”
“Dr. Balmer, Dr. Sarda was here, on time, with Mr. Troon. Everything went smoothly. They left about fifteen minutes ago.”
Balmer was beyond rational thinking by now. He pushed Sarda forward in front of the screen, gibbering almost incoherently. “I’ll explain why in a moment. . . . The money . . . He’ll recognize you. . . . Ask him if the funds went into your account.”
Still not understanding, his face darkening with suspicion, Sarda confronted the screen. “You know me, right? Were some funds paid into an account that I have with you?”
“Yes, I know you of course, Dr. Sarda. . . .” Now it was Walworth’s turn to be bewildered. “But if you’re with Dr. Balmer, why does he think . . .” Walworth shook his head, evidently deciding that it was beyond him, or else none of a respectable bank official’s business. “Anyway, yes, the funds were paid into your account here, and have been transferred onward in accordance with your further instructions. . . .”
20
Kieran stared distantly over the remains of the evening meal, while June attended to dishes in the kitchen area. There was no word in the English language that rhymed with “orange,” she had claimed. A few feet away, Teddy hunched on one of the breakfast-bar stools, eying Guinness as he lay sprawled on the edge of the living area, chin resting on paws.
“An Irishman green,
Can take the potheen,
But an Irishman orange,
Just falls to the flooranj-,
Ust doesn’t seem able,
To stay at the table.”
He looked triumphantly across. “Were we playing for forfeits?”
June shook her head despairingly. “Kieran, you’re impossible.”
“But surely it can’t come as a surprise. You know that my creative genius knows no bounds. In fact, I’m considering a project to popularize Shakespeare in the American South by translating it into redneck. I thought the first sample might be As Y’All Like It. What do you think?”
“I refuse to think anything. I’m putting it down to nonadaptation to the gravity and the air mixture here. It can affect some people strangely, you know . . .” she looked at him hesitantly, “except that for you, I suppose, it isn’t that strange.”
“Scoff if you will. You’ll regret it one day, when women are flocking around in a feeding frenzy after they put up a statue to me in Atlanta. Or maybe they’ll give my name to an expressway across Alabama and the Carolinas. Won’t you feel proud to have known me, then?”
“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather an airport?”
Kieran considered the suggestion gravely. “Well, okay . . . but I wouldn’t settle for less than international.”
Before June could reply, the room’s sound system chimed for an incoming call. She took it on the comset that she had placed nearby, listened for a few seconds, and then switched the call to the mural screen in the living area for Kieran to join in too. “It’s Leo and Elaine, from Phobos,” she informed him. “Donna got them places on a Triplanetary lifting out tonight. They’re just about to board.”
“Splendid!” Kieran got up and moved to the couch to be in the wall unit’s viewing angle. June joined him a moment later. The screen showed Sarda, minus mustache and with his hair trimmed and darkened, pointing a comset while he stood with Elaine, both wearing sunglasses-like imaging spectacles, reflected in one of the mirror panels provided in public places to afford two-way visual connection for handheld devices. Their old feelings had come back in a flood within hours of pulling off the stunt the day before. Kieran had urged them to get away from Lowell that same night, before any repercussions had a chance to catch up with them. They had been sitting out the day at the transfer terminal on Phobos while one of Kieran’s ubiquitous “friends in the business” juggled with reservations and pulled wires.
“Hey, Kieran, so we’re on our way,” Sarda greeted. “TP Sirius clipper, lifting out at three-ten local standard for the Ceres sector. After then . . .” he shrugged, grinned, and gripped Elaine’s hand, “who knows?”