thank us for not charging you for the extra poundage.”
“Well!” Her tail swatted the stallion across the snout as
she turned and flounced away to collect her luggage.
Only the fact that his mate restrained him kept him from
taking a bite out of that fluffy appendage.
“Watch your temper, Dreal,” she told him. “It doesn’t
do to bite the paying freight. Rotten public relations.”
“Bet all her relations have been public,” he snorted,
pawing the ground impatiently. “What’s slowing up those
striped rats back there? I need a rubdown and some sweet
alfalfa.”
“I know you do, dear,” she said as she nuzzled his
neck, “but you have to try and maintain a professional
-attitude, if only for the sake of the business.”
“Yeah, I know,” Jon-Tom overheard as he made his
way toward the depot. “It’s only that there are times when
I think maybe we’d have been better off if we’d bought
ourselves a little farm somewhere out in the country and
20
Alan Dean Foster
THE DAY OF THE DISSOKAWCE
21
hired some housemice and maybe a human or two to do
the dirty work.”
He was the only one in the office. The fox and the other
passengers already had destinations in mind.
“Can I help you?” asked the elderly marten seated
behind the low desk. With his long torso and short waist,
the clerk reminded Jon-Tom of Mudge. The marten was
slimmer still, and instead of Mudge’s jaunty cap and bright
vest and pantaloons he wore dark shorts and a sleeveless
white shirt, a visor to shade his eyes, and bifocals.
“I’m a stranger in town.”
“I suspect you’re a stranger everywhere,” said the