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"We’re both starving, all right That food is going to taste da to eat since I can’t res, and you remember what a failure they were Pretty horrible, huh?"

"Pretty horrible"

"But from the smell, this stehatever you want to call it, it should be great You s down, so you er I’ll tell you, when they bring that stew around, it’s going to taste like a banquet"

"Like a banquet"

I looked at her "Why do you keep repeating everything I say?"

"Because I a to believe you, Evan, al to convinceout properly"

"Why not?"

"Because we both knohat is in that stew"

"Pork and la with pork and lamb and chicken, is there? Oh, oat, and ood as lamb if not better They call it chevon, which is a handy word if the thought of eating goat bothers you What the hell, different people eat different things all over the world" I was talking rapidly now, and ed a couple of decades ago "The Chinese eat dogs, did you know that? Young puppies are considered a great delicacy there They also eat ustibus and all that Goat, now-"

"Evan, you know I aoat"

"Er"

"I as you said in that stew, but I as"

"Uh"

"The parts that had been reoats"

" Plum, we have to eat" She made a face "I know, I know, but we have to eat We can’t let ourselves starve to death" She went ona face "Well, look at it another way I mean, how do you know you won’t like it? Remember the fuss you made about the dead antelope? Couldn’t stand the idea of eating it, you said It was dead erated, probably tee with bacteria, you said But once you tasted it-"

"Evan, please stop it"

"You can’t starve yourself"

"Hu theht and learn important truths"

"The ood for you"

"That is not true, Evan" She tossed her head "I a any of that"

"You could just pick out bits of vegetable-"

"I ary I ao to sleep before it is discovered that I am neither black nor a ht"

"About what?"

"When you told stown" All at once she threw her arms around my neck and sobbed

"Oh, I’m afraid," she said "I am truly afraid"

When she was asleep I slipped out of the hut and joined the crowd The feast was getting into gear noith the stew al to tank up on a hoourd of it I didn’t pass it back It smelled of moldy bread and spoiled fruit, but the taste wasn’t bad and the stuff had a reasonable kick to it It couldn’t coht before, which was probably just as well I refilled led with runting aht I looked like a short-haired white man who had stained his skin with roots and berries, but if they thought as h to keep it to thenorance of their language Every once in a while I would say "Banana Kropotkin Pulaski," a phrase I kept hearing others use, and I guess it was always appropriate, because no one took a swing at me