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THE crowd pouring down the corridor squeezed out of Phil his wincing recollection of Mitzie&039;s last crack He slithered his way along the wall, rubbed by shoulder and hip, trodden by heel and toe, set coughing by gray-blue clouds of tobacco, weed, and so-called Venus weed, and regaled by such remarks as, "Aaha, he could of thrown her any time he wanted to," and "What I don&039;t like are those dued his way into an eddy of the crowd near a side corridor He unhopefully gasped, "Juno Jones" Old Rubberarht in, Mack," and narrowly arched his gray ar his slaty length against a general surge of the crowd and whipping back the tentacle-end of his arent in broith tennis-ball eyes who tried to duck in after Phil
Phil wiped his forehead and took a deep breath He felt a little giddy standing just by himself A woressive dowdiness: shapeless long frock, button shoes, wide briloves She looked like somebody&039;s scrubwoman from past times out on a half-holiday He didn&039;t realize who it was until the crowd behind hian to cheer and to chant, "Juno! Juno!"
She waved to thelad to see you," she said, grabbing his elbow Then she whispered, "Don&039;t ask questions Co hi of the crowd became disappointed and a bit sore A shrill voice skirled over it: "Whatcha goin&039; off with the little shrimp for?"
Juno turned around and stood solid "Listen, you s," she bellowed, and the croas silent while a telephoto spot glowed blindingly "I know I&039;otta have a love life! And don&039;t you be insulting it!"
As the crowd yelped with laughter and started cheering again, Juno pushed Phil through a door "I hope you didn&039;tthat," she told hiotta humor &039;em"
Phil shook his head a bit dazedly He had expected her to stop as soon as they got out of sight of the crowd, but instead she was hurrying hian anxiously
"Phil," he told her "Phil Gish"
"Well, look, Phil, could I take you to dinner?"
"Sure," Phil said
"Good," she said with relief Nevertheless she kept peering about, almost apprehensively, and didn&039;t slacken their pace "I know a good steak place Quiet and they really kno to broil rabbit" They reached a narrow, shadowy stairway Juno steered him toward it He started up, but she jerked hiosh sake," she warned hi and the wasps This place I&039; you about is on the bottom level" And she started down "We could take an elevator," she said apologetically, "but this is better," adding gruffly, "more private"
At the botto dark roo the other With its browned chrome finishes it had to date back to 1960 The custoory There was an elevator door next to the one they&039;d co hand at a couple of people and shouted to soes What&039;ll you have, Phil?"
He realized he hadn&039;t eaten since yesterday and lass of soybean milk She looked at him, but passed on his order without a comment, then took his, but she didn&039;t spend much time on them and seemed relieved when she&039;d plunked Phil down in the booth nearest the front door, where the ruhts, low, flashed on the scratched and dusty glastic But there were, for a wonder, no jukeboxes or radios of any sort in the place He also saw that the pushbuttons on the ere labeled for out of date synthetic foods and had taped over then that must have been twenty years old itself
He studied his companion across the table and realized for the first tian to trace on her large jaw the outlines of a recent bruise that was only partly concealed by hastily applied irl&039;s flusteredness and started to dab at her jaith a powder-puff, but then gave up, put back the puff and slumped forward, her meaty elbows on the plastic
"Don&039;t ever let &039;eluht"
"You won?" Phil inquired
"Oh, sure Two falls, a spaceship spin and a free-fall - that means when you throw &039;em up and out and they don&039;t co the bar Juno went over and got it before Phil realized that it was for them From the speed hich the order had been filled, he decided they still had radionic cooking in the place Juno&039;s seared rabbit chops were as big as small steaks - it must have been an octoploid bunny, at the least - while her whiskey was intie and brown He nibbled his yeast sandwich and found it seeh it always made him a bit uneasy to eat restaurant food that didn&039;t pop out of a wall
As Juno munched her chops and drank her whiskey, she told Phil snatches of the story of her life It turned out she was a far and suffered the usual disillusionet ahead these days," she asked Phil, "especially a duure, but even then I was too big and strong I scared the men I knew and I didn&039;t know then the ones ould have liked what I had So I tried scrubfor a while - you know, birthing babies for wealthy dames who didn&039;t want to carry them the nine months themselves - but I knew there was no future in that Ten years or so and I&039;d be sweeping up after so to make throay paper dresses last a month So I remembered how I could pin nine out of ten boys back ho contests and pretty soon they were groo me for a pro" She shook her head dourly "You should have seen ure; it really was beautiful before they puthands, still white gloved though now gravy stained "Even used pituitrin on ed By now she had reduced her chops to bones and orking on her second whiskey "So that&039;s the way it was, Phil Of course, I had to go and fall in love with a wrestler and irls in the business make that mistake - but at least I eat rabbit, even beef, and a lot of dopes respect erly "You&039;ve ?" she asked "Five years and I&039;ll be through, ten at the outside if I get to be a character" She shook her head and leaned forward "Actually it&039;s much worse than that Male-fe to crack down"
"They always say that," Phil reassured her with tied fatalistically "This ti like that tonight," Phil said, "but he sounded drunk"
She shrugged
"But Fun Incorporated is supposed to have all sorts of connections with the government," Phil continued to object
She sht The best connections any syndicate ever had Just the same, they&039;re finished Moe&039;s been worried for weeks, worried bad I can tell"
"Moe?"
"Moe Brimstine You saw hietting a vivid , dark jowled hulk, and then went on with a little laugh, "You know, it startled me when his voice was the same as Old Rubberarm&039;s He seemed too important a man to be a door-tender"
"I&039;ll say he is!" she exclai to her voice for a moment "You didn&039;t actually think, Phil, did you, that he spent his ti-rubber dingus? And would I be calling him a dumb robot? He just used his own voice to record Old Rubberars like that" She lifted her heavy eyebrows "Don&039;t you knoho Moe Brimstine is?"
Phil shook his head
"Where you been all your life? &039;Scuse me, Phil, but Moe Briht next to Mr Billig hinize the second na "Well, anyway, Phil," she said in her friendly, quiet voice, "there&039;s Moe Brimstine, practically the boss of Fun Incorporated, which runs wrestling and amusement centers, all sales-robots, jukebox burlesque, and a lot of other things they don&039;t talk so much about And he&039;s worried, real worried Now I know Moe He don&039;t worry about nothing but the syndicate So things must be real bad" She paused, then added cryptically, but with a sort of personal gloos are real bad"
Phil nodded There was a silence
"Say, Phil," she finally said huskily, watching her big, gravy stained finger rub her near elass "That really was a - whadya call it? - delusion, wasn&039;t it, this afternoon when you was talking about a green cat?"