The man said, "Would there be any offense if we did that?"
"It would be your choice, and the jewelry of your making. There could be no offense to take. But I am being rude. This is my friend Hallownight. He has been explaining the museum to me."
Doc shook hands with the father.
The woman said to her husband, "I was thinking-what about that piece of rock crystal your grandmother brought with her from Greece? We wouldn't need to use it all, just have a few pieces cut."
The man looked thoughtful, then smiled broadly. "Just the thing." He held out his hand to Cloudhunter again. "That's a wonderful idea. Thank you so much."
"I am glad that it pleased you."
The family moved on. Cloudhunter watched them go, then said quietly to Doc, "The girl will have a brother, the summer of next year."
"You know that?"
"I believe the parents do as well. Are human children troubled by their brothers and sisters?"
"Sometimes. They get upset that their folks seem to like the new baby better."
"Is that true?" Cloud asked. The question was perfectly innocent-as a child would ask it, with no prior knowledge.
"I suppose it is sometimes. I don't have any brothers or sisters."
Cloud was silent. Somehow his silence seemed to echo in the long hall.
Doc said, "I mean… I had a little sister, but she died when we were both small."
"Oh," Cloudhunter said. "I am very sorry." He looked in the direction the family had gone. "Their fear is, I think, of some old pain, some loss they fear to come again."
Doc considered this. Cloudhunter had used the Touch, of course, but it was apparent he was also interpreting what the magic had shown him. Maybe guessing as well. He wondered how Cloud had known he was lying-well, not telling all the truth — about his sister.
For the first time since he had crossed into Shadow. Doe fell a desire for magic, a Touch of his own. To be able CO read a patient's history from the bones and flesh themselves, know without being told where the worst pain was… He glanced at Cloudhunter, who was examining an eagle-headed totem pole and showed no sign of hearing Doc's thought.
How did the Touch show itself?
This wasn't the time to ask. Stagger Lee had said that elves lived their whole lives with magic: there was no reason to suppose Cloudhunter knew what it was like for humans. And there were halls and halls left to explore, a whole world inside walls.
I hirty-five points," Stagger Lee said, examining Doc's cards. "Good thing for you we're not playing Hollywood."
Doc nodded and took a long swallow of beer. They were playing in his apartment, to kill a slow afternoon. He was down a substantial number of points-gin rummy didn't seem to be his game- but he couldn't remember how much they'd agreed the points were worth. "Sure you wouldn't rather play poker?"
"What can you do in poker for two? 'Here's your cards. Yup, that pair wins. Next deal.' Now, two players left out of a table full, that's interesting." He scooped up the cards and began shuffling. "Hey, it's not that long till Monday."
"Yeah. Another beer?"
"Much obliged."
Doc refilled Stagger Lee's glass from the keg. As he set the beer on the table, Stagger fanned and interleaved the cards in an elaborate shuffle, and said, "Last Deal still bothers you, doesn't it?"
Doc sat down slowly. "You've got a right to do what you want with yourself."
"Cool. Now say that again like you believe it."
"Look, have I ever said a word to you about it? To anybody?"
"No," Stagger said seriously, "and I appreciate that. But you act like the word's stuck right there north of your xiphoid, and a good Heimlich would pop it right out. More to the point, about half an hour before Last Deal, the fun content of poker seems to take a serious drop for you.
"It's poker. It's not about fun."
"Nice sidestep."
"I… just don't think I get the idea of never knowing who you're going to sleep with."
"We always know who. There aren't any strangers at Flats's place. Which is the question." He took a long swallow of his beer. "Don't be offended, but a big reason I didn't warn you about it the first time you were there is that you were a stranger, and you wouldn't have been allowed in anyway."
"Stagger, what's this about?"
"Oh, well, the game wasn't going anywhere, cards made me think of Monday night, one thing led to another. I also thought it was about time to make sure of the situation. I take it you haven't just been politely waiting for an invitation to join the game?"
"No."
"Fair enough. The other thing that you might as well know is that, on any given night, as many of those couples are going to spend the evening listening to Dave Brubeck, cooking an elaborate late dinner, reading comics, or whatever as end up playing sixty-nine pickup. Don't get me wrong: much as I like Brubeck, I am nonetheless bisexual as I ever was."
Stagger finished his shuffling. "Now, if you won't misunderstand, how about I teach you honeymoon bridge?" l#oc and Ginny went to the Laughs show the following Friday. The films had an odd, flat, gray quality, with black halos around any bright light; Stagger Lee explained that they were "kinescopes," films made from early television.
The shows had little comedy sketches, musical numbers, blackout jokes that lasted only seconds. Some of the longer playlets had no characters at all, just kitchen utensils or office machines moving to music; not really funny, past the first surprise, but oddly engrossing, watching the machinery dance.
The artist's name was Ernie Kovacs. During an intermission. Stagger said, "If you'd seen a lot of television, this probably wouldn't look like much to you."
Ginny said, "Why?"
"Because ten years later, twenty, thirtv, the rest of television started to catch up to Kovacs's ideas. Do you remember what he said in the third program, about 'the first rule of television is, if something works, beat it to death'? Forty years after he said that, thirty after he died, TV was still following that law" Stagger looked past them, into an unseen distance. "If television is ever allowed to function again, I think we could reconstruct everything good about it from Ernie."
Doc said, joking, "Is the world ready for that?"
"No," Stagger said seriously. "The world is never ready for anything until it's too late. By which time something else has arrived."
They watched a sketch of people getting ready for something special, a party or a night out. There was no dialogue, just music, as the men in one apartment and the women in another showered, shaved, made up, dressed (Doc found himself staring hard at the technique of the garter strap in closeup). This tie wouldn't knot; that stocking was torn. The music was driving toward something, some tension that would have to be released.
A doorbell rang; the women dashed to answer it. Then, abruptly, Doc knew. There were three women in the apartment. There were two men at the door.
Two left with two, and the third woman, her hair and dress perfect, turned away. The camera was looking down on her from above, above the walls of the apartment. Doc did not think anyone in the theater was breathing, all waiting for a doorbell, a telephone. The woman wandered from one room to the other, small in the depths of the shot.
The walls of the apartment collapsed outward, the break of the chambered heart. The music crashed to a stop.
He found Ginny's arm, wrapped his fingers around it.