I thought I had better get busy on this myself. It would look good when I next saw Bury. "I'll give you a hand," I said.

"You sure will," said Teenie. "In fact, you're the research staff. Who the hell else knows big words like 'exilated'?"

The next name Teenie chose was Spartacus. The man was a Roman gladiator who had headed up a revolt of slaves and had come within an ace of putting down the whole empire. She decided that there was not enough about him in the encyclopedia and that we had better go to Rome. It said that at the end of the revolt they had crucified six thousand surviving slaves all along the Appian Way.

She called the captain. "Bittie," she said, "how about sailing along this Appian Way so we can look at the bodies."

Captain Bitts smiled. "The Appian Way was a truck route. If you want to go to Rome, we have to stop at its port, Civitavecchia, which is just down the coast from here. It's quite a ways from the city but there's trams and things."

"They don't give Spartacus's address," said Teenie. "But maybe this guy, Crassus, that licked him, is still around. Do they have city directories in Rome where..."

"Teenie," I said, "Spartacus, it says here, died in 71 B. C. That's two thousand years ago. More. And it only mentions Crassus once. You're dealing with ancient history."

"Oh, (bleep)," said Teenie. "The way people move around, you can't keep track of anybody. I tried to locate an aunt in Chicago once and (bleep) if she hadn't moved five times. I wouldn't have run her down at all if I hadn't seen in the papers they'd just put her in the city jail."

She looked at the globe, did some tracings with her finger and then said, "All right. We'll go to Civitawhatchacallit and take it from there."

"We'll be alongside at dawn," said Bitts. "We're cleared into Italy and all we have to do is sail. So I'll up anchor and away. Have a good night's sleep. When you get a look at Rome traffic, you'll need it!"

Well, I didn't get a good night's sleep. You would have thought all that walking would have tired Teenie out. But after two pieces of hashish candy and other things, I was giggling and doing other things until past midnight.

True to his promise, when I awoke, Captain Bitts had us tied up alongside a dock in Civitavecchia. It was early. The steward had left a port open the night before and it was the din that had awakened me. I looked out. I had a vista of the dock, a forest of cargo booms and funnels and a locomotive stopped nearby which just then gave another blast on its whistle and almost caved in my eardrums. The Italians are an industrious people and especially when it conies to making noise.

I was about to draw back when a flash of color caught my eye. It was Teenie in some scarlet running shorts and a bikini bra. She was at a peddler's stand looking at guidebooks. She was apparently having an argument against his efforts to sell her lottery tickets.

Once more I was about to draw back when I saw a shadowy figure beyond Teenie. A hand reached out and seized her arm.

The black-jowled man!

There he was in his three-piece suit!

He glanced toward the ship and then he yanked Teenie into the dimness behind the booth. They seemed to be having an argument. He had his face very close to Teenie's and he was scowling as he talked.

Then she said something.

He looked at her. And then he did an astonishing thing! He went down on his knees and raised his hands in supplication.

She kept shaking her head. Then she raised a finger in admonishment. He looked at the ground under his knees in dejection.

Teenie kept on talking. Then she started to walk away.

The black-jowled man grabbed at her wrist. She stopped. She spoke.

He looked at the ground again and then he nodded slowly.

She walked back to the ship. The black-jowled man got up, staring after her. He dusted off his knees.

Teenie yelled something to the port gangway sentry who yelled something up to the deck. Then one of our own sailors appeared and Teenie yelled something at him.

She turned and went back to the black-jowled man and they went off down the dock and out of sight.

At breakfast, I was astonished to find Madison. I should have thought he would be off to Rome. I said so.

"Oh, Teenie has gone there," said Madison. "She left word that she might be absent a day or two. I don't think she'll find much about Spartacus in Rome anyway. He was defeated way to the south, in Lucania, when he was attempting to cross to Sicily. Besides, I've got to get my notes together on Napoleon. What a man. He did such a thorough job, France has never amounted to a hill of beans since. Just a little foreign runt, too. What a PR triumph!"

We saw nothing of Teenie for two days. She came back in a small truck. It was stacked with glittering trunks and luggage. She bounded up the gangway in a silver sequin hunting outfit topped with a plumed hat.

I was on the deck and she bounced up to me. "Look at my silver boots!" she said, lifting one sideways so I could see it better. "Ain't they the screaming most?"

"Teenie, what on Earth is in all those trunks and bags?"

"Oh, them," she said, glancing down where the crew was bringing them aboard. "They're mostly empty. I didn't have anything to put my stuff in. A couple are full, though. That's what delayed me: The (bleeped) modiste didn't have a single model the same size I was and I had to stand around getting measured and measured and fitted and fitted. And she kept putting big hems in, saying how I'd grow. Well, maybe I will. Man, do they have great food in them deluxe hotels! I thought all wops ate was spaghetti and I haven't even seen a strand of it! The greatest chow you ever chomped. Am I in time for supper? Boy, am I starved!" She started to rush off. Then she halted. "Those black grips are yours. You didn't have any luggage either." She rushed off.

She appeared at dinner in a black silk evening gown, obviously created by one of Rome's finest couturiers, the effect spoiled somewhat by the rubber band on her ponytail.

"What about Spartacus?" said Madison.

"Who? Oh, yes. Spartacus," said Teenie. "Well, it seems we have to go to Naples to find out."

So I told the captain to sail for Naples, but Teenie didn't seem to have her mind on outlaws. She came into my bed salon in a negligee of absolutely transparent sea green, put a new phonograph down in the middle of the rug and sat before it.

"This is the greatest gadget, Inky," she said. "It runs on batteries and it plays a record upside down or ver­tical or any way at all with a laser beam. No chance for a roll to slide a needle out of a groove. And now I can play my records without a single scratch."

It had two detachable speakers she set up some way apart. "I got some yowley new singles, too. Just wait until you hear this one!"

She turned it on full volume. The drums pounded. The guitars yelled. The bass boomed. A tenor and a chorus sang:

I'm sneaking up on you.

I'm going to get you, you, you.

You're going to get yourself in my dutches!

Look at these daws, claws, daws!

Yay, yay, the trap is set, set, set!

So stick in your foot, foot, foot!

So stick in your neck, neck, neck!

Stick, stick, stick in, stick in, stick in

Your naked neck in, neck in, neck in!

So stick in all of you! You! You! Woohooo!

Oh, I'm going to get you, you, you!

I'm sneaking, I'm sneaking, I'm sneaking

Up on yooooooooooooooooonuunuunuunuu!

WATCH OUT!

The last part of the song almost made me jump out of my skin.

"Ain't it flowy?" said Teenie with dreamy eyes.

"It's terrible," I said. "It doesn't even rhyme."