"I thought he was over his time limit already."

"The excursion was to be for fourteen days, but the situation is not considered critical until twenty days have passed."

"Well, you seem to have a problem on your hands, Mr. Romany," said Thaddeus. "Why not go home and think it over for another day?"

"Fifteen percent," said Mr. Romany suddenly.

Thaddeus laughed. "Get out of here, you fucking amateur!"

Mr. Romany left, and Thaddeus walked to the refrigerator again, pulled out a couple of slices of Swiss cheese, and tossed them to the leopards, who ignored them.

"Oh, well," he shrugged. "You can't please everyone."

"Thaddeus," I said, "what's going to happen?"

"Who knows?" he replied. "But it sure as hell is gonna be interesting, isn't it?"

Chapter 13

It started snowing very heavily about an hour after Mr. Romany left.

Thaddeus turned on the radio, found out that there were traveler's advisory warnings out and that many of the roads had been closed, and decided to shut down the carnival for the day. He sent Big Alvin and me around to post signs to that effect. It took us about twenty minutes, and when we were done we hurried back to the dormitory tent to warm up and have some of Queenie's coffee.

Thaddeus was sitting at a table with Mr. Ahasuerus, the astronomy book turned open to a photo of the Crab Nebula, listening intently to the blue man.

"This I recognize," Mr. Ahasuerus was saying, pointing to the photo. "But you must understand that your stellar configurations are completely different from those I am used to. In other words, I may be acquainted with many of these stars, but not in the positions where they appear to you."

Thaddeus pushed the book over to him. "Is there anything else you recognize?"

The blue man thumbed through the rest of the pages, staring at each one carefully. Finally he shook his head. "I am neither an astronomer nor a navigator," he said. "This one," he added, pointing toward a tiny spot on a huge picture, "could be Mr. Romany's home star. It's the right color, and it seems to be in the right star cluster. But of course I can't be sure."

"How did your company ever pick a loser like Romany in the first place?"

Mr. Ahasuerus shrugged. "We employ hundreds of thousands of beings. From what I know of him, his record has been exemplary."

"Yeah. Well, beware of Greeks bearing gifts and hotshot junior executives with exemplary records." Thaddeus paused for a minute to light a cigarette. "Tell me a little bit about your organization."

"We're a loosely knit community of worlds that have united for economic and cultural benefits," replied Mr. Ahasuerus. "We bear absolutely no resemblance to the quasi-military empires that your more imaginative entertainments envision."

"That's not what I meant. Tell me about the company you work for."

"What do you wish to know?"

"Who runs it? How big is it? What does it do?" He exhaled a stream of smoke and smiled. "I feel more at home talking about businesses than galactic civilizations."

"So do I," admitted Mr. Ahasuerus, flashing his teeth in what I supposed was his equivalent of a grin. "We are what you would call a conglomerate. We have branches on hundreds of worlds, and we deal in everything from manufacturing to real estate to space travel."

"How did you come to pose as a sideshow?"

"I told you. We attract less—"

"I know that," interrupted Thaddeus. "But that means you must have sideshows on your home planet."

"No," corrected the blue man, "but they are quite common on many of our community of worlds. Indeed, had they not been known to Earth, I am sure Mr. Romany would have recommended that we bypass the planet. After all, there are thousands of other worlds worthy of interest."

"Romany told me he was surgically altered."

"That's true. It is a complex and painful operation, though relatively brief."

"What did he look like originally?" asked Thaddeus.

"I have no idea."

"How did they know to make him look the way he does?"

"We tend not to visit worlds that do not transmit television signals," said Mr. Ahasuerus. "Does that answer your question?"

"I suppose so," replied Thaddeus. "What kind of currency do you use?"

"It varies from world to world."

"Doesn't that get pretty complicated after a while?"

"It is no more complicated within the community than dealing in dollars and pounds and yen is to the nations of your world. Of course, when we travel beyond the community, a certain amount of creative financing is required."

"What particular kind of creative financing did Romany indulge in to bankroll your carnival?" asked Thaddeus.

"I really couldn't say," answered the blue man.

"I'm beginning to get the impression that you could teach us one hell of a lot about bureaucracies." He turned to me. "Wouldn't the Rigger make one hell of an advance man?" he said with an amused laugh. "You could plunk him down penniless on any world in the galaxy with nothing but a deck of cards and a pair of dice, and he'd own half the planet by nightfall."

He pulled a flask out of his pocket and took a long swallow. A gust of wind whipped through the canvas a minute later, and I asked if I could have a sip.

He shrugged and handed it to me, and I took a small mouthful. It burned my lips, and stayed hot all the way down.

"What was it?" I gasped.

"What do you care? It'll keep you warm." He took the flask back and then, as an afterthought, offered it to Mr. Ahasuerus.

"No, thank you," said the blue man.

"Right," said Thaddeus. "It would probably kill you." He screwed the top on and put it back in his pocket. "What are the winters like where you come from? Do they ever get this cold?"

"From time to time," said Mr. Ahasuerus. "Though it has been many years since I was on my home planet."

"Don't you ever miss it?" I asked.

"Not with so many new worlds to see," he said. "Our friend the Rubber Man would have you believe that one world is pretty much like another, but he's wrong: each is unique and individual, and each is fascinating in its own way."

"Even this one?" asked Thaddeus.

"Of course," said the blue man.

"How long have you been on the road, so to speak?"

"Oh, perhaps twenty of your years."

"And you have no desire to return home?"

"I've seen home, Mr. Flint," said Mr. Ahasuerus. "These others"—he indicated the rest of the aliens—"are merely tourists and vacationers. I am a wanderer."

"You were a wanderer," Thaddeus corrected him.

"I will be again. Whatever agreement you make or do not make with Mr. Romany, you won't kill us."

"You're sure about that, are you?" asked Thaddeus.

"Yes," said the blue man. "First of all, it is in your best interest to keep us alive and working. And second," he added, looking straight into Thaddeus' eyes, "you're an exploiter, not a killer."

"You think not?"

"I think not."

Thaddeus shook his head. "I give a rubdown to the rainbow man and try to keep Dapper Dan alive, and all of a sudden you seem to think you're dealing with some kind of a pushover. Maybe I've been taking it a little too easy on you."