Eloise

He looked on as she handed Dumarest a goblet of wine. Tonight she wore diaphanous veils, her feet bare, ankles adorned with bands holding tiny bells. More bands graced her wrists, small sounds tinkling as she moved. Her hair was loose, a rippling waterfall which caught the light and reflected it as if it had been oil. Her breasts, half-bared, were dusted with motes of gold.

Dumarest noticed his attention.

He said, quietly, "Your friend is jealous. You should not ignore him."

"Adara?" She smiled, white teeth flashing between scarlet lips. "He's a friend."

A friend and more, a lover certainly; and such a man could be dangerous. Dumarest examined him from behind the cover of his wine. A body which was too soft, a face too worn. A man old before his time, lines creasing his cheeks; his eyes shadowed by sleepless rest, haunted. He drank too deep and too often, like a man seeking an anodyne for an inner pain.

Drink enough and heated emotions would suggest an answer to his problem.

"Forget him, Earl. Drink your wine. Arbush, give us a tune."

The minstrel grinned and slapped the rump of one of his attendant girls.

"My instrument, girl. Hurry!"

The air throbbed as he touched the strings, musing with the skill of long practice, building anticipation as he strummed a succession of chords.

"What shall it be? A love song? No, we have too much love. A wistful air of a young girl betrayed by her lover? No, here that particular type of hell does not exist. One of unrequited passion, perhaps? Of adventure? Of bold men venturing into the spaces between the stars?" The strumming grew deep, strong; the pulse of an engine, the empty gulfs, a beat like that of a pounding heart.

"No." Eloise stood in the center of the room; the others pressed back against the wall, some sitting, others squatted on the carpet. Ten of them; those whom Dumarest had met, friends of Adara and the woman, Arbush's girls.

"Follow me, minstrel." Lifting her arms her fingers began to touch; thin, high ringings coming from the tiny cymbals she had slipped on her fingers and thumbs. "We are in a tavern," she whispered. "A hot and smoky place, heavy with the scent of wine. You know such places and know what is played there. Play, minstrel. Play as I dance."

The thrumming of the strings settled, became a repetitious background against which the tap of whispering drums echoed; chords rising to match the swaying undulations of the woman, accompanying the thin ringings of the cymbals, the bells at wrists and ankles.

It was a dance as old as time, performed with consummate skill; flesh and bone moving in suggestive abandon, naked feet with crimson nails caressing the carpet, the waterfall of hair a shimmering cloud of erotic beauty.

The lights seemed to fade, the walls to fall away, the watchers to turn into a circle of watching eyes, hands moving, fingers tapping as they followed the rhythm; bodies responding to the invitation explicit in every gesture, the thrust and sway of hips, waist, breasts, thighs. So women had danced in primordial times, offering themselves to a surrogate of the Earth God; a ritual designed to make the ground fertile, the harvest good. Now aimed at one man alone.

Adara sensed it and gulped down his wine. Arbush knew it and smiled as his spatulate fingers danced over the strings; the tips hitting the sounding board, returning to alter the note, moving with a fluid grace. Dumarest felt it and wondered what lay behind the bribe, the offer of her flesh.

She wanted something-that had been obvious from the beginning. She had met him too often by apparent chance for it to have been an accident. And there had been hints, barely concealed; suggestions half made, as if she were waiting for him to discover something.

The dance ended and she came to sit on the floor at his feet. Arbush began to play again, this time accompanying himself with a song; a ballad more fitted to a spaceman's dive than to any decent company, but no one seemed to find it offensive. The girls who had accompanied him danced in turn; neat, precise little movements, smooth enough but awkward when compared to the previous display.

"We need more wine," Eloise decided. "Adara, order more wine."

He rose to his feet and came towards her and Dumarest saw that, despite what he had drunk, he was coldly sober.

"Eloise, is that wise? Already you have had more than enough."

"Are you telling me what to do?" He winced at the coldness of her voice.

"No, but-"

"Then order it! Damn you, order it or do I have to do it myself?"

"Eloise, you're mad. Ever since Earl came, you've been acting strange. Don't you realize what you're doing?"

"I'm living!" she flared. "Don't you understand? Living! For the first time in years I've met a real man, and to hell with you and everything else. Get me some more wine!"