Stranger in a Strange Land

Jubal glanced again at the picture. “A type which, in my youth, we referred to as ‘stacked.’ Well, her sex is not in doubt, nor her agility. But why are you showing it to me? I’ve seen better, I assure you.”

“But what should I do with it? The letter is bad enough… but that disgusting picture—should I tear it up? Before Mike sees it?”

“Oh—Siddown, Nurse. What does it say on the envelope?”

“Nothing. Just the address and the return address.”

“How does the address read?”

“Huh? ‘Mr. Valentine Michael Smith, the Man from—”

“Oh. Then it’s not addressed to you.”

“Why, no, of course—”

“That’s all I wanted to be sure of. Now let’s get something straight. I am not Mike’s guardian. You are neither his mother nor his chaperon. I’ve simply co-opted you as his secretary. If Mike wants to read everything that comes in here addressed to him, including third class junk mail, he is free to do so.”

“Well, he does read almost all of those ads. But surely you don’t want him to see filth? Jubal, Mike doesn’t know what the world is like. He’s innocent.”

“So? How many men has he killed so far, Jill?”

Jill did not answer; she looked unhappy. Jubal went on: “If you want to help him, you will concentrate on teaching him that casual killing is frowned on in this society. Otherwise he is bound to be unpleasantly conspicuous when he goes out into the world.”

“Uh, I don’t think he wants to ‘go out into the world.’”

“Well, I’m damned well going to push him out of the nest as soon as I think he can fly. He can come back later, if he wishes—But I shan’t make it possible for him to live out his life here, as an arrested infant. For one thing, I can’t even if I wanted to… because Mike will probably outlive me by sixty or seventy years and this nest will be gone. But you are correct; Mike is innocent our standards. Nurse, have you ever seen that sterile laboratory at Notre Dame?”

“No. I’ve read about it.”

“Healthiest animals in the world but they can’t ever leave the laboratory. Child, I’m not running a sterile laboratory. Mike has got to get acquainted with ‘filth,’ as you call it—and get immunized to it. One day he’s going to meet the gal who wrote this letter, or her spiritual twin sister—in fact he’s going to meet her by the dozens and hundreds, shucks, with his notoriety and his looks he can spend his life skipping from one warm bed to another, if he likes. You can’t stop it, I can’t stop it; it’s up to Mike. Furthermore, I wouldn’t want to stop it, although for my taste it’s a silly way to spend one’s life—doing the same monotonous exercises over and over again, I mean—what do you think?”

“I—” Jill stopped and blushed.

“I withdraw the question. Maybe you don’t find them monotonous but none of my business, either way. But if you don’t want Mike’s feet kicked out from under him by the first five hundred women that get him alone and I don’t regard it as a good idea, either; he should have other interests as well—then don’t try to intercept his mail. Letters like that may vaccinate him a little… or at least tend to put him on guard. Don’t make a thing out of it; just pass it along in the stack, cum ‘filthy’ picture. Answer his questions if he asks them… and try not to blush.”

“Uh, all right. Boss, you’re infuriating when you’re logical.”

“Yes, a most uncouth way to argue. Now run along.”

“All right. But I’m going to tear up that picture after Mike has seen it.”

“Oh, don’t do that!”

“What? Do you want it, Boss?”

“Heaven forbid! I told you I had seen much better. But Duke is not as jaundiced as I am; he collects such pictures. If Mike doesn’t want it—and five-to-one he doesn’t give it to Duke—he’ll be delighted.”

“Duke collects such trash? But he seems such a nice person.”

“He is. A very nice person indeed. Or I’d kick him out.”

“But—I don’t understand it—”

Jubal sighed. “And I could sit here all day explaining it and you still wouldn’t understand it. My dear, there are aspects of sex on which it is impossible to communicate between the two sexes of our race. They are sometimes grokked by intuition across the gulf that separates us, by a few exceptionally gifted individuals. But words are useless, so I won’t try. Just take my word for it: Duke is a perfect knight, sans peur et sans reproche—and he would like to have that picture.”

“All right, he can have it if Mike doesn’t keep it. But I’ll just pass it along to you. I won’t give it to Duke myself—he might get ideas.”

“Sissy. You might enjoy his ideas—Anything startling in the mail otherwise?”

“No. The usual crop of people who want Mike to endorse this and that, or peddle ‘Official Man-from-Mars this’s and that’s’—one character had the nerve to ask for a five-year monopoly royalty free, on the name, but wants Mike to finance it as well.”

“I admire that sort of whole-hearted thief. Encourage him. Tell him that Mike is so rich that he makes crepes suzettes with Napoleon brandy and needs some tax losses—so how much guarantee would he like?”