AS THE DOOR OF THEIR SUITE closed itself behind Patricia Paiwonski, Jillsaid, .What now, Mike?“.We’re leaving. Jill, you’ve read some abnormal psychology.“.Yes, of course. In training. Not as much as you have, I know.“.Do you know the symbolism of tattooing? And snakes?“.Of course. I knew that about Patty as soon as I met her. I had been hopingthat you would find a way.“.I couldn’t, until we were water brothers. Sex is necessary, sex is a helpfulgoodness-but only if it is sharing and growing closer. I grok that if I did itwithout growing closer-well, I’m not sure.“.I grok that you would learn that you couldn’t, Mike. That is one of thereasons-one of the many reasons-I love you.“He looked worried. .I still don’t grok .love.’ Jill, I don’t grok .people.’ Not evenyou. But I didn’t want to send Pat away.“.Stop her. Keep her with us.“(.Waiting is, Jill.“)(.I know.“)He added aloud, .Besides, I doubt if I could give her all she needs. Shewants to give herself all the time, to everybody. Even her Happinessmeetings and her snakes and the marks aren’t enough for Pat. She wants tooffer herself on an altar to everybody in the world, always-and make themhappy. This New Revelation . . . I grok that it is a lot of other things to otherpeople. But that is what it is to Pat.“.Yes, Mike. Dear Mike.“.Time to leave. Pick the dress you want to wear and get your purse. I’lldispose of the rest of the trash.“Jill thought somewhat sadly that she would like, sometimes, to take along justone or two things. But Mike always moved on with just the clothes on hisback-and seemed to grok that she preferred it that way, too. .I’ll wear thatpretty blue one.“It floated out to her, poised itself over her, wriggled down onto her as sheheld up her hands; the zipper closed. Shoes to suit it walked toward her,waited while she stepped into them. .I’m ready, Mike.“Mike had caught the wistful flavor of her thought, but not the concept; it wastoo alien to Martian ideas. .Jill? Do you want to stop and get married?“She thought about it. .We couldn’t, today, Mike. It’s Sunday. We couldn’tget a license.“.Tomorrow, then. I will remember. I grok that you would like it.“She thought about it. .No, Mike.“.Why not, Jill?“.Two reasons. One, we couldn’t be any closer through it, because we alreadyshare water. That’s logic, both in English and in Martian. Yes?“.Yes.“.And two, a reason valid just in English. I wouldn’t have Dorcas and Anneand Miriam-and Patty-think that I was trying to crowd them out and one ofthem might think so.“.No, Jill, none of them would think so.“.Well, I won’t chance it, because I don’t need it. Because you married me in ahospital room ages and ages ago. Just because you were the way you are.
Before I even guessed it.“ She hesitated. .But there is something you mightdo for me.“.What, Jill?“.Well, you might call me pet names occasionally! The way I do you.“.Yes, Jill. What pet names?“.Oh!“ She kissed him quickly. .Mike, you’re the sweetest, most lovable manI’ve ever met-and the most infuriating creature on two planets! Don’t botherwith pet names. Just call me .little brother’ occasionally...it makes me go allquivery inside.“.Yes, Little Brother.“.Oh, my! Now get decent fast and let’s get out of here-before I take you backto bed. Come on. Meet me at the desk; I’ll be paying the bill.“ She left verysuddenly.
They went to the town’s station flat and caught the first Greyhound goinganywhere. A week or two later they stopped at home, shared water for acouple of days, left again without saying good-by—or, rather, Mike did not;saying good-by was one human custom Mike stubbornly resisted and neverused with his own. He used it formally with strangers under circumstances inwhich Jill required him to.
Shortly they were in Las Vegas, stopping in an unfashionable hotel near butnot on the Strip. Mike tried all the games in all the casinos while Jill filled inthe time as a show girl-gambling bored her. Since she couldn’t sing or danceand had no act, standing or parading slowly in a tall improbable hat, a smile,and a scrap of tinsel was the job best suited to her in the Babylon of theWest. She preferred to work if Mike was busy and, somehow, Mike couldalways get her the job she picked out. Since the casinos never closed, Mikewas busy almost all their time in Las Vegas.
Mike was careful not to win too much in any one casino, keeping to limits Jillset for him. After he had milked each one for a few thousand he carefully putit all back, never letting himself be the big-money player at any game,whether winning or losing. Then he took a job as a croupier, studying people,trying to grok why they gambled. He grokked unclearly a drive in many of thegamblers that seemed to be intensely sexual in nature-but he seemed to grokwrongness in this. He kept the job quite a while, letting always the little ballroll without interference.
Jill was amused to discover that the customers in the palatial theaterrestaurant where she worked were just marks . . . marks with more moneybut still marks. She discovered something about herself, too; she enjoyeddisplaying herself, as long as she was safe from hands that she did not wantto grab her. With her steadily increasing Martian honesty she examined thisnewly uncovered facet in herself. In the past, while she had known that sheenjoyed being admired, she had sincerely believed that she wanted it onlyfrom a select few and usually only from one-she had been irked at thediscovery, now long past, that the sight of her physical being really didn’tmean anything to Mike even though he had been and remained asaggressively and tenderly devoted to her physically as a woman could dreamof-il he wasn’t preoccupied.
And he was even generous about that, she reminded herself. If she wished,he would always let her call him out of his deepest withdrawal trances, shiftgears without complaint and be smiling and eager and loving.
Nevertheless, there it was-one of his strangenesses, like his inability tolaugh. Jill decided, after her initiation as a show girl, that she enjoyed beingvisually admired because that was the one thing Mike did not give her.
But her own perfecting self-honesty and steadily growing empathy did notallow that theory to stand. The male half of the audience always had that tobe-expected high percentage who were too old, too fat, too bald, and ingeneral too far gone along the sad road of entropy to be likely to be attractiveto a female of Jill’s youth, beauty, and fastidiousness-she had always beenscornful of .lecherous old wolves“-althOugh not of old men per se, shereminded herself in her own defense; Jubal could look at her, even use crudelanguage in deliberate indecencies, and not give her the slightest feeling thathe was anxious to get her alone and grope her. She was so serenely sure ofJubal’s love for her and its truly spiritual nature that she told herself that shecould easily share a bed with him, go right to sieep-and be sure that be wouldalso, with only the goodnight peck she always gave him.
But now she found that these unattractive males did not set her teeth onedge. When she felt their admiring stares or even their outright lust- and shefound that she did feel it, could even identify the source-she did not resent it;it warmed her and made her feel smugly pleased.
.Exhibitionism“ had been to her simply a word used in abnormal psychologyaneurotic weakness she had held in contempt. Now, in digging out her ownand looking at it, she decided that either this form of narcissism was normal,or she was abnormal and had not known it. But she didn’t feel abnormal; shefelt healthy and happy-healthier than she had ever been. She had beenalways of better than average health-nurses need to be-but she hadn’t had asniffle nor even an upset stomach in she couldn’t remember when . . . why,she thought wonderingly, not even cramps.
Okay, she was healthy-and if a healthy woman liked to be looked at-and notas a side of beefi-then it follows as the night from day that healthy menshould like to look at them, else there was just no darn sense to itl At whichpoint she finally understood, intellectually, Duke and his pictures . . . andbegged his pardon in her mind.
She discussed it with Mike, tried to explain her changed viewpoint- not easy,since Mike could not understand why Jill had ever minded being looked at, atany time, by anyone. Not wishing to be touched he understood; Mike avoidedshaking hands if he could do so without offense, he wanted to touch and betouched only by water brothers (Jill wasn’t sure just how far this includedmale water brothers in Mike’s mind; she had explained homosexuality tOhim, after he had read about it and failed to grok it-and had given himpractical rules for avoiding even the appearance thereof and how to keepsuch passes from being made at him, since she assumed correctly that Mike,pretty as he was, would attract such passes. He had followed her advice andhad set about making his face more masculine, instead of the androgynousbeauty he had first had. Nevertheless Jill was not sure that Mike would refusesuch an invitation from, say, Duke-but fortunately Mike’s male water brotherswere all decidedly masculine men, just as his others were very femalewomen. Jill hoped that it would stay that way; she suspected that Mike wouldgrok a .wrongness“ in the poor in-betweeners anyhow-they would never beoffered water.)Nor could Mike understand why it now pleased her to be stared at. The onlytime when their two attitudes had been even roughly similar had been as theyleft the carnival, when Jill had discovered that she had become indifferent tostares-willing to do their act .stark naked,“ as she had told Patty, if it wouldhelp.
Jill saw that her present self-knowledge had been nascent at that point; shehad never been truly indifferent to masculine stares. Under the uniquenecessities of adjusting to life with the Man from Mars she had been forced toshuck off part of her artificial, training-imposed persona, that degree ofladylike prissiness a nurse can retain despite the rigors of an unusually nononsenseprofession. But Jill hadn’t known that she had any prissiness tolose until she lost it.
Of course, Jill was even more of a .lady“ than ever-but she preferred to thinkof herself as a .gent.“ But she was no longer able to conceal from herconscious mind (nor had any wish to) that there was something inside her ashappily shameless as a tabby in heat going into her belly dance for theenticement of the neighborhood toms.
She tried to explain all this to Mike, giving him her theory of thecomplementary and functional nature of narcissist display and voyeurism,with herself and Duke as clinical examples. .The truth is, Mike, that I find I geta real kick out of having all those men stare at me . . . lots of men and almostany man. So now I grok why Duke likes to have lots of pictures of women,the sexier the better. Same thing, only in reverse. It doesn’t mean that I wantto go to bed with them, any more than Duke wants to go to bed with aphotograph-ShUcks~ dearest, I don’t even want to say hello to them. Butwhen they look at me and tell me-think at me-that I’m desirable, it gives me atingle, a warm pleasant feeling right in my middle.“ She frowned slightly. .Youknow, I think I ought to get a real naughty picture taken of me and send it toDuke. Just to tell him that I’m sorry I snooted him and failed to grok what Ithought was a weakness in him, If it’s a weakness, I’ve got it, too-but girlstyle. If it is a weakness- But I grok it isn’t.“.All right. We’ll find a photographer in the morning.“She shook her head. .I’ll simply apologize to Duke the next time we go home,I wouldn’t actually send such a picture to Duke. He has never made a pass atme-and I don’t want him getting ideas.“.Jill, you would not want Duke?“She heard an echo of .water brother“ in his mind. .11mm truthfully I’ve neverreally thought about it. I guess I’ve been .being faithful’ to you-not that it hasbeen an effort. But I grok you speak rightly; I wouldn’t turn Duke down-and Iwould enjoy it, too. What do you think of that darling?“.I grok a goodness,“ Mike said seriously.
.Hmm ... my gallant Martian, there are times when we human femalesappreciate at least a semblance of jealousy-but I don’t think there is theslightest chance that you will ever grok .jealousy.’ Darling, what would yougrok if one of those marks-those men in the audience, not a water brothermadea pass at me?“Mike barely smiled. .I grok he would be missing.“.Mmm ... I grok he might be, too. But, Mike-listen to me carefully, dear. Youpromised me that you wouldn’t do anything of that sort except in utteremergency. So don’t be hasty. If you hear me scream and shout, and reachinto my mind and know that I’m in real trouble, that’s another matter. But Iwas coping with wolves when you were still on Mars. Nine times out often, ifa girl gets raped, it’s at least partly her own fault. That tenth time-well, allright. Give him your best heave-ho to the bottomless pit. But you aren’t goingto find it necessary.“.All right, I will remember. I wish you were sending that naughty picture toDuke.“.What, dear? I will if you want me to. It’s just that if I ever make a pass atDuke-and I might, now that you’ve put the idea into my little pointy head-I’drather grab his shoulders and look him in the eye and say, .Duke, how aboutit?-I’m willing.’ I don’t want to do it by sending him a naughty picture throughthe mail, like those nasty women used to send to you. But if you want me to,okay. Uh, I needn’t make it too naughty-I could make it obviously a showgirl’s professional picture and tell him what I’m doing and ask him if he hasroom for it in his scrap book. He might not take it as a pass.“Mike frowned. .I spoke incompletely. If you wish to send Duke a naughtypicture, do so. If you do not wish, then do not. But I had hoped to see thenaughty picture taken. Jill, what is a .naughty’ picture?“Mike was baffled by the whole idea-Jill’s reversal from an attitude that he hadnever understood but bad learned to accept into exactly the opposite attitudeof pleasure-sexual pleasure, he understood-at being stared at . . . plus a thirdand long-standing bafflement at Duke’s .art“ collection-it certainly was not art.
But the pale, wan Martian thing which parallels tumultuous human sexualitygave him no foundation for grokking either narcissism or voyeurism, modestyor display.
He added, .“Naughty’ means a wrongness, usually a small wrongness, but Igrokked that you did not mean even a small wrongness, but a goodness.“ anaughty picture could be either one, I guess-depending on who it’s for-nowthat I’m over some prejudice. But- Mike, I’ll have to show you; I can’t tell you.
But first close those slats, will you?“The Venetian blinds flipped themselves shut. .All right,“ she said. .Now thispose would be just a little bit naughty-any of the show girls would use it as aprofessional pic . . . and this one is just a little bit more so, some of the girlswould use it. But this one is unmistakably naughty and this one is quitenaughty . . . and this one is so extremely naughty that I wouldn’t pose for itwith my face wrapped in a towel- unless you wanted it.“.But if your face was covered, why would I want it?“.Ask Duke. That’s all I can say.“He continued to look puzzled. .I grok not wrongness, I grok not goodness. Igrok-. He used a Martian word indicating a null state of all emotions.
But he was interested because he was so baffled; they went on discussing it,in Martian as much as possible because of its extremely fine discriminationsfor emotions and values-and in English, too, because Martian. rich as it is,simply couldn’t cope with the concepts.
Mike showed up at a ringside table that night, Jill having coached him in howto bribe the ma.tre d’h.tel to give him such a spot; he was determined topursue this mystery. Jill was not averse. She came strutting out in the firstproduction number, her smile for everyone but a quick wink for Mike as sheturned and her eyes passed across his. She discovered that, with Mikepresent, the warm, pleased sensation she had been enjoying nightly wasgreatly amplified-she suspected that, if the lights were out, she would glow inthe dark.
When the parade stopped and the girls formed a tableau, Mike was no morethan ten feet from her-she had been promoted her first week to a frontposition. The director had looked her over on her fourth day with the showand had said, .I don’t know what it is, kid. We’ve got girls around townbegging for just any job with twice the shape you’ve got-but when the lightshit you, you’ve got what the customers look at. Okay, I’m moving you upwhere they can see better. The standard raise . . . and I still don’t know why.“She posed and talked with Mike in her mind. (.Feel anything?“)(.I grok but not in fullness.’)(.Look where I am looking, my brother. The small one. He quivers. Hethirsts for me.’)(.I grok his thirst .)(.Can you see him?“) Jill stared straight into the customer’s eyes and gavehim a warm smile . . . not alone to increase his interest in her but also to letMike use her eyes, if possible. As her grokking of Martian thought hadincreased and as they had grown steadily closer in other ways they hadbegun to be able to use this common Martian convenience. Not fully as yet,but with increasing ease-Jill had no control over it; Mike could see throughher eyes simply by calling to her, she could see through his only if he gave ithis attention.
(.We grok him together,“ Mike agreed. (.Great thirst for my little brother.“)(.!!!!“)(.Yes. Beautiful agony.“)A music cue told Jill to break her pose and resume her slow strut. She did so,moving with proud sensuousness and feeling lust boil up in herself inresponse to emotions she was getting both from Mike and from the stranger.
The routine caused her to walk away from Mike and almost toward the ruttylittle stranger, approaching him during her first few steps. She continued tolock eyes with him.
At which point something happened which was totally unexpected to herbecause Mike had never explained that it was possible. She had been lettingherself receive as much as possible of the stranger’s emotions, intentionallyteasing him with eyes and body, and relaying what she felt from him back toMike- -when suddenly the circuit was completed and she was looking atherself, seeing herself through strange eyes, much more lavish than sheconsidered herself to be-and feeling the primitive need with which thatstranger saw her.
Blindly she stumbled and would have fallen flat had not Mike instantly sensedher hazard, caught her, lifted her, straightened her up, and steadied her untilshe could walk unassisted, second-sight gone.
The parade of beauties continued on through exit. Once off stage the girlbehind her said, .What the devil happened to you, Jill?“.Caught my heel.“.Happens. But that was the wildest recovery I ever saw. For a second thereyou looked like a puppet on strings.“(-and so I was, dear, and so I was! But we won’t go into that.) .i’m going toask the stage manager to check that spot. I think there’s a loose board. A galcould break her leg.“For the rest of the show whenever she was on stage Mike gave her quickglimpses of how she looked to various men while always making sure thatshe was not again taken by surprise. Jill was amazed to discover how variedwere their images of her: one noticed only her legs, another seemedfascinated by the undulations of her torso, a third saw only her proud bosom.
Then Mike, warning her first, let her look at other girls in the tableaux. Shewas relieved to find that Mike saw them as she saw them-but sharper.
But she was amazed to find that her own excitement did not diminish as shelooked at, second hand, the girls around her; it increased.
Mike left promptly at the finale, ducking out ahead of the crowd as she hadwarned him to do, She did not expect to see him again that night since hehad asked for relief from his job as croupier only long enough to see his wifein her show. But when she dressed and returned to their hotel room, she felthim inside before she reached the room.
The door opened for her, she stepped inside, it closed behind her. .Hello,darling!“ she called out. .How nice you came home!“He smiled gently. .I now grok naughty pictures.“ Her clothes vanished. .Makenaughty pictures.“.Huh? Yes, dear, of course.“ She ran through much the same poses she hadearlier in the day. With each one, as soon as she was in it, Mike let her usehis eyes to see herself. She looked at herself and felt his emotions and felther own swell in response in a closed and mutually amplified re-echoing. Atlast she placed herself in a pose as randily carefree as her imagination coulddevise.
.Naughty pictures are a great goodness,“ Mike said gravely.
.Yes! And now I grok them, too! What are you waiting for?“They quit their jobs and for the next several days saw as many of the revuesas possible, during which period Jill made still another discovery: she.grokked naughty pictures“ only through a man’s eyes. If Mike watched, shecaught and shared his mood, from quiet sensuous pleasure in a beautifulwoman to fully aroused excitement at times-but if Mike’s attention waselsewhere, the model, dancer, or peeler was just another woman to Jill,possibly pleasant to look at but in no wise exciting. She was likely to getbored and wish mildly that Mike would take her home. But only mildly for shewas now nearly as patient as he was.
She pondered this new fact from all sides and decided that she preferred notto be excited by women other than through his eyes. One man gave her allthe problems she could handle and more-to have discovered in herselfunsuspected latent Lesbian tendencies would have been entirely too much.
But it certainly was a lot of fun-.a great goodness“-~to see those girls throughhis eyes as he had now learned to see them-and a still greater, ecstaticgoodness to know that, at last, he looked at her herself in the same way . . .
only more so.
They stopped in Palo Alto long enough for Mike to try (and fail to) swallow allthe Hoover Library in mammoth gulps. The task was mechanicallyimpossible; the scanners could not spin that fast, nor could Mike turn pagesof bound books fast enough to read them all. He gave up and admitted thathe was taking in raw data much faster than he could grok it, even byspending all hours the library was closed in solitary contemplation. With reliefJill moved them to San Francisco and he embarked on a more systematicsearch.
She came back to their flat one day to find him sitting, not in trance but doingnothing, and surrounded by books-many books: The Talmud, the Kama-Sutra, Bibles in various versions, the Book of the Dead, the Book of Mormon,Patty’s precious copy of the New Revelation, Apocrypha of various sorts, theKoran, the unabridged Golden Bough, The Way, Science and Health withKey to the Scriptures, the sacred writings of a dozen other religions majorand minor-even such deviant oddities as Crowley’s Book of the Law.
.Trouble, dear?“.Jill, I don’t grok.“ He waved his hand at the books. (.Waiting, Michael Waitingfor fullness is~ .).I don’t think waiting will ever fill it. Oh, I know what’s wrong; I’m not really aman, I’m a Martian-a Martian in a body of the wrong shape.“.You’re plenty of man for me, dear-and I love the way your body isshaped.“.Oh, you grok what I’m talking about. I don’t grok people. I don’t understandthis multiplicity of religions. Now among my people-.
.Your people, Mike?“.Sorry. I should have said that, among the Martians, there is only onereligion-and that one is not a faith, it’s a certainty. You grok it. .Thou art God!“.Yes,“ she agreed. .I do grok ... in Martian. But you know, dearest, that itdoesn’t say the same thing in English . . . or any other human speech. I don’tknow why.“.Mmmm ... on Mars, when we needed to know anything-anything at all-wecould consult the Old Ones and the answer was never wrong. Jill, is itpossible that we humans don’t have any .Old Ones?’ No souls, that has tomean. When we discorporate-die!--do we die dead? die all over and nothingleft? Do we live in ignorance because it doesn’t matter? Because we aregone and not a rack behind in a time so short that a Martian would use it forone long contemplation? Tell me, Jill. You’re human.“She smiled with sober serenity. .You yourself have told me. You have taughtme to know eternity and you can’t take it away from me, ever. You can’t die,Mike-you can only discorporate.“ She gestured down at herself with bothhands. .This body that you have taught me to see through your eyes . . . andthat you have loved so well, someday it will be gone. But I shall not be gone .
. . I am that I am! Thou art God and I am God and we are God, eternally. I amnot sure where I will be, or whether I will remember that I was once JillBoardman who was happy trotting bedpanS and equally happy strutting herstuff in her buff under bright lights. I have liked this body-.
With a most uncustomary gesture of impatience Mike threw away herclothes.
.Thank you, dear,“ she said quietly, not stirring from where she was seated.
.It has been a nice body to me-and to you-to both of us who thought of it. ButI don’t expect to miss it when I am through with it. I hope that you will eat itwhen I discorporate.“.Oh, I’ll eat you, all right-unless I discorporate first.“.I don’t suppose that you will. With your much greater control over your sweetbody I suspect that you can live several centuries at least. If you wish it.
Unless you choose to discorporate sooner.“.I might. But not now. Jill, I’ve tried and tried. How many churches have weattended?“.All the sorts there are in San Francisco, I think-except, possibly, for little,secret ones that don’t list their addresses. I don’t recall how many times wehave been to seekers’ services.“.That’s just to comfort Pat-I’d never go again if you weren’t sure that sheneeds to know that we haven’t given up.“.She does need to. And we can’t lie about it-you don’t know how and I can’t,not to Patty. Nor any brother.“.Actually,“ he admitted, .the Fosterites do have quite a bit on the ball. Alltwisted, of course. They are clumsy, groping-the way I was as a carney. Andthey’ll never correct their mistakes, because this thing-. He caused Patty’sbook to lift. .-is mostly crap!“.Yes. But Patty doesn’t see those parts of it. She is wrapped in her owninnocence. She is God and behaves accordingly . . . only She doesn’t knowwho She is.“.Uh huh,“ he agreed. .That’s our Pat. She believes it only when I tell her-withproper emphasis. But, Jill, there are only three places to look. Science-and Iwas taught more about how the physical universe is put together while I wasstill in the nest than human scientists can yet handle. So much that I can’teven talk to them . . . even about as elementary a gimmick as levitation. I’mnot disparaging human scientists . . . what they do and how they go about itis just as it should be; I grok that fully. But what they are after is not what I amlooking for-you don’t grok a desert by counting its grains of sand. Thenthere’s philosophy-supposed to tackle everything. Does it? All anyphilosopher ever comes Out with is exactly what be walked in with-except forthose sell-deluders who prove their assumptions by their conclusions, in acircle. Like Kant. Like many other tail-chasers. So the answer, if it’sanywhere, ought to be here.“ He waved at the pile of religious books. .Onlyit’s not. Bits and pieces that grok true, but never a pattern-Or if there is apattern, every time, without fail, they ask you to take the hard part on faith.
Faith! What a dirty Anglo~ Saxon monosyllable-Jill, how does it happen thatyou didn’t mention that one when you were teaching me the words thatmustn’t be used in polite company?“She smiled. .Mike, you just made a joke.“.I didn’t mean it as a joke ... and I can’t see that it’s funny. Jill, I haven’t evenbeen good for you-you used to laugh. You used to laugh and giggle until Iworried about you. I haven’t learned to laugh; instead you’ve forgotten how.
Instead of my becoming human . . . you’re becoming Martian.“.I’m happy, dear. You probably iust haven’t noticed me laughing.“.If you laughed clear down on Market Street, I would hear it. I grok. Once Iquit being frightened by it I always noticed it-you, especially~ If I grokked it,then I would grok people-I think. Then I could help somebody like Pat . . .
either teach her what I know, or learn from her what she knows. Or both. Wecould talk and understand each other.“.Mike, all you need to do for Patty is to see her occasionally. .Why don’t we,dear? Let’s get out of this dreary fog. She’s home now; the carnie is closedfor the season. Drop south and see her . . . and I’ve always wanted to seeBaja California; we could go on south into warmer weather-and take her withus, that would be fun!“.All right.“She stood up. .Let me get a dress on. Do you want to save any of thosebooks? Instead of one of your usual quick housecleanings I could ship themto Jubal.“He flipped his fingers at them and all were gone but Patricia’s gift. .Just thisone and we’ll take it with us; Pat would notice. But, Jill, right now I need to goout to the zoo.“.All right.“.I want to spit back at a camel and ask him what he’s so sour about. Maybecamels are the real .Old Ones’ on this planet . . . and that’s what is wrongwith the place.“.Two jokes in one day, Mike.“.I ain’t laughing. And neither are you. Nor is the camel. Maybe he groks why.
Come on. is this dress all right? Do you want underCloth& I noticed you werewearing some when i moved those other clothes.“.Please, dear. It’s windy and chilly outdoors.“.Up easy.“ He levitated her a couple of feet. .Pants. Stockings. Garter belt.
Shoes. Down you go and lift your arms. Bra? You don’t need a bra. And nowthe dress-and you’re decent again. And you’re pretty, whatever that is. Youlook good. Maybe I can get a job as a lady’s maid if I’m not good for anythingelse. Baths, shampoos, massages, hair styling, make-up, dressing for alloccasions-I’ve even learned to do your nails in a fashion that suits you. Willthat be all, Madom?“.You’re a perfect lady’s maid, dear. But I’m going to keep you myself.“.Yes, I grok I am. You look so good I think I’ll toss it all away again and giveyou a massage. The growing closer kind.“.Yes, Michael!“.I thought you had learned waiting? First you have to take me to the zooand buy mc peanuts~“.Yes, Mike. Jill will buy you peanuts.“It was cold and windy out at Golden Gate Park but Mike did not notice it andJill had learned that she didn’t have to be cold or uncomfortable if she did notwish it. Nevertheless it was pleasant to relax her control by going into thewarm monkey house. Aside from its heat Jill did not like the monkey housetoo well-monkeys and apes were too much like people, too depressinglyhuman. She was, she thought, finished forever with any sort of prissiness;she had grown to cherish an ascetic, almost Martian joy in all things physicalThe public copulations and evacuations of these simian prisoners did nottrouble her as they once had; these poor penned people possessed noprivacy, they were not at fault. She could now watch such withoutrepugnance; her own impregnable fastidiousness untouched. No, it was thatthey were .Human, All Too Human“, every action, every expression, everypuzzled troubled look reminded her of what she liked least about her ownrace.
Jill preferred the Lion House-the great males arrogant and sure ofthemselves even in captivity-the placid motherliness of the big females, thelordly beauty of Bengal tigers with jungle staring out of their eyes, the littleleopards~swift and deadly, the reek of musk that airconditioners could notpurge. Mike usually shared her tastes for other exhibits, too; he would spendhours in the Aviary, or the Reptile House, or in watching seals- once he hadtold her that, if one had to be hatched on this planet to be a sea lion would beof greatest goodness.
When he had first seen a zoo, Mike had been much upset; Jill had beenforced to order him to wait and grok, as be had been about to take immediateaction to free all the animals. He had conceded presently, under herarguments- that most of these animals could not stay alive free in the climateand environment where he proposed to turn them ioose~that a zoo was anest . . of a sort. He had followed this first experience with many hours ofwithdrawal, after which he never again threatened to remove all the bars andglass and grills. He explained to Jill that the bars were to keep people out atleast as much as to keep the animals in, which he had failed to grok at first.
After that Mike never missed a zoo wherever they went.
But today even the unmitigated misanthropy of the camels could not shakeMike’s moodiness; he looked at them without smiling. Nor did the monkeysand apes cheer him up. They stood for quite a while in front of a cagecontaining a large family of capuchins, watching them eat, sleep, court,nurse, grooms and swarm aimlessly around the cage, while Jill surreptitiouslytossed them peanuts despite .No Feeding“ signs.
She tossed one to a medium sized monk; before he could eat it a muchlarger male was on him and not only stole his peanut but gave him a beating,then left. The little fellow made no attempt to pursue his tormentor; besquatted at the scene of the crime, pounded his knucks against the concretefloor, and chattered his helpless rage. Mike watched it solemnly. Suddenlythe mistreated monkey rushed to the side of the cage, picked a monkey stillsmaller, bowled it over and gave it a drubbing worse than the one he hadsuffered-after which he seemed quite relaxed. The third monk crawled away,still whimpering, and found shelter in the arm of a female who had a stillsmaller one, a baby, on her back. The other monkeys paid no attention toany of it.
Mike threw back his head and laughed-went on laughing, loudly anduncontrollably. He gasped for breath, tears came from his eyes; he started totremble and sink to the floor, still laughing.
.Stop it, Mike!“He did cease folding himself up but his guffaws and tears went on. Anattendant hurried over. .Lady, do you need help?“.No. Yes, I do. Can you call us a cab? Ground car, air cab, anything -I’ve gotto get him out of here.“ She added, .He’s not well.“.Ambulance? Looks like he’s having a fit.“.Anything!“ A few minutes later she was leading Mike into a piloted atr cab.
She gave the address, then said urgently. .Mike, you’ve got to listen to me.
Quiet down.“He became somewhat more quiet but continued to chuckle, laugh aloud,chuckle again, while she wiped his eyes, for all the few minutes it took to getback to their flat. She got him inside, got his clothes off, made him lie downon the bed. .All right, dear. Withdraw now if you need to.“.I’m all right. At last I’m all right.“.I hope so.“ She sighed. .You certainly scared me, Mike.“.I’m sorry, Little Brother. I know. I was scared, too, the first time I heardlaughing.“.Mike, what happened?“.Jill ... I grok people!“.Huh?“ (.!!??“)(.I speak rightly, Little Brother. I grok.“).I grok people now, Jill Little Brother . . . precious darling , little imp with livelylegs and lovely lewd lascivious lecherous licentious libido . . beautiful bumpsand pert posterior . . . with soft voice and gentle hands. My baby darling.“.Why, Michael!“.Oh, I knew all the words; I simply didn’t know when or why to say them . . .
nor why you wanted me to. I love you, sweetheart-I grok .love’ now, too.“.You always have. I knew. And I love you ... you smooth ape. Mydarling.“.’Ape,’ yes. Come here, she ape, and put your bead on my shoulderand tell me a joke.“.Just tell you a joke?“.Well, nothing more than snuggling. Tell me a joke I’ve never heard and seeif I laugh at the right place. I will, I’m sure of it-and I’ll be able to tell you whyit’s funny. Jill ... I grok people!“.But how, darling? Can you tell me? Does it need Martian? Or mindtalk?“.No, that’s the point. I grok people. I am people ... so now I can say it inpeople talk. I’ve found out why people laugh. They laugh because it hurts somuch . . . because it’s the only thing that’ll make it stop hurting.“Jill looked puzzled. .Maybe I’m the one who isn’t people. I don’tunderstand.“.Ah, but you are people, little she ape. You grok it so automatically that youdon’t have to think about it. Because you grew up with people. But I didn’t.
I’ve been like a puppy raised apart from other dogs-Who couldn’t be like hismasters and had never learned how to be a dog. So I had to be taught.
Brother Mahmoud taught me, Jubal taught me, lots of people taught me . . .
and you taught me most of all. Today I got my diploma-and I laughed. Thatpoor little monk.“.Which one, dear? I thought that big one was just mean ... and the one Iflipped the peanut to turned out to be just as mean. There certainly wasn’tanything funny.“.Jill, Jill my darling! Too much Martian has rubbed off on YOU. Of course itwasn’t funny-it was tragic. That’s why I had to laugh. I looked at a cageful ofmonkeys and suddenly I saw all the mean and cruel and utterlyunexplainable things I’ve seen and beard and read about in the time I’vebeen with my own people and suddenly it hurt so much I found myselflaughing.“.But- Mike dear, laughing is something you do when something is nice - . .
not when it’s horrid.“.Is it? Think back to Las Vegas- When all you pretty girls came out on thestage, did people laugh?“.Well ... no.“.But you girls were the nicest part of the show. I grok now, that if they hadlaughed, you would have been hurt. No, they laughed when a comic trippedover his feet and fell down . . . or something else that is not a goodness.“.But that’s not all people laugh at.“.Isn’t it? Perhaps I don’t grok all its fullness yet. But find me something thatreally makes you laugh, sweetheart . . . a joke, or anything else-butsomething that gave you a real belly laugh, not a smile. Then we’ll see ifthere isn’t a wrongness in it somewhere and whether you would laugh if thewrongness wasn’t there.“ He thought. .I grok when apes learn to laugh, they’llbe people.“.Maybe.“ Doubtfully but earnestly Jill started digging into her memory forjokes that had struck her as irresistibly funny, ones which had jerked a laughout of her . . . incidents she had seen or heard of which had made herhelpless with laughter:
.-her entire bridge club.“.Should I bow?“.Neither one, you idiot—instead!“.-the Chinaman objects.“.-broke her leg.“.-make trouble for me!“.-but it’ll spoil the ride for me.“.-and his mother-in-law fainted.“.Stop you? Why, I bet three to one you could do it!“.-something has happened to Ole.“.-and so are you, you clumsy ox!“She gave up on .funny“ stories, pointing out to Mike that such were justfantasies, not real, and tried to recall real incidents. Practical jokes? Allpractical jokes supported Mike’s thesis, even ones as mild as a dribble glassandwhen it came to an interne’S notion of a practical joke-Well, internes andmedical students should be kept in cages. What else? The time Elsa Maehad lost her monogrammed panties? It hadn’t been funny to Elsa Mae. Orthe- She said grimly, .Apparently the pratfall is the peak of all humor. It’s nota pretty picture of the human race, Mike.“.Oh, but it is!“.Huh?“.I had thought-I had been told-that a .funny’ thing is a thing of a goodness. Itisn’t. Not ever is it funny to the person it happens to. Like that sheriff withouthis pants. The goodness is in the laughing itself. I grok it is a bravery . . . anda sharing . . . against pain and sorrow and defeat.“.But- Mike, it is not a goodness to laugh at people.“.No. But I was not laughing at the little monkey. I was laughing at u& People.
And I suddenly knew that I was people and could not stop laughing.“ Hepaused. .This is hard to explain, because you have never lived as a Martian,for all that I’ve told you about it. On Mars there is never anything to laugh at.
All the things that are funny to us humans either physically cannot happen onMars or are not permitted to happen- sweetheart, what you call .freedom’
doesn’t exist on Mars; everything is planned by the Old Ones-or the thingsthat do happen on Mars which we laugh at here on Earth aren’t funnybecause there is no wrongness about them. Death, for example.“.Death isn’t funny.“.Then why are there so many jokes about death? Jill, with us-us humansdeathis so sad that we must laugh at it. All those religions- they contradicteach other on every other point but every one of them is filled with ways tohelp people be brave enough to laugh even though they know they aredying.“ He stopped and Jill could feel that he had ahuost gone into his trancestate. .Jill? Is it possible that I was searching them the wrong way? Could itbe that every one of all those religions is true?“.Huh? How could that possibly be? Mike, if one of them is true, then theothers are wrong. Logic.“.So? Point to the shortest direction around the universe. It doesn’t matterwhich way you point, it’s the shortest ... and you’re pointing right back atyourself.“.Well, what does that prove? You taught me the true answer, Mike. .Thouart God.’“.And Thou art God, my lovely. I wasn’t disputing that ... but that one primefact which doesn’t depend at all on faith may mean that all faiths are true.“.Well . . . if they’re all true, then right now I want to worship Siva.“ Jill changedthe subject with emphatic direct action.
.Little pagan,“ he said softly. .They’ll run you out of San Francisco.“.But we’re going to Los Angeles ... where it won’t be noticed. Oh! Thouart Siva!“.Dance, Kali, dance!“Some time during the night she woke and saw him standing at the window,looking out over the city. (.Trouble, my brother?“)He turned and spoke. .There’s no need for them to be so unhappy.“.Darling, darling! I think I had better take you home. The city is not good foryou.“.But I would still know it. Pain and sickness and hunger and fighting -there’sno need for any of it. It’s as foolish as those little monkeys.“.Yes, darling. But it’s not your fault-.
.Ah, but it is!“.Well ... that way-yes. But it’s not just this one city; it’s five billion people andmore. You can’t help five billion people.“.I wonder.“He came over and sat down by her. .I grok with them now, I can talk to them.
Jill, I could set up our act again . . . and make the marks laugh every minute.
I am certain.“.Then why not do it? Patty would certainly be pleased ... and so would I. Iliked being .with it’-and now that we’ve shared water with Patty, it would belike being home.“He didn’t answer. Jill felt his mind and knew that he was contemplating, tryingto grok. She waited.
.Jill? What do I have to do to be ordained?“