For Walter and Marion Minton
"-it is better to marry than to burn."
-Saul of Tarsus
"He's a Mad Scientist and I'm his Beautiful Daughter."
That's what she said: the oldest cliché in pulp fiction. She wasn't old enough to remember the pulps.
The thing to do with a silly remark is to fail to hear it. I went on waltzing while taking another look down her evening formal. Nice view. Not foam rubber.
She waltzed well. Today most girls who even attempt ballroom dancing drape themselves around your neck and expect you to shove them around the floor. She kept her weight on her own feet, danced close without snuggling, and knew what I was going to do a split second before I led it. A perfect partner-as long as she didn't talk.
"Well?" she persisted.
My paternal grandfather-an unsavory old reactionary; the FemLibbers would have lynched him-used to say, 'Zebadiah, the mistake we made was not in putting shoes on them or in teaching them to read-we should never have taught them to talk.'
I signaled a twirl by pressure; she floated into it and back into my arms right on the beat. I inspected her hands and the outer corners of her eyes. Yes, she really was young-minimum eighteen; Hilda Corners never permitted legal 'infants' at her parties), maximum twenty-five, first approximation twenty-two. Yet she danced like her grandmother's generation.
"Well?" she repeated more firmly.
This time I openly stared. "Is that cantilevering natural? Or is there an invisible bra, you being in fact the sole support of two dependents?"
She glanced down, looked up and grinned. "They do stick out, don't they? Your comment is rude, crude, unrefined, and designed to change the subject."
"What subject? I made a polite inquiry; you parried it with amphigory."
"Amphigory' my tired feet! I answered precisely."
'Amphigory," I repeated. "The operative symbols were 'mad,' 'scientist,' 'beautiful,' and 'daughter.' The first has several meanings-the others denote opinions. Semantic content: zero."
She looked thoughtful rather than angry. "Pop isn't rabid... although I did use 'mad' in ambivalent mode. 'Scientist' and 'beautiful' each contain descriptive opinions, I stipulate. But are you in doubt as to my sex? If so, are you qualified to check my twenty-third chromosome pair? With transsexual surgery so common I assume that anything less would not satisfy you."
"I prefer a field test."
"On the dance floor?"
"No, the bushes back of the pool. Yes, I'm qualified-laboratory or field. But it was not your sex that lay in the area of opinion; that is a fact that can be established....lthough the gross evidence is convincing. I-"
"Ninety-five centimeters isn't gross! Not for my height. One hundred seventy bare-footed, one eighty in these heels. It's just that I'm wasp-waisted for my mass-forty-eight centimeters versus fifty-nine kilos."
"And your teeth are your own and you don't have dandruff. Take it easy, Deedee; I didn't mean to shake your aplomb"-or those twin glands that are not gross but delicious. I have an infantile bias and have known it since I was six-six months, that is. "But the symbol 'daughter' encompasses two statements, one factual-sex-and the other a matter of opinion even when stated by a forensic genetohematologist."
"Gosh, what big words you know, Mister. I mean 'Doctor."
"Mister' is correct. On this campus it is swank to assume that everyone holds a doctorate. Even I have one, Ph.D. Do you know what that stands for?"
"Doesn't everybody? I have a Ph.D., too. 'Piled Higher and Deeper."
I raised that maximum to twenty-six and assigned it as second approximation. "Phys. ed.?"
"Mister Doctor, you are trying to get my goat. Won't work. I had an undergraduate double major, one being phys. ed. with teacher's credentials in case I needed a job. But my real major was math-which I continued in graduate school."
"And here I had been assuming that 'Deedee' meant 'Doctor of Divinity."
"Go wash out your mouth with soap. My nickname is my initials-Dee Tee. Or Deety. Doctor D. T. Burroughs if being formal, as I can't be 'Mister' and refuse to be 'Miz' or 'Miss.' See here, Mister; I'm supposed to be luring you with my radiant beauty, then hooking you with my feminine charm... and not getting anywhere. Let's try another tack. Tell me what you piled higher and deeper."
"Let me think. Flycasting? Or was it basketweaving? It was one of those transdisciplinary things in which the committee simply weighs the dissertation. Tell you what. I've got a copy around my digs. I'll find it and see what title the researcher who wrote it put on it."
"Don't bother. The title is 'Some Implications of a Six-Dimensional NonNewtonian Continuum.' Pop wants to discuss it."
I stopped waltzing. "Huh? He'd better discuss that paper with the bloke who wrote it."
"Nonsense; I saw you blink-I've hooked you. Pop wants to discuss it, then offer you a job."
"'Job'! I just slipped off the hook."
"Oh, dear! Pop will be really mad. Please? Please, sir!"
"You said that you had used 'mad' in ambivalent mode. How?"
"Oh. Mad-angry because his colleagues won't listen to him. Mad-psychotic in the opinions of some colleagues. They say his papers don't make sense."
"Do they make sense?"
"I'm not that good a mathematician, sir. My work is usually simplifying software. Child's play compared with n-dimensional spaces."
I wasn't required to express an opinion; the trio started Blue Tango, Deety melted into my arms. You don't talk if you know tango.
Deety knew. After an eternity of sensual bliss, I swung her out into position precisely on coda; she answered my bow and scrape with a deep curtsy. "Thank you, sir."
"Whew! After a tango like that the couple ought to get married."
"All right. I'll find our hostess and tell Pop. Five minutes? Front door, or side?"
She looked serenely happy. I said, "Deety, do you mean what you appear to mean? That you intend to marry me? A total stranger?"
Her face remained calm but the light went out-and her nipples went down. She answered steadily. "After that tango we are no longer strangers. I construed your statement as a proposal-no, a willingness-to marry me. Was I mistaken?"
My mind went into emergency, reviewing the past years the way a dr9wning man's life is supposed to flash before his eyes (how could anyone know that?):
a rainy afternoon when my chum's older sister had initiated me into the mysteries; the curious effect caused by the first time strangers had shot back at me; a twelve-month cohabitation contract that had started with a bang and had ended without a whimper; countless events which had left me determined never to marry.
I answered instantly, "I meant what I implied-marriage, in its older meaning. I'm willing. But why are you willing? I'm no prize."
She took a deep breath, straining the fabric, and-thank Allah!-her nipples came up. "Sir, you are the prize I was sent to fetch, and, when you said that we really ought to get married-hyperbole and I knew it-I suddenly realized, with a deep burst of happiness, that this was the means of fetching you that I wanted above all!"
She went on, "But I will not trap you through misconstruing a gallantry. If you wish, you may take me into those bushes back of the pool... and not marry me." She went on firmly, 'But for that... whoring... my fee is for you to talk with my father and to let him show you something."
"Deety, you're an idiot! You would ruin that pretty gown."
"Mussing a dress is irrelevant but I can take it off. I will. There's nothing under it."
"There's a great deal under it!"
That fetched a grin, instantly wiped away. "Thank you. Shall we head for the bushes?"
"Wait a half! I'm about to be noble and regret it the rest of my life. You've made a mistake. Your father doesn't want to talk to me; I don't know anything about n-dimensional geometry." (Why do I get these attacks of honesty? I've never done anything to deserve them.)
"Pop thinks you do; that is sufficient. Shall we go? I want to get Pop out of here before he busts somebody in the mouth."
"Don't rush me; I didn't ask you to rassle on the grass; I said I wanted to marry you-but wanted to know why you were willing to marry me. Your answer concerned what your father wants. I'm not trying to marry your father; he's not my type. Speak for yourself, Deety. Or drop it." (Am I a masochist? There's a sunbathing couch back of those bushes.)
Solemnly she looked me over, from my formal tights to my crooked bow tie and on up to my thinning brush cut-a hundred and ninety-four centimeters of big ugly galoot. "I like your firm lead in dancing. I like the way you look. I like the way your voice rumbles. I like your hair-splitting games with words- you sound like Whorf debating Korzybski with Shannon as referee." She took another deep breath, finished almost sadly: "Most of all, I like the way you smell."
It would have taken a sharp nose to whiff me. I had been squeaky clean ninety minutes earlier, and it takes more than one waltz and a tango to make me sweat. But her remark had that skid in it that Deety put into almost anything. Most girls, when they want to ruin a man's judgment, squeeze his biceps and say, "Goodness, you're strong!"
I grinned down at her. "You smell good too. Your perfume could rouse a corpse."
"I'm not wearing perfume."
"Oh. Correction: your natural pheromone. Enchanting. Get your wrap, Side door. Five minutes."
"Yes, sir."
"Tell your father we're getting married. He gets that talk, free. I decided that before you started to argue. It won't take him long to decide that I'm not Lobachevski."
"That's Pop's problem," she answered, moving. "Will you let him show you this thing he's built in our basement?"
'Sure, why not? What is it?"
"A time machine."
"This Universe never did make sense-"
Zeb:
Tomorrow I will seven eagles see, a great comet will appear, and voices will speak from whirlwinds foretelling monstrous and fearful things- This Universe never did make sense; I suspect that it was built on government contract.
'Big basement?"
"Medium. Nine by twelve. But cluttered. Work benches and power tools."
A hundred and eight square meters- Ceiling height probably two and a half- Had Pop made the mistake of the man who built a boat in his basement?
Mv musing was interrupted by a male voice in a high scream: 'You Overeducated, obstipated, pedantic ignoramus! Your mathematical intuition froze solid the day you matriculated"
I didn't recognize the screamer but did know the stuffed shirt he addressed:
Professor Neil O'Heret Brain, head of the department of mathematics-and God help the student who addressed a note to "Professor N.O. Brain" or even "N. O'H. Brain." "Brainy" had spent his life in search of The Truth-intendinng to place it under house arrest.
He was puffed up like a pouter pigeon with is professional pontifical pomposity reeling. His expression suggested that he was giving birth to a porcupine.
Deety gasped, "It's started," and dashed toward the row. Me, I stay out of rows; I'm a coward by trade and wear fake zero-prescription glasses as a buffer-when some oaf snarls, "Take off your glasses!" that gives me time to retreat.
I headed straight for the row.
Deety had placed herself between the two, facing the screamer, and was saying in a low but forceful voice, "Pop, don't you dare!-I won't bail you out!" She was reaching for his glasses with evident intent to put them back on his face. It was clear that he had taken them off for combat; he was holding them out of her reach.
I reached over their heads, plucked them out of his hand, gave them to Deety. She flashed me a smile and put them back on her father. He gave up and let her. She then took his arm firmly. "Aunt Hilda!"
Our hostess converged on the row. "Yes, Deety? Why did you stop them, darling? You didn't give us time to get bets down." Fights were no novelty at "Sharp" Corners' parties. Her food and liquor were lavish, the music always live; her guests were often eccentric but never dull-I had been surprised at the presence of N. O. Brain.
I now felt that I understood it: a planned hypergolic mixture.
Deety ignored her questions. "Will you excuse Pop and me and Mr. Carter? Something urgent has come up."
"You and Jake may leave if you must. But you can't drag Zebbie away. Deety, that's cheating."
Deety looked at me. "May I tell?"
"Eh? Certainly!"
That bliffy "Brainy" picked this moment to interrupt. "Mrs. Corners, Doctor Burroughs can't leave until he apologizes! I insist. My privilege!"
Our hostess looked at him with scorn. "Merde, Professor. I'm not one of your teaching fellows. Shout right back at Jake Burroughs if you like. If your command of invective equals his, we'll enjoy hearing it. But just one more word that sounds like an order to me or to one of my guests-and out you go! Then you had best go straight home; the Chancellor will be trying to reach you." She turned her back on him. "Deety, you started to add something?"
"Sharp" Corners can intimidate Internal Revenue agents. She hadn't cut loose on "Brainy"-just a warning shot across his bow. But from his face one would have thought she had hulled him. However, her remark to Deety left me no time to see whether he would have a stroke.
"Not Deety, Hilda. Me. Zeb."
"Quiet, Zebbie. Whatever it is, the answer is No. Deety? Go ahead, dear."
Hilda Corners is related to that famous mule. I did not use a baseball bat because she comes only up to my armpits and grosses forty-odd kilos. I picked her up by her elbows and turned her around, facing me. "Hilda, we're going to get married."
"Zebbie darling! I thought you would never ask."
"Not you, you old harridan. Deety. I proposed, she accepted; I'm going to nail it down before the anesthetic wears off."
Hilda looked thoughtfully interested. "That's reasonable." She craned her neck to look at Deety. "Did he mention his wife in Boston, Deety? Or the twins?"
I set her back on her feet. "Pipe down, Sharpie; this is serious. Doctor Burroughs, I am unmarried, in good health, solvent, and able to support a family. I hope this meets with your approval."
"Pop says Yes," Deety answered. "I hold his power of attorney."
"You pipe down, too. My name is Carter, sir-Zeb Carter. I'm on campus; you can check my record. But I intend to marry Deety at once, if she will have me."
"I know your name and record, sir. It doesn't require my approval; Deety is of age. But you have it anyhow." He looked thoughtful. "If you two are getting married at once, you'll be too busy for shop talk. Or would you be?"
"Pop-let it be; it's all set."
"So? Thank you, Hilda, for a pleasant evening. I'll call you tomorrow."
"You'll do no such thing; you'll come straight back and give me a full report. Jake, you are not going on their honeymoon-I heard you."
"Aunt Hilda-please! I'll manage everything."
We were out the side door close on schedule. At the parking lot there was a bobble: which heap, mine or theirs. Mine is intended for two but can take four. The rear seats are okay for two for short trips. Theirs was a four-passenger family saloon, not fast but roomy-and their luggage was in it. "How much luggage?" I asked Deety, while I visualized two overnight bags strapped into one back seat with my prospective father-in-law stashed in the other.