d newspaperman would
take it. Damn Carter!

Gene went out.

He seemed to be dreaming. Over him bent a repulsive, man-like face. But
the man had fingernails growing on his chin where his whiskers should
have been. And his eyes were funny--walled, as though he bordered on
idiocy. In the dream, Gene felt himself strapped into a hammock. Then
something pulled at him and made a terrible racket for a long time. Then
it got very quiet except for a throbbing in his head. He went back to
sleep.

* * * * *

She had on a starched white outfit, but it wasn't a nurse's uniform.
There wasn't much skirt, and what there was of it was only the back
part. The neckline plunged to the waist and stopped there. It was a
peculiar outfit for a nurse to be wearing. But it looked familiar.

Her soft hands fixed something over his eyes, something cold and wet. He
felt grateful, but kept on trying to remember. Ah, he had it; the girls
wore that kind of outfit in the Blue Moon in one of the skits they did,
burlesquing a hospital. He took off the wet cloth and looked again.

She was a dream. Even with her lips rouge-scarlet, her cheeks pink with
makeup, her eyes heavy with artifice.

"What gives, beautiful?" He was surprised at the weakness of his voice.

Her voice was hard, but nice, and it was bitter, as though she wanted
hard people to know she knew the score, could be just a little harder.
"You're a spaceman now! Didn't you know?"

Gene grinned weakly. "I don't know a star from a street light. Nobody
gets on the space crews these days--it's a closed union."

Her laugh was full of a knowledge denied him. "That's what I used to
think!"

She began to unstrap him from the hammock. Then she pushed back his
hair, prodded at the purple knob on his head with careful fingertips.

"How come you're on this ship?" asked Gene, wincing but letting her
fingers explore.

"Shanghaied, same as you. I'm from the Blue Moon. I stepped out between
acts for a breath of fresh air, and wham, a sack over the head and here
I am. They thought you might have a cracked skull. One of the monsters
told me to check you. No doctor on the ship."

Gene groaned. "Then I didn't dream it--there is a guy on this ship with
fingernails instead of a beard on his chin!"

She nodded. "You haven't seen anything yet!"

"Why are we here?"

"You've been shanghaied to work the ship, I'm here for a different
purpose--these men can't get off th