d Pierce say.

And one of the young men came toward him laughing.

"Is it true that this lunatic cannot go and make up with the lady of
his heart because she has had him banned? If we all try to smuggle him
in--"

And one of the girls, a really gorgeous blonde, called, "He was just
telling us about that time you were in space with the pirates after
you and they had stolen the big focusing mirror from the first Belt
foundry furnace. I'm sure you can tell it better--you tell it."

He was surrounded by the five then. "Go ahead," they were urging,
laughing, "Go ahead!" "It didn't really happen did it?"

This accusation was made by the pretty blonde. He looked at her half
indignantly. "I don't know how he tells it but it happened." And he
began to tell what had happened.

The two girls and the two young men listened, adding occasional
startled interjections and admiring laughter.

Pierce inserted an occasional question and Bryce became aware that in
answering them he was guided to stress and amplify points that made
clearer the danger and comedy. Later he became aware that he was half
consciously following the clues of Pierce's expression for the right
stress and mood of the telling, now off-hand and smiling in telling
what he had done, now heavily dramatic mimicking and burlesquing the
tones and threats of the outlaws, now ironic and bitterly indifferent
in passing over damage and deaths--as a wryly lifted eyebrow in the
dark young face listening, and a faint imperceptible shrug made him
see what had happened from a different angle than he had seen it then.
Pierce apparently had something he needed, a good story sense.
Following him must be something he had learned unconsciously last
night, but it worked. He could see how well it worked in the
expressions of his audience.

Someone leaving the party had stopped to listen, standing behind his
right shoulder. When he finished, amid the exclamations and sighs of
his listeners a cool, familiar voice drawled.

"That's quite a story. I picked up something about that at the new
foundry on reef five, but it was already an old yarn then." She stood
before him, still smooth and poised and lovely, offering her hand.
"I'm glad to hear it from the horse's mouth. Aren't you Bryce Carter?
We were introduced in there, I think, but the name didn't click."

It was Sheila Wesley.

That evening was something to remember.

First they were a private party at a nightclub, then at a