trying not to react to it. Barton took him off the hook; he pulled out one of the wigs from his shopping trip.

"Here, Limila,'* he said, "take that thing off your head for a minute, and try this on."

The hair was long, black and glossy; there was a lot of it. The forehead was in the high range for Earth, but of course nowhere near the over-the-ears Tilaran hairline.

And Limila didn't like it at all. "Bartoni This is not me. This is one of your women. I do not have hair grow- ing so far forward. You must remember that?"

"It's the highest-foreheaded wig I could find. And it looks good on you."

"Nol I am Tilari!" She tore it away, threw it against

the wall.

Barton had had enough. He caught her by the shoul- ders, taking great care not to grip her as hard as his impulse demanded,

"Now look!" be said. "You are on Earth, not on Tilara.

You're wearing plastic Earth tits, aren't you?" She looked at him, blankly.

*Tits?"

"Breasts, dammiti" Barton relaxed his grip. Limila

nodded slowly.

"All right," he continued. "So while you're here you wear the local-style scalp fixtures, too. So that you can mix with people without them staring at you all the time.

When we get to Tilara you can do it your way. In fact I'll get a special wig made for you; as soon as I can.

"But meanwhile, Limila," Barton said in a harsher tone than he intended, "you pick that wig up and dust it off and put it on your head, and we will go home."

Nobody said anything. Limila followed Barton's in- structions. The wig looked a little mussed, but not badly.

Dr. Parr wore a pained expression, as if he desperately needed to visit the toilet but was too polite to say so,

He looked even more as though he'd. never make it when Limila went to him and kissed him strongly, before letting Barton lead her away.

In the Jeep, Barton couldn't think of anything to say;

he was too taken with Limila's new appearance as seen in his peripheral vision. He was embarrassed to look at her directly too much or too often. In fact, he was just plain embarrassed, a feeling that was strange to him. He was glad when they reached their quarters and the ride was over.

109.

He parked the jeep and walked with Limila into the house. Then he asked her.

"The doc's a pretty good guy, huh? Naturally you're grateful to him."

"Oh, of course," she said. "And I had not made love *

for so long, either."

Before or after the bandages came off? Barton didn't ask; any question would be the wrong one. Tilara was not Earth, he told himself. But now he saw why Dr. Parr had been so uncharacteristically embarrassed.

Umila was happy, bubbling. She found things Barton hadn't known were in the freezer, and prepared the best dinner he'd had in a long while. She showed him, from the suitcase, two more dresses. Dr. Parr's nurse had helped her order them. She drank with him, bathed with him, and eventually went to bed with him.

First, though, she asked, "Barton, do you want me to wear the wig to bed?" She had it in her hand.

"Suit yourself," he said. "Whatever you want."

"Without it I do not repel you?"

"Hell no!" said Barton. "Look, Limila: one time I was going with a girl who did fashion modeling work.

She was quite a doll-long blond hair and a face like an angel with a body to match. One night I went to pick her up for a date, and damned if she wasn't shaved as bald as you are right now. This nut of a fashion designer bad her do it, to get some publicity for one of his shows.

''Well, it startled the hell out of me. She wore a wig on our date, of course, but she took it off for bed because she didn't want it mussed up. At first it was odd as hell seeing her with no hair, but after a while I took it for granted; Jt was still her, wasn't it?" He chuckled. "In fact it looked better on her than the crew-cut stage when she grew it out again."

"But I thought that' was part of why you couldn't . . ."

Barton shook his head. "No, Limila; that wasn't it. It was what they had done to your face. I'm sorry I could never see past that, but I couldn't."

"Do you like my face now?" she asked. "It is not as before, really."

"I like it," he said. "It's not exactly as I remember you;

no. But it's close enough that it could be, almost It is you, Limila.

"Limila!" he whispered against her cheek, and that

110.

was enough talk. Barton didn't get as much sleep that night as he was used to, but he didn't miss it.

Before he went to sleep, it struck him that this was the first" sex of any kind that he'd had since leaving the Demu research station. He had not been able to bring himself to love the Demu-ized Limila, and yet her presence, her ac- ousing presence, had inhibited him from seeking other women. Well, how about thati Until freed from it, he'd had no idea how heavy upon him had been the burden of Limila's disfigurement. He sighed, yawned, and drowsed off into relaxed slumber.

Limila was nervous, next morning. "At the ship. Bar- ton, what will they think? I am all new. Almost I want to

hide, to wear the veil."

Barton laughed, then sobered. "Don't worry about a

thing. They'll stare, sure. Why not? You're worth looking

at, you know."

"And before, I was not."

Barton went to her. "I'm sorry. It's just that now you're you again." Then she smiled, and it was all right, '

She took as much time choosing between three dresses as if they had been thirty, but finally chose a white smock. Carefully she donned and brushed the wig, ap- plied tinted polish to the glue-on fingernails she was wearing for the first time. Barton could see that they were not going to be "bright and early*' as Tarleton had

specified, but he controlled his impatience.

Eventually they were ready to leave. Barton drove faster than usual and made up some of the time; they were about ten minutes late. Tarleton was waiting, pac- ing back and forth alongside his car.