"A Stranger in a Strange Land" - читать интересную книгу автора (Heinlein Robert)

XXVI

IT WAS THE USUAL SORT OF CARNIVAL in the usual sort of town. The rides were the same, the cotton candy tasted the same, the flat joints practiced a degree of moderation acceptable to the local law in separating the marks from their half dollars, whether with baseballs thrown at targets, with wheels of fortune, or what - but the separation took place just the same. The sex lecture was trimmed to suit local opinions concerning Charles Darwin's opinions, the girls in the posing show wore that amount of gauze that local mores required, and the Fearless Fentons did their Death-Defying (in sober truth) Double Dive just before the last bally each night.

The ten-in-one show was equally standard. It did not have a mentalist, it did have a magician; it did not have a bearded lady, it did have a half-man half-woman; it did not have a sword swallower, it did have a fire eater. In place of a tattooed man the show had a tattooed lady who was also a snake charmer - and for the blow-off (at another half dollar per mark) she appeared "absolutely nude!… clothed only in bare living flesh in exotic designs!"-and any mark who could find one square inch below her neckline untattooed would be awarded a twenty dollar bill.

That twenty dollars had gone unclaimed all season, because the blowoff was honestly ballyhooed. Mrs. Paiwonski stood perfectly still and completely unclothed - other than in "bare, living flesh"… in this case a fourteen-foot boa constrictor known as "Honey Bun." Honey Bun was looped around Mrs. P. so strategically that even the local ministerial alliance could find no real excuse to complain, especially as some of their own daughters wore not nearly as much and covered still less while attending the carnival. To keep the placid, docile Honey Bun from being disturbed, Mrs. P. took the precaution of standing on a small platform in the middle of a canvas tank - on the floor of which were more than a dozen cobras.

The occasional drunk who was certain that all snake charmer's snakes were defanged and so tried to climb into the tank in pursuit of that undecorated square inch invariably changed his opinion as soon as a cobra noticed him, lifted and spread its hood.

Besides, the lighting wasn't very good.

However, the drunk could not have won the twenty dollars in any case. Mrs. P's claim was much sounder than the dollar. She and her late husband had had for many years a tattooing studio in San Pedro; when trade was slack they had decorated each other - and, eventually, at some minor inconvenience to herself, the art work on her was so definitively complete from her neck down that there was no possible room for an encore. She took great pride both in the fact that she was the most completely decorated woman in the world (and by the world's greatest artist, for such was her humbly grateful opinion of her late husband) and also in the certainty that every dollar she earned was honest.

She associated with grifters and sinners and did not hold herself aloof from them. But her own integrity was untouched. She and her husband had been converted by Foster himself, she kept her membership in San Pedro and attended services at the nearest branch of the Church of the New Revelation no matter where she was.

Patricia Paiwoush would gladly have dispensed with the protection of Honey Bun in the blow-off not merely to prove that she was honest (that needed no proof, since she knew it was true) but because she was serene in her conviction that she was the canvas for religious art greater than any on the walls or ceilings of the Vatican. When she and George had seen the light. there was still about three square feet of Patricia untouched before he died she carried a complete pictorial life of Foster, from his crib with the angels hovering around to the day of glory when he had taken his appointed place among the archangels.

Regrettably (since it might have turned many sinners into seekers of the light) much of this sacred history had to be covered up. the amount depending on the local lawmen. But she could show it in closed Happiness meetings of the local churches she attended, if the shepherd wanted her to, which he almost always did. But, while it was always good to add to Happiness, the saved did not need it; Patricia would rather have saved sinners. She couldn't preach, she couldn't sing, and she had never been called to speak in tongues but she was a living witness to the light.

In the ten-in-one, her act came next to last, just before the magician; this gave her time to put away unsold photographs of herself (a quarter for black amp; white, half a dollar in color, a set of special photographs for five dollars in a sealed envelope sold only to marks who signed a printed form alleging that they were doctors of medicine, psychology, sociology, or other such entitled to professional material not available to the general public - and such was Patricia's integrity that she would not sell these even for ten dollars if the mark did not look the part; she would then ask to see his business card - no dirty dollars were going to put her kids through school - and also gave her time to slip behind the rear canvas and get herself and her snakes ready for the blow-off.

The magician, Dr. Apollo, performed on the last platform nearest to the canvas fly leading to the blow-off. He started by passing out to his audience a dozen shiny steel rings, each as wide as a plate; he invited them to convince themselves that each ring was solid and smooth. Then he had them hold the rings so that they overlapped. Dr. Apollo walked along the platform, reached out with his wand and tapped each overlap - the solid steel links formed a chain.

Casually he laid his wand in the air, rolled up his sleeves, accepted a bowl of eggs from his assistant, and started to juggle half a dozen of them. His juggling did not attract too many eyes; his assistant was more worthy of stares. She was a fine example of modern functional design and, while she wore a great deal more than did the young ladies in the posing show, nevertheless there seemed to be a strong probability that she was not tattooed anywhere. The marks hardly noticed it when the six eggs became five, then four three, two - until at last Dr. Apollo was tossing one egg in the air, with his sleeves still rolled up and a puzzled look on his face. At last he said, "Eggs are getting scarcer every year," and tossed the remaining egg over the heads of those nearest the platform to a man in the back of the crowd. "Catch!"

He turned away and did not seem to notice that the egg never reached its destination.

Dr. Apollo performed several other tricks, while wearing always the same slightly puzzled expression and with the same indifferent patter. Once he called a young boy close to the platform. "Son, I can tell you what you are thinking. You think I'm not a real magician. And you're right. For that you win a dollar." He handed the kid a dollar bill. It disappeared.

The magician looked unhappy. "Dropped it? Well, hang on to this one." A second bill disappeared.

"Oh, dear. Well, we'll have to give you one more chance. Use both hands. Got it? All right, better get out of here fast with it - YOU should be home in bed anyhow." The kid dashed away with the money and the magician turned back and again looked puzzled "Madame Merlin, what should we do now?"

His pretty assistant came up to him, pulled his head down by one ear, whispered into it. He shook his head. "No, not in front of all these people."

She whispered again; he looked distressed. "I'm sorry, friends, but Madame Merlin insists that she wants to go to bed. Will any of you gentlemen help her?"

He blinked at the rush of volunteers - "Oh, just two of you. Were any of you gentlemen in the Army?"

There were still more than enough volunteers. Dr. Apollo picked two and said, "There's an army cot under the end of the platforms just lift up the canvasflow, will you set it up for her here on the platform? Madame Merlin, face this way, please."

While the two men set up the cot, Dr. Apollo made passes in the air at his assistant. "Sleep… sleep… you are now asleep. Friends, she is in a deep trance. Will you two gentlemen who so kindly prepared her bed now place her on it? One take her head, one take her feet. Careful, now - " In corpse-like rigidity the girl was transferred to the cot.

"Thank you, gentlemen. But we ought not to leave her uncovered, should we? There was a sheet here, somewhere. Oh, there it is." The magician reached out, recovered his wand from where he had parked it, pointed to a table laden with props at the far end of his platform; a sheet detached itself from the pile and came to him. "Just spread this over her. Cover her head, too; a lady should not be exposed to public gaze while sleeping. Thank you. Now if you will just step down off the platform. Fine! Madame Merlin… can you hear me?"

"Yes, Doctor Apollo."

"You were heavy with sleep. Now you are resting. You feel lighter, much lighter. You are sleeping on a bed of clouds. You are floating away on clouds - " The sheet-covered form raised slowly up about a foot. "Wups! Don't get too light. We don't want to lose you."

In the crowd, a boy in his late teens explained in a loud whisper, "She's not under the sheet now. When they put the sheet over her, she went down through a trap door. That's just a light framework, doesn't weigh as much as the sheet. And in a minute he'll flip the sheet away and while he does, the framework will collapse and disappear. It's just a gimmick - anybody could do it,"

Dr. Apollo ignored him and went on talking. "A little higher, Madame Merlin. Higher. There - " The draped form floated about six feet above the platform.

The smart youngster whispered to his friends, "There's a slender steel rod but you can't see it too easily. It's probably where one corner of the sheet hangs down there and touches the cot."

Dr. Apollo turned and requested his volunteers to remove the cot and put it back under the platform. "She doesn't need it now. She sleeps on clouds." He faced the floating form and appeared to be listening. "What? Louder, please. Oh? She says that she doesn't want the sheet - it's too heavy."

("Here's where the framework disappears.")

The magician tugged one corner of the sheet, snatched it away; the audience hardly noticed that the sheet disappeared without his bothering to gather it in; they were looking at Madame Merlin, still floating, still sleeping, six feet above the platform. The platform stood in the middle rear of the tent and the audience surrounded it on all sides. A companion of the boy who knew all about stage magic said, "Okay, Speedy, where's the steel rod?"

The kid said uncertainly, "You have to look where he doesn't want you to look, it's the way they've got those lights fixed to shine right into your eyes."

Dr. Apollo said, "That's enough sleep, fairy princess. Give me your hand. Wake up, wake up!" He took her hand, pulled her erect and helped her step down to the platform.

("You see? You saw how stiff she got down, you saw where she put her foot? That's where the steel rod went." The kid added with satisfaction, "Just a gimmick.")

The magician went on talking, "And now friends, if you will kindly give your attention to our learned lecturer, Professor Timoshenko-"

The talker cut in at once. "Don't go 'way! For this one performance only by arrangement with the Council of Colleges and Universities and with the permission of the Department of Safety and Welfare of this wonderful city, we are offering this twenty dollar bill absolutely free to any one of you-"

Most of the tip was turned into the blow-off. A few wandered around, then started to leave as most of the lights in the main tent were turned off. The freaks and other carnies started packing their props and slum preparatory to tear-down. There was a train jump coming in the morning and living tops would remain up for a few hours sleep, but canvas boys were already loosening stakes on the sideshow top.

Shortly the talker-owner-manager of the ten-in-one came back into the semi-darkened tent, having rushed the blow-off and spilled the last marks out the rear exit. "Smitty, don't go 'way. Got something for you." He handed the magician an envelope, which Dr. Apollo tucked away without looking at it. The manager added, "Kid, I hate to tell you this - but you and your wife ain't going with us to Paducah."

"I know."

"Well… look, don't take it hard, there's nothing personal about it - but I got to think of the show. We're replacing you with a mentalist team. They do a top reading act, then she runs a phrenology and mitt camp while he makes with the mad ball. We need 'em… and you know as well as I do you didn't have no season's guarantee. You were just on trial."

"I know," agreed the magician. "I knew it was time to leave. No hard feelings, Tim."

"Well, I'm glad you feel that way about it." The talker hesitated. "Smitty, do you want some advice? Just say no if you don't."

"I would like very much to have your advice," the magician said simply.

"Okay, you asked for it. Smitty, your tricks are good. Hell, some of 'em even got me baffled. But clever tricks don't make a magician. The trouble is you're not really with it. You behave like a carney - you mind your own business and you never crab anybody else's act and you're helpful if anybody needs it. But you're not a carney. You know why? You don't have any feeling for what makes a chump a chump; you don't get inside his mind. A real magician can make the marks open their mouths and catch flies just by picking a quarter out of the air. That Thurston's levitation you do - I've never seen it done any more perfectly but the marks don't warm to it. No psychology. Now take me, for example. I can't even pick a quarter out of the air - hell, I can barely use a knife and fork without cutting my mouth. I got no act… except I got the one act that counts. I know marks. I know where that streak of larceny is in his heart, I know just how wide it is. I know what he hungers for, whether he knows it or not. That's showmanship, son, whether you're a politician running for office, a preacher pounding a pulpit… or a magician. You find out what the chumps want and you can leave half your props in your trunk."

"I'm sure you're right."

"I know I am. He wants sex and blood and money. We don't give him any real blood - unless a fire eater or a knife thrower makes a terrible mistake. We don't give him money, either; we just encourage him to hope for it while we take away a little. We don't give him any real sex. But why do seven out of ten of a tip buy the blow-off? To see a nekkid broad, that's why - and a chance to be paid a double sawbuck for lookin' - when maybe they got one just as good or better at home, nekkid anytime they like. So he don't see one and he don't get paid - and still we send him out happy.

"What else does a chump want? Mystery! He wants to think that the world is a romantic place when he knows damn well it ain't. That's your job… only you ain't learned how. Shucks, son, even the marks know that your tricks are fake… only they'd like to believe they're real, and it's up to you to help 'em believe, as long as they're inside the show. That's what you lack."

"How do I get it, Tim? How do I learn what makes a chump tick?"

"Hell, I can't tell you that; that's the piece you have to learn for yourself. Get out and stir around and be a chump yourself a while, maybe. But- Well, take this notion you had of billing yourself as 'The Man from Mars.' You mustn't offer the chump what he won't swallow. They've all seen the Man from Mars, in pictures and on stereovision. Hell, I've seen him myself. Sure, you look a bit like him, same general type, a casual resemblance - but even if you were his twin brother, the marks know they won't find the Man from Mars in a ten-in-one in the sticks. It's as silly as it would be to bill a sword swallower as 'the President of the United States.' Get me? A chump wants to believe - but he won't thank you to insult what trace of intelligence he has. And even a chump has brains of a sort. You have to remember that."

"I will remember."

"Okay. I talk too much - but a talker gets in the habit. Are you kids going to be all right? How's the grouch bag? Hell, I oughtn't to do it - but do you need a loan?"

"Thanks, Tim. We're not hurtin' any."

"Well, take care of yourself. Bye, Jill." He hurried out.

Patricia Paiwonski came in through the rear fly, wearing a robe. "Kids? Tim sloughed your act."

"We were leaving anyhow, Pat."

"I knew he was going to. He makes me so mad I'm tempted to jump the show myself."

"Now, Pat-"

"I mean it. I could take my act anywhere and he knows it. Leave him without a blow-off. He can get other acts… but a good blow-off that the clowns won't clobber is hard to find."

"Pat, Tim is right, and Jill and I know it. I don't have showmanship."

"Well… maybe so. But I'm going to miss you. You've been just like my own kids to me. Oh, dear! Look, the show doesn't roll until morning - come back to my living top and set awhile and visit."

Jill said, "Better yet, Patty, come into town with us and have a couple of drinks. How would you like to soak yourself in a big, hot tub, with bath salts?"

"Uh, I'll bring a bottle."

"No," Mike objected, "I know what you drink and we've got it. Come along."

"Well, I'll come - you're at the Imperial, aren't you? - but I can't come with you. I've got to be sure my babies are all right first and tell Honey Bun I'll be gone a bit and fix her hot water bottles. I'll catch a cab. Half an hour, maybe."

They drove into town with Mike at the controls. It was a fairly small town, without automatic traffic control even downtown. Mike drove with careful precision, exactly at zone maximum and sliding the little ground car into holes Jill could not see until they were through them. He did it without effort in the same fashion in which he juggled. Jill knew how it was done, had even learned to do it a bit herself; Mike stretched his time sense until the problem of juggling eggs or speeding through traffic was an easy one with' everything in slow motion. Nevertheless she reflected that it was an odd accomplishment for a man who, only months earlier, had been baffled by tying shoelaces.

She did not talk. Mike could talk while on extended time, if necessary, but it was awkward to converse while they were running on different time rates. Instead she thought with mild nostalgia of the life they were leaving, calling it up in her mind and cherishing it, some of it in Martian concepts, more of it in English. She had enjoyed it very much. All her life, until she had met Mike, she had been under the tyranny of the clock, first as a little girl in school, then as a bigger girl in a much harder school, then under the unforgiving pressures of hospital routine.

The carnival had been nothing like that. Aside from the easy and rather pleasant chore of standing around and looking pretty several times a day from midafternoon to the last bally of the night, she never had anything she actually had to do at any set time. Mike did not care whether they ate once a day or six times, and whatever housekeeping she chose to do suited him. They had their own living top and camping equipment; in many towns they had never left the lot from arrival to tear-down. The carnival was a closed little world, an enclave, where the headlines and troubles of the outside world did not reach. She had been happy in it.

To be sure, in every town the lot was crawling with marks - but she had acquired the carney viewpoint; marks did not count - they might as well have been behind glass. Jill quite understood why the girls in the posing show could and did exhibit themselves in very little (and, in some towns, nothing, if the fix was solid) without feeling immodest… and without being immodest in their conduct outside the posing show. Marks weren't people to them; they were blobs of nothing, hardly seen, whose sole function was to cough up half dollars for the take.

Yes, the carnie had been a happy, utterly safe home, even though their act had flopped. It had not always been that way when first they left the safety of Jubal's home to go out into the world and increase Mike's education. They had been spotted more than once and several times they had had trouble getting away, not only from the press, but from the endless people who seemed to feel that they had a right to demand things of Mike, simply because he had the misfortune to be the Man from Mars.

Presently Mike had thought his features into more mature lines and had made other slight changes in his appearance. That, plus the fact that they frequented places where the Man from Mars would certainly not be expected (by the public) to go, got them privacy. About that time, when Jill was phoning home to give a new mailing address, Jubal had suggested a cover-up story - and a couple of days later Jill had read that the Man from Mars had again gone into retreat, this time in a Tibetan monastery.

The retreat had actually been "Hank's Grill" in a "nowhere" town, with Jill as a waitress and Mike as dishwasher. It was no worse than being a nurse and much less demanding - and her feet no longer hurt. Mike had a remarkably quick way of cleaning dishes, although he had to be careful not to use it when the boss was watching. They kept that job a week, then moved on, sometimes working, sometimes not. They visited public libraries almost daily, once Mike found out about them - Jill had discovered that Mike had taken for granted that Jubal's library contained a copy of every book on Earth. When he learned the marvelous truth, they had remained in Akron nearly a month. Jill did quite a lot of shopping that month, as Mike with a book was almost no company at all.

But Baxter's Combined Shows and Riot of Fun for All the Family had been the nicest part of their meandering trip. Jill recalled with an inner giggle the time in - what town? - no matter-when the entire posing show had been pinched. It wasn't fair, even by chumps' standards, since that concession always worked under precise prearrangement: bras or no bras; blue lights or bright lights; whatever the top town clown ordained. Nevertheless the sheriff had hauled them in and the local justice of the peace had seemed disposed not only to fine but to jail the girls as "vagrants."

The lot had closed down and most of the carnies had gone to the hearing, along with innumerable chumps slavering to catch sight of "shameless women" getting their come-uppance. Mike and Jill had managed to crowd against the back wall of the courtroom.

Jill had long since impressed on Mike that he must never do anything that an ordinary human could not do where it might be noticed. But Mike had grokked a cusp and had not discussed it with Jill.

The sheriff was testifying as to what he had seen, the details of this "public lewdness" - and he was enjoying it.

Mike had restrained himself, Jill admitted. In the midst of testimony both sheriff and judge became suddenly and completely without clothes of any sort.

She and Mike slipped quietly away during the excitement, and later she learned that the accused, all of them, had left, too, and nobody seemed disposed to object. Of course no one had connected the miracle with Mike, and he himself had never mentioned it to Jill - nor she to him; it was not necessary. The show had torn down at once and moved on two days early, to a more honest town where the rule was net bra and briefies and no beefs afterwards.

But Jill would treasure forever the expression on the sheriff's face, and his appearance, too, when it was plain to be seen that his sudden sag in front meant that the sheriff had been wearing a tight corset for his pride.

Yes, carnie days had been nice days. She started to speak to Mike in her mind, intending to remind him of how funny that hick sheriff had looked with creases from his girdle on his hairy pot belly. But she stopped. Martian had no concept for "funny" so of course she could not say it. They shared a growing telepathic bond - but in Martian only.

("Yes Jill?") his mind answered hers.

("Later.")

Shortly they approached the Imperial Hotel and she felt his mind slow down as he parked the car. Jill much preferred camping on the carnival grounds… except fox one thing: bathtubs. Showers were a1l right, but nothing could beat a big tub of hot, hot water, climb into it up to your chin and soak! Sometimes they checked into a hotel for a few days and rented a ground car. Mike did not, by early training, share her fanatic enthusiasm for scrubbing; he was now as fastidiously clean as she was - but only because she had trained him to be; it did not annoy him. Moreover, he could keep himself immaculate without wasting time on washing or bathing, just as he never had to see a barber once he knew precisely how Jill wanted his hair to grow. But Mike, too, liked the time spent in hotels for the sake of baptism alone; be enjoyed immersing himself in the water of life as much as ever, irrespective of a non-existant need to clean and no longer with any superstitious feeling about water.

The Imperial was a very old hotel and had not been much even when new, but the tub in what was proudly called the "Bridal Suite" was satisfactorily large. Jill went straight to it as they came in, started to fill it - and was hardly surprised to find herself suddenly ready for her bath, even to pretty bare feet, except that her purse was still clutched under her arm. Dear Mike! He knew how she liked to shop. how pleased she was with new clothes; he gently forced her to indulge her childish weakness by sending to neverwhere any outfit which he sensed no longer delighted her. He would have done so daily had she not cautioned him that too many new clothes would make them conspicuous around the carnival.

"Thanks, dear!" she called out. "Let's climb in."

He had either undressed or caused his own clothes to go away - probably the former she decided; Mike found buying clothes for himself without interest. He still could see no possible reason for clothes other than for simple protection against the elements, a weakness he did not share. They got into the tub facing each other; she scooped up a handful of water, touched it to her lips, offered it to him. It was not necessary to speak, nor was the ritual necessary; it simply pleased Jill to remind them both of something for which no reminder could ever be necessary, through all eternity.

When he raised his head, she said, "The thing I was thinking of while you were driving was how funny that horrid sheriff looked in his skin"

"Did be look funny?"

"Oh, very funny indeed! It was all I could do to keep from laughing out loud. But I did not want us noticed."

"Explain to me why he was funny. I do not see the joke."

"Uh… dear, I don't think I can explain it. It was not a joke - not like puns and things like that which can be explained."

"I did not grok that he was funny," Mike said seriously. "In both those men - the judge and the lawman - I grokked wrongness. Had I not known that it would displease you, I would have sent them both away."

"Dear Mike." She touched his cheek. "Good Mike. Believe me, dearest, it was better far to do only what you did do. Neither one of them will ever live it down - and I'll bet that there won't be another attempt to arrest anyone for indecent exposure in that township for another fifty years. Let's talk about something else. I have been wanting to say that I am sorry, truly sorry, that your act didn't go over. I did my best in writing the patter for it, dear - but I guess I'm no showman, either."

"It was my lack, Jill. Tim speaks rightly - I don't grok the chumps. Nevertheless it has been good to be with Baxter's Combined Shows… I have grokked closer to the chumps each day."

"Only we must not call them chumps any longer, nor marks, now that we are no longer with it. Just people - not 'chumps.'"

"I grok that they are chumps."

"Yes, dear. But it isn't polite to say so."

"I will remember."

"Have you decided where we are going now?"

"No. When the time comes, I will know."

"Yes, dear." Jill reflected that Mike always did know. From his first change from docility to dominance he had grown steadily in strength and sureness in all ways. The boy (he had seemed like a boy then) who had found it tiring to hold an ash tray in the air, could now not only hold her in the air (and it did feel like "floating on clouds"; that was why she had written it into the patter that way) while doing several other things and continuing to talk, but also could exert any other strength he needed. She recalled one very rainy lot where one of the trucks had bogged down. Twenty men were crowded around it, trying to get it free - Mike had added his shoulder… and the truck moved.

She had seen how it had happened; the sunken hind wheel had simply lifted itself out of the mud. But Mike, much more sophisticated now, had not allowed anyone to guess.

She recalled, too, when be had at last grokked that the injunction about "wrongness" being necessary before he could make things go away applied only to living, grokking things - her dress did not have to have "wrongness" for him to toss it away. The injunction was merely a precaution in the training of nestlings; an adult was free to do as he grokked.

She wondered what his next major change would be? But she did not worry about it; Mike was good and wise. All she could teach him were little details of how to live among humans - while leaning much more from him, in perfect happiness, greater happiness than she had known since her father died. "Mike, wouldn't it be nice to have Dorcas and Anne and Miriam all here in the tub, too? And Father Jubal and the boys and - oh, our whole family!"

"It would take a bigger tub."

"Who minds a little crowding? But Jubal's pool would do nicely. When are we making another visit home, Mike? Jubal asks me every time I talk to him."

"I grok it will be soon."

"Martian 'soon'? Or Earth 'soon'? Never mind, darling, I know it will be when the waiting is filled. But that reminds me that Aunt Patty will be here soon and I do mean Earth 'soon.' Wash me off?"

She stood up, he stayed where he was. The soap lifted out of the soap dish, traveled all over her, replaced itself, and the soapy layer slathered into bubbles of lather. "Oooh! That's enough. You tickle."

"Rinse?"

"I'll just dunk." Quickly she squatted down, sloshed suds off her, stood up. "Just in time, too."

Someone was knocking at the outer door. "Dearie? Are you decent?"

"Coming, Pat!" Jill shouted and added as she stepped out of the tub, "Dry me, please?"

At once she was dry, leaving not even wet footprints on the bath mat. "Dear? You'll remember to put on some clothes before you come out? Patty's a lady - not like me."

"I will remember."