Show Business

by Boyd Ellanby

Here's the behind-the-scenes lowdown on Luna City life and a promoter of Martian dancing girls, vaudeville, and—other things. But remember: stop us if you've heard this one!

SHOW BUSINESS

By Boyd Ellanby

Illustrated by Mel Hunter

Except for old Dworken, Kotha's bar was deserted when I dropped in shortly after midnight. The ship from Earth was still two days away, and the Martian flagship would get in next morning, with seven hundred passengers for Earth on it. Dworken must have been waiting in Luna City a whole week—at six thousand credits a day. That's as steep to me as it is to you, but money never seemed to worry Dworken.

He raised the heavy green lids from his protruding brown eyes as I came in. He waved his tail.

"Sit down and join me," he invited, in his guttural voice. "It is not good for a man to drink alone. But I haf no combany in dis by-de-gods-deserted hole. A man must somet'ing be doing, what?"

I sat down in the booth across from my Venusian friend, and stared at him while he punched a new order into the drinkboard.

"For me, another shchikh," he announced. "And for you? De same?"