Wheeler shrank. "But I thought—"
"Never mind what you thought. Fill his order. Send it compliments of—let's see, Gauyuth-Six is uncommitted—compliments of the Western Cluster."
It was a fine morning on McWorther's World. Cotton-candy clouds floated over the fields. Dreaming herons, balanced on slender legs, gave the shallows of the lake a tufted appearance. A delightful breeze, artificially generated at the equator, wafted flowering stalks and rocked the air car and spaceabout at their moorings.
Titus snorted on the veranda and reached for his julep. He was a chunky little man, with the ruddiness of good health tinting his face and overflowing onto his partly bald pate.
"Where are you, Titus?" an anxious voice disturbed the quiet of the house.
"Out here, Love."
Edna appeared in the doorway. Despite her age, there was still the fascination in her timeless eyes that had snared Titus more than ninety years ago.
"The chef burned the beans again," she said, frowning.
"Guess I'll have to fix it."