"Hi," she said. "How do you feel?"
"Quite mild," Hal admitted with wonder. "Odd, too. That junk you fed me last night must have some very efficient drug in it."
"Junk I fed you last night?" Lois echoed, sitting up. Then she laughed her amusement. "Oh, you mean that soup. That wasn't last night, Hal Webber. That was last week."
"But—I just woke up," he protested.
"Yes." She smiled at him, reaching up and patting his cheek affectionately. "You've been a little delirious. Gravity trauma, very common. You get used to it fast, but that's one thing they didn't condition you to, I guess, and your conscious promptly rejected the possibility."
Sudden remembrance came to Hal of the agony it had been to move the last time he remembered trying it. Cautiously he lifted an arm and flexed it. He glanced back at Lois, who was watching him with amusement. "It feels all right now. Heavy and clumsy, but no pain."
"Good." She stood up and brushed her unruly hair away from her forehead. "I'll fix your breakfast just as soon as I take my bath, all right?" she said. Hal nodded absently. The stream was twenty yards away, and Lois walked quickly over to it. There she pulled her jumper over her head and dove into the crystal water. "Eeii, it's cold!" she shrieked. Her vigorous splashing threw sharp brilliance in the early morning sunlight. After a few minutes, she came out, letting the water dry on her soft, golden skin.
Hal was watching her in open-mouthed admiration. It was a most remarkable sensation, this pleasure at seeing her move in that lithe, supple way. He had never before experienced such a thing.
As she came up on the grassy bank, she noticed his rapt gaze, and quickly snatched up her single garment and held it in front of her. "All right," she told him briskly. "You too. You're much too big for me to handle effectively, so you haven't had a decent bath since we got here. And it gets pretty hot during the day."
Obediently, as if in a vic-spell, Hal stood up and walked to the water's edge, keeping his eyes on her.