"Oui." The Martian kid grinned, his mouth full of purple teeth. "I keep you company on your first night in Hoover City, n'est-ce-pas?"
"This isn't my first night here," Ben lied. "I've been around a while."
"You are spacemen?"
Ben threw a fifty-cent credit piece on the table. "Here. Take off, will you?"
Spiderlike fingers swept down upon the coin. "Ich danke, senor. You know why city is called Hoover City?"
Ben didn't answer.
"They say it is because after women come, they want first thing a thousand vacuum cleaners for dust. What is vacuum cleaner, monsieur?"
Ben raised his hand as if to strike the boy.
"Ai-yee, I go. You keep listen to good Martian music."
The toothpick of a body melted into the semi-darkness.