She hesitated, smiled and said modestly, "We're gods."
It took Chandler's breath away—not because it was untrue, but because it had never occurred to him that gods were aware of their deity.
"We're gods, love, with the privilege of electing mortals to the club. Don't judge us by anything that has gone before. Don't judge us by anything. We are a New Thing. We don't have to conform to precedent because we upset all precedents. From now on, to the end of time, the rules will grow from us."
She patted her lips briskly with a napkin and said, "Would you like to see something? Let's take a little walk."
She took him by the hand and led him across the room, out to a sundeck on the other side of the restaurant. They were looking down on what had once been a garden. There were people in it; Chandler was conscious of sounds coming from them, and he was able to see that there were dozens of them, perhaps a hundred, and that they all seemed to be wearing suntans like his own.
"From Tripler?" he guessed.
"No, love. They pick out those clothes themselves. Stand there a minute."
The girl in the coronet walked out to the rail of the sundeck, where pink and amber spotlights were playing on nothing. As she came into the colored lights there was a sigh from the people in the garden. A man walked forward with an armload of leis and deposited them on the ground below the rail.
They were adoring her.
Rosalie stood gravely for a moment, then nodded and returned to Chandler.