"Lazy?"
"Lazy," she repeated. "Want it both barrels, or will you take it with sugar?"
"Hard. What's wrong with me?"
"You're educated. You know a lot. You've explained things that neither Mr. Andrews nor I had ever dreamed of, let alone understood. You know your way around spacecraft, know a lot of the basic sciences. Not that you'd ever be a scientist, but you're bright enough to grasp the idea and make it work. But what do you do about it? You jockey a spacer, instead of digging in and making it pay off. You look for the easy way out instead of working for it." Alice looked up at him sharply to see how he was taking it, and then she added, "You have the only brain present that has the mental right to stand up and direct operations. Instead, you argue and backstep."
Harshly he said, "What would you have me do—take a swing at Napoleon when he sits on those short hind legs of his and objects or demands?"
"I don't know. I'm not a spaceman, responsible for the lives of three people—at a hundred clams an hour."
"Some day I'm going to shove those hundred fish down your throat."
"Do. And I'll spit 'em back at you!"
Norton roughly took her shoulders in his hands. He twisted her to face him, clamped down on her soft shoulders until she turned her face up to complain with welling eyes. He put his lips on hers and tried to force some warmth into them. She submitted calmly, and when he found no response and opened his eyes, she was staring at him vacantly.
Abruptly he let her go. She relaxed in the seat.