"The service at this table is unspeakable!" Kark Al, the little Martian, told Crane indignantly. "We've been waiting a quarter hour. I'm going to speak to the captain-"
Crane only half listened to their voices. The TSS man was keenly studying the Jovian and Saturnian. He was remembering how the necks of the men in Doctor Alph's house had been broken with one snap.
Only a Jovian or Saturnian had the physical strength to do such a thing! And these two were the only representatives of their worlds in the dining saloon. Was one of them the man with whom Crane was struggling blindly? His heart began to beat a little faster.
"This is my table, isn't it? My name is Lalla Dee," an uncertain, girlish voice said.
It was a Venusian girl who was claiming the last empty chair at the table. She was young and pretty. She wore a white silk dress, and her dark eyes were shining with naive excitement as she looked over the glittering saloon. Crane introduced everyone to her.
"This is my first trip off Venus," Lalla Dee told Crane shyly. "I just won a contest in college — the first prize was a trip to Earth. Isn't it wonderful — people of five different worlds right at this table!"
Crane smiled and said, "Yes, and all of them hungry. It looks as though our steward had forgotten us completely."
"It's an outrage!" declared Kark Al angrily.
"Not gonna wait any longer for steward. I'm hungry," the drunken young Earthman, Ennimer, said owlishly.
And calmly the drunk took one of the exquisite Venusian flame orchids from the center vase, salted it, and began to eat it. Lalla Dee giggled, and Kark Al snorted in disgust.