The robot clicked disapprovingly, gurgled briefly inside its cubical interior and extruded a pony glass of brownish liquid. "Sir, you will undoubtedly end up in a drunkard's grave, dead of hepatic cirrhosis," it informed me virtuously as it returned my ID card. I glared as I pushed the glass across the table.
"Robots," I said contemptuously. It was lost on that metallic monstrosity. It was already rolling away toward another table.
The spaceman poured the pony glass into his Napoleon, sniffed appreciatively, sipped delicately and extended a meaty hand. "My name's Halsey," he said. "Captain Roger Halsey. I skipper the Two Two Four."
"The Bureau ship that landed this morning?"
He nodded. "Yeah. I'm one of the Bureau's brave boys." There was a faint sneer in his voice. "The good old Bureau of Extraterrestrial Exploration. The busy BEE." He failed to pronounce the individual letters. "You're a reporter, aren't you?" he asked suddenly.
"How'd you guess?"
"That little trick of not answering an introduction. Most of you sludge pumpers do it, but I never knew why."
"Libel and personal privacy laws," I said. "If you don't know who we are, you can't sue."
He grinned. "Okay. I don't care. Keep your privacy. All I want is someone to talk to."
I smiled inwardly.