Alger Wilde, I might as well explain here, is a makron from the word glorm, if you'll pardon my language. He's been trying, in his smirking way, to get in with Suzi for almost as many years as I have, and until I won the championship was doing at least as well as I. His strong point was the fact that he was even further around the corner in regard to the ancients than was Suzi. They could sit and talk for hours about the primitive comic books and other cultural matters that the average person had no interest in whatsoever.
I still didn't know what all the clapping was about, and I still didn't like the raucous music, but I ignored it all and made my way toward their table, rehearsing to myself what I was going to say to Suzi.
When I got nearer, the two of them, self-consciously, also came to their feet and both made with feeble applause to the extent of clapping their hands together once or twice.
I said, "What goes on here?"
We all sat down—with me congratulating myself that Suzi didn't object—and Suzi, her eyes shining, gushed, "Oh Jak, isn't it wonderful?"
I said, "I guess so. What?" I looked around the room in irritation. "What's all the noise about? I can hardly hear ourselves talk."
Alger Wilde said stiffly, "It's the new anthem, The Solar System Forever. Very patriotic. It was just completed by a staff of more than three hundred of the System's outstanding musicians. I understand that it's being played on every viziscreen on nine planets and twenty satellites. On order of the governments of all Solar System League members, the musicians rushed it through."
"It sounds like it," I growled. At least everybody had sat down again and were eating their lunch.
The stars were still in Suzi's eyes. She said softly, "It's dedicated to you, Jak."