"I'm a little fool," she said through clenched teeth. "Of course you'll be back. And you'd better make it quick, or I'll come after you."
He kissed her, rumpled her short hair, straightened her crumpled body on the bed, pulled the sheet over her.
"Why don't you go back to sleep," he suggested. "Rest. I'll have breakfast in the E club room. That's where we'll be watching the Eden briefing. Sleep. Sleep all morning."
Gently he closed her eyes with the tip of his forefinger. Gently he kissed her once more. This time she didn't cling to him, try to hold him.
He tucked the sheet in around her throat. Dutifully, she kept her eyes closed. He stood up then, and signaled the orderly.
"I'll take my shower now," he said.
The orderly didn't speak, just followed him into the bathroom to stand in the doorway and watch him through the shower glass. He was rigidly obeying the cardinal rule of E.H.Q.
Unless his life is in danger, never interrupt the thinking of an E. The whole course of man's destiny in the universe may depend on it.
How much of the future of the universe depended upon his not interrupting the scene he had just witnessed wasn't for him to say. He sighed. He thought of his own wife—shrewish, fat, coarse, always complaining. He wondered what she would do if he picked her up, carried her to bed, closed her eyes with his fingers. For once, he'd bet, she'd be speechless.
He must try it sometime. But first, she'd have to lose about fifty pounds.