At the first opportunity, he swung her without a break to a small observation lounge, and in the cold green glow of a million stars drew her to him, letting himself be stunned by the warmth of her and the drugging quality of her perfume. He kissed her. He was carried away into a land of intricate enchantment where Love is All, and the Girl in my Arms is You.
She opened her eyes, looking at him dreamily. "I love you," she murmured.
"I know," said Unterzuyder.
"I don't know what your intentions are. I don't care what kind of a sneaky, underhanded person you are, I still love you."
He kissed her again. She was crying. Unterzuyder took out his handkerchief and wiped away her tears. "Now don't worry, Fayette," he soothed. "Everything will turn out all right." He took her back to the dance floor. By luck he found the young husband she'd been dancing with. He gave her back.
"Sorry!" he said. He gave Fayette a fleeting smile and hurriedly took off.
He went to his cabin and feverishly got to work. Plug up the loopholes as you go along! A favorite axiom of the Unterzuyders. Now that Fayette was in love with him, he could draw on her for any emergency.
Apparently the time was coming when he would need an ally.
He ran the negative through the hypo, put it in the dryer and paced the floor. He rubbed at his lips with the back of his hand. He could still smell Fayette's perfume. He could still feel her bare warm back. Careful, careful. He went to a mirror and looked at his face. Weak. The glassless eyes red-rimmed. Thin nose and lips. His spirits dropped. How could Fayette be in love with him? Particularly when he was one of the outlawed Unterzuyders.
The finished photograph went into the automatic pantograph. He blew it up six times onto a square of Mirac paper. He smoothed the new map onto the desk. Instantly he saw why at first the map had appeared so impossibly distorted. The circles did not indicate the orbits of the planets. They were merely a logarithmic indication of the scale of the map.