Every Man's Fantasy Ch. 15

"But women's studies is worse than soft science. As a scientist, I want the facts (6% of engineers are women) not the interpretation (male prejudice keeps women out of science). At least allow me to investigate the interpretation; but all the soft sciences wrap the facts up together with their interpretations and some of them, especially women's studies, don't allow alternative interpretations at all. They call you a bigot for even thinking about them."

"I really upset Eva. When they recruited me into the feminist movement, I was given a book full of horrible misogynist statements by men, about how women are irrational, illogical, wanting both sides of the argument, irresponsible, blame-shifting, sexually inconstant and money-motivated, etc, etc.

"It realised later it was just hate-ammunition against men, especially because all the quotations were five hundred years old or more. But I told Eva there was an element of truth to some of the accusations of irrationality. I'm not saying women are irrational, but one small group of women are inconsistent, want both sides of the argument, shift the blame and are morally outraged if any one disagrees with them."

"What group?"

"Feminists, of course."

"I suppose Eva Welwyn didn't take that very well."

"Not at all. It wasn't screaming hysterics, thank God, but I'm a traitor to my sex and a cat's-paw, apparently."

"'Cat's-paw'? What a lovely old word! I like your friend, Eva. What did you say to that?"

"I'm afraid I was a bit priggish. I said: We're human before we're anything else and I'm not on the side of women against men nor men against women."

"Clever you, capturing the moral high-ground."

"I was sincere. I still am. I want a level playing-field; which means that men might do better than women in some things and women might do better than men in other things. But feminists want a level playing-field for things that women do better than men (such as psychology) and they want special privileges - subsidies and quotas - for things that men do better than women (such as physics)."

"Did you get the last word?"

"Only the last clean one."

After a few moments thought, Roger said:

"It's historically true that women have often gotten a raw deal."

"Yes, but not for the last five-hundred years. You're a liberal, Darling. You believe we should be equal before the law but how can you square liberalism with collective discrimination against one sex in favour of the other?"

"You're right, Darling. I'm with you completely. It should be a level playing-field."

There was nothing to add, so they enjoyed the peace of the garden until it was time to collect their suitcases and reluctantly leave Japan.

4 Capella Spaceport

Danielle and Roger took a stratoliner to Equatorial Africa, then the Commonwealth Spacelift to a hyperspace passenger ship, which threaded through a beacon in Earth-synchronous orbit to jump in an instant forty-two light-years to Capella.

From fifty-thousand miles away, Capella Spaceport was a dot among millions of luminous dots sprinkled heavily on the black curtain of space. It reflected light from Capella's four stars behind them, which powered a vast array of hyperspace beacons.

Three hours later, the Spaceport looked like a giant gyroscope with a spindle about ten miles long and a wheel three miles across. Huge radio dishes grew like mushrooms from the top of the spindle. More radio dishes adorned the outer surface of the wheel. The bottom of the spindle widened in two places into a lower Military Dock and an upper Freight Dock. Giant vessels attached themselves nose-first to the SpacePort like sucker-fish. Smaller vessels parked themselves half-way into the docks.

Above the wheel were another two docks: one for private vessels, the other for passenger ships.

Passengers passed from the docks through customs and hygiene, where they presented their health stamps or submitted to quarantine. Capella was a gateway to the outworld colonies, which were obsessive about disease. Then it was a lift and a moving pavement to the commercial and residential districts, which lined the outer-edge of the wheel, whose spin created an Earth-like artificial gravity.

Having shuffled through customs and hygiene, Danielle and Roger dropped their bags at a hotel and went out to get their bearings.

The rim of the wheel was divided into four quarters or causeways. The West Causeway had posh shops, banks and the better hotels. The North Causeway had the homes of the permanent residents, the school and a park with a zoo. The South Causeway had businesses, markets, food halls and the workshops of craftsmen who serviced the SpacePort. The East Causeway had the less salubrious bars, betting shops, a casino, pawn-brokers and brothels.

Danielle and Roger found the police-station between a pawnshop and a launderette in the middle of the East Causeway. Here they met the Constable of Capella Spaceport.

Arthur Jeffries was a hassled man in an ill-fitting blue uniform, sitting at a grubby table, buried beneath stacks of papers, open boxes, tablets and hand-scanners. Behind his messy desk was a steel safe with peeling paint. A well-used coffee-maker sat on top. There were projector screens with scrawled hand-writing on them and a water cooler against the other wall. There was no jail but there were a few rough-looking couches where drunks could sleep off the night's excesses. Ominous scratches on the legs of the couches suggested that some drunks had needed to be handcuffed in place.

"Excuse me, Sir?" Roger spoke from the door-way. "Can you help us?"

"That depends on what you want," the Constable answered from behind his stack of papers, not bothering to look up. His voice was a growl, from over-work rather than bad temper.

"We're in search of a missing person," Danielle said. "Her name is Yumi Takahashi."

A young woman's voice made him look up.

"Can't you just search for her on the 'net?" he asked. "Everyone's got a presence on the 'net."

"Not Yumi. She disappeared a year or so ago. She was last known to be on Capella."

Jeffries sighed and pushed the document he was working on to one side. He grabbed a nearby keypad and said:

"Spell her name for me."

Danielle did so and he picked the letters out with a forefinger, angrily poking the keypad as if it was the computer's fault he had too much work to do. Capella's database quickly revealed its secrets but Jeffries was unhappy. He sighed again.

"Who reported her missing?" he asked.

"No one, officially," Danielle said, "not yet."

He looked up at her again.

"So who are you?"

It was an aggressive question but Danielle answered patiently.

"I'm Danielle Harcourt and this is my husband Roger. We're friends of Yumi's family and said we'd find out if she's still here."

"Friends of Miss Takahashi are you?"

He sounded suspicious.

"Yes," said Roger, firmly.

"Look, I can't give you any information, not without authorisation. We have the right to privacy on Capella."

"I have a letter of attorney from Yumi's father."

She flipped the document from her communicator to his computer. He glanced at it, saw the Japanese jurisdiction, and said:

"That's no good here without authorisation."

"Who can authorise it?" she asked.

"A judge."

"So where can we find a judge?"

"Nearest judge is on Earth."

"Have you no legal authority here at all?"

"We have a Justice of the Peace."

"Well, can we see him?"

"No, because she's at work. She's the headmistress of our school. She sees cases in the evenings and at weekends. You'll have to wait in line."

"What about a Clerk of the Court?" Roger suggested.

"He visits once a week making his rounds of the outworld settlements. You missed him by a day."

Roger thought Danielle was doing very well to keep her patience.

"Look," Roger said: "all we want to know is when Yumi left Capella."

"And I can't give you that information without a proper court-order."

Constable Jeffries added more softly:

"I'd love to help you, just to get a break from this paper-work, but the law's clear. I can't give out private information until your document is authorised."

Roger turned to Danielle and whispered:

"Could your Dad pull some strings? He must know someone in authority."

"I could ask him, but I'm not sure he'd have time to do anything before we'd left here anyway."

"So what can we do?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said. "We should really just give it up and get on with our honeymoon, but I don't want to leave it like this, so unresolved."

"I know," Roger said. "I feel the same."

"There is one thing can we do," Danielle said, somewhat uncertainly.

"It's not to do with Yumi directly; but Ezra told me about a girlfriend who lived on Capella called Vesta. I was always pestering him about any girlfriend he might have, so I learned lots about her. I don't think anything came of the relationship, however, because he spent his last day here with Yumi instead of Vesta, but maybe she still lives here. If so, she might have some information."

"All right, let's do it."

Constable Jeffries had gone back to his paperwork but grudgingly looked up again when Danielle addressed him.

"Excuse me? Do you know a woman on Capella called Vesta? She's tall with dark-red hair and green eyes. Very pretty and always elegantly dressed."

"Vesta, you say?"

"Yes. She'd be about thirty now, I'd guess."

"It sounds like someone I know but her name's not Vesta and she doesn't look thirty. Who's this Ezra?"

"My brother. He's a planetary prospector who visits Capella often. Vesta is (or was) his girlfriend."

"A prospector?" Arthur Jeffries said, smiling: "and he used to visit this girl?"

"Yes," said Danielle, defiant in the face of the Constable's amusement. "Who is the someone you know like her?"

Jeffries had a wide grin now.

"Her name is Hestia."

"That's her," said Roger confidently. "Does it infringe your privacy laws to tell us where she lives?"

"Yes; but I can tell you where you can usually find her. No law against that. It's common knowledge she hangs out in the Goat and Chariot pub about eight blocks clock-wise along the Causeway. The barman there will tell you when he next expects her in. Good luck!"

As Danielle and Roger left to take the moving pavement to the pub, Constable Jeffries grinned to himself once more; then he frowned as he brought up Yumi's details on the screen again. He made a call, waited, got transferred and waited some more, until:

"Yes, I know she's busy," he growled into the communicator, "just let me speak to her, please?"

A few minutes later he reached the person he wanted, who listened to his explanation and agreed.

"Sending the document over now. Thank you, Ma'am."

Waiting for her reply, he sat tapping his finger on the desk, thinking, making up his mind. His computer pinged. He checked the screen. He made one more call, a long one, nodded to himself at the end, then grabbed his jacket and followed Danielle and Roger to the pub.

******

Hestia sat by herself at a table in the Goat and Chariot, with a computer tablet, a folder of printed documents and a frown. None of the tables near her was taken, though there were a dozen or so people, mostly young women, in the alcoves surrounding the small dance-floor in the corner. The bar was a metallic semi-circle opposite the entrance. The bearded barman wore a vibrant green flowery shirt and looked bored.

A few people wandered in and out of the pub. Sometimes a man would come in alone, buy a drink while he consulted the barman, then make his way to the corner where the girls were and leave with one of them.

From the entrance, Danielle and Roger saw a gorgeous young red-headed woman at a window, as far from the music as she could be. Ignoring the uninterested barman, they went straight over to Hestia's table.

"Excuse me, are you Hestia?" Danielle asked.

The woman looked up and quickly scanned their faces.

"I don't do couples," she said, dismissing them, returning to her tablet.

"What?" Danielle asked.

"Try the girls in the corner," Hestia said, without looking up. "One of them will accommodate you."

Danielle turned to look toward the corner of the bar. The girls there were beautifully made-up, very attractive in slutty revealing clothes. They sat silently around the table, looking as bored as the barman.

"Oh, gosh! They're ... . Roger, this can't be Vesta. Besides, she's too young."

"It's definitely her," he said with confidence. He addressed himself to Hestia.

"Excuse me, Ma'am? My name is Roger and this is my wife, Danielle. We believe you're a friend of Danielle's brother, Ezra."

"Ezra?"

She sounded vacant or cautious.

"Show her a photo, Danielle."

Danielle projected an image from her communicator onto the table-top. It was her brother and herself on the day he said goodbye before leaving for Capella. Hestia looked closely at the photo and then at Danielle and saw no reason to protect Ezra.

"I know Ezra very well. He's one of my favourite customers. How is he?"

"We don't know," Danielle said, ignoring for now the word 'customer'. "We've not seen him in more than a year. In fact, you may have seen him more recently than us."

"Really? Got himself lost has he? Where was he headed?"

"Samothea."

"Oh! Poor Ezra! He was such a gentleman. Such a good customer. Always so polite and clean. Never haggled about the price or asked for anything kinky. What a shame!"

There was no question now about what Hestia meant by calling Ezra her 'customer'; but Danielle was more shocked at her lack of compassion and sense of priorities.

"We're not ready to mourn him yet, Ma'am," Roger said.

That made Hestia look at him properly and realise what she'd been saying.

"I'm so sorry," she said. "I've been rude and thoughtless. My excuse is that I'm preoccupied at the moment."

She pushed her tablet and file aside, placing them face-down.

"Please, sit down. I hope nothing's happened to Ezra. Tell me how I can help."

Mollified by her sincerity, they sat down. Hestia was as charming as she was gorgeous, with an easy gracious smile and genuine concern in her beautiful green eyes.

"I wanted to meet you," Danielle said, "because I thought you were Ezra's girlfriend. He often mentioned how beautiful you were. He didn't do you justice."

"You're very sweet. Are you really Ezra's sister? I remember him talking about you. He was always so proud. What did he used to say? You were the youngest woman ever to graduate in your science."

"Youngest woman PhD in HyperSpace Engineering, actually; and please stop talking about him in the past tense."

"You're right. Never give up hope."

"I won't. ... However, I don't think you can help us regarding Ezra," Danielle said.

"I'm sorry."

"But you might help us find the woman with whom he spent his last day here on Capella. Her name is Yumi. This is her photo."

"I don't recognise her ..." Hestia said; yet a memory stirred in the back of her mind.

"... but I think I recall something about the last time I saw Ezra. ... Hmm? ... Yes, that's it!" Hestia exclaimed.

"Ezra came to see me here but I already had a customer. It was a real shame because Ezra was ... sorry, Ezra is a favourite of mine. He's always considerate, letting me finish first, you know ..."

Danielle cleared her throat.

"... yes, well," Hestia collected herself. "Ezra was having a drink with someone. It might have been this girl. Then he took her on a tour of the space-station. That's all I remember. ... Is there a problem contacting her?"

"She's gone missing. It's a long story but her family asked us to find out what we can about where she's gone."

"So why seek me out?" Hestia wondered.

"That was for me," Danielle admitted. "I wanted to meet Ezra's girlfriend, just to talk to someone who knows him, to remind me of him."

"I understand. Sorry I'm not quite what you expected."

"It's all right."

It wasn't really all right but, once past the shock, Danielle was warming to Hestia, though she didn't like hearing what a good customer Ezra was. Then she remembered:

"By the way, Roger, how come you were so certain that Hestia was Vesta?"

"Vesta?" Hestia asked.

"Ezra told me your name was Vesta. ... Roger, why would Ezra give Hestia the name Vesta?"

"Classical mythology, Darling. Hestia was the Greek goddess of the hearth and Vesta was more or less her Roman equivalent. I think he was having fun, too. The most famous thing people know about Vesta is that the company of priestesses who served her were called the Vestal Virgins."

"Virgins! Ha!" Hestia laughed. "Was Hestia a virgin goddess?"

"Yes."

"I didn't know. I chose the name 'Hestia' only because I liked the sound."

She paused a second, then she said to Danielle:

"Send your husband to the bar and let's have a real chat, woman to woman."

Roger obeyed, collecting their drink-orders and taking his time to talk pointlessly to the slow barman, giving the women time to get to know each other.

"I can tell you disapprove of me," Hestia began.

"I said nothing," Danielle protested.

"You didn't need to: your eyes said it all. ... I don't mind. I could justify myself to you but I won't. What I do isn't respectable on Earth but it's respectable here. It's legal and it serves a need. I make a good living and I'm proud of what I do."

"I'm not judging you."

"Well you should. It's inhuman not to judge."

Hestia smiled, leaning back in her chair, friendly and relaxed.

"Come on, Danielle. Ask me whatever you want. I know you're curious."

Danielle really wasn't curious about Hestia but she did want to know more about Hestia's relationship to her brother. It seemed to be something more than just a casual relationship between a prostitute and a punter. Doubtless Ezra visited many whores on many different worlds: her image of him as a knight errant in stainless armour was gone forever; yet the question remained: why did Ezra pretend that this woman was his girlfriend? What was so special about Hestia?

"I don't want you to justify yourself," Danielle said. "I want you to justify Ezra."

Hestia laughed.

"Ezra's armour is looking a little stained is it?"

Danielle's surprised look revealed exactly how well Hestia had read her mind. She laughed again.

"It's the easiest thing in the world to justify Ezra. What's the alternative: break some nice girl's heart by leaving her to pine at home while he shags his way across the galaxy?"

"He'd never do that!"

"He's a man, he has urges. Of course he'd do that, if he hadn't decided to keep his sexual relationships pain-free and professional. Ezra is a good man, Danielle. He's considerate, generous and honest, exactly the man you know him to be. It's because of his virtues that he fulfils his needs with someone who won't be hurt when he leaves next day and maybe never comes back."

Danielle wasn't convinced.

"There are prospectors who are married and stay loyal to their wives," she insisted.

"I doubt it," Hestia replied, cynically. "You could also say there are women prospectors and married couples who prospect together. But there are few of them and none of the women want to settle down and have a family. My guess is that Ezra ultimately wants to settle down. In fact, I think I recall him saying so."

This was true. Danielle knew that, at their mother's insistence, Ezra had agreed this trip would be his last and, when he got home, he would find a woman to marry and raise children (or, if he didn't find one himself, then Mariotta would do so for him).

"Face it," Hestia persisted: "most women who fall for prospectors end up heart-broken. Either her lover cheats on her or he gets killed. In both cases, she's left at home, lonely and sad. It's more chivalrous for him not to entangle a woman in a romantic relationship. Believe me, Ezra is being a gentleman here - besides keeping me and my kind in business, oiling the wheels of outworld commerce, you know. It's his heart you should be worried about."