he lay in bed later, wondering what jeannette could have meant, what could account for that brief hurt look.

she was an attractive girl, he thought idly. he wondered why he felt nothing for her, when the native girl aroused in him such an unreasonable longing. it would be a good deal more convenient to fall for jeannette.

he couldn't afford to get mixed up with his maid.

remembering her, he suddenly felt his body trembling.

all right, he told himself, so she's an ignorant, backward native on a planet nobody ever heard of. practically a savage. and even here, she's just a maid, a cleaning woman. nobody a planetary administrator could think about getting mixed up with. but how do they turn them out like that?

how do they turn them out like that, he thought—every movement fluid, every position graceful, every gesture exquisite? how does this nonentity of a planet turn out a girl with the kind of walk the video-stars back home practice and work years to approach? with a voice with that indescribable music and precision? with a flawless skin, radiant hair, a serenity and self-confidence that would make the greatest beauties on terra envious? with a quiet, careless pride that made him, the new ruler of her planet, awkward and insecure in the presence of his own servant?

jeannette had been jealous, he realized suddenly. she was jealous of these girls, of their grace, of their radiance. her cynicism covered a bitter envy.

for a long time he lay there, trying to sleep, haunted by nanae's luminous eyes.