She also hadn’t stopped the mail or papers or arranged for her car to be picked up. It was too late to call anybody who could do much tonight; she’d have to call Hester, the department secretary, from Brazil tomorrow.

She went over to the window and looked out on the field. The sun was getting low, and the tinted windows reflected her image back through the view. God! I look awful! she thought, worried now about first impressions. She hadn’t really realized how much she’d let herself go. She was becoming a real chubette, even in the face, and the very short haircut that had proved so convenient and would also be best for the tropics somehow looked very masculine against that face. I look like a middle-aged bull dyke, she thought unhappily. She was supposed to go on TV looking like this!

She was suddenly struck with a twinge of panic. What if the television people saw her and decided that there was no way somebody looking like her could go on? What if they told her at the last minute that they were getting somebody from the observatories in Chile? There had to be quite a scientific team assembling there for this event.

It was the deserted civil aviation terminal, she told herself. Rushing around from a standing start and then being dropped into this lonely silence. She wasn’t very convincing, however. She was getting old and fat and unattractive at an accelerating rate, and it scared the living hell out of her.

She kept going to the windows and peering out at the Learjet, wondering if she shouldn’t be outside, even in the dark. They might miss her, might not even know she was there.

Suddenly she heard voices approaching. The door opened, and two people walked in.