He said now, “Cheers, Lieutenant. What spins? Thought you were due for a patrol along in here. How come you’re back so soon? Didn’t expect to see you for maybe another couple of weeks.”

Don Mathers looked at him coldly. He said, “You prying into security subjects, Harry? I was on a… special mission. Top confidential.”

Harry wiped the bar with a dirty bar rag, distressed. He said, earnestly, “Well gee, no Lieutenant. You know me. I know all the boys. I was just making conversation.”

“Well, make it with somebody else,” Don said with less than graciousness. “Look, Harry, how about some more credit? I don’t have any pay coming up for a week. My Universal Credit Card is down to its last few pseudo-dollars.”

“Why, sure, Lieutenant. I ever turned you down? You’re into me more than anybody ever comes in here. But, you know me. I never turned down a spaceman in my life. And that goes double for a real pilot. I got a boy serving on the New Taos, you know, the light cruiser.”

Don Mathers knew, all right. He’d heard about it often enough.

Harry was saying, “Any spaceman’s credit is good with me. What’ll it be?”

“Tequila.”

Tequila was the only concession the Nuevo Mexico Bar made to its name, save two sick cactus plants in pots which flanked the entry. Otherwise, the place looked like every other bar has looked in every land and in every era, save the new automated, sterile horrors that were taking over these days.

Harry turned and reached out for a bottle of Sauza. He put it on the bar and took up a lime and cut it into four quarters, then reached back and got a shaker of salt. He took a two-ounce shot glass and filled it carefully with the water-colored liquid H-Bomb.