Gurgeh sat down, taking the small, pale hand of the frightened-looking girl on Boruelal's right. She was wearing something dark and shapeless, and was in her early teens, at most. He smiled with a slight frown, glancing at the professor, trying to share the joke of her inebria with the young blonde girl, but Olz Hap was looking at his hand, not his face. She let her hand be touched but then withdrew it almost immediately. She sat on her hands and stared at her plate.

Boruelal breathed deeply, seeming to gather herself together. She took a drink from a tall glass in front of her.

"Well," she said, looking at Gurgeh as though he'd only just appeared. "How are you, Jernau?"

"Well enough." He watched Mawhrin-Skel manoeuvre itself beside Olz Hap, floating over the table beside her plate, fields all formal blue and green friendliness.

"Good evening," he heard the drone say in its most avuncular voice. The girl brought her head up to look at the machine, and Gurgeh listened to their conversation at the same time as he and Boruelal talked.

"Hello."

"Well enough to play a game of Stricken?"

"Mawhrin-Skel's the name. Olz Hap, am I right?"

"I think so, Professor. Are you well enough to invigilate?"

"Yes. How do you do."

"Fuck me, no; drunk as a desert spring. Have to get somebody else. Suppose I could come down in time but… naa…"

"Oh, ah, shake fields with me, eh? That's very sweet of you; so few people bother. How nice to meet you. We've all heard so much."

"How about the young lady herself?"

"Oh. Oh dear."

"What?"

"What's wrong? Have I said something wrong?"

"Is she ready to play?"

"No, it's just—"

"Play what?"

"Ah; you're shy. You needn't be. Nobody'll force you to play. Least of all Gurgeh, believe me."