But it was not as easy as it sounded; he instinctively appreciated that, expanded frontal lobe-wise. You can’t make healthy people sick just by giving an order.

Or can you?

Excusing himself, he hunted up the robot waiter, and asked that a vidphone be brought to his table.

A few moments later he was in touch with Miss Gleason back at the office. “Listen, I want to see Miss Rondinella Fugate, from Mr. Mayerson’s staff, as soon as I get back. And Mr. Mayerson is not to know. Understand?”

“Yes sir,” Miss Gleason said, making a note.

“I heard,” Pia Jurgens said, when he had hung up. “You know, I could tell Mr. Mayerson; I see him nearly every day in the—”

Leo laughed. The idea of Pia Jurgens throwing away the burgeoning future opening for her vis-à–vis himself amused him. “Listen,” he said, patting her hand, “don’t worry; it’s not within the spectrum of human nature. Finish your Ganymedean wap-frog croquette and let’s get back to the office.”

“What I meant,” Miss Jurgeris said stiffly, “is that it seems a little odd to me that you’d be so open in front of someone else, someone you don’t hardly know.” She eyed him, and her bosom, already overextended and enticing, became even more so; it expanded with indignation.

“Obviously the answer is to know you better,” Leo said, greedily. “Have you ever chewed Can-D?” he asked her, rhetorically. “You should. Despite the fact that it’s habit forming. It’s a real experience.” He of course kept a supply, grade AA, on hand at Winnie-the-Pooh Acres; when guests assembled it often was brought out to add color to what otherwise might have passed as dull. “The reason I ask is that you look like the sort of woman who has active imagination, and the reaction you get to Can-D depends—varies with—your imaginative-type creative powers.”

“I’d enjoy trying it sometime,” Miss Jurgens said. She glanced about, lowered her voice, and leaned toward him. “But it’s illegal.”