Free Job: A Comedy of Justice by Robert A. Heinlein

dinner each evening I would return to my room for a few minutes to refresh myself before the evening’s activities—lounge show, concert, games, or perhaps just a return to the library. At that hour Margrethe would be somewhere in the starboard forward passageway of C deck, opening beds, tidying baths, and so forth—making her guests’ staterooms inviting for the night. Again I would say hello, then wait in my room (whether she had yet reached it or not) because she would come in shortly, either to open my bed or simply to inquire, “Will you need anything more this evening, sir?”
    And I would always smile and answer, “I don’t need a thing, Margrethe. Thank you.” Whereupon she would bid me good night and wish me sound sleep. That ended my day no matter what else I did before retiring.
    Of course I was tempted—daily!—to answer, “You know what I need!” I could not. Imprimis: I was a married man. True, my wife was lost somewhere in another world (or I was). But from holy matrimony there is no release this side of the grave. Item; Her love affair (if such it was) was with Graham, whom I was impersonating. I could not refuse that evening kiss (I’m not that angelically perfect!) but in fairness to my beloved I could not go beyond it. Item: An honorable man must not offer less than matrimony to the object of his love…and that I was both legally and morally unable to offer.
    So those golden days were bittersweet. Each day brought one day nearer the inescapable time when I must leave Margrethe, almost certainly never to see her again.
    I was not free even to tell her what that loss would mean to me.
    Nor was my love for her so selfless that I hoped the separation would not grieve her. Meanly, self-centered as an adolescent, I hoped that she would miss me as dreadfully as I was going to miss her. Childish puppy love—certainly! I offer in extenuation the feet that I had known only the “love” of a woman who loved Jesus so much that she had no real affection for any flesh-and-blood creature.
    Never marry a woman who prays too much.
    We were ten days out from Papeete with Mexico almost over the skyline when this precarious idyll ended. For several days Margrethe had seemed more withdrawn each day. I could not tax her with it as there was nothing I could put my finger on and certainly nothing of which I could complain. But it reached crisis that evening when she tied my tie.
    As usual I smiled and thanked her and kissed her.
    Then I stopped with her still in my arms and said, “What’s wrong? I know you can kiss better than that. Is my breath bad?”
    She answered levelly, “Mr. Graham, I think we had better stop this.”
    “So it’s ‘Mr. Graham,’ is it? Margrethe, what have I done?”
    “You’ve done nothing!”
    “Then—My dear, you’re crying!”
    “I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to.”
    I took my handkerchief, blotted her tears, and said gently, “I have never intended to hurt you. You must tell me what’s wrong so that I can change it.”
    “If you don’t know, sir, I don’t see how I can explain it.”
    “Won’t you try? Please!” (Could it be one of those cyclic emotional disturbances women are heir to?)
    “Uh… Mr. Graham, I knew it could not last beyond the end of the voyage—and, believe me, I did not count on any more. I suppose it means more to me than it did to you. But I never thought that you would simply end it, with no explanation, sooner than we must.”
    “Margrethe… I do not understand.”
    “But you do know!”
    “But I don’t know.”
    “You must know. It’s been eleven days. Each night I’ve asked you and each night you’ve turned me down. Mr. Graham, aren’t you ever again going to ask me to come back later?”
    “Oh. So that’s what you meant! Margrethe—”
    “Yes, sir?”
    “I’m not ‘Mr. Graham.’”
    “Sir?”
    “My name is ‘Hergensheimer.’ It has been exactly eleven days since I saw you for the first time in my life. I’m sorry.