Star Wars - Kenobi

course of diners with questions about his earlier rescue. Who was he? Where was he from? Didn’t he know no one with good sense went out onto The Rumbles? Where did he live, and would he like to know how to adjust his vaporator? Would he like to buy a landspeeder, so he didn’t have to hitchhike with Jawas? Had he come from offworld, and if so, what was really going on with the Republic? Seeing the man blanch a little at the barrage, Annileen hustled him toward the front of the store. “Press conference after he’s done shopping.”
    “Sure, sure.” Leelee stood, arms crossed, surveying Ben as only a lusty Zeltron could. “Keep the new arrival to yourself.”
    Annileen turned her head and whispered, “You have a husband and five kids!”
    “And a pulse,” Leelee said, a hand on her own red-skinned wrist. She smiled. “Bring him back soon.”
    The newcomer’s head sank a little lower. Annileen looked up the aisle, alarmed. More patrons were looking at them—and now the Gaults were inside, studying the new arrival. She had to do something.
    “Excuse me,” she said, leaving Ben by a rack of shirts. She walked to her counter and hopped up on it. Standing, she cupped her hands together and shouted in her best last-call voice, “Now hear this! This is a one-time-only event. The Jawa embargo is off. Shop! ”
    It took a moment for the words to register—and then bedlam. Ben stood back, startled, as a flood of customers rushed for the exit. Some at the bar remained, but all the gawkers left.
    Ben looked up, obvious thanks on his face. “A special occasion, I take it.”
    “I always said the Jawas might be good for something someday,” she said.
    “You never know what role someone will play,” he murmured. He watched her thoughtfully as he helped her down off the counter.

CHAPTER NINE
    THE METAL TUB WAS full. Overfull, in fact. Annileen had taken advantage of the calm to walk Ben through every aisle of the store, helping him find the items on his list—and many things that weren’t. She’d even pointed out which cheaper imported products were just as good as the more expensive local ones. Had any of her regulars overheard her, she’d have been mortified.
    Nobody got this kind of service.
    And he’d responded to it, Annileen thought. “This store is a living thing to you,” he had remarked. A strange observation, to be sure. Almost poetic, coming from a—a what? She didn’t know. Ben hadn’t told her anything substantive about himself.
    “Where are you from, Ben?”
    “All about, really.”
    “Why are you here?”
    “On Tatooine, or here at the store?”
    “What do you do?”
    “This and that. Nothing important.”
    That last answer described two-thirds of her patrons. She’d gotten more substance out of some of her discussions with Bohmer, the Rodian who spoke no Basic. But while Ben’s non-answers were frustrating, they neither surprised nor offended her. None of her customers told her much on the first visit. Not verbally, anyway.
    What they bought, however, spoke volumes. And Ben’s tub—a portable washbasin now doubling as a shopping basket—brimmed with clues for the retail eye.
    The curtain rod told her he wasn’t camping. The basic tools told her he hadn’t been there long. The tins of food paste told her he intended to stay for a while—and that he lived too far away to shop often. The containers of industrial-strength solvent told her he had a big cleaning job ahead.
    And rags. Who bought rags ? Someone who traveled light, who’d arrived without old clothing to spare for cleaning.
    Finally, there was that other little tidbit, which she had very nearly overlooked: a bed pillow. Just one.
    She casually strolled the aisles, finding out a little more from him in between Kallie’s periodic interruptions to report her progress. When the supply room failed to yield packing accessories sized for Ben’s eopie, the girl had taken it upon herself to invent something with spare parts. She’d lashed two smaller feed sacks to a third to create a saddle pannier, and had spent the last half hour working on increasing the load. Only twice did Annileen and Ben hear the surprised bleat of a tipped-over animal from outside.
    “Kallie means well,” Annileen had said.
    Ben hadn’t seemed concerned.
    And while he’d sounded knowledgeable about life in the desert, Annileen had grown to believe he didn’t know much about Tatooine. All desert worlds were the same—except in the ways