Stranger in a Strange Land

the tyranny of the clock, first as a little girl in school, then as a bigger girl in a much harder school, then under the unforgiving pressures of hospital routine.
                The carnival had been nothing like that. Aside from the easy and rather pleasant chore of standing around and looking pretty several times a day from midafternoon to the last bally of the night, she never had anything she actually had to do at any set time. Mike did not care whether they ate once a day or six times, and whatever housekeeping she chose to do suited him. They had their own living top and camping equipment; in many towns they had never left the lot from arrival to tear-down. The carnival was a closed little world, an enclave, where the headlines and troubles of the outside world did not reach. She had been happy in it.
                To be sure, in every town the lot was crawling with marks-but she had acquired the carney viewpoint; marks did not count-they might as well have been behind glass. Jill quite understood why the girls in the posing show could and did exhibit themselves in very little (and, in some towns, nothing, if the fix was solid) without feeling immodest . . . and without being immodest in their conduct outside the posing show. Marks weren't people to them; they were blobs of nothing, hardly seen, whose sole function was to cough up half dollars for the take.
                Yes, the carnie had been a happy, utterly safe home, even though theft act had flopped. It had not always been that way when first they left the safety of Jubal's home to go out into the world and increase Mike's education. They had been spotted more than once and several times they had had trouble getting away, not only from the press, but from the endless people who seemed to feel that they had a right to demand things of Mike, simply because he had the misfortune to be the Man from Mars.
                Presently Mike had thought his features into more mature lines and had made other slight changes in his appearance. That, plus the fact that they frequented places where the Man from Mars would certainly not be expected (by the public) to go, got them privacy. About that time, when Jill was phoning home to give a new mailing address, Jubal had suggested a cover-up story-and a couple of days later Jill had read that the Man from Mars had again gone into retreat, this time in a Tibetan monastery.
                The retreat had actually been "Hank's Grill" in a "nowhere" town, with Jill as a waitress and Mike as dishwasher. It was no worse than being a nurse and much less demanding-and her feet no longer hurt. Mike had a remarkably quick way of cleaning dishes, although he had to be careful not to use it when the boss was watching. They kept that job a week, then moved on, sometimes working, sometimes not. They visited public libraries almost daily, once Mike found out about them-Jill had discovered that Mike had taken for granted that Jubal's library contained a copy of every book on Earth. When he learned the marvelous truth, they had remained in Akron nearly a month. Jill did quite a lot of shopping that month, as Mike with a book was almost no company at all.
                But Baxter's Combined Shows and Riot of Fun for All the Family had been the nicest part of their meandering trip. Jill recalled with an inner giggle the time in-what town?-no matter-when the entire posing show had been pinched. It wasn't fair, even by chumps' standards, since that concession always worked under precise prearrangement: bras or no bras; blue lights or bright lights; whatever the top town clown ordained. Nevertheless the sheriff had hauled them in and the local justice of the peace had seemed disposed not only to fine but to jail the girls as "vagrants."
                The lot had closed down and most of the carnies had gone to the hearing, along with innumerable chumps slavering to catch sight of "shameless women" getting their come-uppance. Mike and Jill had managed to crowd against the back wall of the courtroom.
                Jill had long since impressed on Mike that he must never do anything that an ordinary human could not do where it might be noticed. But Mike had grokked a cusp and had not discussed it with Jill.
                The sheriff was testifying as to what he had seen, the details of this "public lewdness"-and he was enjoying it.