Stranger in a Strange Land

know that you're both saved. But I'm no longer worried about that. Mike has told me about waiting, and why waiting is. You understand me, Jill?"
                "I grok. I'm no longer impatient about anything."
                "But I do have something for you two." The tattooed lady got up and crossed to where she had left her purse, took a book out of it. She came back, stood close to them. "My dear ones ... this is the very copy of the New Revelation that Blessed Foster gave me . . . the night he placed his kiss on me. I want you to have it."
                Jill's eyes suddenly filled with tears and she felt herself choking. "But, Aunt Patty-Patty our brother! We can't take this one. Not this one. We'll buy one."
                "No. It's ...it's 'water' I'm sharing with you. For growing-closer."
                "Oh-" Jill jumped up. "We'll take it. But it's ours now-all of us." She kissed her.
                Presently Mike tapped her on the shoulder. "Greedy little brother. My turn."
                "I'll always be greedy, that way."
                The Man from Mars kissed his new brother first on her mouth, then paused and gently kissed the spot where Foster had kissed her. Then he pondered, briefly by Earth time, picked a corresponding spot on the other side where he saw that George's design could be matched well enough for his purpose-kissed her there while he thought by stretched-out time and in great detail what he wanted to accomplish. It was necessary to grok the capillaries- To the other two, subject and spectator, he simply gently and briefly pressed his lips to the garishly decorated skin. But Jill caught a hint of the effort he had exerted and looked. "Patty! See!"
                Mrs. Paiwonski looked down at herself. Marked on her skin, paired stigmata in blood red, were his lips. She started to faint-then showed the depth of her own staunch faith. "Yes. Yes! Michael-"
                Most shortly thereafter the tattooed lady had disappeared, replaced by a rather mousy housewife in high neck, long sleeves and gloves. "I won't cry," she said soberly, "and it's not good-by; there are no good-bys in eternity. But I will be waiting." She kissed them both, briefly, left without looking back. 

    XXVIII

                "BLASPHEMY!"
                Foster looked up. "Something bite you, Junior?" This temporary annex had been run up in a hurry and Things did get in-swarms of almost invisible imps usually - . . harmless, of course, but a bite from one left an itch on the ego.
                "Uh ... you'd have to see it to believe it-here, I'll run the omniscio back a touch."
                "You'd be surprised at what I can believe, Junior." Nevertheless Digby's supervisor shifted a part of his attention. Three temporals-humans, he saw they were; a man and two women-speculating about the eternal. Nothing odd about that. "Yes?"
                "You heard what she said! The 'Archangel Michael' indeed!"
                "What about it?"
                "'What about it?' Oh, for God's sake!"
                "Very possibly."
                Digby was so indignant that his halo quivered. "Foster, you must not have taken a good look. She meant that over-age juvenile delinquent that sent me to the showers. Scan it again."
                Foster let the gain increase, noted that the angel-in-training had spoken rightly-and noticed something else and smiled his angelic smile. "How do you know he isn't, Junior?"
                "Huh?"
                "I haven't seen Mike around the Club lately and I recall that his name has been scratched on the Millennial Solipsist Tournament-that's a Sign that he's likely away on detached duty, as Mike is one of the most eager Solipsism players in this sector."
                "But the notion's obscene!"
                "You'd be surprised how many of the Boss's best ideas have been called 'obscene' in some quarters-or, rather, you should not be surprised, in view of your field work. But 'obscene' is a concept you don't need; it has no theological meaning. 'To the pure all things are pure.'"
                "But-"
                "I'm still Witnessing, Junior. You listen. In addition to the fact that our brother Michael seems to be away at this micro-instant-and I don't keep