"You're kidding." She stared at the screen, an empty feeling starting to come to her stomach.
Famous . . . Really famous . . .
"Nope, not kidding in the least. We're only sending down a smidgeon of the messages that are pouring in."
God help me. The tabloids were bad enough.
She had a sudden nightmare image of herself trying to conduct a dig somewhere in Montana—with a crowd of spectators surrounding the site.
"I'm a paleontologist," she half-wailed. "How will I be able to keep doing my work?"
"Um. Well, as to that . . . I can tell you, for sure, that at least you won't have to worry about collecting a salary any more. I haven't sent them down, since it seems pointless at the moment. But I can tell you that what looks to be every major garment manufacturer in the world is engaged in a bidding war to get you to be their spokesman. Last I saw, the top offer was fifteen million dollars."
He paused, momentarily. "Well, 'spokeswoman,' I guess I should say. Emphasis definitely on the gender. Seeing as how the main interest seems to be—"
"Nooo—"
She did wail, that time—and felt her stomach fly south for the winter.
"Yup. Their new projected lines of swimwear."
"I'm almost forty-three years old, for God's sake!"
"Yup," Ken's cheery voice continued, relentlessly. "I guess that explains why—near as I can tell—every cosmetics company in the world launched their equivalent of World War Three too. Women entering into middle age are apparently the biggest clientele for cosmetics, at least measured in terms of the money they spend—and you just became the poster girl for all half a billion of them. Last I heard, the cosmetic companies' bids were up to—hold on, I'll check with Jackie—"
He was back in seconds. "Eighteen and a half million, she says. She asks me to pass on that she recommends the offer that wants to market the stuff under the title 'Helen of Mars.' I do agree with her that they came up with the niftiest slogan: the face that launched the greatest ship of all."
"I'll kill her," Helen snarled. "And you're next!"
"Under the circumstances, that's a pretty idle threat," Ken pointed out, as cheerily as ever. "Jackie also wants to know what you'd like for your birthday coming up. She warns you she can't afford anything fancy, even if you are on the verge of becoming richer than Croesus."
"I want a cave in a desert somewhere!" Helen half-shouted. "Where I might get my privacy back!"
Ken laughed again. "Why bother? Just stay on Mars."
Helen's eyed widened.
And widened. Her stomach paused in its headlong flight.
She looked at A.J. He was sitting nearby in the rover, obviously doing his level best to keep from laughing himself.
His level best wasn't nearly good enough, so far as she was concerned. "One chuckle out of you," she hissed, "and you can look forward to a completely celibate stay on Mars."
That sobered him up, some. The threat wasn't idle, either. Not since they'd set up the bubbles and had some personal space again.
"Wouldn't think of it," he managed to get out.
"Good." After a moment, though, her glare started fading. "What do you think, A.J. Is it possible?"
He shrugged. "Maybe. It's certainly feasible, from a technical standpoint. The real question—what else is new?—will be the funding. At a guess, I'd say that depends mostly on what we find—or don't find—at Target 37. If there's a real dig to be done there . . . You know what I mean. A major one."
"A real dig," she mused. "A major dig. Major digs take years . . ."
Somewhere far to the south, Helen's stomach wheeled around and start flapping back.
Since A.J. managed to keep from chuckling—barely—Helen didn't carry out her threat that night. Rather the opposite, in fact.
"I love you," she murmured, contently exhausted and lying sprawled across him. "Would you stay here with me?"
"Don't ask silly questions. I came here looking for one dream, and found two. Of course I will."
She could feel a suspicious rumble, with her palm spread across his bare chest. "What's so funny?"
He was practically choking, now.
"What's so funny?"
"Well, I just got to thinking about funding. And it occurred to me—"
"You even finish that sentence, mister—!"
"Let's see what we can find," Helen said. "And stop whining, Joe. Paleontologists always start work at the crack of dawn, you know that. It's not my fault—"