Trudi has these big, blonde Prussian legs. Tiny blonde hairs dance up and down in the starlight, up under her skirt and back, all through the shadows of her knees, around under the hollows behind them, this starry jittering…. The stump towers above and cups them all, a giant nerve cell, dendrites extended into the city, the night. Signals coming in from all directions, and from back in time too, probably, if not indeed forward….

Säure, who is never able entirely to lay off business, rolls, flows to his feet, clutching on to a root till his head decides where it is going to come to rest. Magda, her ear at its entrance, is banging on Rocketman’s helmet with a stick. It gongs in chords. The separate notes aren’t right on pitch, either: they sound very odd together….

“I don’t know what time it is,” Säure Bummer gazing around. “Weren’t we supposed to be at the Chicago Bar? Or was that last night?”

“I forget,” Trudi giggles.

“Listen, Kerl, I really have to talk to that American.”

“Dear Emil,” Trudi whispers, “don’t worry. He’ll be at the Chicago.”

They decide on an intricate system of disguise. Säure gives Slothrop his jacket. Trudi wears the green cape. Magda puts on Slothrop’s boots, and he goes in his socks, carrying her own tiny shoes in his pockets. They spend some time gathering plausible items, kindling and greens, to fill the helmet with, and Säure carries that. Magda and Trudi help stuff Slothrop into the buckskin pants, both girls down on pretty knees, hands caressing his legs and ass. Like the ballroom in St. Patrick’s Cathedral, there is none in these trousers here, and Slothrop’s hardon, enlarging, aches like thunder.

“Fine for you folks.” The girls are laughing. Grandiose Slothrop limps along after everybody, a network of clear interweaving ripples now like rain all through his vision, hands turning to stone, out of the Tiergarten, past shellstruck lime and chestnut trees, into the streets, or what is serving for them. Patrols of all nations keep coming by, and this mindless quartet have to hit the dirt often, trying not to laugh too much. Slothrop’s sox are sodden with dew. Tanks manoeuvre in the street, chewing parallel ridges of asphalt and stonedust. Trolls and dryads play in the open spaces. They were blasted back in May out of bridges, out of trees into liberation, and are now long citified. “Oh, that drip,” say the subdeb trolls about those who are not as hep, “he just isn’t out-of-the-tree about anything.” Mutilated statues lie under mineral sedation: frock-coated marble torsos of bureaucrats fallen pale in the gutters. Yes, hmm, here we are in the heart of downtown Berlin, really, uh, a little, Jesus Christ what’s that—

“Better watch it,” advises Säure, “it’s kind of rubbery through here.”

“What is that?”