‘You’re not very good,’ she said, ‘but you know the steps. Perfectly, in fact. You’re too rigid, though. Your shoulders are too tight.’

He bowed again. ‘I’ll remember that. Perhaps you might educate me in the finer points of the dance?’

‘Sorry, my card is full.’

‘No room, not even at the end of the night?’

The music had begun again. A Navy officer was waiting for her, impatient anger in his face.

‘Amasec,’ she said. ‘Perhaps, at the end of the night.’

In the zendov clubs, the end of the night meant dawn. The queues of men danced the girls into exhaustion. Heading from the bar to find the washroom, Endor saw three or four shoeless girls in a back hall, smoking lho-sticks and dabbing at bleeding heels and swollen toes.

He went out into the snow, and searched for a public vox-station. He called Liebstrum’s number, and got the message service.

‘Where are you?’ he shouted. ‘Where are you?’

Two glasses sat on the bar. Joiliq in one, diluted with slowly melting ice, and amasec in the other. It was four-thirty.

‘Master Titan?’

‘Titus,’ he corrected, looking around. What he saw made him forget the throbbing in his temples. ‘My name is Titus.’

The girl nodded. ‘Sorry. This for me?’

He smiled. She took up the amasec and sipped.

‘A last dance, then, yes?’ she asked.

‘I’ve been waiting.’

There was a look in her eyes that told him how much she despised the men who waited to dance with her.

She led him to the floor. Her body was as hard as before, but now she was cold. There was no heat in her. The fragrance of lho-smoke and sweat had dulled to a thin, unhealthy smell.

‘Loosen your shoulders,’ she said, as the music began. ‘Turn your head. No, too much. Turn it like this. And swing out. Yes. And back and back.’

‘Am I getting it?’ he asked. He felt like he was dancing with a corpse.

‘Your footwork is fine. Excellent, actually. Your back is still a little stiff. Turn out, turn out, that’s it.’

‘You’re a good teacher.’

‘I do what I’m paid to do, sir.’

‘You’re tired.’

‘Every day is a long day,’ she whispered, her head against his chest. She looked up at him sharply. ‘Please don’t tell the bosses I said that. They’ll dock my pay.’

‘I won’t,’ he smiled, rotating her neatly. ‘I know how long your day’s been. I was at the Theatricala. You are a fine dancer.’

‘This pays better than the classical shit,’ she said. She stared up at him as they spun and re-addressed. ‘Have you been following me?’

‘No,’ he said. ‘I just came here and saw you.’

‘And learned the zendov.’

He chuckled. ‘Something like that. Men must follow women all the time on this world. There are so few of you.’

‘It does become a problem,’ she admitted.