The Servant Problem | Page 7

his brief case and the manila envelopes into the back seat.
Soon, Valleyview was far behind him.
But not as far as it should have been. He couldn't get the green rose out
of his mind. He couldn't get Judith Darrow out of his mind either. Nor
could he exorcise the summer breeze that kept wafting through the
crevices in his common sense.
A green rose and a grass widow and a breeze with a green breath. A
whole town taking off for greener pastures....
He reached into his coat pocket and touched the rose. It was no more
than a stem and a handful of petals now, but its reality could not be
denied. But roses do not bloom in autumn, and green roses do not

bloom at all--
"Ruf!"
He had turned into the new highway some time ago, and was driving
along it at a brisk sixty-five. Now, disbelievingly, he slowed, and
pulled over onto the shoulder. Sure enough, he had a stowaway in the
back seat--a tawny-haired stowaway with golden eyes, over-sized ears,
and a restless, white-tipped tail. "Zarathustra!" he gasped. "How in the
dickens did you get in there?"
"Ruf," Zarathustra replied.
Philip groaned. Now he would have to go all the way back to
Valleyview. Now he would have to see Judith Darrow again. Now he
would have to--He paused in midthought, astonished at the abrupt
acceleration of his heartbeat. "Well I'll be damned!" he said, and
without further preamble transferred Zarathustra to the front seat,
U-turned, and started back.
* * * * *
The gasoline lantern had been moved out of the living-room window,
but a light still showed beyond the panes. He pulled over to the curb
and turned off the ignition. He gave one of Zarathustra's over-sized ears
a playful tug, absently noting a series of small nodules along its lower
extremity. "Come on, Zarathustra," he said. "I may as well deliver you
personally while I'm at it."
After locking the car, he started up the walk, Zarathustra at his heels.
He knocked on the front door. Presently he knocked again. The door
creaked, swung partially open. He frowned. Had she forgotten to latch
it? he wondered. Or had she deliberately left it unlatched so that
Zarathustra could get in? Zarathustra himself lent plausibility to the
latter conjecture by rising up on his hind legs and pushing the door the
rest of the way open with his forepaws, after which he trotted into the
hall and disappeared.

Philip pounded on the panels. "Miss Darrow!" he called. "Judith!"
No answer. He called again. Still no answer.
A summer breeze came traipsing out of the house and engulfed him in
the scent of roses. What kind of roses? he wondered. Green ones?
He stepped into the hall and closed the door behind him. He made his
way into the living room. The two chairs were gone, and so was the
coffee table. He walked through the living room and into the library;
through the library and into the dining room. The gasoline lantern
burned brightly on the dining-room table, its harsh white light bathing
bare floors and naked walls.
The breeze was stronger here, the scent of roses almost cloying. He saw
then that the double door that had thwarted him that morning was open,
and he moved toward it across the room. As he had suspected, it gave
access to the kitchen. Pausing on the threshold, he peered inside. It was
an ordinary enough kitchen. Some of the appliances were gone, but the
stove and the refrigerator were still there. The back doorway had an
odd bluish cast that caused the framework to shimmer. The door itself
was open, and he could see starlight lying softly on fields and trees.
Wonderingly he walked across the room and stepped outside. There
was a faint sputtering sound, as though live wires had been crossed, and
for a fleeting second the scene before him seemed to waver. Then,
abruptly, it grew still.
He grew still, too--immobile in the strange, yet peaceful, summer night.
He was standing on a grassy plain, and the plain spread out on either
hand to promontories of little trees. Before him, the land sloped gently
upward, and was covered with multicolored flowers that twinkled like
microcosmic stars. In the distance, the lights of a village showed. To
his right, a riotous green-rose bush bloomed, and beneath it Zarathustra
sat, wagging his tail.
Philip took two steps forward, stopped and looked up at the sky. It was
wrong somehow. For one thing, Cassiopeia had changed position, and

for another, Orion was awry. For still another, there were no clouds for
the moon to hide behind, and yet the moon had disappeared.
Zarathustra trotted over to where he was standing, gazed up at him with