I am sorry, my dear, but that is the best advice we can give you. If some irrational rule of your society prevents, so much the worse for your societ… - L. Sprague de Camp

But what argument could I offer? It was nothing but an irrational feeling—the kind of “premonition” we get from time to time but remember only on the rare occasions when it is fulfilled by the event. I had no evidence.

We rented an apartment in a rambly wooden-frame building, a block from the beach. This was before the waterfront sprouted a host of huge condominiums, like a plague of concrete mushrooms.

“It is a common belief that all paleskins are superhumanly lusty and incorrigibly lecherous.”
“Now it is you who flatter us,” said Halran.