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came from. So they had taken a word from each of their ancestral languages and made de Mir—from Earth.
    Well, all right, that was somewhat charming, Giyt admitted to himself. But he had never been alone with either of the de Mirs before, and by the time Rina came back with the tea tray he had run out of subjects that did not touch on sexual orientation.
    Lupe, too, seemed oddly embarrassed. She greeted Rina with relief. "And your stove's all right now? Shura used to have a lot of trouble with it, among other things, and Hoak Hagbarth just wouldn't get it fixed for her."
    "It's fine. I think they put in a new one after your friend moved out."
    But Giyt was not interested in a friend who had moved away; he wanted to know what it was that was hanging over his head. "There was something you wanted to tell me?" he prompted his wife.
    Rina looked at her guest for an answer. "Well, it's just that I'm pregnant again," Lupe announced, flushed becomingly rosy. "We always wanted six, so we're almost there."
    "Congratulations," Giyt said, since that was what she seemed to be expecting; thinking that for a pair of same-sex females they were certainly remarkably fecund, courtesy of Ex-Earth's sperm bank.
    "Thanks, but what I wanted to say is that all of a sudden Matya is after me to quit being a volunteer fireman. Too much physical activity for a pregnant woman, she says. Which is nonsense. We don't have that many real fires, and even if we did . . . Well, that's between Matya and me, isn't it? Anyway, I'm going to quit, just to please her, and what I was thinking is that that means there'll be a vacancy in the fire company. So what I was wondering was whether you wanted to join."
    He blinked at her. "Be a fireman?"
    "Only if you want to," Lupe said quickly. "It doesn't take much time—hell, how often does anything burn around here? Not counting brush fires, I mean, and you only get those in the dry. In a couple of weeks we're having our annual firemen's fair. We're calling it 'The Taste of Tupelo' this year, and that'll take everybody in the company to man all the booths. But—"
    "But you really ought to, Shammy," Rina coaxed. "As mayor. Set a good example. What do you say?"
    Well what could he say? He said yes. And on their evening walk that night, did little talking, because he was wondering how it had happened that, without warning, the lifelong career computer thief and con man, Evesham Giyt, was suddenly turning into a model citizen.

V
     
     
    One thing about Tupelo that took some getting used to was its inordinately prolonged day. It wasn't quite 34 hours long, but the Earth-human clocks said it was —it was easier to deal with an "hour" that was only 59 and a bit minutes long than to try to handle an odd fraction of an hour every day.
    Sunrise was at 10 hours. That's when Earth humans usually had a breakfast (actually, their second of the day) and started their day's work. At 16 hours was lunch, then siesta until 19 hours. Then the afternoon's work went until 22 hours, when it was customary to have a break for afternoon tea. Evening work was from 23 to 27 hours, which was sunset. Dinner at 28 hours; nighttimes free for whatever the persons wanted to do until 32 hours; then sleep. Since Earth humans could hardly ever sleep for more than 8 hours at a , stretch, they generally rose at 6, had their first breakfast while it was still dark, and then were on their own until sunrise at 10. It made for a long day, to be sure. But because of the midday siesta, it wasn't an exhausting one.
    — GETTING ALONG ON TUPELO , EX - EARTH GUIDE FOR NEWCOMERS
     
    Time was, back on Earth, when Giyt might hear someone refer to an elected official as a "servant of the people" and take it as a joke. It wasn't a joke here, though. Here his constituents took it seriously. They called him on the net. They showed up on his doorstep. They buttonholed him in the street; and they all wanted something—sometimes a transfer to a different job, perhaps an