”“Well, you are, aren’t you?” said Daddy wryly, at which Jerry snorted good-naturedly and laughed, shaking his head. “Do I need to ask if yo... are going to bring my daughter home at a reasonable hour?”“Oh, absolutely!”It was my turn to laugh and snort - I had already told Mom that it was more than likely I would be having breakfast with Jerry, and not with her and Daddy. She promised to work Daddy over tonight so that he’d sleep late.Jerry glanced at his watch, and Daddy said, “I’ll let you two. "Smitty was quiet for a minute while he thought about that. Then he said, "We could always do both."Smitty hung up and I put my phone away. Inga was staring at me warily. She knew from my side of the conversation that we were setting something up for her and when she heard me mention the Camera Club she immediately got nervous. I let her worry about it though. She was sexy when she was nervous.The restaurant had been just about empty when we got here this morning but it filled up at lunch time.. From what planet did you come originally?”He did raise his head now and looked at me with sad eyes and he said. “I was born on Olx, I think. I was raised by several slave women and I think one of them was my mother. When I was old enough to work the overseers pulled me out of the breeding cages and stuck me to a work gang unloading scrap metal and sorting the bad pieces that not supposed to go into the smelters.”I could not completely hide my feelings and felt a tear roll down my cheek.. We had moved further south after that financial earthquake and taken up residence temporarily in an apartment at the Bronx/Manhattan line that was the absolute pits. It was sort of a last line of defense in terms of rental property because of being directly on the same level as the elevated subway line that rumbled with irritating regularity every eight minutes going either north to the hinterlands of the Bronx or down into the bowels of the city and the chaos of millions jammed together in.