The Queen of Space

A barroom narrator on Venus recounts meeting a frightened man who says a celebrated burlesque performer vanished from his apartment while a gangster named Luigi fired at him. The man leads the narrator home, introduces himself as Timothy J. Brown, a psychiatrist, and relates a string of peculiar events suggesting other-dimensional disappearance. The piece combines pulpy science-fiction and comic noir, populated by nightclub banter, extravagant interplanetary drinks, and colorful characters, and it playfully explores jealousy, mistaken identity, and the surreal fallout of obsession and fame.