" Just outside the door you spot her: tall, dark and alone, half hidden behind a pillar on the edge of the dance floor. You approach laterally, moving your stuff like a Bad Spade through the slalom of a synthesized conga rhytm. She jumps when you touch her shoulder. "Dance?" She looks at you as if you had just suggested instrumental rape. "I do not speak English," she says, when you ask again. "Français?" She shakes her head. Why is she looking at you that way, as if tarantulas were nesting in your eye sockets? "