The Garments of Caean, by Barrington J. Bayley. Back on Earth there was a saying that clothes make the man. But on the world called Caean this became literally true. On that colonized planet there was a material called Prossim. If your body was in contact with Prossim your personality changed. You became handsome, you had charisma, you had total self-confidence - you were always the power center of every enterprise. So throughout the inhabited galaxy clothing from Caean was the sure key to success and men would kill to get such a suit. Peder Forbarth was such a man, prepared to turn space pirate to get his hands on some. But instead he found that - at the risk of worlds - the very secret of Prossim cloth itself was about to open before his eyes...