Finally, Cargill said, "I told you the truth before."

"Which time was that?" Alec asked, sarcastically.

"When I said I didn't kill her. She deserves more credit than that."

"If you didn't, who did? It wasn't me. I was out cold."

"I know. I knocked you out."

Cargill fell silent, either lost in thought or else pretending to be. The impenetrable density of his radiations did not change. Alec tried to remain patient but he couldn't do it any longer.

"Well," he said. "Which is it? Either you're going to tell me about Anna or you're not."

"I wish I could."

"What's stopping you."

Cargill glanced at the control panel, then shrugged. "Oh, nothing, I guess. But you must remember that I'm not a young man and, frankly, without going into details, women have long played a central role in my life. I have always attempted to know and, if and when possible, understand and sympathize with their race. It's hardly a simple process. Greater men than myself-I think of Tolstoy, Max Ophuls, Ibsen, Sternberg, Henry James-have tried and failed. Women are-to me-to us-an alien species. One might even say-with only a hint of facetious-ness-that women were our first true supermen. I hope I'm not being patronizing when I say that I believe women-at their best-to possess all the worthier characteristics of men, plus several others that none of us will ever know. The point of all this-why I dare to bore you- is, of course, Anna. I want you to realize the significance of this remark: of all the women I have ever known or studied, she is the one I admire most."

"But you killed her."

"No," Cargill said. "I did not. I moved her body into the path of the flames in order to ensure that she received a fitting funeral. When I did that, she was already dead."

"That's impossible. Don't tell me there was someone else there."

"No."

"Well, then-"

For the first time, Cargill's radiations reached Alec clearly: anger.

"She killed herself, you idiot."

"Oh."

"I received a report that she had reached the city but, because of this stupid war and my visit to your office, it was delayed reaching me. Nevertheless, I rushed to your home immediately. As I wound my way up the path leading to your doorstep, I spied the flames. I ran ahead as if a demon were pursuing my tail and broke into the house. I went straight into the garden. Neither of you-clearly being involved in more private matters-detected my approach. I crept up behind you and delivered the necessary blow with a stick."

"But why me? You should have hit her."

"So that, in response, she would shoot you?" Cargill shook his head. "Besides, I would never strike a woman. I met Anna eye-to-eye. I started to speak, to voice a plea. It did not prove necessary. She simply turned the weapon on her own face and squeezed the trigger. It was over in a moment and she was dead. It was an act of divine sacrifice."

"Hardly." Alec laughed. "No one made her try to kill me."

Once more, Cargill's anger flared. He glared at Alec. "You call yourself a Superior. Think before you speak. Didn't you hear a word of what I told you before? She was under the control of her father, an Inheritor. He made her try to kill you."

"Then why didn't she?"

"A good question." Cargill nodded his appreciation. "But the answer should be obvious: Anna defied them. She asserted her humanity in what was, perhaps, the only way open to her: through suicide. Can you say the same?"

"You want me to kill myself?" Alec laughed.

"I want you to assert your own freedom. Other ways of doing so are open to you-they weren't for Anna."

"Such as?"

"Ah Tran and I will show you a way."

Alec said, "No," but this denial was by no means positive. What Anna had done-at least what Cargill claimed for her-could not fail to move him. She had sacrificed herself-in the face of dreadful odds-in order to save him. But why? What reason did she have for placing his life above her own? If he wished to lie, he could tell himself she had acted from motives of pure love. But he knew better: Anna hadn't loved him. Instead, he was beginning to understand that she had acted from more selfish motives. Anna had not saved him-no, she had saved herself. In dying, she had chosen to express her own freedom. And now Cargill wanted him to do the same. "All right, tell me what you want."

"I simply want you to agree to save yourself-and the world as well."

"You make that sound so simple. But how am I supposed to do it? By helping you and your friend, Ah Tran, I suppose. There's one thing wrong with that-Ah Tran is a fool. He-(Alec saw no point in continuing to conceal the truth)-doesn't understand reality. He tries to comprehend poetry through science. He tries to mix them together. He talks about souls in terms of ecosystems. That isn't just wrong-it's foolish."

"And why is that?" Cargill asked, evenly.

"Because when science and poetry are merged, the results are invariably a big mess." He gave Cargill some of the examples he had worked out for himself in the garden. Spoken aloud, the words somehow seemed less convincing but he refused to be diverted. "That's the way it is and not you or me or even Ah Tran can change it."

Cargill started to smile but clearly decided to suppress the reaction. He said, "You're wrong-there is no difference."

"Don't joke with me-please."

"I wouldn't, Alec, and I'm not."

"But don't you see? Science is concerned with the world as it is, while poetry conceives of an entirely different place, a world where things exist in the forms they ought to possess."

"But the world-this world-does exist in the form it ought to possess. Science merely confirms the inspirations of poetry, when those inspirations are valid. It has to be this way. In what other possible state could our world exist?"

"It isn't a place filled with love. It could be. It isn't beautiful or glorious or divine. It could be all of those. It could be a place without evil and ugliness and war and poverty and murder and hate and-"

"In other words," Cargill said, and he laughed, "it could be an incredible bore. What you're stating is an adolescent fantasy-a sterile view of a lifeless heaven. It could be as you say, but who really needs it?"

"Maybe I do-maybe the human race does."

"Then you'll have to do something about it, because I won't, but from what you say, you won't either."

"I've already found that world."

"And you won't let anyone else try?"

"Me?"

"Why not? Isn't that what Anna was trying to do?"

"I don't know. Anna is dead." Turning away from Car-gill, Alec looked out the window and noticed that the plane was at last descending through the clouds. A sea of fluffy, unreal whiteness surrounded the plane.

"Let me explain," Cargill said. "I owe you that much." He told Alec about Ah Tran's experiments into the recreation of the mass racial consciousness of the species. "But, so far, he has always failed to reach his goal."

"I'm not surprised."