But I don’t have to come in; I can tell you from out here in the corridor. Or through the door.”

She sighed. I couldn’t tell whether she was really angry or not. “Just a moment.” She disappeared. I heard a rustling sound, and then she pulled the door open and I stepped inside. She closed it. Her room was the same layout and color scheme. She’d scrubbed off what makeup she’d been wearing, even the lipstick, and had on a rather conservative nightgown under the négligé she was struggling with, but she was unbelievably exciting. I didn’t know why.

“Mostly trivial,” I said. “But revealing. For instance, when I was a kid, all the other slobs put their money in the Christmas Club, but I kept mine in a regular account. Got two per cent.”

“You don’t have to hit me over the head,” she replied. I kissed her. This was even more exciting, in spite of the fact she obviously didn’t care whether it was or not. She finally broke it up, but she said, “All right.” It was rather the way you’d buy a potato peeler from a salesman to get rid of him, but by this time I didn’t even care what the terms were.

 * * *

She was smooth, deft, experienced, and agreeably cooperative about the whole thing. I lay there afterwards in the annealed and quiescent dark trying to pin down her exact attitude, and decided the word I was looking for was pleasant. That was it. She was quite pleasant about it—the perfect hostess, in fact.

She said something, but I missed it. I was still thinking about her, trying to remember exactly what she looked like—”

“You’re not even listening,” she said.

“What?”

“Speech. It may have escaped your attention, but for a long time now people have been able to communicate—”

“Oh. I’m sorry. What was it?”

“You mentioned acting. Was that by any chance the truth?”

“Yes. But just amateur. In school. I never did try to turn pro; not enough talent.”

“Were you a fast study?”

“Fairly so,” I said. “I usually knew my lines by the time we finished the first rehearsal. For some reason I learn fast, or easily. Just luck, I suppose.”

“Tell me about your family.”

“I’m it, except for my step-father. My mother and father were divorced when I was about five.