Terry, who fretted sharply in his new restraint.

Moadine, grave and strong, as sadly patient as a mother with a
degenerate child, kept steady watch on him, with enough other women
close at hand to prevent an outbreak. He had no weapons, and well knew
that all his strength was of small avail against those grim, quiet
women.

We were allowed to visit him freely, but he had only his room, and a
small high-walled garden to walk in, while the preparations for our
departure were under way.

Three of us were to go: Terry, because he must; I, because two were
safer for our flyer, and the long boat trip to the coast; Ellador,
because she would not let me go without her.

If Jeff had elected to return, Celis would have gone too--they were the
most absorbed of lovers; but Jeff had no desire that way.

"Why should I want to go back to all our noise and dirt, our vice and
crime, our disease and degeneracy?" he demanded of me privately. We
never spoke like that before the women. "I wouldn't take Celis there for
anything on earth!" he protested. "She'd die! She'd die of horror and
shame to see our slums and hospitals. How can you risk it with Ellador?
You'd better break it to her gently before she really makes up her
mind."

Jeff was right. I ought to have told her more fully than I did, of all
the things we had to be ashamed of. But it is very hard to bridge the
gulf of as deep a difference as existed between our life and theirs. I
tried to.

"Look here, my dear," I said to her. "If you are really going to my
country with me, you've got to be prepared for a good many shocks. It's
not as beautiful as this--the cities, I mean, the civilized parts--of
course the wild country is."

"I shall enjoy it all," she said, her eyes starry with hope. "I
understand it's not like ours. I can see how monotonous our quiet life
must seem to you, how much more stirring yours must be. It must be
like the biological change you told me about when the second sex
was introduced--a far greater movement, constant change, with new
possibilities of growth."

I had told her of the later biological theories of sex, and she
was deeply convinced of the superior advantages of having two, the
superiority of a world with men in it.

"We have done what we could alone; perhaps we have some things better
in a quiet way, but you have the whole world--all the people of the
different nations--all the long rich history behind you--all the
wonderful new knowled