e broke off suddenly and asked, "Do any of you ever venture
outside?"

"A few of the men are allowed to," she told him, "for short trips in
special protective suits, to hunt for canned food and fuels and
batteries and things like that."

"Aye, and those blind-souled slugs would never see anything but what
they're looking for," he said, nodding bitterly. "They'd never see the
garden where a dozen buds blossom where one did before, and the flowers
have petals a yard across, with stingless bees big as sparrows gently
supping their nectar. Housecats grown spotted and huge as leopards (not
little runts like Joe Louis here) stalk through those gardens. But
they're gentle beasts, no more harmful than the rainbow-scaled snakes
that glide around their paws, for the dust burned all the murder out of
them, as it burned itself out.

"I've even made up a little poem about that. It starts, 'Fire can hurt
me, or water, or the weight of Earth. But the dust is my friend.' Oh,
yes, and then the robins like cockatoos and squirrels like a princess's
ermine! All under a treasure chest of Sun and Moon and stars that the
dust's magic powder changes from ruby to emerald and sapphire and
amethyst and back again. Oh, and then the new children--"

"You're telling the truth?" she interrupted him, her eyes brimming with
tears. "You're not making it up?"

"I am not," he assured her solemnly. "And if you could catch a glimpse
of one of the new children, you'd never doubt me again. They have long
limbs as brown as this coffee would be if it had lots of fresh cream in
it, and smiling delicate faces and the whitish teeth and the finest
hair. They're so nimble that I--a sprightly man and somewhat enlivened
by the dust--feel like a cripple beside them. And their thoughts dance
like flames and make me feel a very imbecile.

"Of course, they have seven fingers on each hand and eight toes on each
foot, but they're the more beautiful for that. They have large pointed
ears that the Sun shines through. They play in the garden, all day long,
slipping among the great leaves and blooms, but they're so swift that
you can hardly see them, unless one chooses to stand still and look at
you. For that matter, you have to look a bit hard for all these things
I'm telling you."

"But it is true?" she pleaded.

"Every word of it," he said, looking straight into her eyes. He put down
his knife and fork. "What's your name?" he asked softly. "Mine's
Patrick."

"Eff