Her name was no longer Doris; it was any of a thousand, and her perfume, heavy in his nostrils, was not her perfume or any individual's. She was there before him; she was real. But along with her were a thousand names and a thousand scents. There was the painful nostalgia of recognizing a strange room. Awkwardly he said, "I really must go. I'd like to have a long talk, but--" Her lips parting in sudden artificiality, she crossed to him, reached for his hand with her own. In his mind was the heavy futility of repeating the same thing senselessly until it lost all meaning. "I apologize about the poem," he said, because he knew that it was not his place to speak of it. "That's all right," she said with hollow cheerfulness. Her mouth jerked and her eyes darkened. "Please don't go yet." The palms of his hands were moist. He looked around the apartment again, and he did not want to ask, to bring it out in cruel words. It was not the sort of thing one asked. "I really must go," he repeated levelly. She put her hands on his shoulders. "Please...." And then he saw that she intended to bribe him in the only way she knew how, and he said, "Don't worry, I won't tell Don." He saw relief on her face, and then he was out of the apartment, shaken. He felt as if he had been kicked in the stomach, and he was sickened and his hand trembled. He wanted to talk to someone and try to explain it. Hertha was waiting when he came out to the street. * * * * * The fever passed; control of his body returned. "For you?" Hertha asked. He half propped himself up on the cot. He waved his hand weakly. "Those dead plants. You must throw them out and bring in more." He listened tensely, imagining that he could hear the precious oxygen hiss in from the emergency tank to freshen and revitalize the dead air. Halfway down on the dial. Not enough for ten days, even for one person, unless the air was replenished by bringing in plants. "Hertha, we've got to purify this air. Now listen. Listen carefully, Hertha. You've seen me dig up those plants on the outside?" "Yes, I watch when you go out. I always watch, Jimmy." "Good. You've got to do the same thing. You've got to go out and dig up some plants. You've got to bring them in here and plant them the way I did. You know which ones they are?" "Yes," she said. He closed his eyes, trying to think of a way to make her see how vital a thing a tiny plant could be. The complex chemistry of it bubbled to the surface of his mind. He wanted to tell her why the plants died in the artificial human atmosphere and had to be replaced every week or so. He wanted to tell her, but he was growing weaker. "They purify the air by releasing oxygen. You understand?" She nodded her head dumbly.