Softly their bodies arose. As lightly as feathers they floated through an opening in the barrier that came at their mere wishing.... * * * * * Cheryl Ramsden, torch singer for the _Midnight Club_, screamed just once in her apartment. They found her prostrate and writhing, as though from the after-effects of a seizure. "Nerves!" the physician pronounced it. "Better take it easy, girl!" "Look, doc," cried Cheryl. "I ain't going nuts, am I? For an instant it was like swimming through space. Suddenly it was like being inside a flame, with every part of me going up in ashes and...." The doctor looked very serious, as if he felt the surge of forces that had swept her up. Then he shrugged his shoulders as though to say some things were better to be left unnamed and guessed at. "That's what comes of too much torch singing," he said lightly, and being young and not immune to beauty, he smiled encouragingly and with depth. "Maybe you've been burning the torch at both ends, Cheryl." "What would you suggest, Doctor--" "Mudd! Phineas Axelton Mudd!--mi-lady!" "How horrible! Did your parents actually tack that onto you or was it invented to torture your patients?" "A little of both, but I'd recommend a long drive into the country, maybe a swim at the seashore--" "In the company of a young doctor, red-haired, by the name of Mudd?" "Well, I didn't say that, Cheryl, but could be, gal, could be."