“No, you _don’t_ see what I mean. You aren’t even on the right road—your whole _concept_ is wrong. There couldn’t be any _thought_, even of privacy, no _conception_ of such a thing. _Think_ a minute! From birth—from the very birth of the whole race—full and open meetings of minds must have been the norm of thought. That kind of thing is—must be—what Nadine is accustomed to at home.” “Hm . . . I never thought . . . you go see her, Joan, and I’ll stay home.” “What good would _that_ do? Whatever you may be, my dear, I know darn well you’re _not_ stupid.” “Not exactly stupid, maybe, but I haven’t thought this thing through the way you have . . . of course, if she’s half as good as we know she is, she’s read us both already, clear down to the footings of our foundations . . . but this thing of a _full_ meeting of minds with anybody but you. . . .” “You haven’t a thing to hide, you know. At least, _I_ know, whether you do or not.” “No? How do you figure that? Maybe _you_ think so, but . . . I’ve tried, of course, but I’ve failed a lot oftener than I succeeded.” “Who hasn’t? You’re not unique, my dear. Shall we go?” “We might as well, I guess . . . I’m as ready as I ever will be. . . . I’ll try, but. . . .” “Please do, Master,” came Nadine’s quiet, composed thought, in a vein completely foreign to her usual attitude of self-sufficient aloofness. “I have been observing; studying with awe and with wonder. If you will so deign, revered Master, come fully into my mind.” “Deign?” Cloud demanded. “What kind of a thought is that, Nadine, from you to me?” “Deign.” Nadine repeated, firmly. Deeply moved, she was feeling and sending a solemnity of respect Cloud had never before experienced. “My powers are ordinary, since I am of Type One. The two greatest Masters of Manarka are Fives, and have been the greatest Masters of the past. This is the first time I have ever encountered a mind of a type higher than Five. Come in, sir, I plead.” Cloud went in, and his first flash of comparison was that it was like diving into the pellucid depths of a clean, cool, utterly transparent mountain lake. This mind was _so_ different from Joan’s! Joan’s was rich, warmly sympathetic, tender and emphatic, yet it was full of dark corners, secret nooks, recesses, and automatic blocks. . . . Huh? He had thought her mind as open as a book, but it wasn’t. . . . On the other hand, Nadine’s was wide open by nature. It was cool, poised—although at the moment uncomfortably worshipful—and utterly, _shockingly_ open! His second thought was that Joan was no longer with him. She was there, in a sense, but _outside_, some way; she wasn’t in Nadine’s mind the way he was. “I’ll say I’m not!” Joan agreed, fervently. “Thank God! I don’t know what you did or how you did it, but when you went in you peeled me off like the skin of a banana, and I was clinging like a leech, too. I’m on the outside, looking in. Did you see how he did it, Nadine?”