I remembered swiftly that I had never seen Acquilla laugh. It was true. Acquilla had never laughed. No one laughed now in this era of pure reason! I shrank back staring at her and a sudden suspicion came to me. Acquilla was not human, Acquilla too was an automaton. “Why do you stare so, Bogardus?” “Give me your hand,” I blurted out, shuddering. I felt the warm flesh under mine. I examined the clear texture minutely. The veins were there, red and finely blue. Acquilla _was_ human. Then softly I passed my fingers caressingly over the molded forearm. “That is strangely pleasant, Bogardus,” she said at once. “But now your face is contorted again. Is that laughter?” “I was afraid you were an automaton.” She shook her head gravely. “What a strange idea! But here is dinner.” She resumed her seat. The centre of the table rose, charged with curious silver and ivory dishes, which to my whetted appetite appeared alarmingly inadequate. But the presence of certain promising flagons reassured me. I sat up hungrily for my first meal after two hundred and fifty years with this amazing young Amazon of seventy-six, who was bald as Socrates, strong as Achilles and totally devoid of a sense of humor. “My dear Acquilla,” I said beaming. “You will teach me many things but I shall teach you how to laugh.” CHAPTER IV Acquilla cast a swift glance at the centre of the table, and drawing a silver platter towards her on which were a dozen colored bottles about the size of egg cups, said: “I shall dine as you dine but in a different manner.” “Pills!” I exclaimed in dismay. “Compressed food--I knew it!” “You are like all men, I see,” she answered gravely. “Always jumping at conclusions. What I am eating is exactly what you will partake of, only it is in the form of extracts and quite as delicious too, I assure you. As for your fear of compressed tablets, it is groundless. Until the age of seventy, modern dietetics long ago recognized the value of bulk in food. It is only when the problem of preserving tissues and health is one of arrestation rather than development of the vitamins that we eliminate bulk for chemical values. I can recommend the soup, Bogardus, it is a _pot-au-feu_ such as I am certain you have never tasted.” Saying which she took a little bottle at her side, unscrewed it, and poured a few drops into a silver cup the size of a liqueur glass. “Take off the cover before you, Bogardus, and give me your opinion.” At her direction I unscrewed, not without effort, the upper half of a silver melon and discovered the receptacle filled with a liquid of peculiarly agreeable odor. I tasted it and looked at her in surprise. “Ghosts of Savarin and Vatel! This _is_ a soup!” “It has been aging twenty-five years,” said Acquilla proudly. “What, that surprises you? True, you applied the principle only to wines and liqueurs; but if the principle, which is after all but the evaporation of noxious gases holds true in one case why not in another?”