"You inflicted yours on me, and I'm entitled to revenge. And so--you're intelligent, lazy, dreamy, and with a fine perception of artistic values. You're very alert to impressions of the senses--I mean you're sensuous without being sensual. You're delightfully serious without being somber, except sometimes. Sometimes I feel a hint, just a thrilling hint, in your character, of something dangerously darker--" "Don't!" said Nick sharply. Pat shot him a quick glance. "And you're frightened to death of falling in love," she concluded imperturbably. "Oh! Do you think so?" "I do." "Then you're wrong! I can't be afraid of it, since I've known for the better part of a month that I've been in love." "With me," said the girl. "Yes, with you!" "Well!" said Pat. "It never before took me a month to extract that admission from a man. Is twenty-two getting old?" "You're a tantalizing imp!" "And so?" She pursed her lips, assuming an air of disappointment. "What am I to do about it--scream for help? You haven't given me anything to scream about." The kiss, Pat admitted to herself, was quite satisfactory. She yielded herself to the pleasure of it; it was decidedly the best kiss she had, in her somewhat limited experience, encountered. She pushed herself away finally, with a little gasp, gazing bright-eyed at her companion. He was staring down at her with serious eyes; there was a tense twist to his mouth, and a curiously unexpected attitude of unhappiness. "Nick!" she murmured. "Was it as bad as all that?" "Bad! Pat, does it mean you--care for me? A little, anyway?" "A little," she admitted. "Maybe more. Is that what makes you look so forlorn?" He drew her closer to him. "How could I look forlorn, Honey, when something like this has happened to me? That was just my way of looking happy." She nestled as closely as the steering wheel permitted, drawing his arm about her shoulders. "I hope you mean that, Nick." "Then _you_ mean it? You really do?" "I really do." "I'm glad," he said huskily. The girl thought she detected a strange dubious note in his voice. She glanced at his face; his eyes were gazing into the dim remoteness of the night horizon. "Nick," she said, "why were you so--well, so reluctant about admitting this? You must have known I--like you. I showed you that deliberately in so many ways." "I--I wasn't quite sure." "You were! That isn't it, Nick. I had to practically browbeat you into confessing you cared for me. Why?" He stepped on the starter; the motor ground into sudden life. The car backed into the road, turning toward Chicago, that glared like a false dawn in the southern sky. "I hope you never find out," he said. 2 Science of Mind "She's out," said Pat as the massive form of Dr. Carl Horker loomed in the doorway. "Your treatments must be successful; Mother's out playing bridge."