"These are all my children," he said softly. "My first-born." He glanced at me apologetically and his face was flushed. "I must appear odd," he said. "You see, as I have told you, there were no male plants in the bundle which you sent me, and consequently, although it was not difficult to bring them to maturity, pollination of the female flowers was impossible. As soon as I understood a little of their morphology and metabolism I realized that they must be artificially fertilized if the strain was to continue. Lacking the male element, it was necessary for me to devise some mixture of chemicals which would serve as a substitute. Needless to say, I was successful, and these lovely creatures are the result. "The methods of insemination which I was forced to employ were drastic in the extreme, I am afraid, but it will never again be necessary to make use of them. We have a fine new generation of young plants growing up and maturing, ready to mate and bring forth their own kind as you have seen. Many of the parent plants, alas, failed to survive. Some of the young died, too, but these you see here I brought up myself, with the aid of one strong plant which did endure my treatment. She is still alive, and these--the children of my science--the young whom I fed through infancy and taught as I once taught you, James--they look to me as to a father. They love me, James. They--and she--and no one else. It has been lonely." We went back to the house. The cloying perfume of the weird plants still clung to us, and I could see the tendrils of the little "orphans" creeping and writhing over his cassock. We went inside. It was as I remembered it, fifteen years before--not a picture or stick of furniture had changed. But there was one addition. On the taboret beside his chair, at the left of the great tiled fireplace, was a squat black urn, and in it--the plant. I realized, of course, that this was the one remaining plant of those I had sent him--the veteran of his experiment--the "she" of whom he spoke. It was showing signs of age. Its waxen leaves were splotched and greyish. Its silky crimson petals, deepening to scarlet at the heart, were faded. Not until he sank down in the old Morris chair and stretched his long legs out toward the hearth did it respond and bend down toward him. He cradled the great blossom for a moment in his palm, and let his fingers slip lovingly down its slender stem. I saw its withered leaves tremble at his touch, and smelled the faint perfume that rose from it. "She is growing old, James," he said wistfully. "She is sick and old, and I am all she has. She is very like me, in many ways, and her company has been good for me, but some day soon I must kill her, quickly and painlessly, before disease cripples her any further. It will be the kind thing to do."