“Revaluate is sometimes preferred, dear.”

“I thought it had an extra sound.” Suddenly she laughed, pushed him into a chair, and plumped down on his lap. Powell groaned.

“Gently, Barbara. You’re ages older and pounds heavier.”

“Listen,” she said. “What ever made me think you was… Were? Were my father?”

“What’s the matter with me as a father?”

“Let’s be frank. Real frank.”

“Sure.”

“Do you feel like a father toward me? Because I don’t feel like a daughter toward you.”

“Oh? How do you feel?”

“I asked first, so you go first.”

“My feelings toward you are those of a loving and dutiful son.”

“No. Be serious.”

“I have resolved to be a trustworthy son to all women until Vulcan assumes its rightful place is the Community of Planets.”

She flushed angrily and got up from his lap. “I wanted you to be serious, because I need advice. But if you—”

“I’m sorry, Barbara. What is it?”

She knelt alongside him and took his hand. “I’m all mixed up about you.”

She looked into his eyes with the alarming directness of the young. “You know.”

After a pause, he nodded. “Yes. I know.”

“And you’re all mixed up about me, too. I know.”

“Yes, Barbara. That’s true. I am.”

“Is it wrong?”

Powell heaved up from the chair and began pacing unhappily. “No, Barbara, it isn’t wrong. It’s… mistimed.”

“I want you to tell me about it.”

“Tell you…? Yes, I suppose I’d better. I… I’ll put it this way, Barbara. The two of us are four people. There’s two of you, and two of me.”

“Why?”

“You’ve been sick, dear. So we had to turn you into a baby and let you grow up again. That’s why you’re two people. The grown-up Barbara inside, and the baby outside.”

“And you?”

“I’m two grown-up people. One of them is me… Powell… The other is a member of the governing Council of the Esper Guild.”

“What’s that?”

“It doesn’t need explaining. It’s the part of me that’s got me mixed up… God knows, maybe it’s the baby part. I don’t know.”

She considered earnestly, then said slowly. “When I don’t feel like a daughter to you… which me feels like that?”

“I don’t know, Barbara.”

“You do know. Why won’t you say?” She came to him and put her arms around his neck… a grown-up woman with the manner of a child. “If it isn’t wrong, why won’t you say? If I love you—”

“Who said anything about love!”

“It’s what we’re talking about, isn’t it? lsn’t it? I love you and you love me. Isn’t that it?”

“All right,” Powell thought desperately. “Here it is. What are you going to do? Admit the truth?”

“Yes!” From the stairs. Mary was descending with a travelling case in her hand. “Admit the truth.”

“She isn’t a peeper.”

“Forget that. She’s a woman and she’s in love with you. You’re in love with her. Please, Linc, give yourselves a chance.”

“A chance for what? An affair if I get out of this Reich mess alive? That’s all it could be. You know the Guild won’t let us marry normals.”