Will calmed down some, but he stood up, frowning. “This kind of thing always happens in these classes,” he said. “The teacher keeps changing into you, or vice versa. I like you better, though, I’ll say that. He’s too near my age to know much more than I do.”

“So that’s it,” Seven said.

“Well, at least you’re old enough to have learned something,” Will replied. Then, suspiciously, “Am I awake or dreaming? I’m never sure of that, either, when I’m here.”

“Both,” Seven answered. “You should know that by now.”

“Know? I don’t know anything,” Will blurted. “And besides, I think that Physical Reality is a lousy course.”

“Then why did you take it to begin with?” Seven asked. He almost turned back into the young graduate teacher, but caught himself just in time.

“To prove I could do it, that’s why,” Will yelled.

In consternation, Seven forgot himself and called out to Cyprus, “Did you hear that?” Then, to Will, he said as calmly as he could, “That’s your trouble right there. You don’t have to prove yourself to anyone; including yourself!”

Before Will could answer, Cyprus materialized, and for once Will just stood there silently, staring; for with Cyprus’ image an indefinable sense of power and assurance came to him. Suddenly he knew that he was somehow secure despite all of his difficulties; yet he couldn’t tell for the life of him who stood before him.

For one thing, Cyprus reminded him of his mother and his sister, not as they were, necessarily (for they often annoyed him), but as he wished they might be. At the same time, Cyprus seemed to be someone else—the woman (not girl) that he often dreamed of meeting and falling in love with. All of these images were merged in the woman he saw before him, so that it was impossible to separate them. And, for reasons he didn’t understand, Will felt more and more assured.

“You’re the feminine principle? Or the female muse? Or”—he snapped his dream fingers—“Mother Goddess? I do have considerable education on earth,” he said, when she didn’t answer. “I’m not as stupid as I sometimes seem.”

Amazing, thought Seven as he watched, for now Will looked nonchalant and even half insolent. He strolled over to Cyprus. “You are damnably attractive, whoever you are,” he said. And the closer to her he came, the more powerful and assured he felt.

Yet suddenly he stopped and felt that he should go no further. At the same time, an image opened in his mind so that he saw himself—foolishly strutting, petty somehow—approaching what?