ie," she told him.

He shook his head. "That can't be," he said. Then his face brightened.
"Euphemia," he exclaimed. "That's what Effie is short for. Your name is
Euphemia." As he said that, looking at her, she suddenly felt beautiful.
He got up and came around the table and stretched out his hand toward
her.

"Euphemia--" he began.

"Yes?" she answered huskily, shrinking from him a little, but looking up
sideways, and very flushed.

"Don't either of you move," Hank said.

The voice was flat and nasal because Hank was wearing a nose respirator
that was just long enough to suggest an elephant's trunk. In his right
hand was a large blue-black automatic pistol.

* * * * *

They turned their faces to him. Patrick's was abruptly alert, shifty.
But Effie's was still smiling tenderly, as if Hank could not break the
spell of the magic garden and should be pitied for not knowing about
it.

"You little--" Hank began with an almost gleeful fury, calling her
several shameful names. He spoke in short phrases, closing tight his
unmasked mouth between them while he sucked in breath through the
respirator. His voice rose in a crescendo. "And not with a man of the
community, but a pariah! _A pariah!_"

"I hardly know what you're thinking, man, but you're quite wrong,"
Patrick took the opportunity to put in hurriedly, conciliatingly. "I
just happened to be coming by hungry tonight, a lonely tramp, and
knocked at the window. Your wife was a bit foolish and let
kindheartedness get the better of prudence--"

"Don't think you've pulled the wool over my eyes, Effie," Hank went on
with a screechy laugh, disregarding the other man completely. "Don't
think I don't know why you're suddenly going to have a child after four
long years."

At that moment the cat came nosing up to his feet. Patrick watched him
narrowly, shifting his weight forward a little, but Hank only kicked the
animal aside without taking his eyes off them.

"Even that business of carrying the wristwatch in your pocket instead of
on your arm," he went on with channeled hysteria. "A neat bit of
camouflage, Effie. Very neat. And telling me it was my child, when all
the while you've been seeing him for months!"

"Man, you're mad; I've not touched her!" Patrick denied hotly though
still calculatingly, and risked a step forward, stopping when the gun
instantly swung his way.

"Pretending you were going to give me a healthy child," Hank