raved on,
"when all the while you knew it would be--either in body or germ
plasm--a thing like _that_!"

He waved his gun at the malformed cat, which had leaped to the top of
the table and was eating the remains of Patrick's food, though its
watchful green eyes were fixed on Hank.

"I should shoot him down!" Hank yelled, between sobbing, chest-racking
inhalations through the mask. "I should kill him this instant for the
contaminated pariah he is!"

All this while Effie had not ceased to smile compassionately. Now she
stood up without haste and went to Patrick's side. Disregarding his
warning, apprehensive glance, she put her arm lightly around him and
faced her husband.

"Then you'd be killing the bringer of the best news we've ever had," she
said, and her voice was like a flood of some warm sweet liquor in that
musty, hate-charged room. "Oh, Hank, forget your silly, wrong jealousy
and listen to me. Patrick here has something wonderful to tell us."

* * * * *

Hank stared at her. For once he screamed no reply. It was obvious that
he was seeing for the first time how beautiful she had become, and that
the realization jolted him terribly.

"What do you mean?" he finally asked unevenly, almost fearfully.

"I mean that we no longer need to fear the dust," she said, and now her
smile was radiant. "It never really did hurt people the way the doctors
said it would. Remember how it was with me, Hank, the exposure I had and
recovered from, although the doctors said I wouldn't at first--and
without even losing my hair? Hank, those who were brave enough to stay
outside, and who weren't killed by terror and suggestion and panic--they
adapted to the dust. They changed, but they changed for the better.
Everything--"

"Effie, he told you lies!" Hank interrupted, but still in that same
agitated, broken voice, cowed by her beauty.

"Everything that grew or moved was purified," she went on ringingly.
"You men going outside have never seen it, because you've never had eyes
for it. You've been blinded to beauty, to life itself. And now all the
power in the dust has gone and faded, anyway, burned itself out. That's
true, isn't it?"

She smiled at Patrick for confirmation. His face was strangely veiled,
as if he were calculating obscure changes. He might have given a little
nod; at any rate, Effie assumed that he did, for she turned back to her
husband.

"You see, Hank? We can all go out now. We