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 them; however, at Jen Cordeen's, she wanted to read them; and Rinderfeld told her why.

"You're realizing that what you'd been standing on—and what's been knocked from under you—was not merely an illusion concerning one man but a fallacy regarding your whole situation; so you need now to know more about what the human race actually is and has been."

"What was my fallacy?" Marjorie asked.

But Rinderfeld refused the attempt to phrase it; and thereby kept her thinking for herself and of him.

She was not actually discussing history with Rinderfeld when Billy came upon them, but their discussion was at least more mental and impersonal than any she had ever had with Bill; however, this probably was not apparent.

Clara saw Billy first and, of course, did not recognize him. "Hello!" Clara warned in hoarse sotto voce. "The place is pinched!"

Rinderfeld looked about, then, and instantly recognized William Whittaker; and simultaneously Rinderfeld grasped the inevitable developments of the next moment; he thought so quickly, indeed, that his impulse to be on his feet got no further than a tugging at his knee muscles.

"Whittaker is here," he said quickly in a low voice to Marjorie. "He has seen you; keep your seat."

She jerked and pulled herself up straight, swung about and saw Billy; as she faced about, he cried her name, "Marjorie!"

But she had no regard for the commotion he caused; she was not able to think about other people; they might have been, for those seconds, blotted out and the room blotted out, as Billy approached her; here