"They will not laugh at you. You will be allowed to live on any approved planet that you wish, and choose your own profession. You will be trained at the expense of the Empire. And in a few years you may be allowed to visit your father and brother on Ophir. Only visit, I mean. Does that sound so bad?"
"But if they laugh—"
"I am not laughing," said Wellesley, with a strange lump in his throat.
"You might if you could see me. I'm too dark. My eyes are too big. My ears are too small."
"I can see you," he said.
"Is it true!" She clasped his shoulders. "But when—how long?"
"Since this morning, a little. The effect of the venom is passing. Now I can see you perfectly, and you are beautiful. Strange, and—and beautiful."
And she was.
"Do not go to Rigel Twelve. Stay with me," he said. (It was Wellesley's misfortune that he always sounded like a policeman making an arrest, but she kissed him anyway.)
And he thought what a fool Amos Sealilly had been.