Loring stared at her wordlessly, stunned, unbelieving. He would have liked to trust his reason completely, to dismiss what she had said as the meaningless ranting of a madwoman. But somehow he couldn't quite ignore the look of desperate appeal in her eyes, her aspect of absolute sanity. He had turned deathly pale.
"You must believe me," she went on quickly. "I am risking destruction by telling you this. They have a plan for world conquest which is audacious beyond anything the human mind could have conceived, audacious and terrible, with every detail coldly thought out, weighed, decided upon. I will become not one woman, but many. I am the first, but there will be others. A thousand women with my lips and hair and eyes, and my white and beautiful limbs that almost brought you to your knees in adoration. A thousand women like me will be laboratory-created.
"A thousand women and a thousand men. Your Janice saw the man when she awoke this morning. There are men who only have to look once at a woman and she begins to tremble. Her breathing quickens and she knows only the insensate joy of immediate and complete surrender."
Her lips were trembling slightly and she cast an apprehensive glance toward the door, then went on quickly. "Your Janice is a very strong-willed young woman. When she saw the stranger in her room she was startled and frightened at first. That was only to be expected. She had just awakened and it was only natural for her to experience nothing but fear for a moment. Then she lost her fear but she was not instantly and overwhelmingly drawn to him. She should have been, but she wasn't. She was very strongly attracted to him, but she did not lose control."
Loring moistened his lips. "She told me," he said. "She told me exactly how she felt. But what happened when he left the apartment made me jealous beyond reason."
"That was a hypnotic illusion, deliberately introduced into her mind. I will tell you a strange thing. When her breath did not quicken with passion, anger overcame him. He did not step forward and embrace her simply because he could not. We must not make the first advance. Deep in our minds they have implanted a command: If you do not succeed instantly, do nothing. Your presence alone must stir the chosen ones to an ardor they are powerless to resist. We cannot judge the strength of that ardor otherwise.
"Do you understand? She did not respond with instant, overwhelming ardor and he could do nothing. He stood there as if paralyzed, staring at her. He is as human as I am in that respect. In that moment of repudiation—and it was a repudiation even though his physical nearness stirred her—he experienced great bitterness and anger. But he had to pretend that he was not angered. So he advanced to the bed, kissed her lightly on the forehead and left the apartment.
"Then I think they lost their heads for a moment. It is what I have been told. They introduced into her mind an erotic fantasy, so powerful, so compelling, that she was powerless to resist. They know that to the human mind an erotic trance, dreamlike and unreal, can be more compulsively irresistible than any waking moment of rapture and abandonment, enforced by fervent kisses and caressing hands. In dreams of desire, the human mind is completely set free. All inhibitions are dissolved. But such dreams cannot last. They do not permanently enslave, because the dreamer is bound by no physical chains."
"But—"
"Listen carefully. You must listen. That erotic fantasy accomplished nothing, proved nothing. They realized that almost at once. They were defeated and discouraged. Your Janice had disappointed them and she had been one of the chosen two—a fool for love. Now you have disappointed them. Your ardor cooled too quickly. You remembered how completely, how desperately you loved her and you ceased to desire me. Do not tell me otherwise. I know better. Your discovery of the disk may have helped to cool your ardor, but she was the real reason. She is all beauty and all grace in your sight. She is the mistress of your heart and will always remain so."