There was more; but later I couldn't remember it all. The beauty of a thing can't be recreated in its absence. Only the memory of it lingers. But the memory of an exalted experience has a beauty of its own.
After a while I came back. Back to my gross self lying on the bed, the jade-green cigaret holder in my fingers, a long ash on the end of the cigaret. So I had been away only a minute or two in our time. It had seemed hours in his.
Gradually the sparkling worlds reverted to patches of sunlight and the dust-cloud to tobacco smoke.
Jones stood near the bed. Gently he took the holder from my fingers and snuffed out the cigaret in the ashtray.
"You are pleased," he said, speaking with his voice now. "You have told me that."
"Yes," I said. "Oh, yes." I wanted to say much more, but the inhibition of speech was on me now.
"I understand. Do not talk. You are still too close to it. The change is too great. But some of it remains with you, does it not?"
I nodded. It did. There was no great letdown. No harsh awakening to the detested world of everyday. It must have been because I carried over with me enough of the memory to cushion the shock of adjustment. I sat up. I felt fine.
"You have had only a glimpse," he said. "You must go now. But perhaps you will come back?"
"Please," I said.