"Why not? Man, you're young yet, if—if——"

"Yes, I know, Quarren.... But my mind is too old—very old and very infirm—dying in me of age—the age that comes through those centuries of pain that men sometimes live through in a few months."

Quarren looked at him hopelessly.

"Yet," he said, "if only a man wills it, the world is new again."

"But—if the will fails?"

"I don't know, Ledwith."

"I do." He drew up his cuff a little way, his dead eyes resting on Quarren, then, in silence, he drew the sleeve over the scars.

"Even that can be cured," said the younger man.

"If there is a will to cure it, perhaps."

"Even a desire is enough."