"Well?" she said.
"I was reading some of the old books yesterday. Some of them centuries old. The people then, most of them, didn't live as well as we do but they were very much like us in some other ways.
"They—well, sometimes a man would think he had fallen out of harmony with his mate. In this book, the man thought he'd found another woman more suitable to his psyche. He was about to obtain a release—divorce I think they used to call it—when she was injured in an accident. His mate, I mean. The medical experts did not think she could live.
"He realized then, when it seemed to be too late, that there could never be any other mate for him. They didn't have psychoadjusters in those days, so, if she died, he would be affected for many years. The only way emotional upsets could wear off was through the primitive process of letting time wear them down, little by little. It all ended well, however, because medical experts discovered that it was only her psyche that made the injury seem fatal; when she found that he still wanted her to be his mate, she recovered."
"Eric, what are you trying to tell me?"
"That I don't want to be released from you ever. Even if this had never happened, if what I saw out there was only my imagination.
"I know now that I was only deceiving myself when I sought release from you. Sandra? Well, I rather like her, but she could never take your place. I still wish to be your mate, Natalla."
Her eyes answered him, he thought.
"You're tired, Eric. But perhaps you'd better not spend the night in the lab after all."
He reached down, picked her up in his arms. "In the old days," he said, "it was considered particularly fine form for a man to carry his mate to their sleeping quarters."