"Yeah. I guess not."

Danner hesitated. "It's a glorious thing. And dangerous."

"Yeah."

The professor tried to simplify the biology of his discovery. He perceived that it was going to involve him in the mysteries of sex. He knew that to unfold them to a child was considered immoral. But Danner was far, far beyond his epoch. He put his hand on Hugo's shoulder. And Hugo set off the process.

"Dad, how come I'm—like this?"

"I'll tell you. It's a long story and a lot for a boy your age to know. First, what do you know about—well—about how you were born?"

Hugo reddened. "I—I guess I know quite a bit. The kids in school are always talkin' about it. And I've read some. We're born like—well—like the kittens were born last year."

"That's right." Banner knitted his brow. He began to explain the details of conception as it occurs in man—the biology of ova and spermatazoa, the differences between the anatomy of the sexes, and the reasons for those differences. He drew, first, a botanical analogy. Hugo listened intently. "I knew most of that. I've seen—girls."

"What?"

"Some of them—after school—let you."

Danner was surprised, and at the same time he was amused. He had forgotten the details of his young investigation. They are blotted out of the minds of most adults—to the great advantage of dignity. He did not show his amusement or his surprise.

"Girls like that," he answered, "aren't very nice. They haven't much modesty. It's rather indecent, because sex is a personal thing and something you ought to keep for the one you're very fond of. You'll understand that better when you're older. But what I was going to tell you is this. When you were little more than a mass of plasm inside your mother, I put a medicine in her blood that I had discovered. I did it with a hypodermic needle. That medicine changed you. It altered the structure of your bones and muscles and nerves and your blood. It made you into a different tissue from the weak fibre of ordinary people. Then—when you were born—you were strong. Did you ever watch an ant carry many times its weight? Or see a grasshopper jump fifty times its length? The insects have better muscles and nerves than we have. And I improved your body till it was relatively 

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