He tossed off the balance of the drink, set the glass on the table and made a sweeping gesture. "They're all alike," he said brutally. "Fickle and treacherous. Deceivers. Always flinging their sex around." "Not all women," she countered. "Take this Professor Madigan who discovered that new adhesion force." "A woman?" "Of course. Professor Madigan is a scholarly young woman. Her sex appeal might not win a beauty contest, but she discovered a perfectly wonderful man-catcher." "What?" "A new force. Works like gravity—only it's different. Its strength increases in ratio to the square of the distance." "What are you talking about? Women don't understand things like that." "No?" "No! Need I spell it out for you? Your delivery should be in the pneumatic by now. Why don't you pick it up and go home and make your cake?" "I shall. I had no idea I was living next door to a misogynist, and a brutal one at that." "I don't like women," Kerran said emphatically. "They're all alike. Fickle. Deceivers. Everything about them artificial. Lips, color, shape." The girl rose and stood over him. "I'm not wearing make-up," she asserted. "You flatter yourself in thinking I would put on my face to come across the hall." "Your shape! Your hips aren't that neat!" The color rose in her cheeks. She lifted a hand as though to strike him. The hand trembled. She lowered it to her side. "I do not wear a girdle. Want to feel?" "No," he said, his own color rising. "Go on home." Ignoring the pneumatic, she crossed to the door, snatched it open, marched into the corridor. Through the open doorway he heard the knob turn on her door. He went to the pneumatic, picked up the sugar, strode across the corridor and knocked. In a moment her head appeared, then the door swung wide. "You forgot something," he said contritely. "Sorry I was rude. I'm a natural woman-hater, and a moment before you came in some wench on television triggered my feelings on the subject.... Just keep on your own side of the fence and I'll stay on mine. I'll even
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