“Okay!” Lurine said angrily.

“See?” Ely said to her husband.

He saw; it was true and he knew it.

“So he’s not a gesunt,” Lurine said. Gesunt—a healthy person. Not made sick or maimed by the war, as the incompletes had been. Pete Sands was a kranker, a sick one; it showed on his marred head, hairless, his pocked and pitted face. Back to the Anglo-Saxton peasant with his pox, he thought with surprising venom. Was it jealousy? He amazed himself.

Nodding toward Father Handy, Ely said, speaking to Lurine, “Why not sleep with him? He’s a gesunt.”

“Aw, come on,” Lurine said in her small, quiet, but deadly boiling-hot angry voice; when she became really terribly furious her entire face flushed, and she sat as stiffly as if calcified.

“I mean it,” Ely said, in a sort of loud, high screech.

“Please,” Father Handy said, trying to calm his wife.

“But why come here?” Ely asked Lurine. “To announce you’re going to revert, is that it? Who cares? Revert. In fact, sleep with Abernathy; a lot of good it’ll do you.” She made it meaningful; she put over the significance of her words by the wild tone alone. Women had such great ability at that; they possessed such a range. Men, in contrast, grunted, as with McComas; they resorted, as in his case, to an ugly chuckle. That was little enough.

Trying to sound wise, Father Handy said to Lurine, “Have you thought it over carefully? There’s a stigma attached; after all, you do live by sewing and weaving and spinning—you depend on goodwill in this community, and if you join Abernathy’s church—”

“Freedom of conscience,” Lurine said.

“Oh god,” Ely moaned.

“Listen,” Father Handy said. Reaching out, he took hold of both of Lurine’s hands, held them with his own. He explained, then, patiently. “Just because you’re sleeping with Sands, that doesn’t force you to accept their religious teachings. ‘Freedom of conscience’ also means freedom not to accept dogma; do you see? Now look, dear.” She was twenty; he was forty-two, and felt sixty; he felt, holding her hands, like a tottering old ram, some defanged creature mumbling and drooling, and he cringed at his self-image.