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placed one hand on Silas Timberman’s shoulder. “That is the last thing in the world I intended to imply,” he said with sincerity. “By God, if you have no right to say what you please, Silas, then what in hell’s name is the good of any kind of defense, civil or otherwise!”
    Even coming as it did from Lundfest, there was a certain insane truth in the statement, and it at least served the purpose of returning Silas to time and reality. He was still standing in front of Whittier Hall on the campus of Clemington University. The grass was green and the sun shone. Most of the students had drifted into the various buildings, and the clock on the tower told him that he had only ten minutes left before his own class started—meaning that he would be unable to do any of the preparatory work he had left for this morning. He brought his eyes back to Lundfest before he answered, and looking at the man now, the tall, sturdy figure in Harris tweed, cashmere sweater, white shirt and neat blue tie, he envied an ability to dress so well and casually, and said to himself, “I don’t want to make an enemy out of Ed Lundfest. There’s no reason why I should. He has his ways and I have mine, but we’ve always been good friends, always respected each other. Of course, he’s impulsive, but on the other hand, I’m stodgy—I don’t move at all. People are different. He’s not asking any great sacrifice from me, only to take him off the hook by joining this civil defense nonsense. Why not? What do I lose?” So his thoughts went, and it seemed as if someone else was speaking when he said, as he had to,
    â€œBut where is that right after you’ve committed me?”
    â€œCommitted you to what?” Lundfest demanded.
    â€œTo civil defense.”
    â€œSilas, so help me God, I don’t understand what you’re after! Can’t we talk about this quietly and sanely?”
    â€œI’ve been quiet,” Silas answered. “You ask me what I object to—just this. There’s as much need for civil defense at Clemington as there is in Death Valley, maybe less, for all I know. In the first place, this is a United Nations war—and it’s being fought in Korea. In the second place, if an atom bomb were dropped on Clemington, what good would all this mummery be? In the third place, no atom bombs are going to be dropped here. In the fourth place, I don’t like to whoop up a war, any war, especially a war like this. The thing to do with a war is to get it over with and done with, and you don’t do that by turning a war scare loose across the campus.”
    â€œAnd if all that is true, Silas, what’s behind this? Since you know all the other answers, I’m sure you know this one too.”
    â€œYou know it as well as I do, Ed. You said it before.”
    â€œWhat did I say?”
    Silas was in it now, as he well knew, in it and deeply, with only one last chance of going back. He would tell Myra about it later, and she would ask him why he had to say what he was going to say, and he would be unable to answer, just as he was unable to explain to himself now why he said,
    â€œThe unique importance of Clemington and President Cabot—”
    â€œI’m sorry you said that. I’m sorry, Silas. I don’t want to press you any further now. I want you to think this through again. I’ll see you at convocation.”
    * * *
    The mood that Lundfest left with Silas carried over into the classroom, and Silas found himself regarding his students with a mixture of curiosity and uncertainty. Lundfest had succeeded in making him doubt a number of things which were not subject to doubt when he awoke that morning, and to some extent these doubts were effective. He looked at the students as he might at strangers; and this was new, for he had never regarded a classroom as a gathering of strangers before—nor had they ever puzzled him to