IN THE SHADOW
being possesses certain impulses, spiritual and physical. To both of these there is a vague force, called, for lack of a better word 'magnetism,' which, unlike that peculiar to the poles of an electric magnet, serves not to neutralize, but tends rather to a diffusion which results in the establishing of an equilibrium. An individual possessing an excess of the spiritual calls loudly for the other complementary quality to bring its physical up to the level of its spiritual; calls unconsciously and aside from all reasoning; in other words, craves."
Leyden paused, placed the tips of his fingers together; the man had beautiful hands, the hands of a gentleman who uses them and his brain.
"Thank you, Wiggin," he remarked without looking around. "You may place them on the table." Leyden stared into the fire … seemed to be following the flow of his thought as the eager draught sucked it into the flames. "I am a poor talker," he observed; "possibly you do not follow me!"
Manning writhed uneasily, reached down, shoved his chair back with a gasp of pain. He had not realized that his knees were scorching; there was an odor of burnt wool. He swore a soft, warm oath; oaths and tobacco were Manning's most affected vices.
"Not entirely," he said, "your distinctions are too fine, too subtle, for a practical person like myself." "Practical" is the term by which people lacking in imagination define their lack of this quality. "If a powerful physical attraction is neither love nor lust then it is something which I do not understand."
"That also is possible," said Leyden sharply. The assumption of this young man to a right to knowledge
128
