That night they make love, and he discovers that to hold a woman in his arms is "the one ecstasy granted to the race of men."
But even in his newfound happiness he asks disturbing questions. If this solitude of theirs is evil, he wonders, then what kind of happiness is possible to human beings? If this is wrong, as they have been taught all their lives, then what is right? Now for the first time, he begins to doubt the truth of this teaching.
One day the Golden One says to him, "We love you. " But she frowns and shakes her head, realizing that those words — that word, "we" — do not capture the truth of her feelings. He looks into her eyes, knowing that for one instant they had been on the verge of a discovery. But then the instant flees. He wonders, what is the word that they lack?
