The head nurse came striding up, her leather heels clacking on the
tile floor. "Miss--" She looked puzzled. "Who are you, anyway?" she
demanded. "I've never seen you before."
These women! Maybe the Bryd was getting peevish in its old age, but why
couldn't people mind their own business for a change?
It resolved itself into a doctor, and it was gratified to watch the
head nurse's eyes shoot open.
"Madam," the Bryd said in its best baritone, "were you addressing me?"
"I--" The head nurse swallowed. "No, sir, I--I beg your pardon, sir."
She recovered slightly. "Have I seen you before, sir?"
* * * * *
Oh, bother! Details, details! Humans wouldn't be happy if they weren't
tied up in details all the time. The Bryd dematerialized and went
inside the sanatorium by the simple process of flowing through the
spaces around the nuclei of the atoms in the wall. Then, on second
thought, it went back and erased some memories from the mind of the
head nurse; then it took Marillyn through the wall into the sanatorium.
It went into her mind and did some repair work that would have amazed
the finest brain surgeons on Earth. In a few months Marillyn's
paralysis would be gone and she would be well and happy. Miracles, did
they say? Well, they'd asked for it.
The Bryd was somewhat irked with itself for having interfered--but it
had been for the best.
It got on a tight beam and went back to sun-station No. 18. Dale
Stevenson's finger was just starting to move the button. There was
maybe a fiftieth of a second left.
The Bryd carefully implanted the knowledge of Marillyn's cure in a
corner of Dale's brain and sat back to await results. But in the next
hundredth of a second there was no response. Dale still was about to
turn the sun on Paris.
So the Bryd, now thoroughly disgusted, implanted the knowledge of Ann's
love in another corner of Dale's mind and then to its astonishment had
to jump fast to get out of the way.
Did that ever get results! Dale held his finger. He got up and rubbed
his forehead a moment. Then he went to the radio-phone. "Get me the
U.N. police headquarters in London," he said.
He stood there beating his brains to figure out what had gotten into
him, so the Bryd just felt around and erased a few memories, and
everything was all right. Then the Bryd climbed into its favorite cozy
spot in Dale's mind. The spot was still warm and snuggly. It began to
settle down--but then it remembered something.
It got up. It went back to Earth and hunted up the minds of the men who
were flying atom-bombs over France. The Bryd knew by now, of course,
that France herself had never had any atom-bombs.
The Bryd went into the minds of the foreign fliers and sent them back
to drop the atom-bombs on their own cities. After all, they had those
bombs and they apparently were the kind who wouldn't be satisfied until
they could drop them. The Bryd dusted off its hands and headed wearily
for sun-station No. 18. It hoped for many restful years ahead with Dale
and Ann.
If it didn't get them, the Bryd thought disgustedly, it had better try
to hitch a ride back to Pluto. At least it had had rest and quiet there.