Mel extended the medical records he had obtained in Central Valley. Dr.
Winters picked them up and examined them for a long time while Mel
watched silently.
Finally, Dr. Winters put the records down with a sigh. "This seems to
make the problem even more complex than it was."
"There are X-rays, too," said Mel. "Alice had pelvic X-rays only a
little over two years ago. I tried to get them, but the doctor said
you'd have to request them. They should be absolute proof that Alice was
different then."
"Tell me who has them and I'll send for them at once."
An hour later Dr. Winters shook his head in disbelief as he turned off
the light box and removed the X-ray photograph. "It's impossible to
believe that these were taken of your wife, but they corroborate the
evidence of the other medical records. They show a perfectly normal
structure."
The two men remained silent across the desk, each reluctant to express
his confused thoughts. Dr. Winters finally broke the silence. "It must
be, Mr. Hastings," he said, "--it must be that this woman--this utterly
alien person--is simply not your wife, Alice. Somehow, somewhere, there
must be a mistake in identity, a substitution of similar individuals."
"She was not out of my sight," said Mel. "Everything was completely
normal when I came home that night. Nothing was out of place. We went
out to a show. Then, on the way home, the accident occurred. There could
have been no substitution--except right here in the hospital. But I know
it was Alice I saw. That's why I made you let me see her again--to make
sure."
"But the evidence you have brought me proves otherwise. These medical
records, these X-rays prove that the girl, Alice, whom you married, was
quite normal. It is utterly impossible that she could have metamorphosed
into the person on whom we operated."
Mel stared at the reflection of the sky in the polished desk top. "I
don't know the answer," he said. "It must not be Alice. But if that's
the case, where is Alice?"
"That might even be a matter for the police," said Dr. Winters. "There
are many things yet to be learned about this mystery."
"There's one thing more," said Mel. "Fingerprints. When we first came
here Alice got a job where she had to have her fingerprints taken."
"Excellent!" Dr. Winters exclaimed. "That should give us our final
proof!"
It took the rest of the afternoon to get the fingerprint record and make
a comparison. Dr. Winters called Mel at home to give him the report.
There was no question. The fingerprints were identical. The corpse was
that of Alice Hastings.
* * * * *
The nightmare came again that night. Worse than Mel could ever remember
it. As always, it was a dream of space, black empty space, and he was
floating alone in the immense depths of it. There was no direction. He
was caught in a whirlpool of vertigo from which he reached out with
agonized yearning for some solidarity to cling to.
There was only space.
After a time he was no longer alone. He could not see them, but he knew
they were out there. The searchers. He did not know why he had to flee
or why they sought him, but he knew they must never overtake him, or all
would be lost.
[Illustration]
Somehow he found a way to propel himself through empty space. The
searchers were growing points of light in the far distance. They gave
him a sense of direction. His being, his existence, his universe of
meaning and understanding depended on the success of his flight from the
searchers. Faster, through the wild black depths of space--
He never knew whether he escaped or not. Always he awoke in a tangle of
bedclothes, bathed in sweat, whimpering in fear. For a long time Alice
had been there to touch his hand when he awoke. But Alice was gone now
and he was so weary of the night pursuit. Sometimes he wished it would
end with the searchers--whoever they were--catching up with him and
doing what they intended to do. Then maybe there would be no more
nightmare. Maybe there would be no more Mel Hastings, he thought. And
that wouldn't be so bad, either.
He tossed sleeplessly the rest of the night and got up at dawn feeling
as if he had not been to bed at all. He would take one day more, and
then get back to the News Bureau. He'd take this day to do what couldn't
be put off any longer--the collecting and disposition of Alice's
personal belongings.
* * * * *
He shaved, bathed and dressed, then began emptying the drawers, one by
one. There were many souvenirs, mementos. She was always collecting
these. Her bottom drawer was full of stuff that he'd glimpsed only
occasionally.
In the second layer of junk in the drawer he came across the brochure on
Martian vacations. It must have been one of the dreams of her life, he
thought. She'd wanted it so much that she'd almost come to believe that
it was real. He turned the pages of the smooth, glossy brochure. Its
cover bore the picture of the great Martian Princess and the blazoned
emblem of Connemorra Space Lines. Inside were glistening photos of the
plush interior of the great vacation liner, and pictures of the domed
cities of Mars where Earthmen played more than they worked. Mars had
become the great resort center of Earth.
Mel closed the book and glanced again at the Connemorra name. Only one
man had ever amassed the resources necessary to operate a private space
line. Jim Connemorra had done it; no one knew quite how. But he operated
now out of both hemispheres with a space line that ignored freight and
dealt only in passenger business. He made money, on a scale that no
government-operated line had yet been able to approach.
Mel sank down to the floor, continuing to shift through the other things
in the drawer.
His hand stopped. He remained motionless as recognition showered sudden
frantic questions in his mind. There lay a ticket envelope marked
Connemorra Lines.
The envelope was empty when he looked inside, and there was no name on
it. But it was worn. As if it might have been carried to Mars and back.
In sudden frenzy he began examining each article and laying it in a
careless pile on the floor. He recognized a pair of idiotic Martian
dolls. He found a tourist map of the ruined cities of Mars. He found a
menu from the Red Sands Hotel.
And below all these there was a picture album. Alice at the Red Sands.
Alice at the Phobos Oasis. Alice at the Darnella Ruins. He turned the
pages of the album with numb fingers. Alice in a dozen Martian settings.
Some of them were dated. About two years ago. They had gone together,
Alice had said, but there was no evidence of Mel's presence on any such
trip.
But it was equally impossible that Alice had made the trip, yet here was
proof. Proof that swept him up in a doubting of his own senses. How
could such a thing have taken place? Had he actually made such a trip
and been stripped of the memory by some amnesia? Maybe he had forced
himself to go with her and the power of his lifelong phobia had wiped it
from his memory.
And what did it all have to do--if anything--with the unbelievable thing
Dr. Winters had found about Alice?
Overcome with grief and exhaustion he sat fingering the mementos
aimlessly while he stared at the pictures and the ticket envelope and
the souvenirs.
* * * * *
Dr. Winters spoke a little more sharply than he intended. "I don't think
anything is going to be solved by a wild-goose chase to Mars. It's going
to cost you a great deal of money, and there isn't a single positive
lead to any solution."
"It's the only possible explanation." Mel persisted. "Something happened
on Mars to change her from what she once was to--what you saw on your
operating table."
"And you are hoping that in some desperate way you will find there was a
switch of personalities--that there may be a ghost of a chance of
finding Alice still alive."
Mel bit his lip. He was scarcely willing to admit such a hope but it was
the foundation of his decision. "I've got to do what I can," he said.
"I must take the chance. The uncertainty will torment me all my life if
I don't."
Dr. Winters shook his head. "I still wish I could persuade you against
it. You will find only disappointment."
"My mind is made up. Will you help me or not?"
"What can I do?"
"I can't go into space unless I can find some way of lifting, even
temporarily, this phobia that nearly drives me crazy at the thought of
going out there. Isn't there a drug, a hypnotic method, or something to
help a thing like this?"
"This isn't my field," said Dr. Winters. "But I suspect that the cause
of your trouble cannot be suppressed. It will have to be lifted.
Psycho-recovery is the only way to accomplish that. I can recommend a
number of good men. This, too, is very expensive."
"I should have done it for Alice--long ago," said Mel.
* * * * *
Dr. Martin, the psychiatrist, was deeply interested in Mel's problem.
"It sounds as if it is based on some early trauma, which has long since
been wiped from your conscious memory. Recovery may be easy or
difficult, depending on how much suppression of the original event has
taken place."
"I don't even care what the original event was," said Mel, "if you rid
me of this overwhelming fear of space. Dr. Winters said he thought
recovery would be required."
"He is right. No matter how much overlay you pile on top of such a
phobia to suppress it, it will continue to haunt you. We can make a
trial run to analyze the situation, and then we can better predict the
chance of ultimate success."
As a reporter, Mel Hastings had had vague encounters with the subject of
psycho-recovery, but he knew little of the details about it. He knew it
involved some kind of a machine that could tap the very depths of the
human mind and drag out the hidden debris accumulated in mental
basements and attics. But such things had always given him the willies.
He steered clear of them.
When Dr. Martin first introduced him into the psycho-recovery room his
resolution almost vanished. It looked more like a complex electronic
laboratory than anything else. A half dozen operators and assistants in
nurses' uniforms stood by.
"If you will recline here--," Dr. Martin was saying.
Mel felt as if he were being prepared for some inhuman biological
experiment. A cage of terminals was fitted to his head and a thousand
small electrodes adjusted to contact with his skull. The faint hum of
equipment supported the small surge of apprehension within him.
After half an hour the preparations were complete. The level of lights
in the room was lowered. He could sense the operators at their panels
and see dimly the figure of Dr. Martin seated near him.
"Try to recall as vividly as possible your last experience with this
nightmare you have described. We will try to lock on to that and follow
it on down."
This was the last thing in the world Mel wanted to do. He lay in
agonized indecision, remembering that he had dreamed only a short time
ago, but fighting off the actual recollection of the dream.
"Let yourself go," Dr. Martin said kindly. "Don't fight it--"
A fragment of his mind let down its guard for a brief instant. It was
like touching the surface of a whirlpool. He was sucked into the
sweeping depths of the dream. He sensed that he cried out in terror as
he plunged. But there was no one to hear. He was alone in space.
Fear wrapped him like black, clammy fur. He felt the utter futility of
even being afraid. He would simply remain as he was, and soon he would
cease to be.
But they were coming again. He sensed, rather than saw them. The
searchers. And his fear of them was greater than his fear of space
alone. He moved. Somehow he moved, driving headlong through great
vastness while the pinpoints of light grew behind him.
"Very satisfactory," Dr. Martin was saying. "An extremely satisfactory
probe."
His voice came through to Mel as from beyond vast barriers of time and
space. Mel felt the thick sweat that covered his body. Weakness throbbed
in his muscles.
"It gives us a very solid anchor point," Dr. Martin said. "From here I
think we run back to the beginning of the experience and unearth the
whole thing. Are you ready, Mr. Hastings?"
Mel felt too weak to nod. "Let 'er rip!" he muttered weakly.
* * * * *
The day was warm and sunny. He and Alice had arrived early at the
spaceport to enjoy the holiday excitement preceding the takeoff. It was
something they had both dreamed of since they were kids--a vacation in
the fabulous domed cities and ruins of Mars.
Alice was awed by her first close view of the magnificent ship lying in
its water berth that opened to Lake Michigan. "It's _huge_--how can such
an enormous ship ever get off the Earth?"
Mel laughed. "Let's not worry about that. We know it does. That's all
that matters." But he could not help being impressed, too, by the
enormous size and the graceful lines of the luxury ship. Unlike Alice,
he was not seeing it at close range for the first time. He had met the
ship scores of times in his reporting job, interviewing famous and
well-known personages as they departed or arrived from the fabulous
playgrounds of Mars.
"If you look carefully," Mel pointed out, "you'll see a lot of faces
that make news when they come and go."
Alice's face glowed as she clung to Mel's arm and recognized some of the
famous citizens who would be their fellow passengers. "This is going to
be the most fun we've ever had in our lives, darling."
"Like a barrel of monkeys," Mel said casually, enjoying the bubbling
excitement that was in Alice.
The ship was so completely stabilized that the passengers did not even
have to sit down during takeoff. They crowded the ports to watch the
land and the water shoot past as the ship skimmed half the length of
Lake Michigan in its takeoff run. As it bore into the upper atmosphere
on an ever-increasing angle of climb, its own artificial gravity system
took over and gave the illusion of horizontal flight with the Earth
receding slowly behind.
Mel and Alice wandered through the salons and along the spacious decks
as if in some fairyland-come-true. All sense of time seemed to vanish
and they floated with the great ship in timeless, endless space.
He wasn't quite certain when he first became aware of his own sense of
disquietude. It seemed to result from a change in the members of the
crew. On the morning of the third day they ceased their universal and
uninterrupted concern for their passengers' entertainment and enjoyment.
Most of the passengers seemed to have taken no note of it. Mel commented
to Alice. She laughed at him. "What do you expect? They've spent two
full days showing us the ship and teaching us to play all the games
aboard. You don't expect them to play nurse to us during the whole trip,
do you?"
It sounded reasonable. "I suppose so," said Mel dubiously. "But just
what _are_ they doing? They all seem to be in such a hurry to get
somewhere this morning."
"Well, they must have some duties to perform in connection with running
the ship."
Mel shook his head in doubt.
* * * * *
Alice joined him in wandering about the decks, kibitzing on the games of
the other passengers, and watching the stars and galaxies on the
telescopic screens. It was on one of these that they first saw the
shadow out in space. Small at first, the black shadow crossed a single
star and made it wink. That was what caught Mel's attention, a winking
star in the dead night of space.
When he was sure, he called Alice's attention to it. "There's something
moving out there." By now it had shape, like a tiny black bullet.
"Where? I don't see anything."
"It's crossing that patch of stars. Watch, and you can see it blot them
out as it moves."
"It's another ship!" Alice exclaimed. "That's exciting! To think we're
passing another ship in all this great emptiness of space! I wonder
where it's coming from?"
"And where it's going to."
They watched its slow, precise movement across the stars. After several
minutes a steward passed by. Mel hailed him and pointed to the screen.
"Can you tell us what that other ship is?"
The steward glanced and seemed to recognize it instantly. But he paused
in replying. "That's the Mars liner," he said finally. "In just a few
minutes the public address system will announce contact and change of
ship."
"Change of ship?" Mel asked, puzzled. "I never heard anything about a
change of ship."
"Oh, yes," the steward said. "This is only the shuttle that we're on
now. We transfer to the liner for the remainder of the trip. I'm sure
that was explained to you at the time you purchased your tickets." He
hurried away.
Mel was quite sure no such thing had been explained to him when he
purchased tickets. He turned back to the screen and watched the black
ship growing swiftly larger now as it and the Martian Princess
approached on contact courses.
The public address system came alive suddenly. "This is your Captain.
All passengers will now prepare to leave the shuttle and board the Mars
liner. Hand luggage should be made ready. All luggage stowed in the hold
will be transferred without your attention. It has been a pleasure to
have you aboard. Contact with the liner will be made in fifteen
minutes."
From the buzz around him Mel knew that this was as much a surprise to
everyone else as it was to him, but it was greeted with excitement and
without question.
Even Alice was growing excited now and others crowded around them when
it was discovered what they were viewing. "It looks _big_," said Alice
in subdued voice. "Bigger than this ship by far."
Mel moved away and let the others have his place before the screen. His
sense of uneasiness increased as he contemplated the approach of that
huge black ship. And he was convinced its color _was_ black, that it was
not just the monotone of the view screen that made it so.
Why should there be such a transfer of passengers in mid-space? The
Martian Princess was certainly adequate to make the journey to Mars.
Actually they were more than a third of the way there, already. He
wasn't sure why he felt so certain something was amiss. Surely there was
no possibility that the great Connemorra Lines would plan any procedure
to the detriment of the more than five thousand passengers aboard the
ship. His uneasiness was pretty stupid, he thought.
But it wouldn't go away.
He returned to the crowd clustered at the viewing screen and took Alice
by the arm to draw her away.
She looked quizzically at him. "This is the most exciting thing yet. I
want to watch it."
"We haven't got much time," Mel said. "We've got a lot of things to get
in our suitcases. Let's go down to our stateroom."
"Everyone else has to pack, too. There's no hurry."
"Fifteen minutes, the Captain said. We don't want to be the last ones."
Unwillingly, Alice followed. Their stateroom was a long way from the
salon. The fifteen minutes were almost up by the time they reached it.
* * * * *
Mel closed the door to their room and put his hands on Alice's
shoulders. He glanced about warily. "Alice--I don't want to go aboard
that ship. There's something wrong about this whole thing. I don't know
what it is, but we're not going aboard."
Alice stared at him. "Have you lost your mind? After all our hopes and
all our planning you don't want to go on to Mars?"
Mel felt as if a wall had suddenly sprung up between them. He clutched
Alice's shoulders desperately in his hands. "Alice--I don't think that
ship out there is going to Mars. I know it sounds crazy, but please
listen to me--we weren't told anything about the Martian Princess being
merely a shuttle and that we'd transfer to another ship out here. No one
was told. The Martian Princess is a space liner perfectly capable of
going to Mars. There's no reason why such a huge ship should be used
merely as a shuttle."
"That ship out there is bigger."
"Why? Do we need any more room to finish the journey?"
Alice shook herself out of his grasp. "I don't know the answers to those
questions and I don't care to know them!" she said angrily.
"If you think I'm going to give up this vacation and turn right around
here in space and go back home you're crazy. If you go back you'll go
back alone!"
Alice whirled and ran to the door. Mel ran after her, but she was
through the door and was melting into the moving throng by the time he
reached the door. He took a step to follow, then halted. He couldn't
drag her forcibly back into the stateroom. Maybe she'd return in a few
minutes to pack her bags. He went back in the room and closed the door.
* * * * *
Even as he did so he knew that he was guessing wrong. Alice would be
matching him in a game of nerves. She'd go on to the other ship,
expecting him to pack the bags and follow. He sat down on the bed and
put his head in his hands for a moment. A faint shudder passed through
the ship and he heard the hollow ring of clashing metal. The unknown
ship had made contact with the Martian Princess. Their airlocks were
being mated now.
From the porthole he could see the incredible mass of the ship. He
crossed the room and pressed the curtains aside. His impression had been
right. The ship _was_ black. Black, nameless, and blind. No insignia or
portholes were visible anywhere on the hull within his range of vision.
He didn't know what he was going to do, but he knew above all else that
he wasn't going to board that ship. He paced the floor telling himself
it was a stupid, neurotic apprehension that filled his mind, that the
great Connemorra Lines could not be involved in any nefarious acts
involving five thousand people--or even one person. They couldn't afford
such risk.
He couldn't shake it. He was certain that, no matter what the cost, he
was not going to board that black ship.
He looked about the stateroom. He couldn't remain here. They'd certainly
find him. He had to hide somewhere. He stood motionless, staring out the
porthole. There was no place he could hide with assurance inside the
ship.
But what about outside?
His thoughts crumpled in indecision as he thought of Alice. Yet whatever
the black ship meant, he could help no one if he went aboard. He had to
get back to Earth and try to find out what it was all about and alert
the authorities. Only in that way could he hope to help Alice.
* * * * *
He opened the stateroom door cautiously and stepped out. The corridor
was filled with hurrying passengers, carrying hand luggage, laughing
with each other in excitement. He joined them, moving slowly, alert for
crew members. There seemed to be none of the latter in the corridors.
Keeping close to the wall, he moved with the crowd until he reached the
rounded niche that marked an escape chamber. As if pushed by the
hurrying throng, he backed into it, the automatic doors opening and
closing to receive him.
The chamber was one of scores stationed throughout the ship as required
by law. The escape chambers contained space suits for personal exit from
the ship in case of emergency. They were never expected to be used. In
any emergency requiring abandonment of the vessel it would be as
suicidal to go into space in a suit as to remain with the ship. But
fusty lawmakers had decreed their necessity, and passengers received a
perfunctory briefing in the use of the chambers and the suits--which
they promptly forgot.
Mel wrestled now with what he remembered of the instructions. He
inspected a suit hanging in its cabinet and then was relieved to find
that the instructions were repeated on a panel of the cabinet. Slowly,
he donned the suit, following the step by step instructions as he went.
He began to sweat profusely from his exertions and from his fear of
discovery.
He finally succeeded in getting the cumbersome gear adjusted and
fastened without being detected. He did not know if the airlock of the
chamber had some kind of alarm that would alert the crew when it was
opened. That was a chance he had to take. He discovered that it was
arranged so that it could be opened only by a key operated from within
the suit. This was obviously to prevent anyone leaving the ship
unprotected. Perhaps with this safeguard there was no alarm.
He twisted the lock and entered the chamber. He opened the outer door
and faced the night of space.
* * *
He would not have believed that anything could be so utterly terrifying.
His knees buckled momentarily and left him clinging to the side of the
port. Sweat burst anew from every pore. Blindly, he pressed the jet
control and forced himself into space.
He arced a short distance along the curve of the ship and then forced
himself down into contact with the hull. He clung by foot and hand
magnetic pads, sick with nausea and vertigo.
He had believed that by clinging to the outside of the hull he could
escape detection and endure the flight back to Earth. In his sickness of
body and mind the whole plan now looked like utter folly. He retched and
closed his eyes and lay on the hull through the beginning of an
eternity.
* * * * *
He had no concept of time. The chronometer in the suit was not working.
But it seemed as if many hours had passed when he felt a faint shock
pass through the hull beneath him. He felt a momentary elation. The
ships had separated. The search for him--if any--had been abandoned.
Slowly he inched his way around the hull to get a glimpse of the black
ship. It was still there, standing off a few hundred yards but not
moving. Its presence dismayed him. There could be no reason now for the
two ships to remain together. The Martian Princess should be turning
around for the return to Earth.
Then out of the corner of his eye he saw it. A trace of movement. A
gleam of light. Like a small moon it edged up the distant curvature of
the hull. Then there were more--a nest of quivering satellites.
Without thought, Mel pressed the jet control and hurled himself into
space.
The terror of his first plunge was multiplied by the presence of the
searchers. Crewmen of the Martian Princess, he supposed. The absence of
the space suit had probably been discovered.
In headlong flight, he became aware of eternity and darkness and
loneliness. The sun was a hot, bright disc, but it illuminated nothing.
All that his mind clung to for identification of itself and the
universe around it was gone. He was like a primeval cell, floating
without origin, without purpose, without destination.
Only a glimmer of memory pierced the thick terror with a shaft of
rationality. Alice. He must survive for Alice's sake. He must find the
way back to Alice--back to Earth.
He looked toward the Martian Princess and the searchers on the hull. He
cried out in the soundless dark. The searchers had left the hull and
were pursuing him through open space. Their speed far exceeded his. It
was futile to run before them--and futile to leave the haven of the
Martian Princess. His only chance of survival or success lay in getting
to Earth aboard the ship. In a long curve he arced back toward the ship.
Instantly, the searchers moved to close in the arc and meet him on a
collision course.
He could see them now. They were not crewmen in spacesuits as he had
supposed. Rather, the objects--two of them--looked like miniature
spaceships. Beams of light bore through space ahead of them, and he
suspected they carried other radiations also to detect by radar and
infra red.
In the depths of his mind he knew they were not of the Martian Princess.
Nor were there any crewmen within them. They were robot craft of some
kind, and they had come from the great black ship.
He felt their searching beams upon him and waited for a deadly, blasting
burst of heat or killing radiation. He was not prepared for what
happened.
* * * * *
They closed swiftly, and the nearest robot came within a dozen feet,
matching Mel's own velocity. Suddenly, from a small opening in the
machine, a slender metal tentacle whipped out and wrapped about him like
the coils of a snake. The second robot approached and added another
binding. Mel's arms and legs were pinned. Frantically, he manipulated
the jet control in the glove of the suit. This only caused the tentacles
to cut deeply and painfully, and threatened to smash the shell of the
suit. He cut the jets and admitted the failure of his frantic mission.
In short minutes they were near the ships again. Mel wondered what kind
of reprimand the crewmen of the Martian Princess could give him, and
what fantastic justification they might offer for their own actions.
But he wasn't being taken toward the Martian Princess. He twisted
painfully in the grip of the robot tentacles and confirmed that he was
being carried to the black stranger.
Soundlessly, a port slid open and the robots swept him through into the
dark interior of the ship. He felt himself dropped on a hard metal
floor. The tentacles unwound. Alone, he struggled to his feet and
flashed a beam of light from the suit flashlight to the walls about him.
Walls, floor and ceiling were an indistinguishable dark gray. He was the
only object in the chamber.
While he strained his sight to establish features in the blank metallic
surfaces a clipped, foreign voice spoke. "Remove your suit and walk
toward the opening in the wall. Do not try to run or attack. You will
not be harmed unless you attack."
There was no use refusing. He did as commanded. A bright doorway opened
in the wall before him. He walked through.
It reminded him of a medical laboratory. Shelves and cabinets of hand
instruments and electronic equipment were about. And in the room three
men sat watching the doorway through which he entered. He gazed at the
strangers as they at him.
They looked ordinary enough in their white surgeons' smocks. All seemed
to be of middle age, with dark hair turning gray at the fringe. One was
considerably more muscular than the other two. One leaned to overweight.
The third was quite thin. Yet Mel felt himself bristling like a dog in
the dark of the moon.
No matter how ordinary they looked, these three were not men of Earth.
The certainty of this settled like a cold, dead weight in the pit of his
stomach.
"You--" he stammered. There was nothing to say.
"Please recline on this couch," the nearest, the muscular one said. "We
wish you no harm so do not be afraid. We wish only to determine if you
have been harmed by your flight into space."
All three of them were tense and Mel was sure they were worried--by his
escapade. Had he nearly let some unknown cat out of the bag?
"Please--," the muscular one said.
He had no alternative. He might struggle, and destroy a good deal of
apparatus, but he could not hope to overwhelm them. He lay on the couch
as directed. Almost instantly the overweight one was behind him, seizing
his arm. He felt the sting of a needle. The thin one was at his feet,
looking down at him soberly. "He will rest," the thin one said, "and
then we shall know what needs to be done."
* * *
The sleep had lasted for an eon, he thought. He had a sense of the
passage of an enormous span of time when he at last awoke. His vision
was fuzzy, but there was no mistaking the image before him.
Alice. His Alice--safe.
She was sitting on the edge of the bed, smiling down at him. He fought
his way up to a half-sitting position. "Alice!" He wept.
Afterwards, he said, "Where are we? What happened? I remember so many
crazy things--the vacation to Mars."
"Don't try to remember it all, darling," she said. "You were sick. Some
kind of hysteria and amnesia hit you while we were there. We're home
now. You'll soon be out of the hospital and everything will be all
right."
"I spoiled it," he murmured. "I spoiled it all for you."
"No. I knew you were going to be all right. I even had a lot of fun all
by myself. But we're going back. As soon as you are all well again we'll
start saving up and go again."
He nodded drowsily. "Sure. We'll go to Mars again and have a real
vacation."
Alice faded away. All of it faded away.
* * * * *
As if from a far distance the walls of Dr. Martin's laboratory seemed to
close about him and the lights slowly increased. Dr. Martin was seated
beside him, his head shaking slowly. "I'm so terribly sorry, Mr.
Hastings. I thought we were going to get the full and true event this
time. But it often happens, as in your case, that fantasy lies upon
fantasy, and it is necessary to dig through great layers of them before
uncovering the truth. I think, however, that we shall not have to go
much deeper to find the underlying truth for you."
Mel lay on the couch, continuing to stare at the ceiling. "Then there
was no great, black ship out of space?"
"Of course not! That is one danger of these analyses, Mr. Hastings. You
must not be deceived into believing that a newly discovered fantasy is
the truth for which you were looking. You must come back and continue
your search."
"Yes. Yes, of course." He got up slowly and was helped to the outer room
by the Doctor and an attendant. The attendant gave him a glass of white,
sweetish substance to drink.
"A booster-upper," laughed Dr. Martin. "It takes away the grogginess
that sometimes attends such a deep sweep. We will look for you day after
tomorrow."
Mel nodded and stepped out into the hall.
* * *
No great black ship.
No mysterious little robot ships with tentacles that whip out and
capture a man.
No strange trio in surgeons' gowns.