"Look, it's late. I'll be here in the morning."
The doctor walked on in silence for a long moment. Jeff followed, his
mind racing, a thousand questions tumbling through in rapid succession:
questions he dared not ask, questions he couldn't answer. How much did
Schiml know? And how much did he suspect? A chill ran down Jeff's back.
What had he been doing with the dice? Could Blackie possibly have told
him? Or could he have heard about the freakish occurrence in the game
room through other channels? And what could he learn in the course of
the testing that he didn't know already?
Jeff puzzled as he matched the doctor's rapid pace. They went up the
escalator, down the twisting corridor toward an area beyond the living
quarters that Jeff hadn't seen before. Above all, he must keep his
nerve, keep a tight control on his tongue, on his reactions, make sure
that there were no tricks to tear information from him that he didn't
dare divulge.
He looked at Schiml, sharply, a frown on his face. "I still don't see
why this can't wait till morning. Why the big hurry?"
Schiml stopped, turned to Jeff in exasperation. "You still think we're
running a picnic grounds here, don't you?" he snapped. "Well, we're
not. We're doing a job, a job that can't wait for morning or anything
else. We work a twenty-four-hour schedule here. All you do is provide
the where-withal to work with--nothing more."
"But I'll be tired, nervous. I don't see how I could pass any kind of
test."
Schiml laughed shortly. "These aren't the kind of tests you pass or
fail. Actually, the more tired and nervous you are, the better the
results will be for you. They'll give you an extra edge of safety when
you're assigned to a job. What the tests tell us is what we can expect
from you, the very minimum. Basically, we're working to save your life
for you."
Jeff blinked at him, followed him through swinging doors into a long,
brightly lighted corridor, with green walls and a gleaming tile floor.
"What do you mean, save my life? You seem to delight in just the
opposite here, from what I've heard."
The doctor made an impatient noise. "You got the wrong information," he
said angrily. "That's the trouble. You people insist upon listening to
and believing the morbid stories, all the unpleasantness you hear about
the work here. And it's all either completely false or only half-truth.
This business of bloodthirstiness, for instance. It's just plain not
true.
"One of the biggest factors in our work here is making arrangements for
optimum conditions for the success of our experiments. By 'optimum' we
mean the best conditions from several standpoints: from the standpoint
of what we're trying to learn--the experiment itself, that is--and from
the standpoint of the researcher, too. But most particularly, we're
working for optimum recovery odds for the experimental animals--you, in
this case."
Jeff snorted. "But still, we're just experimental animals, from your
viewpoint," he said sharply.
"Not _just_ experimental animals," Schiml snapped angrily. "You're
_the_ experimental animals. Working with human beings isn't the same as
working with cats and dogs and monkeys--far from it. Dogs and cats are
stronger and tougher, more durable than humans, which is why they're
used for preliminary work of great success. But basically, they're
expendable. If something goes wrong, that's too bad. But we've learned
something, and the dog or cat can be sacrificed without too many tears.
But we don't feel quite the same about human beings."
"I'm glad to hear that," said Jeff sourly. "It makes me feel better."
"I'm not trying to be facetious. I mean it. We're not ghouls. We don't
have any less regard for human life than anyone else, just because
we're responsible for some human death in the work we're doing. For one
thing, we study every human being we use, try to dig out his strengths
and weaknesses, physical and mental. We want to know how he reacts to
what, how fast he recuperates, how much physical punishment his body
can take, how far his mental resiliency will extend. Then when we know
these things, we can fit him into the program of research which will
give him the very best chance of coming out in one piece. At the same
time, he will fill a spot that we need filled. No, there's no delight
here in taking human life or jeopardizing human safety."
They turned abruptly off the corridor and entered a small office.
Schiml motioned Jeff to a chair, sat himself down behind a small desk
and began sorting through several stacks of forms. The room was silent
for a moment. Then the doctor punched a button on the telephone panel.
When the light blinked an answer to him, he said: "Gabe? He's here.
Better come on up."
Then he flipped down the switch and leaned back, lighting a long,
slender cigar and undoing the green robe around his neck.
Jeff watched him, still puzzling over what he had just said. The doctor
seemed so matter-of-fact. What he had said made sense, but somewhere in
the picture there seemed to be a gaping hole. "This sounds like it's a
great setup--for you doctors and researchers," he said finally. "But
what's it leading to? What good is it doing? Oh, I know, it increases
your knowledge of men's minds, but how does it help the man in the
street? How does it actually help _anyone_, in the long run? How do
you ever get the government to back it with the financial mess they're
facing in Washington?"
Schiml threw back his head and laughed aloud. "You've got the cart
before the horse," he said, when he got control of his voice. "Support?
Listen, my lad, the government is running itself bankrupt just to keep
our research going. Did you realize that? _Bankrupting itself!_ And
why? Because unless our work pays off--and soon--there isn't going to
be any government left. That's why. Because we're fighting something
that's eating away at the very roots of our civilization, something
that's creeping and growing and destroying."
He stared at Jeff, his eyes wide. "Oh, the government knows that the
situation is grave. We had to prove it to them, show it to them time
and again, until they couldn't miss it any longer. But they saw it
finally. They've seen it growing for a century or more, ever since the
end of the Second War. They've seen the business instability, the bank
runs and the stock market dives. They've seen the mental and moral
decay in the cities. They could see it, but it took statistics to
prove that there was a pattern to it, a pattern of decay and rot and
putrefaction that's been crumbling away the clay feet of this colossal
civilization of ours."
The doctor stood up, paced back and forth across the room and sent blue
smoke into the air from the cigar as he walked. "Oh, they support us
all right. We don't know for sure what we're fighting, but we do know
the answer is in the functioning of the minds and brains of man. We're
working against a disease--a creeping disease of men's minds--and we
are forced to use men to search those minds, to study them, to try to
weed out the poison of the disease. And so we have the Mercy Men to
help us fight."
The doctor's lips twisted in a bitter sneer as he sat heavily down on
the chair again, crunched the cigar out viciously in the tray. "Mercy
Men who have no mercy in their souls, who have no interest nor concern
with what they're doing, or what it may be accomplishing. They are
interested in one thing only: the amount of money they'll be paid for
having their brains jogged loose."
The scorn was heavy in Dr. Schiml's eyes. "Well, we don't care who we
have: addicts, condemned murderers, prostitutes, the trash from the
skid-row gutters. They're all drawn here, like flies to a dung hill.
But they're here on errands of mercy, whether they like it or not, or
know it or not. And we take them because they're the only ones who can
be bought, and we guard them for all we're worth, so that the goal will
be accomplished." He took a deep breath and stared scornfully at Jeff.
"That's you I'm talking about, you know."
Jeff's hands trembled as he snuffed out his smoke. He stood up as the
corridor door opened, admitting a small, dark-haired man with thick
glasses. He was dressed in doctor's whites. Jeff rubbed his chest
nervously and took a deep breath, still acutely aware of the stiff card
in his shirt front.
"All right," he said hoarsely, "so you're talking about me. When do we
get started with this?"
* * * * *
The little dressing room was cramped; it reeked of anesthetic. Jeff
walked in, followed by Dr. Schiml and the other doctor, and started
removing his shoes. "This is Doctor Gabriel," Schiml said, indicating
his myopic colleague. "He'll start you off with a complete physical.
Then you'll have a neurological. Come on into the next room as soon as
you're undressed." And with that the two doctors disappeared through
swinging doors into an inner room.
Jeff removed his shirt and trousers swiftly, carefully folding the
file card and stuffing it under the inner sole of his right shoe. It
wasn't exactly the perfect hiding place, if anyone were looking for the
card. But not once during the conversation had Schiml's eyes strayed
curiously to Jeff's shirt front. Either Schiml had not seen him take
the card, or else the doctor's self-control was superhuman. And no
mention of the dice had been made, either. Jeff gave his shoes a final
pat, tossed his clothes on one of the gurneys lining the walls and
pushed through the doors into the next room.
It was huge, dome-ceilinged, with a dozen partitions dividing different
sections from one another. One end looked like a classroom, with
blackboards occupying a whole wall. Another section carried the
paraphernalia of a complete gymnasium. The doctors were sitting in a
corner that was obviously outfitted as an examination room: the tables
were covered with crisp green sheeting, and the walls had gleaming
cabinets full of green-wrapped bundles and instruments.
Schiml sat on the edge of a desk. His eyes watched Jeff closely as he
lit a cigarette, leaned back and blew rings into the air. Dr. Gabriel
motioned Jeff to the table and started the physical without further
delay.
It was the most rigorous, painstaking physical examination Jeff had
ever had. The little, squinting doctor poked and probed him from head
to toe. He snapped retinal-pattern photos, examined pore-patterns,
listened, prodded, thumped, auscultated. He motioned Jeff back onto
the chair and started going over him with a rubber hammer, tapping him
sharply in dozens of areas, eliciting a most disconcerting variety of
muscular jerks and twitches. Then the hammer was replaced by a small
electrode, with which the doctor probed and tested, bringing spasmodic
jerks to the muscles of Jeff's back and arms and thighs. Finally, Dr.
Gabriel relaxed, sat Jeff down in a soft chair and retired to a small
portable instrument cabinet nearby.
Dr. Schiml put out his smoke and stood up. "Any questions before we
begin?"
Jeff almost sighed aloud. Any questions? His nerves tingled all over
and his mind was full of conjecture--wild, ridiculous guesses of what
they would discover in the testing, of what the results would bring.
Suppose they learned about the dice? Suppose they found out that he
was a fraud, that he was in the Center on a private mission, a mission
of death all his own, and no party to their own missions of death? And
yet, if he had to follow through, the kind of work he would be assigned
to would depend upon the results of the tests--that seemed sure. But
what if they rendered him unconscious, knocked him out, used drugs?
His mind raced frantically, searching for some way of stalling things,
some way of slowing down the red tape of testing and assignment, to
give him time to complete his own mission and get out. But he knew that
already he must have aroused suspicions. Schiml must have suspected
that all the cards were not on the table, yet Schiml seemed willing to
overlook his suspicions. And the wheels had begun to move more and more
swiftly, carrying him to the critical point where he would have to sign
a release and take an assignment, or reveal his real purpose for being
in the Center. If he were to find Conroe, he must find him before the
chips were down.
He stared at Schiml, his mind still groping for something to hang
onto. He found nothing. "No. No questions, I guess," he said.
The doctor looked at him closely, then shrugged in resignation. "All
right," he said, tiredly. "You'll have a whole series of tests of all
kinds: physical stamina, mental alertness, reaction time, intelligence,
sanity--everything we could possibly need to know. But I should warn
you of one thing." He looked at Jeff, his eyes deadly serious. "All
of these future tests are subjective. All of them will tell us about
you as a person: how you think, how you behave. Desperately essential
stuff, if you're to survive the sort of work we do here. What we find
is the whole basis of our assignments."
He paused for a long moment. "You'd be wise to stick to the truth. No
embellishments, no fancy stuff. We can't do anything about it if you
don't choose to take the advice. But if you falsify, you're tampering
with your own life expectancy here."
Jeff blinked, shifting in his seat uneasily. _Don't worry about that,
Jack_, he thought. _I won't be around long enough for it to make any
difference._ Nevertheless the doctor's words were far from soothing.
If only Jeff could maintain the fraud throughout the testing, keep his
wits about him as the tests progressed. Then he could get back to the
hunt as soon as they were through.
He watched the doctor prepare a long paper on the desk. Then the
rapid-fire series of questions began: family history, personal history,
history of family disease and personal illness. The questions were
swift and businesslike, and Jeff felt his muscles relaxing as he sat
back. He answered almost automatically. Then: "Ever been hypnotized
before?"
Something in Jeff's mind froze, screaming a warning. "No," he snapped.
Schiml's eyes widened imperceptibly. "Part of the testing should be
done under hypnosis, for your sake, and for the sake of speed." His
eyes caught Jeff's hard. "Unless you have some reason for objecting--"
"It won't work," Jeff lied swiftly, his mind racing. "Psychic block
of some kind--induced in childhood, probably. My father had a block
against it too." Every muscle in his body was tense, and he sat forward
in his seat, his eyes wide.
Schiml shrugged. "It would make the testing a hundred per cent easier
on you if you'd allow it. Some of these tests are pretty exhausting and
some take a powerful long time without hypnotic-recovery aid. And of
course we keep all information strictly confidential--"
"No dice," said Jeff hoarsely.
The doctor shrugged again, glancing over at Dr. Gabriel. "Hear that,
Gabe?"
The little doctor shrugged. "His funeral," he growled. He rolled a
small, shiny-paneled instrument with earphones to Jeff's side. "We'll
start on the less strenuous ones, then. This is a hearing test. Very
simple. You just listen, mark down the signals you hear. Keep your eyes
on the eyepiece; it records visio-audio correlation times, tells us how
soon after you hear a word you form a visual image of it." He snapped
the earphones over Jeff's head and moved a printed answer sheet in
front of him on the desk. And then the earphones started talking.
There was a long series of words, gradually becoming softer and softer.
Jeff marked them down, swiftly, gradually forgetting his surroundings,
throwing his attention toward the test. The doctors retired to the
other side of the room. They talked to each other in low whispers,
until he no longer heard them. There was only the low, insistent
whispering in the earphones.
And then the words seemed to grow louder again, but somehow he had lost
track of what they meant. He listened, his eyes watching the cool gray
pearly screen in the eyepieces. His fingers were poised to write down
the words, but he couldn't quite understand the syllables.
They were _nonsense syllables_, syllables with no meaning. His eyes
opened wide, a bolt of suspicion shooting through him, and his hands
gripped the arms of the chair as he began to rise.
And then the light exploded in his eyes with such agonizing brilliance
that it sent shooting pain searing through his brain. He let out a
stifled cry. He struggled and tried to rise from the chair. But he was
blinded by the piercing beam. And then he felt the needle bite his arm,
and the nonsense words in his ears straightened out into meaningful
phrases. A soft, soothing voice was saying: "Relax ... relax ... sit
back and relax ... relax and rest...."
Slowly the warmth crept over his body, and he felt his muscles relax,
even as the voice instructed. He eased gently back into the chair, and
soon his mind was clear of fear and worry and suspicion. He was still,
sleeping with the peaceful ease of a newborn child.