Judith Merril - The Year's Greatest Science Fiction & Fantasy 4

At a little before five-thirty Cedric tactfully eased his last patient all the way across the reception room and out, then locked the door and leaned his back against it.

“Today was rough,” he sighed.

Helena glanced up at him briefly, then continued typing. “I only have a little more on this last transcript,” she said.

A minute later she pulled the paper from the typewriter and placed it on the neat stack beside her.

“I’ll sort and file them in the morning,” she said. “It was rough, wasn’t it, Doctor? That Gerald Bocek is the most unusual patient you’ve had since I’ve worked for you. And poor Mr. Potts. A brilliant executive, making half a million a year, and he’s going to have to give it up. He seems so normal.”

“He is normal,” Cedric said. “People with above normal blood pressure often have very minor cerebral hemorrhages so small that the affected area is no larger than the head of a pin. All that happens is that they completely forget things that they knew. They can relearn them, but a man whose judgment must always be perfect can’t afford to take the chance. He’s already made one error in judgment that cost his company a million and a half. That’s why I consented to take him on as a— Gerald Bocek really upset me, Helena. I consent to take a five hundred thousand dollar a year executive as a patient.”

“He was frightening, wasn’t he?” Helena said. “I don’t mean so much because he’s a mass murderer as—”

“I know. I know,” Cedric said. “Let’s prove him wrong. Have dinner with me.”

“We agreed—”

“Let’s break the agreement this once.”

Helena shook her head firmly. “Especially not now,” she said. “Besides, it wouldn’t prove anything. He’s got you boxed in on that point. If I went to dinner with you, it would only show that a wish fulfillment entered your dream world.”

“Ouch,” Cedric said, wincing. “That’s a dirty word. I wonder how he knew about the yellow pills? I can’t get out of my mind the fact that if we had spaceships and if there were a type of space madness in which you began to personify objects, a yellow pill would be the right thing to stop that.”

“How?” Helena said.

“They almost triple the strength of nerve currents from end organs. What results is that reality practically shouts down any fantasy insertions. It’s quite startling. I took one three years ago when they first became available. You’d be surprised how little you actually see of what you look at, especially of people. You look at symbol inserts instead. I had to cancel my appointments for a week. I found I couldn’t work without my professionally built symbol inserts about people that enable me to see them—not as they really are—but as a complex of normal and abnormal symptoms.”

“I’d like to take one sometime,” Helena said.

“That’s a twist,” Cedric said, laughing. “One of the characters in a dream world takes a yellow pill and discovers it doesn’t exist at all except as a fantasy.”

“Why don’t we both take one?” Helena said.

“Uh uh,” Cedric said firmly. “I couldn’t do my work.”

“You’re afraid you might wake up on a spaceship?” Helena said, grinning.

“Maybe I am,” Cedric said. “Crazy, isn’t it? But there is one thing today that stands out as a serious flaw in my reality. It’s so glaring that I actually am afraid to ask you about it.”

“Are you serious?” Helena said.

“I am.” Cedric nodded. “How does it happen that the police brought Gerald Bocek here to my office instead of holding him in the psychiatric ward at City Hospital and having me go there to see him? How does it happen the D.A. didn’t get in touch with me beforehand and discuss the case with me?”

“I ... I don’t know!” Helena said. “I received no call. They just showed up, and I assumed they wouldn’t have without your knowing about it and telling them to. Mrs. Fortesque was your first patient and I called her at once and caught her just as she was leaving the house, and told her an emergency case had come up.” She looked at Cedric with round, startled eyes.

“Now we know how the patient must feel,” Cedric said, crossing the reception room to his office door. “Terrifying, isn’t it, to think that if I took a yellow pill all this might vanish —my years of college, my internship, my fame as the world’s best known psychiatrist, and you. Tell me, Helena, are you sure you aren’t an expediter at Mars Port?”

He leered at her mockingly as he slowly closed the door, cutting off his view of her.

Cedric put his coat away and went directly to the small square of one-way glass in the reception-room door. Gerald Bocek, still in strait jacket, was there, and so were the same four police officers.

Cedric went to his desk and, without sitting down, deflected the control on the intercom.

“Helena,” he said, “before you send in Gerald Bocek get me the D.A. on the phone.”

He glanced over the four patient cards while waiting. Once he rubbed his eyes gently. He had had a restless night.

When the phone rang he reached for it. “Hello? Dave?” he said. “About this patient, Gerald Bocek—•”

“I was going to call you today,” the District Attorney’s voice sounded. “I called you yesterday morning at ten, but no one answered, and I haven’t had time since. Our police psychiatrist, Walters, says you might be able to snap Bocek out of it in a couple of days—at least long enough so that we can get some sensible answers out of him. Down underneath his delusion of killing lizard pirates from Venus, there has to be some reason for that mass killing, and the press is after us on this.”

“But why bring him to my office?” Cedric said. “It’s OK, of course, but . . . that is ... I didn’t think you could! Take a patient out of the ward at City Hospital and transport him around town.”

“I thought that would be less of an imposition on you,” the D.A. said: “I’m in a hurry on it.”

“Oh,” Cedric said. “Well, OK, Dave. He’s out in the waiting room. I’ll do my best to snap him back to reality for you.”

He hung up slowly, frowning. “Less of an imposition!” His whispered words floated into his ears as he snapped into the intercom, “Send Gerald Bocek in, please.”

The door from the reception room opened, and once again the procession of patient and police officers entered.

“Well, well, good morning, Gar,” Jerry said. “Did you sleep well? I could hear you talking to yourself most of the night.”

“I am Dr. Cedric Elton,” Cedric said firmly.

“Oh, yes,” Jerry said. “I promised to try to see things your way, didn’t I? I’ll try to co-operate with you, Dr. Elton.” Jerry turned to the four officers. “Let’s see now, these gear lockers are policemen, aren’t they? How do you do, officers.” He bowed to them, then looked around him. “And,” he said, “this is your office, Dr. Elton. A very impressive office. That thing you’re sitting behind is not the chart table but your desk, I gather.” He studied the desk intently. “All metal, with a gray finish, isn’t it?”

“All wood,” Cedric said. “Walnut.”

“Yes, of course,” Jerry murmured. “How stupid of me. I really want to get into your reality, Gar ... I mean Dr. Elton. Or get you into mine. I’m the one who’s at a disadvantage, though. Tied up, I can’t get into the medicine locker and take a yellow pill like you can. Did you take one yet?”

“Not yet,” Cedric said.

“Uh, why don’t you describe your office to me, Dr. Elton?” Jerry said. “Let’s make a game of it. Describe parts of things and then let me see if I can fill in the rest. Start with your desk. It’s genuine walnut? An executive style desk. Go on from there.”