She left. She came back in about three minutes. She was carrying a radio on a strap. She hung it somewhere on the wall above and behind my head. She put some earphones on her ears. As she tuned in, leaking from under the pads I could hear the Istanbul hot pop station.

She put the earphones over my ears. She turned it up very loud. She left.

I don't care for commercials about bubble gum and camel feed. But everybody in Turkey these days seemed to be listening to hot pop.

I couldn't take the earphones off or change the station.

As the hours wore on, I found that the Goat Guys must be especially popular for they played their records frequently. And at least once in every hour, they played their latest hit. With flutes and drums and snarls and roars, it went:

You are my monster,

I am your camel.

You make me crazy,

The way you play.

I only wonder,

Why my dear mother,

Bought strychnine

And asked you here today.

At first, I was sort of detached about it. Then I began to realize that they must be playing it for me as a sort of request. It fitted my case pretty exactly when you got right down to it. I even invented a sort of personality test to go with it. Each time the news came on, I would fill in the interval of Arabs not getting along with Arabs with searching probes into my reactions to the word strychnine.

Since the cells and body are the only things which determine personality, and if I could detect any change of reaction in myself to the word strychnine, it followed that from this I would be able to work out exactly what they had done to me physically. It didn't work.

Fortunately, the station was off the air for several hours each night and I could get some sleep.

About three times a day someone would come in and read the meters. But as I had earphones on, they presumed I couldn't hear anything they said and so didn't bother to answer anything I said.

For the next eight days, the only real change I could detect was a snowstorm that whitened up the tree for a day. The boughs then gradually, bit by bit, from wind, lost the whiting.

I began to believe that for the rest of eternity I would just float here without sensation, detached from every world except that of hot pop and camel feed, while somewhere in another world, Arabs fought Arabs and mothers bought strychnine.

But, one morning, just as I had become accustomed to it, my life in the Zanco Model 16 Magnaspeed came to an abrupt and shocking end.

It was about 11:00 A.M. by the cold sun in the window.

Prahd walked in.

He was followed by two orderlies and a cart of instruments, gas canisters and masks.

The clatter smashed through "You Are My Monster." I looked at this invasion in sudden fear.

Prahd took the earphones off me. "I've come to disconnect you," he said.

He held up his right hand.

An orderly put an anesthesia mask in it.

"But..." I started to say.

The mask was over my face and I was out!

I came to after what seemed to be a space of two seconds.

I was lying in a bed. I was in a different room. I had a sheet over me. Over and under the sheet there were straps. I could not move my arms or legs or lift my body.

They had done something else to me! I was sure of it. But no, nothing much could happen in two seconds.

I turned my head. A very thin, low sun was coming in the window. It must be afternoon. It hadn't been two seconds. It had been 11:00 A.M. It must now be 3:00 P.M. Plenty of time to do something else nasty!

I found I could flex something at the end of my arms. I managed to get a hand in view. Oh, thank Gods! Not flippers. They were fingers! I could move and control them. They weren't fakes. They were mine.

Somewhere toward the bottom of the bed I could feel the canvas ankle cuffs. I stirred that extremity. The sheet lifted slightly. By craning my neck I could see toes. I wiggled them. Oh, thank Gods they were not hoofs! They were my toes! I tried the other one. Toes on both feet! Oh, thank Gods! A clatter at the door.

Nurse Bildirjin came in pushing a cart with food on it. She was all starched and crisp looking. All smiles. Was there something sly in that smile? "How about some breakfast?" she said.

BREAKFAST! Oh, my Gods, they had been working on me another twenty hours! I looked anxiously at the food. Maybe they had given me the stomach of a goat. Was it hay on that cart? No, just a couple of boiled eggs and some kahve. However, it did not dispel my fears. I knew they had done something.

She didn't let me use my hands, which was suspicious enough. She fed me with a spoon and gave me the kahve through a straw. And all the time she was humming a little tune. I recognized it: "You Are My Monster"! Oh Gods, what had they done?

I tried to read it on her face. She was a very pretty girl, though young. Raven-black hair, a tan complexion, even, white teeth, full lips, big black eyes capable of considerable expression. And very well developed in spite of her being only sixteen. But she was a woman and treachery could not be far off. Anybody can tell you that treachery and beauty go hand in hand. That's why you have to kill songbirds wherever found. But where women are concerned, it's the other way around. Where killing is concerned, they always choose me as the first target of choice. Piled onto earlier experience, Krak with her hypnohelmets, Miss Pinch with her red pepper and even dear Utanc with her credit cards proved that beyond any doubt whatever! I was learning to be wary. Nurse Bildirjin undoubtedly had something up her sleeve!

She straightened up her tray and gave it a push toward the door. She smiled at me very cheerfully: a very bad sign!

Then she went to the foot of the bed.

She lifted the sheet slightly and looked up under it. "That's what I wanted to see," she said.

Oh, Gods! What had she looked at?

They HAD done something!

It was too much for my already unbalanced wits. I screamed, "PRAHD! PRAHD! PRAHD!"

Nurse Bildirjin was smiling all over herself. "If you mean Doktor Muhammed," she said, citing his Earth name, "I'll get him for you. Oh, this is great."

In under a minute young doctor Prahd (alias Doktor Muhammed Ataturk) came in, followed by Nurse Bildirjin.

He walked over and exposed my chest. There were a couple cup bandages there. He pulled them off and took some chest hair with them.

"You had me under another twenty hours!" I raved at him. "What have you done now that you haven't already done?!"

He pulled the sheet down further, found two more cups on my abdomen and pulled them off. "Tube holes. They've healed very nicely. After you come out of a Magnaspeed, the tube holes have to be closed and healed."

The strap across my lower middle was in the way. He pulled the upper part of the sheet back across my chest. He went down to the foot of the bed and, just like Nurse Bildirjin, lifted the sheet slightly and looked. "Oh, yes," he said. "You've done very well."

Oh, my Gods, what were they looking at? I knew Crobe. I went into terror. "What have I done very well?" I screamed.

"Get the mirror," he said to Nurse Bildirjin.

She had it right there. She held it by my knees and adjusted it. Young doctor Prahd lifted the sheet with the air of a theater manager introducing a new play.

I looked in the mirror.

I almost fainted.

I looked again. I shrieked, "You've made me into a horse!"

"No, no," he said, with professional calm. "That's simply normal. You are so used to one testicle not being there and the other drawn up into the body that a normal scrotum and actually having testicles may look strange to you."

"But the LENGTH of IT!" I screamed.

"Sultan Bey," said Prahd, "you don't seem to trust me. Your skin is all new, your old mis-set broken bones are mended, your vital organs are all fixed up. And although it was a great temptation, I didn't even change your face; I only removed some warts and scars. You will just look a bit brighter and fresher. You still aren't very good looking, so don't be alarmed."