«I'm glad you finally realized that,» J said acidly.
«I'm not giving up on the poor chap. I'm sure we'll think of something if we sit around and scratch our heads a while. Hmm. Seems to me I recall hearing about a similar case. Wasn't there another one of your men who came back from the X dimensions with much the same symptoms before I started working here?»
J nodded, remembering. «That's right. We were training a fellow named Dexter as a replacement for Blade, but the first time he went through Leighton's bloody machine, he came back screaming 'The worm has a thousand heads! The worm has a thousand heads!' The man was definitively bonkers, and remains so to this day. We've got him tucked away in a sanitarium in Scotland.»
«I'd like to examine your Mr. Dexter, after I've studied his file.» The fat man leaned back reflectively. «Dexter and Blade may follow a common pattern.»
J said sharply, «Are you telling me that Blade is going to spend the rest of his life tucked away in some sanitarium?»
«Not necessarily. I have a better chance than the team that worked on Dexter. I have more data. The state of the art in my field has progressed somewhat. No cause for undue pessimism, but on the other hand we shouldn't expect any overnight casting out of unclean spirits. By the by, who was on the team that handled Dexter?»
«Team?» J laughed mirthlessly. «There was no team. In those days the only psychiatrist in England with a security clearance high enough to work with us was a Dr. Saxton Colby. Colby handled the whole matter personally, without consultation with anyone.»
Ferguson shook his head, frowning. «Bad show. No help for it now, though. Could I speak to Dr. Colby?»
«I don't know.»
«You don't know? Why on earth not?»
J shifted uneasily. «We don't know where Colby is. We put him in charge of a testing program for candidates for training for the project, potential replacements for Blade. To make a long unpleasant story short, Colby did not develop any viable replacements, but he did develop a few-ah, personal vices-which required his being taken off the project. Nothing nasty, so far as I can recall, but we sent him back to private practice, carefully wrapped in the Official Secrets Act. As to his present whereabouts I haven't the foggiest notion.»
Ferguson burst out laughing, much to J's annoyance. «Do you mean to tell me that after all your paranoid security screening, you ended up with a lunatic for your one and only expert on sanity? Oh that's delightful!»
J said coldly, «Our screening can examine a man's past, but not his future. We don't use crystal balls, you know.»
«You should! You should!» The little psychiatrist sobered with effort. «And, though for some reason I've never been able to fathom, your MI6A is called an 'intelligence service,' you've unleashed this mad scientist, upon an unsuspecting world and now you don't even know where he is. Really, old boy, the mind boggles!»
«If you want to talk to Colby, we'll find him, Doctor Ferguson!»
«Do that! It could be there is a reason why a man sane enough to pass all your tests should suddenly develop these odd vices immediately after treating this Dexter fellow. We have an expression in our profession: 'Loony germs rub off.' What were these vices anyway, if I may ask?»
«If you must know, he was cultivating a taste for nude orgies.»
«My word.»
«We heard stories: I sent a man down to check, and there was old Colby, capering in the moonlight out in the woods, naked as the proverbial jaybird, along with a number of likeminded associates of both sexes. Well, you know how it is in the service. A little eccentricity is regarded as charming, but anything kinky opens you up to blackmail. The KGB does more than scripture can to keep us on the straight and narrow path, if you see what I mean. We had to let him go.»
«Of course. But tell me, exactly how many associates of both sexes were there?»
«I don't recall. Around a dozen. What difference does it make?»
«Probably none, but if there were twelve of them, six male and six female, that would make up a witches' coven. Witches are rather fond of-as you put it-capering in the moonlight in the woods, buns in the breeze. I'm told the Old Religion is still very much alive in Scotland.»
J glanced at Ferguson suspiciously, thinking, He must be joking. Ferguson, however, was not smiling. J muttered, «I dare say. Scotland never has been truly English.»
The psychiatrist waved this remark aside, continuing, «I have another question. This Dexter fellow, was he…»
J interrupted, «I've a question myself, Doctor Ferguson. Can I see Blade?»
«Certainly.»
«When?»
«Right now, if you wish. In fact, I'd like to see if he shows any sign of recognizing you. If he does, the prognosis could be much more favorable than it is at present.» He heaved himself to his feet. «Follow me.»
As they entered the corridor, the public address system pinged and began announcing, «Dr. Ferguson wanted in Room Twenty-four. Ferguson to Twenty-four.» J noticed an odd note in the voice, a note of subdued panic.
Ferguson frowned and hastened his pace, saying in a puzzled tone, «That's Blade's room.»
As they neared Room 24, a burly white-clad orderly emerged from inside, caught sight of Ferguson and J, and broke into a run toward them calling, «Dr. Ferguson! Come quick!» The man was alarmingly pale.
«Calm down, damnit,» Ferguson snapped. «Get a grip on yourself.» He slapped the frightened orderly on the back somewhat more roughly than the occasion demanded, then proceeded to the door of Room 24, J close behind him.
A cluster of orderlies and nurses huddled together in the doorway, murmuring in worried voices. Ferguson and J pushed through the crowd into the small, brightly lit room. J noted with relief that Richard Blade was apparently unharmed, strapped down in a bed, staring vacantly into space.
Ferguson was demanding angrily, «What is all this nonsense, anyway?»
Three of the nurses began speaking at once, trying to explain, a moment before J's gaze fell on the cause of their near-hysteria.
«My God,» J whispered.
A large massive white steel dresser lay overturned on its face to the left of the foot of Richard's bed. Above it, near the ceiling, J saw a deep gash in the plaster wall from which pulverized plaster was sifting down in a rapidly diminishing cascade.
One of the nurses, a disheveled redhead, stepped forward as the others fell silent «I heard a crash in here, sir,» she said. «I was in another room down the hall, but I came running. When I entered the dresser was… it was…»
«Go on, woman,» J prompted. «It's all right.»
«The dresser was floating slowly through the air, settling gently to the floor where you see it now,» she finished.
«Was there anyone in the room?» J demanded
«No, sir. Mr. Blade was here of course, but he was strapped down to his bed. There was nobody in the hall either until a moment later, when every staff person on this ward showed up.»
«She screamed, sir,» the burly orderly explained.
«I suppose I did,» the nurse admitted apologetically, looking down.
Doctor Ferguson was examining the dresser. He shook his head slowly and let out a low whistle. «This is a heavy piece of furniture. We had to move it when we repainted the room a few months back. As I recall it took four strong men to lift it.» He turned his gaze to the gash in the wall. The powdered plaster was no longer falling. «Yet it would appear that someone picked the thing up and threw it across the room, smashing it against the wall up there. I can't believe it.» He faced the nurse. «Did you say you saw it floating slowly through the air?»
«She didn't see nothing like that, did you, luv?» The orderly slipped a protective arm around her waist.
«Yes, I did!» she insisted.