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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/37653-8.txt b/37653-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..44db4b7 --- /dev/null +++ b/37653-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1749 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Sentiment, Inc., by Poul William Anderson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sentiment, Inc. + +Author: Poul William Anderson + +Release Date: October 7, 2011 [EBook #37653] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SENTIMENT, INC. *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Dianna Adair and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + [Illustration: Cover] + + + [Illustration: Dr. Kennedy's examination room] + + + [Illustration: the machine] + + + + + _The way we feel about another person, or about objects, is often + bound up in associations that have no direct connection with the + person or object at all. Often, what we call a "change of heart" + comes about sheerly from a change in the many associations which + make up our present viewpoint. Now, suppose that these associations + could be altered artificially, at the option of the person who was + in charge of the process...._ + + + + + _Sentiment, Inc._ + + _by_ POUL ANDERSON + + +She was twenty-two years old, fresh out of college, full of life and +hope, and all set to conquer the world. Colin Fraser happened to be on +vacation on Cape Cod, where she was playing summer stock, and went to +more shows than he had planned. It wasn't hard to get an introduction, +and before long he and Judy Sanders were seeing a lot of each other. + +"Of course," she told him one afternoon on the beach, "my real name is +Harkness." + +He raised his arm, letting the sand run through his fingers. The beach +was big and dazzling white around them, the sea galloped in with a +steady roar, and a gull rode the breeze overhead. "What was wrong with +it?" he asked. "For a professional monicker, I mean." + +She laughed and shook the long hair back over her shoulders. "I wanted +to live under the name of Sanders," she explained. + +"Oh--oh, yes, of course. Winnie the Pooh." He grinned. "Soulmates, +that's what we are." It was about then that he decided he'd been a +bachelor long enough. + +In the fall she went to New York to begin the upward grind--understudy, +walk-on parts, shoestring-theaters, and roles in outright turkeys. +Fraser returned to Boston for awhile, but his work suffered, he had to +keep dashing off to see her. + +By spring she was beginning to get places; she had talent and everybody +enjoys looking at a brown-eyed blonde. His weekly proposals were also +beginning to show some real progress, and he thought that a month or two +of steady siege might finish the campaign. So he took leave from his job +and went down to New York himself. He'd saved up enough money, and was +good enough in his work, to afford it; anyway, he was his own +boss--consulting engineer, specializing in mathematical analysis. + +He got a furnished room in Brooklyn, and filled in his leisure time--as +he thought of it--with some special math courses at Columbia. And he had +a lot of friends in town, in a curious variety of professions. Next to +Judy, he saw most of the physicist Sworsky, who was an entertaining +companion though most of his work was too top-secret even to be +mentioned. It was a happy period. + +There is always a jarring note, to be sure. In this case, it was the +fact that Fraser had plenty of competition. He wasn't good-looking +himself--a tall gaunt man of twenty-eight, with a dark hatchet face and +perpetually-rumpled clothes. But still, Judy saw more of him than of +anyone else, and admitted she was seriously considering his proposal and +no other. + +He called her up once for a date. "Sorry," she answered. "I'd love to, +Colin, but I've already promised tonight. Just so you won't worry, it's +Matthew Snyder." + +"Hm--the industrialist?" + +"Uh-huh. He asked me in such a way it was hard to refuse. But I don't +think you have to be jealous, honey. 'Bye now." + +Fraser lit his pipe with a certain smugness. Snyder was several times a +millionaire, but he was close to sixty, a widower of notably dull +conversation. Judy wasn't--Well, no worries, as she'd said. He dropped +over to Sworsky's apartment for an evening of chess and bull-shooting. + + * * * * * + +It was early in May, when the world was turning green again, that Judy +called Fraser up. "Hi," she said breathlessly. "Busy tonight?" + +"Well, I was hoping I'd be, if you get what I mean," he said. + +"Look, I want to take you out for a change. Just got some unexpected +money and dammit, I want to feel rich for one evening." + +"Hmmm--" He scowled into the phone. "I dunno--" + +"Oh, get off it, Galahad. I'll meet you in the Dixie lobby at seven. +Okay?" She blew him a kiss over the wires, and hung up before he could +argue further. He sighed and shrugged. Why not, if she wanted to? + +They were in a little Hungarian restaurant, with a couple of Tzigani +strolling about playing for them alone, it seemed, when he asked for +details. "Did you get a bonus, or what?" + +"No." She laughed at him over her drink. "I've turned guinea pig." + +"I hope you quit _that_ job before we're married!" + +"It's a funny deal," she said thoughtfully. "It'd interest you. I've +been out a couple of times with this Snyder, you know, and if anything +was needed to drive me into your arms, Colin, it's his political +lectures." + +"Well, bless the Republican Party!" He laid his hand over hers, she +didn't withdraw it, but she frowned just a little. + +"Colin, you know I want to get somewhere before I marry--see a bit of +the world, the theatrical world, before turning hausfrau. Don't be +so--Oh, never mind. I like you anyway." + +Sipping her drink and setting it down again: "Well, to carry on with the +story. I finally gave Comrade Snyder the complete brush-off, and I must +say he took it very nicely. But today, this morning, he called asking me +to have lunch with him, and I did after he explained. It seems he's got +a psychiatrist friend doing research, measuring brain storms or +something, and--Do I mean storms? Waves, I guess. Anyway, he wants to +measure as many different kinds of people as possible, and Snyder had +suggested me. I was supposed to come in for three afternoons +running--about two hours each time--and I'd get a hundred dollars per +session." + +"Hm," said Fraser. "I didn't know psych research was that well-heeled. +Who is this mad scientist?" + +"His name is Kennedy. Oh, by the way, I'm not supposed to tell anybody; +they want to spring it on the world as a surprise or something. But +you're different, Colin. I'm excited; I want to talk to somebody about +it." + +"Sure," he said. "You had a session already?" + +"Yes, my first was today. It's a funny place to do research--Kennedy's +got a big suite on Fifth Avenue, right up in the classy district. +Beautiful office. The name of his outfit is Sentiment, Inc." + +"Hm. Why should a research-team take such a name? Well, go on." + +"Oh, there isn't much else to tell. Kennedy was very nice. He took me +into a laboratory full of all sorts of dials and meters and blinking +lights and os--what do you call them? Those things that make wiggly +pictures." + +"Oscilloscopes. You'll never make a scientist, my dear." + +She grinned. "But I know one scientist who'd like to--Never mind! +Anyway, he sat me down in a chair and put bands around my wrists and +ankles--just like the hot squat--and a big thing like a beauty-parlor +hair-drier over my head. Then he fiddled with his dials for awhile, +making notes. Then he started saying words at me, and showing me +pictures. Some of them were very pretty; some ugly; some funny; some +downright horrible.... Anyway, that's all there was to it. After a +couple of hours he gave me a check for a hundred dollars and told me to +come back tomorrow." + +"Hm." Fraser rubbed his chin. "Apparently he was measuring the electric +rhythms corresponding to pleasure and dislike. I'd no idea anybody'd +made an encephalograph that accurate." + +"Well," said Judy, "I've told you why we're celebrating. Now come on, +the regular orchestra's tuning up. Let's dance." + +They had a rather wonderful evening. Afterward Fraser lay awake for a +long time, not wanting to lose a state of happiness in sleep. He +considered sleep a hideous waste of time: if he lived to be ninety, he'd +have spent almost thirty years unconscious. + + * * * * * + +Judy was engaged for the next couple of evenings, and Fraser himself was +invited to dinner at Sworsky's the night after that. So it wasn't till +the end of the week that he called her again. + +"Hullo, sweetheart," he said exuberantly. "How's things? I refer to +Charles Addams Things, of course." + +"Oh--Colin." Her voice was very small, and it trembled. + +"Look, I've got two tickets to _H. M. S. Pinafore_. So put on your own +pinafore and meet me." + +"Colin--I'm sorry, Colin. I can't." + +"Huh?" He noticed how odd she sounded, and a leadenness grew within him. +"You aren't sick, are you?" + +"Colin, I--I'm going to be married." + +"_What?_" + +"Yes. I'm in love now; really in love. I'll be getting married in a +couple of months." + +"But--but--" + +"I didn't want to hurt you." He heard her begin to cry. + +"But who--how--" + +"It's Matthew," she gulped. "Matthew Snyder." + +He sat quiet for a long while, until she asked if he was still on the +line. "Yeah," he said tonelessly. "Yeah, I'm still here, after a +fashion." Shaking himself: "Look, I've got to see you. I want to talk to +you." + +"I can't." + +"You sure as hell can," he said harshly. + +They met at a quiet little bar which had often been their rendezvous. +She watched him with frightened eyes while he ordered martinis. + +"All right," he said at last. "What's the story?" + +"I--" He could barely hear her. "There isn't any story. I suddenly +realized I loved Matt. That's all." + +"_Snyder!_" He made it a curse. "Remember what you told me about him +before?" + +"I felt different then," she whispered. "He's a wonderful man when you +get to know him." + +_And rich._ He suppressed the words and the thought. "What's so +wonderful specifically?" he asked. + +"He--" Briefly, her face was rapt. Fraser had seen her looking at him +that way, now and then. + +"Go on," he said grimly. "Enumerate Mr. Snyder's good qualities. Make a +list. He's courteous, cultured, intelligent, young, handsome, +amusing--To hell! _Why_, Judy?" + +"I don't know," she said in a high, almost fearful tone. "I just love +him, that's all." She reached over the table and stroked his cheek. "I +like you a lot, Colin. Find yourself a nice girl and be happy." + +His mouth drew into a narrow line. "There's something funny here," he +said. "Is it blackmail?" + +"No!" She stood up, spilling her drink, and the flare of temper showed +him how overwrought she was. "He just happens to be the man I love. +That's enough out of you, good-bye, Mr. Fraser." + +He sat watching her go. Presently he took up his drink, gulped it +barbarously, and called for another. + + + + +2 + + +Juan Martinez had come from Puerto Rico as a boy and made his own way +ever since. Fraser had gotten to know him in the army, and they had seen +each other from time to time since then. Martinez had gone into the +private-eye business and made a good thing of it; Fraser had to get past +a very neat-looking receptionist to see him. + +"Hi, Colin," said Martinez, shaking hands. He was a small, dark man, +with a large nose and beady black eyes that made him resemble a +sympathetic mouse. "You look like the very devil." + +"I feel that way, too," said Fraser, collapsing into a chair. "You can't +go on a three-day drunk without showing it." + +"Well, what's the trouble? Cigarette?" Martinez held out a pack. +"Girl-friend give you the air?" + +"As a matter of fact, yes; that's what I want to see you about." + +"This isn't a lonely-hearts club," said Martinez. "And I've told you +time and again a private dick isn't a wisecracking superman. Our work is +ninety-nine percent routine; and for the other one percent, we call in +the police." + +"Let me give you the story," said Fraser. He rubbed his eyes wearily as +he told it. At the end, he sat staring at the floor. + +"Well," said Martinez, "it's too bad and all that. But what the hell, +there are other dames. New York has more beautiful women per square inch +than any other city except Paris. Latch on to somebody else. Or if you +want, I can give you a phone number--" + +"You don't understand," said Fraser "I want you to investigate this; I +want to know why she did it." + +Martinez squinted through a haze of smoke. "Snyder's a rich and powerful +man," he said. "Isn't that enough?" + +"No," said Fraser, too tired to be angry at the hint. "Judy isn't that +kind of a girl. Neither is she the kind to go overboard in a few days, +especially when I was there. Sure, that sounds conceited, but dammit, I +_know_ she cared for me." + +"Okay. You suspect pressure was brought to bear?" + +"Yeah. It's hard to imagine what. I called up Judy's family in Maine, +and they said they were all right, no worries. Nor do I think anything +in her own life would give a blackmailer or an extortionist anything to +go on. Still--I want to know." + +Martinez drummed the desk-top with nervous fingers. "I'll look into it +if you insist," he said, "though it'll cost you a pretty penny. Rich +men's lives aren't easy to pry into if they've got something they want +to hide. But I don't think we'd find out much; your case seems to be +only one of a rash of similar ones in the past year." + +"Huh?" Fraser looked sharply up. + +"Yeah. I follow all the news; and remember the odd facts. There've been +a good dozen cases recently, where beautiful young women suddenly +married rich men or became their mistresses. It doesn't all get into the +papers, but I've got my contacts. I know. In every instance, there was +no obvious reason; in fact, the dames seemed very much in love with +daddy." + +"And the era of the gold-digger is pretty well gone--" Fraser sat +staring out the window. It didn't seem right that the sky should be so +full of sunshine. + +"Well," said Martinez, "you don't need me. You need a psychologist." + +_Psychologist!_ + +"By God, Juan, I'm going to give you a job anyway!" Fraser leaped to his +feet. "You're going to check into an outfit called Sentiment, Inc." + + * * * * * + +A week later, Martinez said, "Yeah, we found it easily enough. It's not +in the phone-book, but they've got a big suite right in the high-rent +district on Fifth. The address is here, in my written report. Nobody in +the building knows much about 'em, except that they're a quiet, +well-behaved bunch and call themselves research psychologists. They have +a staff of four: a secretary-receptionist; a full-time secretary; and a +couple of husky boys who may be bodyguards for the boss. That's this +Kennedy, Robert Kennedy. My man couldn't get into his office; the girl +said he was too busy and never saw anybody except some regular clients. +Nor could he date either of the girls, but he did investigate them. + +"The receptionist is just a working girl for routine stuff, married, +hardly knows or cares what's going on. The steno is unmarried, has a +degree in psych, lives alone, and seems to have no friends except her +boss. Who's not her lover, by the way." + +"Well, how about Kennedy himself?" asked Fraser. + +"I've found out a good bit, but it's all legitimate," said Martinez. +"He's about fifty years old, a widower, very steady private life. He's a +licensed psychiatrist who used to practice in Chicago, where he also did +research in collaboration with a physicist named Gavotti, who's since +died. Shortly after that happened-- + +"No, there's no suspicion of foul play; the physicist was an old man and +died of a heart attack. Anyway, Kennedy moved to New York. He still +practices, officially, but he doesn't take just anybody; claims that his +research only leaves him time for a few." Martinez narrowed his eyes. +"The only thing you could hold against him is that he occasionally sees +a guy named Bryce, who's in a firm that has some dealings with Amtorg." + +"The Russian trading corporation? Hm." + +"Oh, that's pretty remote guilt by association, Colin. Amtorg does have +legitimate business, you know. We buy manganese from them, among other +things. And the rest of Kennedy's connections are all strictly blue +ribbon. _Crème de la crème_--business, finance, politics, and one big +union-leader who's known to be a conservative. In fact, Kennedy's +friends are so powerful you'd have real trouble doing anything against +him." + +Fraser slumped in his chair. "I suppose my notion was pretty wild," he +admitted. + +"Well, there is one queer angle. You know these rich guys who've +suddenly made out with such highly desirable dames? As far as I could +find out, every one of them is a client of Kennedy's." + +"Eh?" Fraser jerked erect. + +"'S a fact. Also, my man showed the building staff, elevator pilots and +so on, pictures of these women, and a couple of 'em were remembered as +having come to see Kennedy." + +"Shortly before they--fell in love?" + +"Well, that I can't be sure of. You know how people are about +remembering dates. But it's possible." + +Fraser shook his dark head. "It's unbelievable," he said. "I thought +Svengali was outworn melodrama." + +"I know something about hypnotism, Colin. It won't do anything like what +you think happened to those girls." + +Fraser got out his pipe and fumbled tobacco into it. "I think," he said, +"I'm going to call on Dr. Robert Kennedy myself." + +"Take it easy, boy," said Martinez. "You been reading too many weird +stories; you'll just get tossed out on your can." + +Fraser tried to smile. It was hard--Judy wouldn't answer his calls and +letters any more. "Well," he said, "it'll be in a worthy cause." + + * * * * * + +The elevator let him out on the nineteenth floor. It held four big +suites, with the corridor running between them. He studied the +frosted-glass doors. On one side was the Eagle Publishing Company and +Frank & Dayles, Brokers. On the other was the Messenger Advertising +Service, and Sentiment, Inc. He entered their door and stood in a quiet, +oak-paneled reception room. Behind the railing were a couple of desks, a +young woman working at each, and two burly men who sat boredly reading +magazines. + +The pretty girl, obviously the receptionist, looked up as Fraser +approached and gave him a professional smile. "Yes, sir?" she asked. + +"I'd like to see Dr. Kennedy, please," he said, trying hard to be +casual. + +"Do you have an appointment, sir?" + +"No, but it's urgent." + +"I'm sorry, sir; Dr. Kennedy is very busy. He can't see anybody except +his regular patients and research subjects." + +"Look, take him in this note, will you? Thanks." + +Fraser sat uneasily for some minutes, wondering if he'd worded the note +correctly. _I must see you about Miss Judy Harkness._ _Important._ Well, +what the devil else could you say? + +The receptionist came out again. "Dr. Kennedy can spare you a few +minutes, sir," she said. "Go right on in." + +"Thanks." Fraser slouched toward the inner door. The two men lowered +their magazines to follow him with watchful eyes. + +There was a big, handsomely-furnished office inside, with a door beyond +that must lead to the laboratory. Kennedy looked up from some papers and +rose, holding out his hand. He was a medium-sized man, rather plump, +graying hair brushed thickly back from a broad, heavy face behind +rimless glasses. "Yes?" His voice was low and pleasant. "What can I do +for you?" + +"My name's Fraser." The visitor sat down and accepted a cigarette. Best +to act urbanely. "I know Miss Harkness well. I understand you made some +encephalographic studies of her." + +"Indeed?" Kennedy looked annoyed, and Fraser recalled that Judy had been +asked not to tell anyone. "I'm not sure; I would have to consult my +records first." He wasn't admitting anything, thought Fraser. + +"Look," said the engineer, "there's been a marked change in Miss +Harkness recently. I know enough psychology to be certain that such +changes don't happen overnight without cause. I wanted to consult you." + +"I'm not her psychiatrist," said Kennedy coldly. "Now if you will excuse +me, I really have a lot to do--" + +"All right," said Fraser. There was no menace in his tones, only a +weariness. "If you insist, I'll play it dirty. Such abrupt changes +indicate mental instability. But I know she was perfectly sane before. +It begins to look as if your experiments may have--injured her mind. If +so, I should have to report you for malpractice." + +Kennedy flushed. "I am a licensed psychiatrist," he said, "and any other +doctor will confirm that Miss Harkness is still in mental health. If you +tried to get an investigation started, you would only be wasting your +own time and that of the authorities. She herself will testify that no +harm was done to her; no compulsion applied; and that you are an +infernal busybody with some delusions of your own. Good afternoon." + +"Ah," said Fraser, "so she _was_ here." + +Kennedy pushed a button. His men entered. "Show this gentleman the way +out, please," he said. + +Fraser debated whether to put up a fight, decided it was futile, and +went out between the two others. When he got to the street, he found he +was shaking, and badly in need of a drink. + + * * * * * + +Fraser asked, "Jim, did you ever read _Trilby_?" + +Sworsky's round, freckled face lifted to regard him. "Years ago," he +answered. "What of it?" + +"Tell me something. Is it possible--even theoretically possible--to do +what Svengali did? Change emotional attitudes, just like that." Fraser +snapped his fingers. + +"I don't know," said Sworsky. "Nuclear cross-sections are more in my +line. But offhand, I should imagine it might be done ... sometime in the +far future. Thought-habits, associational-patterns, the labeling of this +as good and that as bad, seem to be matters of established neural paths. +If you could selectively alter the polarization of individual +neurones--But it's a pretty remote prospect; we hardly know a thing +about the brain today." + +He studied his friend sympathetically. "I know it's tough to get +jilted," he said, "but don't go off your trolley about it." + +"I could stand it if someone else had gotten her in the usual kind of +way," said Fraser thinly. "But this--Look, let me tell you all I've +found out." + +Sworsky shook his head at the end of the story. "That's a mighty wild +speculation," he murmured. "I'd forget it if I were you." + +"Did you know Kennedy's old partner? Gavotti, at Chicago." + +"Sure, I met him a few times. Nice old guy, very unworldly, completely +wrapped up in his work. He got interested in neurology from the physics +angle toward the end of his life, and contributed a lot to cybernetics. +What of it?" + +"I don't know," said Fraser; "I just don't know. But do me a favor, will +you, Jim? Judy won't see me at all, but she knows you and likes you. Ask +her to dinner or something. Insist that she come. Then you and your wife +find out--whatever you can. Just exactly how she feels about the whole +business. What her attitudes are toward everything." + +"The name is Sworsky, not Holmes. But sure, I'll do what I can, if +you'll promise to try and get rid of this fixation. You ought to see a +head-shrinker yourself, you know." + +_In vino veritas_--sometimes too damn much _veritas_. + + * * * * * + +Toward the end of the evening, Judy was talking freely, if not quite +coherently. "I cared a lot for Colin," she said. "It was pretty +wonderful having him around. He's a grand guy. Only Matt--I don't know. +Matt hasn't got half of what Colin has; Matt's a single-track mind. I'm +afraid I'm just going to be an ornamental convenience to him. Only if +you've ever been so you got all dizzy when someone was around, and +thought about him all the time he was away--well, that's how he is. +Nothing else matters." + +"Colin's gotten a funny obsession," said Sworsky cautiously. "He thinks +Kennedy hypnotized you for Snyder. I keep telling him it's impossible, +but he can't get over the idea." + +"Oh, no, no, no," she said with too much fervor. "It's nothing like +that. I'll tell you just what happened. We had those two measuring +sessions; it was kind of dull but nothing else. And then the third time +Kennedy did put me under hypnosis--he called it that, at least. I went +to sleep and woke up about an hour later and he sent me home. I felt all +good inside, happy, and shlo--slowly I began to see what Matt meant to +me. + +"I called him up that evening. He said Kennedy's machine _did_ speed up +people's minds for a short while, sometimes, so they decided quick-like +what they'd've worked out anyway. Kennedy is--I don't know. It's funny +how ordinary he seemed at first. But when you get to know him, he's +like--God, almost. He's strong and wise and good. He--" Her voice +trailed off and she sat looking foolishly at her glass. + +"You know," said Sworsky, "perhaps Colin is right after all." + +"Don't say that!" She jumped up and slapped his face. "Kennedy's _good_, +I tell you! All you little lice sitting here making sly remarks behind +his back, and he's so, much bigger than all of you and--" She broke into +tears and stormed out of the apartment. + +Sworsky reported the affair to Fraser. "I wonder," he said. "It doesn't +seem natural, I'll agree. But what can anybody do? The police?" + +"I've tried," said Fraser dully. "They laughed. When I insisted, I damn +near got myself jugged. That's no use. The trouble is, none of the +people who've been under the machine will testify against Kennedy. He +fixes it so they worship him." + +"I still think you're crazy. There _must_ be a simpler hypothesis; I +refuse to believe your screwy notions without some real evidence. But +what are you going to do now?" + +"Well," said Fraser with a tautness in his voice, "I've got several +thousand dollars saved up, and Juan Martinez will help. Ever hear the +fable about the lion? He licked hell out of the bear and the tiger and +the rhinoceros, but a little gnat finally drove him nuts. Maybe I can be +the gnat." He shook his head. "But I'll have to hurry. The wedding's +only six weeks off." + + + + +3 + + +It can be annoying to be constantly shadowed; to have nasty gossip about +you spreading through the places where you work and live; to find your +tires slashed; to be accosted by truculent drunks when you stop in for a +quick one; to have loud horns blow under your window every night. And it +doesn't do much good to call the police; your petty tormentors always +fade out of sight. + +Fraser was sitting in his room some two weeks later, trying +unsuccessfully to concentrate on matrix algebra, when the phone rang. He +never picked it up without a fluttering small hope that it might be +Judy, and it never was. This time it was a man's voice: "Mr. Fraser?" + +"Yeah," he grunted. "Wha'dya want?" + +"This is Robert Kennedy. I'd like to talk to you." + +Fraser's heart sprang in his ribs, but he held his voice stiff. "Go on, +then. Talk." + +"I want you to come up to my place. We may be having a long +conversation." + +"Mmmm--well--" It was more than he had allowed himself to hope for, but +he remained curt: "Okay. But a full report of this business, and what I +think you're doing, is in the hands of several people. If anything +should happen to me--" + +"You've been reading too many hard-boileds," said Kennedy. "Nothing will +happen. Anyway, I have a pretty good idea who those people are; I can +hire detectives of my own, you know." + +"I'll come over, then." Fraser hung up and realized, suddenly, that he +was sweating. + +The night air was cool as he walked down the street. He paused for a +moment, feeling the city like a huge impersonal machine around him, +grinding and grinding. Human civilization had grown too big, he thought. +It was beyond anyone's control; it had taken on a will of its own and +was carrying a race which could no longer guide it. Sometimes--reading +the papers, or listening to the radio, or just watching the traffic go +by like a river of steel--a man could feel horribly helpless. + +He took the subway to Kennedy's address, a swank apartment in the lower +Fifties. He was admitted by the psychiatrist in person; no one else was +around. + +"I assume," said Kennedy, "that you don't have some wild idea of pulling +a gun on me. That would accomplish nothing except to get you in +trouble." + +"No," said Fraser, "I'll be good." His eyes wandered about the living +room. One wall was covered with books which looked used; there were some +quality reproductions, a Capehart, and fine, massive furniture. It was a +tasteful layout. He looked a little more closely at three pictures on +the mantel: a middle-aged woman and two young men in uniform. + +"My wife," said Kennedy, "and my boys. They're all dead. Would you like +a drink?" + +"No. I came to talk." + +"I'm not Satan, you know," said Kennedy. "I like books and music, good +wine, good conversation. I'm as human as you are, only I have a +purpose." + +Fraser sat down and began charging his pipe. "Go ahead," he said. "I'm +listening." + +Kennedy pulled a chair over to face him. The big smooth countenance +behind the rimless glasses held little expression. "Why have you been +annoying me?" he asked. + +"I?" Fraser lifted his brows. + +Kennedy made an impatient gesture. "Let's not chop words. There are no +witnesses tonight. I intend to talk freely, and want you to do the same. +I know that you've got Martinez sufficiently convinced to help you with +this very childish persecution-campaign. What do you hope to get out of +it?" + +"I want my girl back," said Fraser tonelessly. "I was hoping my +nuisance-value--" + + * * * * * + +Kennedy winced a bit. "You know, I'm damned sorry about that. It's the +one aspect of my work which I hate. I'd like you to believe that I'm not +just a scientific procurer. Actually, I have to satisfy the minor +desires of my clients, so they'll stay happy and agree to my major +wishes. It's the plain truth that those women have been only the +minutest fraction of my job." + +"Nevertheless, you're a free-wheeling son, doing something like that--" + +"Really, now, what's so horrible about it? Those girls are in love--the +normal, genuine article. It's not any kind of zombie state, or whatever +your overheated imagination has thought up. They're entirely sane, +unharmed, and happy. In fact, happiness of that kind is so rare in this +world that if I wanted to, I could pose as their benefactor." + +"You've got a machine," said Fraser; "it changes the mind. As far as I'm +concerned, that's as gross a violation of liberty as throwing somebody +into a concentration camp." + +"How free do you think anyone is? You're born with a fixed heredity. +Environment molds you like clay. Your society teaches you what and how +to think. A million tiny factors, all depending on blind, uncontrollable +chance, determine the course of your life--including your love-life.... +Well, we needn't waste any time on philosophy. Go on, ask some +questions. I admit I've hurt you--unwittingly, to be sure--but I do want +to make amends." + +"Your machine, then," said Fraser. "How did you get it? How does it +work." + +"I was practicing in Chicago," said Kennedy, "and collaborating on the +side with Gavotti. How much do you know of cybernetics? I don't mean +computers and automata, which are only one aspect of the field; I mean +control and communication, in the animal as well as in the machine." + +"Well, I've read Wiener's books, and studied Shannon's work, too." +Despite himself, Fraser was thawing, just a trifle. "It's exciting +stuff. Communications-theory seems to be basic, in biology and +psychology as well as in electronics." + +"Quite. The future may remember Wiener as the Galileo of neurology. If +Gavotti's work ever gets published, he'll be considered the Newton. So +far, frankly, I've suppressed it. He died suddenly, just when his +machine was completed and he was getting ready to publish his results. +Nobody but I knew anything more than rumors; he was inclined to be +secretive till he had a _fait accompli_ on hand. I realized what an +opportunity had been given me, and took it; I brought the machine here +without saying much to anyone." + +Kennedy leaned back in his chair. "I imagine it was mostly luck which +took Gavotti and me so far," he went on. "We made a long series of +improbably good guesses, and thus telescoped a century of work into a +decade. If I were religious, I'd be down on my knees, thanking the Lord +for putting this thing of the future into my hands." + +"Or the devil," said Fraser. + +Briefly, anger flitted across Kennedy's face. "I grant you, the machine +is a terrible power, but it's harmless to a man if it's used +properly--as I have used it. I'm not going to tell you just how it +works; to be perfectly honest, I only understand a fraction of its +theory and its circuits myself. But look, you know something of +encephalography. The various basic rhythms of the brain have been +measured. The standard method is already so sensitive that it can detect +abnormalities like a developing tumor or a strong emotional disturbance, +that will give trouble unless corrected. Half of Gavotti's machine is a +still more delicate encephalograph. It can measure and analyze the +minute variations in electrical pulses corresponding to the basic +emotional states. It won't read thoughts, no; but once calibrated for a +given individual, it will tell you if he's happy, sorrowful, angry, +disgusted, afraid--any fundamental neuro-glandular condition, or any +combination of them." + +He paused. "All right," said Fraser. "What else does it do?" + +"It does _not_ make monsters," said Kennedy. "Look, the specific +emotional reaction to a given stimulus is, in the normal individual, +largely a matter of conditioned reflex, instilled by social environment +or the accidental associations of his life. + +"Anyone in decent health will experience fear in the presence of +danger; desire in the presence of a sexual object, and so on. That's +basic biology, and the machine can't change that. But most of our +evaluations are learned. For instance, to an American the word 'mother' +has powerful emotional connotations, while to a Samoan it means nothing +very exciting. You had to develop a taste for liquor, tobacco, +coffee--in fact most of what you consume. If you're in love with a +particular woman, it's a focusing of the general sexual libido on her, +brought about by the symbolizing part of your mind: she _means_ +something to you. There are cultures without romantic love, you know. +And so on. All these specific, conditioned reactions can be changed." + +"How?" + + * * * * * + +Kennedy thought for a moment "The encephalographic part of the machine +measures the exact pulsations in the individual corresponding to the +various emotional reactions. It takes me about four hours to determine +those with the necessary precision; then I have to make statistical +analyses of the data, to winnow out random variations. Thereafter I put +the subject in a state of light hypnosis--that's only to increase +suggestibility, and make the process faster. As I pronounce the words +and names I'm interested in, the machine feeds back the impulses +corresponding to the emotions I want: a sharply-focused beam on the +brain center concerned. + +"For instance, suppose you were an alcoholic and I wanted to cure you. +I'd put you in hypnosis and stand there whispering 'wine, whisky, beer, +gin,' and so on; meanwhile, the machine would be feeding the impulses +corresponding to your reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into your +brain. You'd come out unchanged, except that your appetite for alcohol +would be gone; you could, in fact, come out hating the stuff so much +that you'd join the Prohibition Party--though, in actual practice, it +would probably be enough just to give you a mild aversion." + +"Mmmm--I see. Maybe." Fraser scowled. "And the--subject--doesn't +remember what you've done?" + +"Oh, no. It all takes place on the lower subconscious levels. A new set +of conditioned neural pathways is opened, you see, and old ones are +closed off. The brain does that by itself, through its normal +symbolizing mechanism. All that happens is that the given symbol--such +as liquor--becomes reflectively associated with the given emotional +state, such as dislike." + +Kennedy leaned forward with an air of urgency. "The end result is in no +way different from ordinary means of persuasion. Propaganda does the +same thing by sheer repetition. If you're courting a girl, you try to +identify yourself in her mind with the things she desires, by +appropriate behavior.... I'm sorry; I shouldn't have used that +example.... The machine is only a direct, fast way of doing this, +producing a more stable result." + +"It's still--tampering," said Fraser. "How do you know you're not +creating side-effects, doing irreparable long-range damage?" + +"Oh, for Lord's sake!" exploded Kennedy. "Take your mind off that shelf, +will you? I've told you how delicate the whole thing is. A few +microwatts of power more or less, a frequency-shift of less than one +percent, and it doesn't work at all. There's no effect whatsoever." He +cooled off fast, adding reflectively: "On the given subject, that is. It +might work on someone else. These pulsations are a highly individual +matter; I have to calibrate every case separately." + +There was a long period of silence. Then Fraser strained forward and +said in an ugly voice: + +"All right You've told me how you do it. Now tell me _why_. What +possible reason or excuse, other than your own desire to play God? This +thing could be the greatest psychiatric tool in history, and you're +using it to--pimp!" + +"I told you that was unimportant," said Kennedy quietly. "I'm doing much +more. I set up in practice here in New York a couple of years ago. Once +I had a few chance people under control--no, I tell you again, I didn't +make robots of them. I merely associated myself, in their own minds, +with the father-image. That's something I do to everyone who comes under +the machine, just as a precaution if nothing else, Kennedy is all-wise, +all-powerful; Kennedy can do no wrong. It isn't a conscious realization; +to the waking mind, I am only a shrewd adviser and a damn swell fellow. +But the subconscious mind knows otherwise. It wouldn't _let_ my subjects +act against me; it wouldn't even let them want to. + +"Well, you see how it goes. I got those first few people to recommend me +to certain selected friends, and these in turn recommended me to others. +Not necessarily as a psychiatrist; I have variously been a doctor, a +counsellor, or merely a research-man looking for data. But I'm building +up a group of the people I want. People who'll back me up, who'll follow +my advice--not with any knowledge of being dominated, but because the +workings of their own subconscious minds will lead them inevitably to +think that my advice is the only sound policy to follow and my requests +are things any decent man must grant." + +"Yeah," said Fraser. "I get it. Big businessmen. Labor-leaders. +Politicians. Military men. And Soviet spies!" + + * * * * * + +Kennedy nodded. "I have connections with the Soviets; their agents think +I'm on their side. But it isn't treason, though I may help them out from +time to time. + +"That's why I have to do these services for my important clients, such +as getting them the women they want--or, what I actually do more often, +influencing their competitors and associates. You see, the subconscious +mind knows I am all-powerful, but the conscious mind doesn't. It has to +be satisfied by occasional proofs that I _am_ invaluable; otherwise +conflicts would set in, my men would become unstable and eventually +psychotic, and be of no further use to me. + +"Of course," he added, almost pedantically, "my men don't know how I +persuade these other people--they only know that I do, somehow, and +their regard for their own egos, as well as for me, sets up a bloc which +prevents them from reasoning out the fact that they themselves are +dominated. They're quite content to accept the results of my help, +without inquiring further into the means than the easy rationalization +that I have a 'persuasive personality.' + +"I don't like what I'm doing, Fraser. But it's got to be done." + +"You still haven't said _what's_ got to be done," answered the engineer +coldly. + +"I've been given something unbelievable," said Kennedy. His voice was +very soft now. "If I'd made it public, can you imagine what would have +happened? Psychiatrists would use it, yes; but so would criminals, +dictators, power-hungry men of all kinds. Even in this country, I don't +think libertarian principles could long survive. It would be too +simple-- + +"And yet it would have been cowardly to break the machine and burn +Gavotti's notes. Chance has given me the power to be more than a chip in +the river--a river that's rapidly approaching a waterfall, war, +destruction, tyranny, no matter who the Pyrrhic victor may be. I'm in a +position to do something for the causes in which I believe." + +"And what are they?" asked Fraser. + +Kennedy gestured at the pictures on the mantel. "Both my sons were +killed in the last war. My wife died of cancer--a disease which would be +licked now if a fraction of the money spent on armaments had been +diverted to research. That brought it home to me; but there are hundreds +of millions of people in worse cases. And war isn't the only +evil--there is poverty, oppression, inequality, want and suffering. It +could be changed. + +"I'm building up my own lobby, you might say. In a few more years, I +hope to be the indispensable adviser of all the men who, between them, +really run this country. And yes, I have been in touch with Soviet +agents--have even acted as a transmitter of stolen information. The +basic problem of spying, you know, is not to get the information in the +first place as much as to get it to the homeland. Treason? No. I think +not. I'm getting my toehold in world communism. I already have some of +its agents; sooner or later, I'll get to the men who really matter. Then +communism will no longer be a menace." + +He sighed. "It's a hard row to hoe. It'll take my lifetime, at least; +but what else have I got to give my life to?" + +Fraser sat quiet. His pipe was cold, he knocked it out and began filling +it afresh. The scratching of his match seemed unnaturally loud. "It's +too much," he said. "It's too big a job for one man to tackle. The world +will stumble along somehow, but you'll just get things into a worse +mess." + +"I've got to try," said Kennedy. + +"And I still want my girl back." + +"I can't do that; I need Snyder too much. But I'll make it up to you +somehow." Kennedy sighed. "Lord, if you knew how much I've wanted to +tell all this!" + +With sudden wariness: "Not that it's to be repeated. In fact, you're to +lay off me; call off your dogs. Don't try to tell anyone else what I've +told you. You'd never be believed and I already have enough power to +suppress the story, if you should get it out somehow. And if you give me +any more trouble at all, I'll see to it that you--stop." + +"Murder?" + +"Or commitment to an asylum. I can arrange that too." + +Fraser sighed. He felt oddly unexcited, empty, as if the interview had +drained him of his last will to resist. He held the pipe loosely in his +fingers, letting it go out. + +"Ask me a favor," urged Kennedy. "I'll do it, if it won't harm my own +program. I tell you, I want to square things." + +"Well--" + +"Think about it. Let me know." + +"All right." Fraser got up. "I may do that." He went out the door +without saying goodnight. + + + + +4 + + +He sat with his feet on the table, chair tilted back and teetering +dangerously, hands clasped behind his head, pipe filling the room with +blue fog. It was his usual posture for attacking a problem. + +And damn it, he thought wearily, this was a question such as he made his +living on. An industrial engineer comes into the office. We want this +and that--a machine for a very special purpose, let's say. What should +we do, Mr. Fraser? Fraser prowls around the plant, reads up on the +industry, and then sits down and thinks. The elements of the problem are +such-and-such; how can they be combined to yield a solution? + +Normally, he uses the mathematical approach, especially in machine +design. Most practicing-engineers have a pathetic math background--they +use ten pages of elaborate algebra and rusty calculus to figure out +something that three vector equations would solve. But you have to get +the logical basics straight first, before you can set up your equations. + +All right, what is the problem? To get Judy back. That means forcing +Kennedy to restore her normal emotional reactions--no, he didn't want +her thrust into love of him; he just wanted her as she had been. + +What are the elements of the problem? Kennedy acts outside the law, but +he has blocked all official channels. He even has connections extending +through the Iron Curtain. + +Hmmmm--appeal to the FBI? Kennedy couldn't have control over +them--_yet_. However, if Fraser tried to tip off the FBI, they'd act +cautiously, if they investigated at all. They'd have to go slow. And +Kennedy would find out in time to do something about it. + +Martinez could help no further. Sworsky had closer contact with +Washington. He'd been so thoroughly cleared that they'd be inclined to +trust whatever he said. But Sworsky doubted the whole story; like many +men who'd suffered through irresponsible Congressional charges, he was +almost fanatic about having proof before accusing anyone of anything. +Moreover, Kennedy knew that Sworsky was Fraser's friend; he'd probably +be keeping close tabs on the physicist and ready to block any attempts +he might make to help. With the backing of a man like Snyder, Kennedy +could hire as many detectives as he wanted. + +In fact, whatever the counter-attack, it was necessary to go warily. +Kennedy's threat to get rid of Fraser if the engineer kept working +against him was not idle mouthing. He could do it--and, being a fanatic, +would. + +But Kennedy, like the demon of legend, would grant one wish--just to +salve his own conscience. Only what should the wish be? Another woman? +Or merely to be reconciled, artificially, to an otherwise-intolerable +situation? + +_Judy, Judy, Judy!_ + +Fraser swore at himself. Damn it to hell, this was a problem in logic. +No room for emotion. Of course, it might be a problem without a +solution. There are plenty of those. + +He squinted, trying to visualize the office. He thought of burglary, +stealing evidence--silly thought. But let's see, now. What was the +layout, exactly? Four suites on one floor of the skyscraper, three of +them unimportant offices of unimportant men. And-- + +_Oh, Lord!_ + +Fraser sat for a long while, hardly moving. Then he uncoiled himself and +ran, downstairs and into the street and to the nearest pay phone. His +own line might be tapped-- + +"Hello, hello, Juan?... Yes, I know I got you out of bed, and I'm not +sorry. This is too bloody important.... Okay, okay.... Look, I want a +complete report on the Messenger Advertising Service.... When? +Immediately, if not sooner. And I mean _complete_.... That's right, +Messenger.... Okay, fine. I'll buy you a drink sometime." + +"Hello, Jim? Were you asleep too?... Sorry.... But look, would you make +a list of all the important men you know fairly well? I need it bad.... +No, don't come over. I think I'd better not see you for a while. Just +mail it to me.... All right, so I am paranoid...." + + * * * * * + +Jerome K. Ferris was a large man, with a sense of his own importance +that was even larger. He sat hunched in the chair, his head dwarfed by +the aluminum helmet, his breathing shallow. Around him danced and +flickered a hundred meters, indicator lights, tubes. There was a low +humming in the room, otherwise it was altogether silent, blocked and +shielded against the outside world. The fluorescent lights were a muted +glow. + +Fraser sat watching the greenish trace on the huge oscilloscope screen. +It was an intricate set of convolutions, looking more like a plate of +spaghetti than anything else. He wondered how many frequencies were +involved. Several thousand, at the very least. + +"Fraser," repeated Kennedy softly into the ear of the hypnotized man. +"Colin Fraser. Colin Fraser." He touched a dial with infinite care. +"Colin Fraser. Colin Fraser." + +The oscilloscope flickered as he readjusted, a new trace appeared. +Kennedy waited for a while, then: "Robert Kennedy. Sentiment, Inc. +Robert Kennedy. Sentiment, Inc. Robert Kennedy. Sentiment--" + +He turned off the machine, its murmur and glow died away. Facing Fraser +with a tight little smile, he said: "All right. Your job is done. Are we +even now?" + +"As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser. + +"I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. "I'd +have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch." + +"Well, I was interested," said Fraser. + +"Frankly, I still don't see what you stand to gain by the doglike +devotion of this Ferris. He's rich, but he's too weak and short-sighted +to be a leader. I'd never planned on conditioning him for my purposes." + +"I've explained that," said Fraser patiently. "Ferris is a large +stockholder in a number of corporations. His influence can swing a lot +of business my way." + +"Yes, I know. I didn't grant your wish blindly, you realize. I had +Ferris studied; he's unable to harm me." Kennedy regarded Fraser with +hard eyes. "And just in case you still have foolish notions, please +remember that I gave him the father-conditioning with respect to myself. +He'll do a lot for you, but not if it's going to hurt me in any way." + +"I know when I'm licked," said Fraser bleakly; "I'm getting out of town +as soon as I finish those courses I'm signed up for." + +Kennedy snapped his fingers. "All right, Ferris, wake up now." + +Ferris blinked. "What's been happening?" he asked. + +"Nothing much," said Kennedy, unbuckling the electrodes. "I've taken my +readings. Thank you very much for the help, sir. I'll see that you get +due credit when my research is published." + +"Ah--yes. Yes." Ferris puffed himself out. Then he put an arm around +Fraser's shoulder. "If you aren't busy," he said, "maybe we could go +have lunch." + +"Thanks," said Fraser. "I'd like to talk to you about a few things." + +He lingered for a moment after Ferris had left the room. "I imagine this +is goodbye for us," he said. + +"Well, so long, at least. We'll probably hear from each other again." +Kennedy shook Fraser's hand. "No hard feelings? I did go to a lot of +trouble for you--wangling your introduction to Ferris when you'd named +him, and having one of my men persuade him to come here. And right when +I'm so infernally busy, too." + +"Sure," said Fraser. "It's all right. I can't pretend to love you for +what you've done, but you aren't a bad sort." + +"No worse than you," said Kennedy with a short laugh. "You've used the +machine for your own ends, now." + +"Yeah," said Fraser. "I guess I have." + + * * * * * + +Sworsky asked, "Why do you insist on calling me from drugstores? And why +at my office? I've got a home phone, you know." + +"I'm not sure but that our own lines are tapped," said Fraser. +"Kennedy's a smart cookie, and don't you forget it. I think he's about +ready to dismiss me as a danger, but you're certainly being watched; +you're on his list." + +"You're getting a persecution-complex. Honest, Colin, I'm worried." + +"Well, bear with me for a while. Now, have you had any information on +Kennedy since I called last?" + +"Hm, no. I did mention to Thomson, as you asked me to, that I'd heard +rumors of some revolutionary encephalographic techniques and would be +interested in seeing the work. Why did you want me to do that?" + +"Thomson," said Fraser, "is one of Kennedy's men. Now look, Jim, before +long you're going to be invited to visit Kennedy. He'll give you a spiel +about his research and ask to measure your brain waves. I want you to +say yes. Then I want to know the exact times of the three appointments +he'll give you--the first two, at least." + +"Hmmm--if Kennedy's doing what you claim--" + +"Jim, it's a necessary risk, but _I'm_ the one who's taking it. You'll +be okay, I promise you; though perhaps later you'll read of me being +found in the river. You see, I got Kennedy to influence a big stockowner +for me. One of the lesser companies in which he has a loud voice is +Messenger. I don't suppose Kennedy knows that. I hope not!" + + * * * * * + +Sworsky looked as if he'd been sandbagged. He was white, and the hand +that poured a drink shook. + +"Lord," he muttered. "Lord, Colin, you were right." + +Fraser's teeth drew back from his lips. "You went through with it, eh?" + +"Yes. I let the son hypnotize me, and afterward I walked off with a +dreamy expression, as you told me to. Just three hours ago, he dropped +around here in person. He gave me a long rigmarole about the stupidity +of military secrecy, and how the Soviet Union stands for peace and +justice. I hope I acted impressed; I'm not much of an actor." + +"You don't have to be. Just so you didn't overdo it. To one of Kennedy's +victims, obeying his advice is so natural that it doesn't call for any +awe-struck wonderment." + +"And he wanted data from me! Bombardment cross-sections. Critical +values. Resonance levels. My Lord, if the Russians found that out +through spies it'd save them three years of research. This is an FBI +case, all right." + +"No, not yet." Fraser laid an urgent hand on Sworsky's arm. "You've +stuck by me so far, Jim. Go along a little further." + +"What do you want me to do?" + +"Why--" Fraser's laugh jarred out. "Give him what he wants, of course." + + * * * * * + +Kennedy looked up from his desk, scowling. "All right, Fraser," he said. +"You've been a damned nuisance, and it's pretty patient of me to see you +again. But this is the last time. Wha'd'you want?" + +"It's the last time I'll need to see you, perhaps." Fraser didn't sit +down. He stood facing Kennedy. "You've had it, friend; straight up." + +"What do you mean?" Kennedy's hand moved toward his buzzer. + +"Listen before you do anything," said Fraser harshly. "I know you tried +to bring Jim Sworsky under the influence. You asked him for top-secret +data. A few hours ago, you handed the file he brought you on to Bryce, +who's no doubt at the Amtorg offices this minute. That's high treason, +Kennedy; they execute people for doing that." + +The psychologist slumped back. + +"Don't try to have your bully boys get rid of me," said Fraser. "Sworsky +is sitting by the phone, waiting to call the FBI. I'm the only guy who +can stop him." + +"But--" Kennedy's tongue ran around his lips. "But he committed treason +himself. He gave me the papers!" + +Fraser grinned. "You don't think those were authentic, do you? I doubt +if you'll be very popular in the Soviet Union either, once they've tried +to build machines using your data." + +Kennedy looked down at the floor. "How did you do it?" he whispered. + +"Remember Ferris? The guy you fixed up for me? He owns a share of your +next-door neighbor, the Messenger Advertising Service. I fed him a song +and dance about needing an office to do some important work, only my +very whereabouts had to be secret. The Messenger people were moved out +without anybody's knowing. I installed myself there one night, also a +simple little electric oscillator. + +"Encephalography is damn delicate work; it involves amplifications up to +several million. The apparatus misbehaves if you give it a hard look. +Naturally, your lab and the machine were heavily shielded, but even so, +a radio emitter next door would be bound to throw you off. My main +trouble was in lousing you up just a little bit, not enough to make you +suspect anything. + +"I only worked at that during your calibrating sessions with Sworsky. I +didn't have to be there when you turned the beam on him, because it +would be calculated from false data and be so far from his pattern as to +have no effect. You told me yourself how precise an adjustment was +needed. Sworsky played along, then. Now we've got proof--not that you +meddled with human lives, but that you are a spy." + +Kennedy sat without moving. His voice was a broken mumble. "I was going +to change the world. I had hopes for all humankind. And you, for the +sake of one woman--" + +"I never trusted anybody with a messiah complex. The world is too big to +change single-handed; you'd just have bungled it up worse than it +already is. A lot of dictators started out as reformers and ended up as +mass-executioners; you'd have done the same." + +Fraser leaned over his desk. "I'm willing to make a deal, though," he +went on. "Your teeth are pulled; there's no point in turning you in. +Sworsky and Martinez and I are willing just to report on Bryce, and let +you go, if you'll change back all your subjects. We're going to read +your files, and watch and see that you do it. Every one." + +Kennedy bit his lip. "And the machine--?" + +"I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, God, here's the phone +number of Judy Harkness. Ask her to come over for a special treatment. +At once." + + * * * * * + +A month later, the papers had a story about a plausible maniac who had +talked his way into the Columbia University laboratories, where +Gavotti's puzzling machine was being studied, and pulled out a hammer +and smashed it into ruin before he could be stopped. Taken to jail, he +committed suicide in his cell. The name was Kennedy. + +Fraser felt vague regret, but it didn't take him long to forget it; he +was too busy making plans for his wedding. + + +THE END + + + * * * * * + + + Transcriber Notes: + + This etext was produced from Science Fiction Stories 1953. + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. + copyright on this publication was renewed. + + Obvious punctuation errors have been repaired. + + page 17 original: on the mantel: a midle-aged woman and two young + men + + replacement: on the mantel: a middle-aged woman and two young men + + + page 20 original: inpulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, + fear, and disgust into + + replacement: impulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, + fear, and disgust into + + + page 25 original: Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, + artifically, to an otherwise-intolerable situation? + + replacement: Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, + artificially, to an otherwise-intolerable situation? + + + page 26 original: "As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said + Fraser. + + "Well, I was interested," said Fraser. + + "I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. + "I'd have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch." + + replacement: "As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser. + + "I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. + "I'd have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch." + + "Well, I was interested," said Fraser. + + + page 29 original: "I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, + God, here's the phone-number + + replacement: "I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, God, + here's the phone number (no hyphen used on page 10) + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sentiment, Inc., by Poul William Anderson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SENTIMENT, INC. *** + +***** This file should be named 37653-8.txt or 37653-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/6/5/37653/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Dianna Adair and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sentiment, Inc. + +Author: Poul William Anderson + +Release Date: October 7, 2011 [EBook #37653] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SENTIMENT, INC. *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Dianna Adair and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figcenter extraspacetop extraspacebot" > +<img src="images/sfs1953001_1.jpg" width="220" height="311" alt="Cover" title="Cover" /> +</div> + +<div class="figcenter extraspacetop" > +<img src="images/sfs1953004i.png" width="250" height="384" alt="Dr. Kennedy's examination room" title="Dr. Kennedy's examination room" /> +</div> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<div class="figcenter extraspacetop extraspacebot" > +<img src="images/sfs1953005i.png" width="250" height="220" alt="the machine" title="the machine" /> +</div> + +<p class="blockquote center"><i><b>The way we feel about another person, +or about objects, is often bound up in associations that have no direct +connection with the person or object at all. Often, what we call a "change +of heart" comes about sheerly from a change in the many associations which +make up our present viewpoint. Now, suppose that these associations +could be altered artificially, at the option of the person +who was in charge of the process....</b></i></p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<h1><i>Sentiment, Inc.</i><br /> +<small><i>by</i> POUL ANDERSON</small></h1> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> SHE was twenty-two years old, fresh out of college, full of life and +hope, and all set to conquer the world. Colin Fraser happened to +be on vacation on Cape Cod, where she was playing summer +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>stock, and went to more shows than he had planned. It wasn't hard to +get an introduction, and before long he and Judy Sanders were seeing +a lot of each other.</p> + +<p>"Of course," she told him one afternoon on the beach, "my real name +is Harkness."</p> + +<p>He raised his arm, letting the sand run through his fingers. The beach +was big and dazzling white around them, the sea galloped in with a +steady roar, and a gull rode the breeze overhead. "What was wrong +with it?" he asked. "For a professional monicker, I mean."</p> + +<p>She laughed and shook the long hair back over her shoulders. "I +wanted to live under the name of Sanders," she explained.</p> + +<p>"Oh—oh, yes, of course. Winnie the Pooh." He grinned. "Soulmates, +that's what we are." It was about then that he decided he'd been a +bachelor long enough.</p> + +<p>In the fall she went to New York to begin the upward grind—understudy, +walk-on parts, shoestring-theaters, and roles in outright turkeys. +Fraser returned to Boston for awhile, but his work suffered, he had to +keep dashing off to see her.</p> + +<p>By spring she was beginning to get places; she had talent and everybody +enjoys looking at a brown-eyed blonde. His weekly proposals were +also beginning to show some real progress, and he thought that a month +or two of steady siege might finish the campaign. So he took leave from +his job and went down to New York himself. He'd saved up enough +money, and was good enough in his work, to afford it; anyway, he was +his own boss—consulting engineer, specializing in mathematical +analysis.</p> + +<p>He got a furnished room in Brooklyn, and filled in his leisure time—as +he thought of it—with some special math courses at Columbia. And +he had a lot of friends in town, in a curious variety of professions. Next +to Judy, he saw most of the physicist Sworsky, who was an entertaining +companion though most of his work was too top-secret even to be mentioned. +It was a happy period.</p> + +<p>There is always a jarring note, to be sure. In this case, it was the fact +that Fraser had plenty of competition. He wasn't good-looking himself—a +tall gaunt man of twenty-eight, with a dark hatchet face and +perpetually-rumpled clothes. But still, Judy saw more of him than of anyone +else, and admitted she was seriously considering his proposal and +no other.</p> + +<p>He called her up once for a date. "Sorry," she answered. "I'd love to, +Colin, but I've already promised tonight. Just so you won't worry, it's +Matthew Snyder."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Hm—the industrialist?"</p> + +<p>"Uh-huh. He asked me in such a way it was hard to refuse. But I +don't think you have to be jealous, honey. 'Bye now."</p> + +<p>Fraser lit his pipe with a certain smugness. Snyder was several times +a millionaire, but he was close to sixty, a widower of notably dull +conversation. Judy wasn't—Well, no worries, as she'd said. He dropped +over to Sworsky's apartment for an evening of chess and bull-shooting.</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> IT WAS early in May, when the world was turning green again, that +Judy called Fraser up. "Hi," she said breathlessly. "Busy tonight?"</p> + +<p>"Well, I was hoping I'd be, if you get what I mean," he said.</p> + +<p>"Look, I want to take you out for a change. Just got some unexpected +money and dammit, I want to feel rich for one evening."</p> + +<p>"Hmmm—" He scowled into the phone. "I dunno—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, get off it, Galahad. I'll meet you in the Dixie lobby at seven. +Okay?" She blew him a kiss over the wires, and hung up before he +could argue further. He sighed and shrugged. Why not, if she wanted +to?</p> + +<p>They were in a little Hungarian restaurant, with a couple of Tzigani +strolling about playing for them alone, it seemed, when he asked for +details. "Did you get a bonus, or what?"</p> + +<p>"No." She laughed at him over her drink. "I've turned guinea pig."</p> + +<p>"I hope you quit <i>that</i> job before we're married!"</p> + +<p>"It's a funny deal," she said thoughtfully. "It'd interest you. I've been +out a couple of times with this Snyder, you know, and if anything was +needed to drive me into your arms, Colin, it's his political lectures."</p> + +<p>"Well, bless the Republican Party!" He laid his hand over hers, she +didn't withdraw it, but she frowned just a little.</p> + +<p>"Colin, you know I want to get somewhere before I marry—see a bit +of the world, the theatrical world, before turning hausfrau. Don't be +so—Oh, never mind. I like you anyway."</p> + +<p>Sipping her drink and setting it down again: "Well, to carry on with +the story. I finally gave Comrade Snyder the complete brush-off, and I +must say he took it very nicely. But today, this morning, he called asking +me to have lunch with him, and I did after he explained. It seems +he's got a psychiatrist friend doing research, measuring brain storms or +something, and—Do I mean storms? Waves, I guess. Anyway, he wants +to measure as many different kinds of people as possible, and Snyder +had suggested me. I was supposed to come in for three afternoons running—about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span> +two hours each time—and I'd get a hundred dollars per session."</p> + +<p>"Hm," said Fraser. "I didn't know psych research was that well-heeled. +Who is this mad scientist?"</p> + +<p>"His name is Kennedy. Oh, by the way, I'm not supposed to tell anybody; +they want to spring it on the world as a surprise or something. +But you're different, Colin. I'm excited; I want to talk to somebody +about it."</p> + +<p>"Sure," he said. "You had a session already?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, my first was today. It's a funny place to do research—Kennedy's +got a big suite on Fifth Avenue, right up in the classy district. +Beautiful office. The name of his outfit is Sentiment, Inc."</p> + +<p>"Hm. Why should a research-team take such a name? Well, go on."</p> + +<p>"Oh, there isn't much else to tell. Kennedy was very nice. He took +me into a laboratory full of all sorts of dials and meters and blinking +lights and os—what do you call them? Those things that make wiggly +pictures."</p> + +<p>"Oscilloscopes. You'll never make a scientist, my dear."</p> + +<p>She grinned. "But I know one scientist who'd like to—Never mind! +Anyway, he sat me down in a chair and put bands around my wrists +and ankles—just like the hot squat—and a big thing like a beauty-parlor +hair-drier over my head. Then he fiddled with his dials for +awhile, making notes. Then he started saying words at me, and showing +me pictures. Some of them were very pretty; some ugly; some +funny; some downright horrible.... Anyway, that's all there was to it. +After a couple of hours he gave me a check for a hundred dollars and +told me to come back tomorrow."</p> + +<p>"Hm." Fraser rubbed his chin. "Apparently he was measuring the +electric rhythms corresponding to pleasure and dislike. I'd no idea anybody'd +made an encephalograph that accurate."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Judy, "I've told you why we're celebrating. Now come +on, the regular orchestra's tuning up. Let's dance."</p> + +<p>They had a rather wonderful evening. Afterward Fraser lay awake +for a long time, not wanting to lose a state of happiness in sleep. He +considered sleep a hideous waste of time: if he lived to be ninety, he'd +have spent almost thirty years unconscious.</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> JUDY was engaged for the next couple of evenings, and Fraser himself +was invited to dinner at Sworsky's the night after that. So it +wasn't till the end of the week that he called her again.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Hullo, sweetheart," he said exuberantly. "How's things? I refer to +Charles Addams Things, of course."</p> + +<p>"Oh—Colin." Her voice was very small, and it trembled.</p> + +<p>"Look, I've got two tickets to <i>H. M. S. Pinafore</i>. So put on your own +pinafore and meet me."</p> + +<p>"Colin—I'm sorry, Colin. I can't."</p> + +<p>"Huh?" He noticed how odd she sounded, and a leadenness grew +within him. "You aren't sick, are you?"</p> + +<p>"Colin, I—I'm going to be married."</p> + +<p>"<i>What?</i>"</p> + +<p>"Yes. I'm in love now; really in love. I'll be getting married in a +couple of months."</p> + +<p>"But—but—"</p> + +<p>"I didn't want to hurt you." He heard her begin to cry.</p> + +<p>"But who—how—"</p> + +<p>"It's Matthew," she gulped. "Matthew Snyder."</p> + +<p>He sat quiet for a long while, until she asked if he was still on the +line. "Yeah," he said tonelessly. "Yeah, I'm still here, after a fashion." +Shaking himself: "Look, I've got to see you. I want to talk to you."</p> + +<p>"I can't."</p> + +<p>"You sure as hell can," he said harshly.</p> + +<p>They met at a quiet little bar which had often been their rendezvous. +She watched him with frightened eyes while he ordered martinis.</p> + +<p>"All right," he said at last. "What's the story?"</p> + +<p>"I—" He could barely hear her. "There isn't any story. I suddenly +realized I loved Matt. That's all."</p> + +<p>"<i>Snyder!</i>" He made it a curse. "Remember what you told me about +him before?"</p> + +<p>"I felt different then," she whispered. "He's a wonderful man when +you get to know him."</p> + +<p><i>And rich.</i> He suppressed the words and the thought. "What's so wonderful +specifically?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"He—" Briefly, her face was rapt. Fraser had seen her looking at +him that way, now and then.</p> + +<p>"Go on," he said grimly. "Enumerate Mr. Snyder's good qualities. +Make a list. He's courteous, cultured, intelligent, young, handsome, +amusing—To hell! <i>Why</i>, Judy?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know," she said in a high, almost fearful tone. "I just love +him, that's all." She reached over the table and stroked his cheek. "I +like you a lot, Colin. Find yourself a nice girl and be happy."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p> + +<p>His mouth drew into a narrow line. "There's something funny here," +he said. "Is it blackmail?"</p> + +<p>"No!" She stood up, spilling her drink, and the flare of temper showed +him how overwrought she was. "He just happens to be the man I love. +That's enough out of you, good-bye, Mr. Fraser."</p> + +<p>He sat watching her go. Presently he took up his drink, gulped it +barbarously, and called for another.</p> + +<hr class="r65" /> +<h2>2</h2> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> JUAN MARTINEZ had come from Puerto Rico as a boy and made +his own way ever since. Fraser had gotten to know him in the +army, and they had seen each other from time to time since then. +Martinez had gone into the private-eye business and made a good +thing of it; Fraser had to get past a very neat-looking receptionist to +see him.</p> + +<p>"Hi, Colin," said Martinez, shaking hands. He was a small, dark man, +with a large nose and beady black eyes that made him resemble a sympathetic +mouse. "You look like the very devil."</p> + +<p>"I feel that way, too," said Fraser, collapsing into a chair. "You can't +go on a three-day drunk without showing it."</p> + +<p>"Well, what's the trouble? Cigarette?" Martinez held out a pack. +"Girl-friend give you the air?"</p> + +<p>"As a matter of fact, yes; that's what I want to see you about."</p> + +<p>"This isn't a lonely-hearts club," said Martinez. "And I've told you +time and again a private dick isn't a wisecracking superman. Our work +is ninety-nine percent routine; and for the other one percent, we call +in the police."</p> + +<p>"Let me give you the story," said Fraser. He rubbed his eyes wearily +as he told it. At the end, he sat staring at the floor.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Martinez, "it's too bad and all that. But what the hell, +there are other dames. New York has more beautiful women per square +inch than any other city except Paris. Latch on to somebody else. Or if +you want, I can give you a phone number—"</p> + +<p>"You don't understand," said Fraser "I want you to investigate this; +I want to know why she did it."</p> + +<p>Martinez squinted through a haze of smoke. "Snyder's a rich and +powerful man," he said. "Isn't that enough?"</p> + +<p>"No," said Fraser, too tired to be angry at the hint. "Judy isn't that +kind of a girl. Neither is she the kind to go overboard in a few days,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> +especially when I was there. Sure, that sounds conceited, but dammit, +I <i>know</i> she cared for me."</p> + +<p>"Okay. You suspect pressure was brought to bear?"</p> + +<p>"Yeah. It's hard to imagine what. I called up Judy's family in Maine, +and they said they were all right, no worries. Nor do I think anything +in her own life would give a blackmailer or an extortionist anything to +go on. Still—I want to know."</p> + +<p>Martinez drummed the desk-top with nervous fingers. "I'll look into +it if you insist," he said, "though it'll cost you a pretty penny. Rich +men's lives aren't easy to pry into if they've got something they want +to hide. But I don't think we'd find out much; your case seems to be +only one of a rash of similar ones in the past year."</p> + +<p>"Huh?" Fraser looked sharply up.</p> + +<p>"Yeah. I follow all the news; and remember the odd facts. There've +been a good dozen cases recently, where beautiful young women suddenly +married rich men or became their mistresses. It doesn't all get +into the papers, but I've got my contacts. I know. In every instance, +there was no obvious reason; in fact, the dames seemed very much in +love with daddy."</p> + +<p>"And the era of the gold-digger is pretty well gone—" Fraser sat +staring out the window. It didn't seem right that the sky should be so +full of sunshine.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Martinez, "you don't need me. You need a psychologist."</p> + +<p><i>Psychologist!</i></p> + +<p>"By God, Juan, I'm going to give you a job anyway!" Fraser leaped +to his feet. "You're going to check into an outfit called Sentiment, +Inc."</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> A WEEK later, Martinez said, "Yeah, we found it easily enough. It's +not in the phone-book, but they've got a big suite right in the +high-rent district on Fifth. The address is here, in my written report. +Nobody in the building knows much about 'em, except that they're a +quiet, well-behaved bunch and call themselves research psychologists. +They have a staff of four: a secretary-receptionist; a full-time secretary; +and a couple of husky boys who may be bodyguards for the boss. +That's this Kennedy, Robert Kennedy. My man couldn't get into his +office; the girl said he was too busy and never saw anybody except +some regular clients. Nor could he date either of the girls, but he did +investigate them.</p> + +<p>"The receptionist is just a working girl for routine stuff, married,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> +hardly knows or cares what's going on. The steno is unmarried, has a +degree in psych, lives alone, and seems to have no friends except her +boss. Who's not her lover, by the way."</p> + +<p>"Well, how about Kennedy himself?" asked Fraser.</p> + +<p>"I've found out a good bit, but it's all legitimate," said Martinez. +"He's about fifty years old, a widower, very steady private life. He's a +licensed psychiatrist who used to practice in Chicago, where he also +did research in collaboration with a physicist named Gavotti, who's +since died. Shortly after that happened—</p> + +<p>"No, there's no suspicion of foul play; the physicist was an old man +and died of a heart attack. Anyway, Kennedy moved to New York. He +still practices, officially, but he doesn't take just anybody; claims that +his research only leaves him time for a few." Martinez narrowed his +eyes. "The only thing you could hold against him is that he occasionally +sees a guy named Bryce, who's in a firm that has some dealings with +Amtorg."</p> + +<p>"The Russian trading corporation? Hm."</p> + +<p>"Oh, that's pretty remote guilt by association, Colin. Amtorg does +have legitimate business, you know. We buy manganese from them, +among other things. And the rest of Kennedy's connections are all +strictly blue ribbon. <i>Crème de la crème</i>—business, finance, politics, +and one big union-leader who's known to be a conservative. In fact, +Kennedy's friends are so powerful you'd have real trouble doing anything +against him."</p> + +<p>Fraser slumped in his chair. "I suppose my notion was pretty wild," +he admitted.</p> + +<p>"Well, there is one queer angle. You know these rich guys who've +suddenly made out with such highly desirable dames? As far as I could +find out, every one of them is a client of Kennedy's."</p> + +<p>"Eh?" Fraser jerked erect.</p> + +<p>"'S a fact. Also, my man showed the building staff, elevator pilots +and so on, pictures of these women, and a couple of 'em were remembered +as having come to see Kennedy."</p> + +<p>"Shortly before they—fell in love?"</p> + +<p>"Well, that I can't be sure of. You know how people are about remembering +dates. But it's possible."</p> + +<p>Fraser shook his dark head. "It's unbelievable," he said. "I thought +Svengali was outworn melodrama."</p> + +<p>"I know something about hypnotism, Colin. It won't do anything like +what you think happened to those girls."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p> + +<p>Fraser got out his pipe and fumbled tobacco into it. "I think," he +said, "I'm going to call on Dr. Robert Kennedy myself."</p> + +<p>"Take it easy, boy," said Martinez. "You been reading too many +weird stories; you'll just get tossed out on your can."</p> + +<p>Fraser tried to smile. It was hard—Judy wouldn't answer his calls +and letters any more. "Well," he said, "it'll be in a worthy cause."</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> THE elevator let him out on the nineteenth floor. It held four big +suites, with the corridor running between them. He studied the +frosted-glass doors. On one side was the Eagle Publishing Company +and Frank & Dayles, Brokers. On the other was the Messenger Advertising +Service, and Sentiment, Inc. He entered their door and stood +in a quiet, oak-paneled reception room. Behind the railing were a +couple of desks, a young woman working at each, and two burly men +who sat boredly reading magazines.</p> + +<p>The pretty girl, obviously the receptionist, looked up as Fraser approached +and gave him a professional smile. "Yes, sir?" she asked.</p> + +<p>"I'd like to see Dr. Kennedy, please," he said, trying hard to be +casual.</p> + +<p>"Do you have an appointment, sir?"</p> + +<p>"No, but it's urgent."</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry, sir; Dr. Kennedy is very busy. He can't see anybody +except his regular patients and research subjects."</p> + +<p>"Look, take him in this note, will you? Thanks."</p> + +<p>Fraser sat uneasily for some minutes, wondering if he'd worded the +note correctly. <i>I must see you about Miss Judy Harkness.</i> <i>Important.</i> +Well, what the devil else could you say?</p> + +<p>The receptionist came out again. "Dr. Kennedy can spare you a few +minutes, sir," she said. "Go right on in."</p> + +<p>"Thanks." Fraser slouched toward the inner door. The two men +lowered their magazines to follow him with watchful eyes.</p> + +<p>There was a big, handsomely-furnished office inside, with a door beyond +that must lead to the laboratory. Kennedy looked up from some +papers and rose, holding out his hand. He was a medium-sized man, +rather plump, graying hair brushed thickly back from a broad, heavy +face behind rimless glasses. "Yes?" His voice was low and pleasant. +"What can I do for you?"</p> + +<p>"My name's Fraser." The visitor sat down and accepted a cigarette. +Best to act urbanely. "I know Miss Harkness well. I understand you +made some encephalographic studies of her."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Indeed?" Kennedy looked annoyed, and Fraser recalled that Judy +had been asked not to tell anyone. "I'm not sure; I would have to consult +my records first." He wasn't admitting anything, thought Fraser.</p> + +<p>"Look," said the engineer, "there's been a marked change in Miss +Harkness recently. I know enough psychology to be certain that such +changes don't happen overnight without cause. I wanted to consult +you."</p> + +<p>"I'm not her psychiatrist," said Kennedy coldly. "Now if you will +excuse me, I really have a lot to do—"</p> + +<p>"All right," said Fraser. There was no menace in his tones, only a +weariness. "If you insist, I'll play it dirty. Such abrupt changes indicate +mental instability. But I know she was perfectly sane before. It begins +to look as if your experiments may have—injured her mind. If so, I +should have to report you for malpractice."</p> + +<p>Kennedy flushed. "I am a licensed psychiatrist," he said, "and any +other doctor will confirm that Miss Harkness is still in mental health. +If you tried to get an investigation started, you would only be wasting +your own time and that of the authorities. She herself will testify that +no harm was done to her; no compulsion applied; and that you are an +infernal busybody with some delusions of your own. Good afternoon."</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Fraser, "so she <i>was</i> here."</p> + +<p>Kennedy pushed a button. His men entered. "Show this gentleman +the way out, please," he said.</p> + +<p>Fraser debated whether to put up a fight, decided it was futile, and +went out between the two others. When he got to the street, he found +he was shaking, and badly in need of a drink.</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> FRASER asked, "Jim, did you ever read <i>Trilby</i>?"</p> + +<p>Sworsky's round, freckled face lifted to regard him. "Years ago," +he answered. "What of it?"</p> + +<p>"Tell me something. Is it possible—even theoretically possible—to +do what Svengali did? Change emotional attitudes, just like that." +Fraser snapped his fingers.</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Sworsky. "Nuclear cross-sections are more in my +line. But offhand, I should imagine it might be done ... sometime in +the far future. Thought-habits, associational-patterns, the labeling of +this as good and that as bad, seem to be matters of established neural +paths. If you could selectively alter the polarization of individual neurones—But +it's a pretty remote prospect; we hardly know a thing about +the brain today."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span></p> + +<p>He studied his friend sympathetically. "I know it's tough to get +jilted," he said, "but don't go off your trolley about it."</p> + +<p>"I could stand it if someone else had gotten her in the usual kind +of way," said Fraser thinly. "But this—Look, let me tell you all I've +found out."</p> + +<p>Sworsky shook his head at the end of the story. "That's a mighty +wild speculation," he murmured. "I'd forget it if I were you."</p> + +<p>"Did you know Kennedy's old partner? Gavotti, at Chicago."</p> + +<p>"Sure, I met him a few times. Nice old guy, very unworldly, completely +wrapped up in his work. He got interested in neurology from +the physics angle toward the end of his life, and contributed a lot to +cybernetics. What of it?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Fraser; "I just don't know. But do me a favor, +will you, Jim? Judy won't see me at all, but she knows you and likes +you. Ask her to dinner or something. Insist that she come. Then you +and your wife find out—whatever you can. Just exactly how she feels +about the whole business. What her attitudes are toward everything."</p> + +<p>"The name is Sworsky, not Holmes. But sure, I'll do what I can, if +you'll promise to try and get rid of this fixation. You ought to see a +head-shrinker yourself, you know."</p> + +<p><i>In vino veritas</i>—sometimes too damn much <i>veritas</i>.</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> TOWARD the end of the evening, Judy was talking freely, if not +quite coherently. "I cared a lot for Colin," she said. "It was pretty +wonderful having him around. He's a grand guy. Only Matt—I don't +know. Matt hasn't got half of what Colin has; Matt's a single-track +mind. I'm afraid I'm just going to be an ornamental convenience to +him. Only if you've ever been so you got all dizzy when someone was +around, and thought about him all the time he was away—well, that's +how he is. Nothing else matters."</p> + +<p>"Colin's gotten a funny obsession," said Sworsky cautiously. "He +thinks Kennedy hypnotized you for Snyder. I keep telling him it's impossible, +but he can't get over the idea."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, no, no," she said with too much fervor. "It's nothing like +that. I'll tell you just what happened. We had those two measuring +sessions; it was kind of dull but nothing else. And then the third time +Kennedy did put me under hypnosis—he called it that, at least. I went +to sleep and woke up about an hour later and he sent me home. I felt +all good inside, happy, and shlo—slowly I began to see what Matt +meant to me.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I called him up that evening. He said Kennedy's machine <i>did</i> speed +up people's minds for a short while, sometimes, so they decided quick-like +what they'd've worked out anyway. Kennedy is—I don't know. +It's funny how ordinary he seemed at first. But when you get to know +him, he's like—God, almost. He's strong and wise and good. He—" +Her voice trailed off and she sat looking foolishly at her glass.</p> + +<p>"You know," said Sworsky, "perhaps Colin is right after all."</p> + +<p>"Don't say that!" She jumped up and slapped his face. "Kennedy's +<i>good</i>, I tell you! All you little lice sitting here making sly remarks +behind his back, and he's so, much bigger than all of you and—" She +broke into tears and stormed out of the apartment.</p> + +<p>Sworsky reported the affair to Fraser. "I wonder," he said. "It doesn't +seem natural, I'll agree. But what can anybody do? The police?"</p> + +<p>"I've tried," said Fraser dully. "They laughed. When I insisted, I +damn near got myself jugged. That's no use. The trouble is, none of +the people who've been under the machine will testify against Kennedy. +He fixes it so they worship him."</p> + +<p>"I still think you're crazy. There <i>must</i> be a simpler hypothesis; I +refuse to believe your screwy notions without some real evidence. But +what are you going to do now?"</p> + +<p>"Well," said Fraser with a tautness in his voice, "I've got several +thousand dollars saved up, and Juan Martinez will help. Ever hear the +fable about the lion? He licked hell out of the bear and the tiger and +the rhinoceros, but a little gnat finally drove him nuts. Maybe I can be +the gnat." He shook his head. "But I'll have to hurry. The wedding's +only six weeks off."</p> + +<hr class="r65" /> +<h2>3</h2> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> IT CAN be annoying to be constantly shadowed; to have nasty gossip +about you spreading through the places where you work and live; +to find your tires slashed; to be accosted by truculent drunks when +you stop in for a quick one; to have loud horns blow under your window +every night. And it doesn't do much good to call the police; your +petty tormentors always fade out of sight.</p> + +<p>Fraser was sitting in his room some two weeks later, trying unsuccessfully +to concentrate on matrix algebra, when the phone rang. He +never picked it up without a fluttering small hope that it might be +Judy, and it never was. This time it was a man's voice: "Mr. Fraser?"</p> + +<p>"Yeah," he grunted. "Wha'dya want?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span></p> + +<p>"This is Robert Kennedy. I'd like to talk to you."</p> + +<p>Fraser's heart sprang in his ribs, but he held his voice stiff. "Go on, +then. Talk."</p> + +<p>"I want you to come up to my place. We may be having a long conversation."</p> + +<p>"Mmmm—well—" It was more than he had allowed himself to hope +for, but he remained curt: "Okay. But a full report of this business, +and what I think you're doing, is in the hands of several people. If anything +should happen to me—"</p> + +<p>"You've been reading too many hard-boileds," said Kennedy. "Nothing +will happen. Anyway, I have a pretty good idea who those people +are; I can hire detectives of my own, you know."</p> + +<p>"I'll come over, then." Fraser hung up and realized, suddenly, that +he was sweating.</p> + +<p>The night air was cool as he walked down the street. He paused for +a moment, feeling the city like a huge impersonal machine around him, +grinding and grinding. Human civilization had grown too big, he +thought. It was beyond anyone's control; it had taken on a will of its +own and was carrying a race which could no longer guide it. Sometimes—reading +the papers, or listening to the radio, or just watching the traffic +go by like a river of steel—a man could feel horribly helpless.</p> + +<p>He took the subway to Kennedy's address, a swank apartment in the +lower Fifties. He was admitted by the psychiatrist in person; no one +else was around.</p> + +<p>"I assume," said Kennedy, "that you don't have some wild idea of +pulling a gun on me. That would accomplish nothing except to get you +in trouble."</p> + +<p>"No," said Fraser, "I'll be good." His eyes wandered about the living +room. One wall was covered with books which looked used; there were +some quality reproductions, a Capehart, and fine, massive furniture. It +was a tasteful layout. He looked a little more closely at three pictures +on the mantel: a middle-aged woman and two young men in uniform.</p> + +<p>"My wife," said Kennedy, "and my boys. They're all dead. Would +you like a drink?"</p> + +<p>"No. I came to talk."</p> + +<p>"I'm not Satan, you know," said Kennedy. "I like books and music, +good wine, good conversation. I'm as human as you are, only I have a +purpose."</p> + +<p>Fraser sat down and began charging his pipe. "Go ahead," he said. +"I'm listening."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span></p> + +<p>Kennedy pulled a chair over to face him. The big smooth countenance +behind the rimless glasses held little expression. "Why have you +been annoying me?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"I?" Fraser lifted his brows.</p> + +<p>Kennedy made an impatient gesture. "Let's not chop words. There +are no witnesses tonight. I intend to talk freely, and want you to do +the same. I know that you've got Martinez sufficiently convinced to +help you with this very childish persecution-campaign. What do you +hope to get out of it?"</p> + +<p>"I want my girl back," said Fraser tonelessly. "I was hoping my +nuisance-value—"</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> KENNEDY winced a bit. "You know, I'm damned sorry about that. +It's the one aspect of my work which I hate. I'd like you to believe +that I'm not just a scientific procurer. Actually, I have to satisfy +the minor desires of my clients, so they'll stay happy and agree to my +major wishes. It's the plain truth that those women have been only +the minutest fraction of my job."</p> + +<p>"Nevertheless, you're a free-wheeling son, doing something like +that—"</p> + +<p>"Really, now, what's so horrible about it? Those girls are in love—the +normal, genuine article. It's not any kind of zombie state, or whatever +your overheated imagination has thought up. They're entirely +sane, unharmed, and happy. In fact, happiness of that kind is so rare +in this world that if I wanted to, I could pose as their benefactor."</p> + +<p>"You've got a machine," said Fraser; "it changes the mind. As far as +I'm concerned, that's as gross a violation of liberty as throwing somebody +into a concentration camp."</p> + +<p>"How free do you think anyone is? You're born with a fixed heredity. +Environment molds you like clay. Your society teaches you what +and how to think. A million tiny factors, all depending on blind, uncontrollable +chance, determine the course of your life—including +your love-life.... Well, we needn't waste any time on philosophy. Go on, +ask some questions. I admit I've hurt you—unwittingly, to be sure—but +I do want to make amends."</p> + +<p>"Your machine, then," said Fraser. "How did you get it? How does +it work."</p> + +<p>"I was practicing in Chicago," said Kennedy, "and collaborating +on the side with Gavotti. How much do you know of cybernetics? I +don't mean computers and automata, which are only one aspect of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> +field; I mean control and communication, in the animal as well as in +the machine."</p> + +<p>"Well, I've read Wiener's books, and studied Shannon's work, too." +Despite himself, Fraser was thawing, just a trifle. "It's exciting stuff. +Communications-theory seems to be basic, in biology and psychology +as well as in electronics."</p> + +<p>"Quite. The future may remember Wiener as the Galileo of neurology. +If Gavotti's work ever gets published, he'll be considered the +Newton. So far, frankly, I've suppressed it. He died suddenly, just +when his machine was completed and he was getting ready to publish +his results. Nobody but I knew anything more than rumors; he was +inclined to be secretive till he had a <i>fait accompli</i> on hand. I realized +what an opportunity had been given me, and took it; I brought the +machine here without saying much to anyone."</p> + +<p>Kennedy leaned back in his chair. "I imagine it was mostly luck +which took Gavotti and me so far," he went on. "We made a long +series of improbably good guesses, and thus telescoped a century of +work into a decade. If I were religious, I'd be down on my knees, +thanking the Lord for putting this thing of the future into my hands."</p> + +<p>"Or the devil," said Fraser.</p> + +<p>Briefly, anger flitted across Kennedy's face. "I grant you, the machine +is a terrible power, but it's harmless to a man if it's used properly—as +I have used it. I'm not going to tell you just how it works; to be +perfectly honest, I only understand a fraction of its theory and its +circuits myself. But look, you know something of encephalography. +The various basic rhythms of the brain have been measured. The +standard method is already so sensitive that it can detect abnormalities +like a developing tumor or a strong emotional disturbance, that will +give trouble unless corrected. Half of Gavotti's machine is a still more +delicate encephalograph. It can measure and analyze the minute variations +in electrical pulses corresponding to the basic emotional states. It +won't read thoughts, no; but once calibrated for a given individual, it +will tell you if he's happy, sorrowful, angry, disgusted, afraid—any +fundamental neuro-glandular condition, or any combination of them."</p> + +<p>He paused. "All right," said Fraser. "What else does it do?"</p> + +<p>"It does <i>not</i> make monsters," said Kennedy. "Look, the specific +emotional reaction to a given stimulus is, in the normal individual, +largely a matter of conditioned reflex, instilled by social environment +or the accidental associations of his life.</p> + +<p>"Anyone in decent health will experience fear in the presence of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span> +danger; desire in the presence of a sexual object, and so on. That's basic +biology, and the machine can't change that. But most of our evaluations +are learned. For instance, to an American the word 'mother' has powerful +emotional connotations, while to a Samoan it means nothing very +exciting. You had to develop a taste for liquor, tobacco, coffee—in fact +most of what you consume. If you're in love with a particular woman, +it's a focusing of the general sexual libido on her, brought about by +the symbolizing part of your mind: she <i>means</i> something to you. +There are cultures without romantic love, you know. And so on. All +these specific, conditioned reactions can be changed."</p> + +<p>"How?"</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> KENNEDY thought for a moment "The encephalographic part of +the machine measures the exact pulsations in the individual +corresponding to the various emotional reactions. It takes me about +four hours to determine those with the necessary precision; then I have +to make statistical analyses of the data, to winnow out random variations. +Thereafter I put the subject in a state of light hypnosis—that's +only to increase suggestibility, and make the process faster. As I pronounce +the words and names I'm interested in, the machine feeds back +the impulses corresponding to the emotions I want: a sharply-focused +beam on the brain center concerned.</p> + +<p>"For instance, suppose you were an alcoholic and I wanted to cure +you. I'd put you in hypnosis and stand there whispering 'wine, whisky, +beer, gin,' and so on; meanwhile, the machine would be feeding the +impulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into +your brain. You'd come out unchanged, except that your appetite for +alcohol would be gone; you could, in fact, come out hating the stuff +so much that you'd join the Prohibition Party—though, in actual +practice, it would probably be enough just to give you a mild aversion."</p> + +<p>"Mmmm—I see. Maybe." Fraser scowled. "And the—subject—doesn't +remember what you've done?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no. It all takes place on the lower subconscious levels. A new +set of conditioned neural pathways is opened, you see, and old ones +are closed off. The brain does that by itself, through its normal symbolizing +mechanism. All that happens is that the given symbol—such as +liquor—becomes reflectively associated with the given emotional state, +such as dislike."</p> + +<p>Kennedy leaned forward with an air of urgency. "The end result +is in no way different from ordinary means of persuasion. Propaganda<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span> +does the same thing by sheer repetition. If you're courting a +girl, you try to identify yourself in her mind with the things she desires, +by appropriate behavior.... I'm sorry; I shouldn't have used that +example.... The machine is only a direct, fast way of doing this, +producing a more stable result."</p> + +<p>"It's still—tampering," said Fraser. "How do you know you're not +creating side-effects, doing irreparable long-range damage?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, for Lord's sake!" exploded Kennedy. "Take your mind off that +shelf, will you? I've told you how delicate the whole thing is. A few +microwatts of power more or less, a frequency-shift of less than one +percent, and it doesn't work at all. There's no effect whatsoever." He +cooled off fast, adding reflectively: "On the given subject, that is. It +might work on someone else. These pulsations are a highly individual +matter; I have to calibrate every case separately."</p> + +<p>There was a long period of silence. Then Fraser strained forward +and said in an ugly voice:</p> + +<p>"All right You've told me how you do it. Now tell me <i>why</i>. What +possible reason or excuse, other than your own desire to play God? +This thing could be the greatest psychiatric tool in history, and you're +using it to—pimp!"</p> + +<p>"I told you that was unimportant," said Kennedy quietly. "I'm doing +much more. I set up in practice here in New York a couple of years +ago. Once I had a few chance people under control—no, I tell you +again, I didn't make robots of them. I merely associated myself, in +their own minds, with the father-image. That's something I do to +everyone who comes under the machine, just as a precaution if nothing +else, Kennedy is all-wise, all-powerful; Kennedy can do no wrong. +It isn't a conscious realization; to the waking mind, I am only a shrewd +adviser and a damn swell fellow. But the subconscious mind knows +otherwise. It wouldn't <i>let</i> my subjects act against me; it wouldn't even +let them want to.</p> + +<p>"Well, you see how it goes. I got those first few people to recommend +me to certain selected friends, and these in turn recommended me to +others. Not necessarily as a psychiatrist; I have variously been a doctor, +a counsellor, or merely a research-man looking for data. But I'm building +up a group of the people I want. People who'll back me up, who'll +follow my advice—not with any knowledge of being dominated, but +because the workings of their own subconscious minds will lead them +inevitably to think that my advice is the only sound policy to follow +and my requests are things any decent man must grant."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yeah," said Fraser. "I get it. Big businessmen. Labor-leaders. +Politicians. Military men. And Soviet spies!"</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> KENNEDY nodded. "I have connections with the Soviets; their +agents think I'm on their side. But it isn't treason, though I may +help them out from time to time.</p> + +<p>"That's why I have to do these services for my important clients, +such as getting them the women they want—or, what I actually do +more often, influencing their competitors and associates. You see, the +subconscious mind knows I am all-powerful, but the conscious mind +doesn't. It has to be satisfied by occasional proofs that I <i>am</i> invaluable; +otherwise conflicts would set in, my men would become unstable and +eventually psychotic, and be of no further use to me.</p> + +<p>"Of course," he added, almost pedantically, "my men don't know +how I persuade these other people—they only know that I do, somehow, +and their regard for their own egos, as well as for me, sets up a +bloc which prevents them from reasoning out the fact that they themselves +are dominated. They're quite content to accept the results of +my help, without inquiring further into the means than the easy +rationalization that I have a 'persuasive personality.'</p> + +<p>"I don't like what I'm doing, Fraser. But it's got to be done."</p> + +<p>"You still haven't said <i>what's</i> got to be done," answered the engineer +coldly.</p> + +<p>"I've been given something unbelievable," said Kennedy. His voice +was very soft now. "If I'd made it public, can you imagine what would +have happened? Psychiatrists would use it, yes; but so would criminals, +dictators, power-hungry men of all kinds. Even in this country, I don't +think libertarian principles could long survive. It would be too +simple—</p> + +<p>"And yet it would have been cowardly to break the machine and +burn Gavotti's notes. Chance has given me the power to be more than +a chip in the river—a river that's rapidly approaching a waterfall, +war, destruction, tyranny, no matter who the Pyrrhic victor may be. +I'm in a position to do something for the causes in which I believe."</p> + +<p>"And what are they?" asked Fraser.</p> + +<p>Kennedy gestured at the pictures on the mantel. "Both my sons +were killed in the last war. My wife died of cancer—a disease which +would be licked now if a fraction of the money spent on armaments +had been diverted to research. That brought it home to me; but there +are hundreds of millions of people in worse cases. And war isn't the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> +only evil—there is poverty, oppression, inequality, want and suffering. +It could be changed.</p> + +<p>"I'm building up my own lobby, you might say. In a few more years, +I hope to be the indispensable adviser of all the men who, between +them, really run this country. And yes, I have been in touch with +Soviet agents—have even acted as a transmitter of stolen information. +The basic problem of spying, you know, is not to get the information +in the first place as much as to get it to the homeland. Treason? No. +I think not. I'm getting my toehold in world communism. I already +have some of its agents; sooner or later, I'll get to the men who really +matter. Then communism will no longer be a menace."</p> + +<p>He sighed. "It's a hard row to hoe. It'll take my lifetime, at least; +but what else have I got to give my life to?"</p> + +<p>Fraser sat quiet. His pipe was cold, he knocked it out and began +filling it afresh. The scratching of his match seemed unnaturally loud. +"It's too much," he said. "It's too big a job for one man to tackle. The +world will stumble along somehow, but you'll just get things into a +worse mess."</p> + +<p>"I've got to try," said Kennedy.</p> + +<p>"And I still want my girl back."</p> + +<p>"I can't do that; I need Snyder too much. But I'll make it up to you +somehow." Kennedy sighed. "Lord, if you knew how much I've wanted +to tell all this!"</p> + +<p>With sudden wariness: "Not that it's to be repeated. In fact, you're +to lay off me; call off your dogs. Don't try to tell anyone else what +I've told you. You'd never be believed and I already have enough +power to suppress the story, if you should get it out somehow. And +if you give me any more trouble at all, I'll see to it that you—stop."</p> + +<p>"Murder?"</p> + +<p>"Or commitment to an asylum. I can arrange that too."</p> + +<p>Fraser sighed. He felt oddly unexcited, empty, as if the interview +had drained him of his last will to resist. He held the pipe loosely +in his fingers, letting it go out.</p> + +<p>"Ask me a favor," urged Kennedy. "I'll do it, if it won't harm my +own program. I tell you, I want to square things."</p> + +<p>"Well—"</p> + +<p>"Think about it. Let me know."</p> + +<p>"All right." Fraser got up. "I may do that." He went out the door +without saying goodnight.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span></p> + +<hr class="r65" /> +<h2>4</h2> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> HE sat with his feet on the table, chair tilted back and teetering +dangerously, hands clasped behind his head, pipe filling the +room with blue fog. It was his usual posture for attacking a +problem.</p> + +<p>And damn it, he thought wearily, this was a question such as he +made his living on. An industrial engineer comes into the office. We +want this and that—a machine for a very special purpose, let's say. +What should we do, Mr. Fraser? Fraser prowls around the plant, reads +up on the industry, and then sits down and thinks. The elements of +the problem are such-and-such; how can they be combined to yield +a solution?</p> + +<p>Normally, he uses the mathematical approach, especially in machine +design. Most practicing-engineers have a pathetic math background—they +use ten pages of elaborate algebra and rusty calculus to figure +out something that three vector equations would solve. But you have +to get the logical basics straight first, before you can set up your +equations.</p> + +<p>All right, what is the problem? To get Judy back. That means +forcing Kennedy to restore her normal emotional reactions—no, he +didn't want her thrust into love of him; he just wanted her as she had +been.</p> + +<p>What are the elements of the problem? Kennedy acts outside the +law, but he has blocked all official channels. He even has connections +extending through the Iron Curtain.</p> + +<p>Hmmmm—appeal to the FBI? Kennedy couldn't have control over +them—<i>yet</i>. However, if Fraser tried to tip off the FBI, they'd act +cautiously, if they investigated at all. They'd have to go slow. And +Kennedy would find out in time to do something about it.</p> + +<p>Martinez could help no further. Sworsky had closer contact with +Washington. He'd been so thoroughly cleared that they'd be inclined +to trust whatever he said. But Sworsky doubted the whole story; like +many men who'd suffered through irresponsible Congressional charges, +he was almost fanatic about having proof before accusing anyone of +anything. Moreover, Kennedy knew that Sworsky was Fraser's friend; +he'd probably be keeping close tabs on the physicist and ready to +block any attempts he might make to help. With the backing of a man +like Snyder, Kennedy could hire as many detectives as he wanted.</p> + +<p>In fact, whatever the counter-attack, it was necessary to go warily.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> +Kennedy's threat to get rid of Fraser if the engineer kept working +against him was not idle mouthing. He could do it—and, being a +fanatic, would.</p> + +<p>But Kennedy, like the demon of legend, would grant one wish—just +to salve his own conscience. Only what should the wish be? +Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, artificially, to an otherwise-intolerable +situation?</p> + +<p><i>Judy, Judy, Judy!</i></p> + +<p>Fraser swore at himself. Damn it to hell, this was a problem in +logic. No room for emotion. Of course, it might be a problem without +a solution. There are plenty of those.</p> + +<p>He squinted, trying to visualize the office. He thought of burglary, +stealing evidence—silly thought. But let's see, now. What was the +layout, exactly? Four suites on one floor of the skyscraper, three of +them unimportant offices of unimportant men. And—</p> + +<p><i>Oh, Lord!</i></p> + +<p>Fraser sat for a long while, hardly moving. Then he uncoiled himself +and ran, downstairs and into the street and to the nearest pay +phone. His own line might be tapped—</p> + +<p>"Hello, hello, Juan?... Yes, I know I got you out of bed, and +I'm not sorry. This is too bloody important.... Okay, okay.... Look, +I want a complete report on the Messenger Advertising Service.... +When? Immediately, if not sooner. And I mean <i>complete</i>.... That's +right, Messenger.... Okay, fine. I'll buy you a drink sometime."</p> + +<p>"Hello, Jim? Were you asleep too?... Sorry.... But look, would +you make a list of all the important men you know fairly well? I need +it bad.... No, don't come over. I think I'd better not see you for a +while. Just mail it to me.... All right, so I am paranoid...."</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> JEROME K. FERRIS was a large man, with a sense of his own +importance that was even larger. He sat hunched in the chair, his +head dwarfed by the aluminum helmet, his breathing shallow. Around +him danced and flickered a hundred meters, indicator lights, tubes. +There was a low humming in the room, otherwise it was altogether +silent, blocked and shielded against the outside world. The fluorescent +lights were a muted glow.</p> + +<p>Fraser sat watching the greenish trace on the huge oscilloscope +screen. It was an intricate set of convolutions, looking more like a +plate of spaghetti than anything else. He wondered how many frequencies +were involved. Several thousand, at the very least.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Fraser," repeated Kennedy softly into the ear of the hypnotized +man. "Colin Fraser. Colin Fraser." He touched a dial with infinite +care. "Colin Fraser. Colin Fraser."</p> + +<p>The oscilloscope flickered as he readjusted, a new trace appeared. +Kennedy waited for a while, then: "Robert Kennedy. Sentiment, Inc. +Robert Kennedy. Sentiment, Inc. Robert Kennedy. Sentiment—"</p> + +<p>He turned off the machine, its murmur and glow died away. Facing +Fraser with a tight little smile, he said: "All right. Your job is done. +Are we even now?"</p> + +<p>"As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser.</p> + +<p>"I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. +"I'd have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch."</p> + +<p>"Well, I was interested," said Fraser.</p> + +<p>"Frankly, I still don't see what you stand to gain by the doglike +devotion of this Ferris. He's rich, but he's too weak and short-sighted +to be a leader. I'd never planned on conditioning him for my purposes."</p> + +<p>"I've explained that," said Fraser patiently. "Ferris is a large stockholder +in a number of corporations. His influence can swing a lot of +business my way."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know. I didn't grant your wish blindly, you realize. I had +Ferris studied; he's unable to harm me." Kennedy regarded Fraser +with hard eyes. "And just in case you still have foolish notions, please +remember that I gave him the father-conditioning with respect to +myself. He'll do a lot for you, but not if it's going to hurt me in any way."</p> + +<p>"I know when I'm licked," said Fraser bleakly; "I'm getting out of +town as soon as I finish those courses I'm signed up for."</p> + +<p>Kennedy snapped his fingers. "All right, Ferris, wake up now."</p> + +<p>Ferris blinked. "What's been happening?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"Nothing much," said Kennedy, unbuckling the electrodes. "I've +taken my readings. Thank you very much for the help, sir. I'll see that +you get due credit when my research is published."</p> + +<p>"Ah—yes. Yes." Ferris puffed himself out. Then he put an arm +around Fraser's shoulder. "If you aren't busy," he said, "maybe we +could go have lunch."</p> + +<p>"Thanks," said Fraser. "I'd like to talk to you about a few things."</p> + +<p>He lingered for a moment after Ferris had left the room. "I imagine +this is goodbye for us," he said.</p> + +<p>"Well, so long, at least. We'll probably hear from each other again." +Kennedy shook Fraser's hand. "No hard feelings? I did go to a lot +of trouble for you—wangling your introduction to Ferris when you'd<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span> +named him, and having one of my men persuade him to come here. +And right when I'm so infernally busy, too."</p> + +<p>"Sure," said Fraser. "It's all right. I can't pretend to love you for +what you've done, but you aren't a bad sort."</p> + +<p>"No worse than you," said Kennedy with a short laugh. "You've +used the machine for your own ends, now."</p> + +<p>"Yeah," said Fraser. "I guess I have."</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> SWORSKY asked, "Why do you insist on calling me from drugstores? +And why at my office? I've got a home phone, you know."</p> + +<p>"I'm not sure but that our own lines are tapped," said Fraser. +"Kennedy's a smart cookie, and don't you forget it. I think he's about +ready to dismiss me as a danger, but you're certainly being watched; +you're on his list."</p> + +<p>"You're getting a persecution-complex. Honest, Colin, I'm worried."</p> + +<p>"Well, bear with me for a while. Now, have you had any information +on Kennedy since I called last?"</p> + +<p>"Hm, no. I did mention to Thomson, as you asked me to, that I'd +heard rumors of some revolutionary encephalographic techniques and +would be interested in seeing the work. Why did you want me to do +that?"</p> + +<p>"Thomson," said Fraser, "is one of Kennedy's men. Now look, Jim, +before long you're going to be invited to visit Kennedy. He'll give you +a spiel about his research and ask to measure your brain waves. I want +you to say yes. Then I want to know the exact times of the three +appointments he'll give you—the first two, at least."</p> + +<p>"Hmmm—if Kennedy's doing what you claim—"</p> + +<p>"Jim, it's a necessary risk, but <i>I'm</i> the one who's taking it. You'll +be okay, I promise you; though perhaps later you'll read of me being +found in the river. You see, I got Kennedy to influence a big stockowner +for me. One of the lesser companies in which he has a loud +voice is Messenger. I don't suppose Kennedy knows that. I hope not!"</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> SWORSKY looked as if he'd been sandbagged. He was white, and +the hand that poured a drink shook.</p> + +<p>"Lord," he muttered. "Lord, Colin, you were right."</p> + +<p>Fraser's teeth drew back from his lips. "You went through with it, eh?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. I let the son hypnotize me, and afterward I walked off with +a dreamy expression, as you told me to. Just three hours ago, he +dropped around here in person. He gave me a long rigmarole about the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> +stupidity of military secrecy, and how the Soviet Union stands for +peace and justice. I hope I acted impressed; I'm not much of an actor."</p> + +<p>"You don't have to be. Just so you didn't overdo it. To one of +Kennedy's victims, obeying his advice is so natural that it doesn't +call for any awe-struck wonderment."</p> + +<p>"And he wanted data from me! Bombardment cross-sections. Critical +values. Resonance levels. My Lord, if the Russians found that out +through spies it'd save them three years of research. This is an FBI +case, all right."</p> + +<p>"No, not yet." Fraser laid an urgent hand on Sworsky's arm. "You've +stuck by me so far, Jim. Go along a little further."</p> + +<p>"What do you want me to do?"</p> + +<p>"Why—" Fraser's laugh jarred out. "Give him what he wants, of +course."</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> KENNEDY looked up from his desk, scowling. "All right, Fraser," +he said. "You've been a damned nuisance, and it's pretty patient +of me to see you again. But this is the last time. Wha'd'you want?"</p> + +<p>"It's the last time I'll need to see you, perhaps." Fraser didn't sit +down. He stood facing Kennedy. "You've had it, friend; straight up."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?" Kennedy's hand moved toward his buzzer.</p> + +<p>"Listen before you do anything," said Fraser harshly. "I know you +tried to bring Jim Sworsky under the influence. You asked him for +top-secret data. A few hours ago, you handed the file he brought you +on to Bryce, who's no doubt at the Amtorg offices this minute. That's +high treason, Kennedy; they execute people for doing that."</p> + +<p>The psychologist slumped back.</p> + +<p>"Don't try to have your bully boys get rid of me," said Fraser. +"Sworsky is sitting by the phone, waiting to call the FBI. I'm the only +guy who can stop him."</p> + +<p>"But—" Kennedy's tongue ran around his lips. "But he committed +treason himself. He gave me the papers!"</p> + +<p>Fraser grinned. "You don't think those were authentic, do you? I +doubt if you'll be very popular in the Soviet Union either, once they've +tried to build machines using your data."</p> + +<p>Kennedy looked down at the floor. "How did you do it?" he whispered.</p> + +<p>"Remember Ferris? The guy you fixed up for me? He owns a share +of your next-door neighbor, the Messenger Advertising Service. I fed +him a song and dance about needing an office to do some important +work, only my very whereabouts had to be secret. The Messenger<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span> +people were moved out without anybody's knowing. I installed myself +there one night, also a simple little electric oscillator.</p> + +<p>"Encephalography is damn delicate work; it involves amplifications +up to several million. The apparatus misbehaves if you give it a hard +look. Naturally, your lab and the machine were heavily shielded, but +even so, a radio emitter next door would be bound to throw you off. +My main trouble was in lousing you up just a little bit, not enough to +make you suspect anything.</p> + +<p>"I only worked at that during your calibrating sessions with Sworsky. +I didn't have to be there when you turned the beam on him, because +it would be calculated from false data and be so far from his pattern +as to have no effect. You told me yourself how precise an adjustment +was needed. Sworsky played along, then. Now we've got proof—not +that you meddled with human lives, but that you are a spy."</p> + +<p>Kennedy sat without moving. His voice was a broken mumble. "I +was going to change the world. I had hopes for all humankind. And +you, for the sake of one woman—"</p> + +<p>"I never trusted anybody with a messiah complex. The world is too +big to change single-handed; you'd just have bungled it up worse than +it already is. A lot of dictators started out as reformers and ended +up as mass-executioners; you'd have done the same."</p> + +<p>Fraser leaned over his desk. "I'm willing to make a deal, though," +he went on. "Your teeth are pulled; there's no point in turning you in. +Sworsky and Martinez and I are willing just to report on Bryce, and +let you go, if you'll change back all your subjects. We're going to +read your files, and watch and see that you do it. Every one."</p> + +<p>Kennedy bit his lip. "And the machine—?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, God, here's the phone number +of Judy Harkness. Ask her to come over for a special treatment. +At once."</p> + +<hr class="r15" /> + +<p class="cap extraspacetop"> A MONTH later, the papers had a story about a plausible maniac +who had talked his way into the Columbia University laboratories, +where Gavotti's puzzling machine was being studied, and pulled out +a hammer and smashed it into ruin before he could be stopped. Taken +to jail, he committed suicide in his cell. The name was Kennedy.</p> + +<p>Fraser felt vague regret, but it didn't take him long to forget it; he +was too busy making plans for his wedding.</p> + +<p class="center extraspacetop">THE END</p> + +<hr class="r65" /> + +<div class="blockquotetn extraspacetop"> +<h2>Transcriber Notes:</h2> + +<p class="extraspacetop">This etext was produced from Science Fiction Stories 1953. Extensive +research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this +publication was renewed.</p> + +<p class="extraspacetop">Obvious punctuation errors have been repaired.</p> + +<p><b>page 17</b> +original: on the mantel: a midle-aged woman and +two young men</p> + +<p>replacement: on the mantel: a middle-aged woman +and two young men</p> + +<p><b>page 20</b> +original: inpulses corresponding to your +reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into</p> + +<p>replacement: impulses corresponding to your +reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into</p> + +<p><b>page 25</b> +original: Another woman? Or merely to be +reconciled, artifically, to an otherwise- +intolerable situation?</p> + +<p>replacement: Another woman? Or merely to be +reconciled, artificially, to an otherwise- +intolerable situation?</p> + +<p><b>page 26</b> +original: "As even, as we'll ever get, I +suppose," said Fraser.</p> + +<p>"Well, I was interested," said Fraser.</p> + +<p>"I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint +of wistfulness. "I'd have done the job honestly; +you didn't have to watch."</p> + +<p>replacement: "As even, as we'll ever get, I +suppose," said Fraser.</p> + +<p>"I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint +of wistfulness. "I'd have done the job honestly; +you didn't have to watch."</p> + +<p>"Well, I was interested," said Fraser.</p> + +<p><b>page 29</b> +original: "I don't know. We'll settle that later. +Okay, God, here's the phone-number</p> + +<p>replacement: "I don't know. We'll settle that +later. Okay, God, here's the phone number (no +hyphen used on page 10)</p></div> +<hr class="r65" /> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sentiment, Inc., by Poul William Anderson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SENTIMENT, INC. *** + +***** This file should be named 37653-h.htm or 37653-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/6/5/37653/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Dianna Adair and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Sentiment, Inc. + +Author: Poul William Anderson + +Release Date: October 7, 2011 [EBook #37653] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SENTIMENT, INC. *** + + + + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Dianna Adair and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + [Illustration: Cover] + + + [Illustration: Dr. Kennedy's examination room] + + + [Illustration: the machine] + + + + + _The way we feel about another person, or about objects, is often + bound up in associations that have no direct connection with the + person or object at all. Often, what we call a "change of heart" + comes about sheerly from a change in the many associations which + make up our present viewpoint. Now, suppose that these associations + could be altered artificially, at the option of the person who was + in charge of the process...._ + + + + + _Sentiment, Inc._ + + _by_ POUL ANDERSON + + +She was twenty-two years old, fresh out of college, full of life and +hope, and all set to conquer the world. Colin Fraser happened to be on +vacation on Cape Cod, where she was playing summer stock, and went to +more shows than he had planned. It wasn't hard to get an introduction, +and before long he and Judy Sanders were seeing a lot of each other. + +"Of course," she told him one afternoon on the beach, "my real name is +Harkness." + +He raised his arm, letting the sand run through his fingers. The beach +was big and dazzling white around them, the sea galloped in with a +steady roar, and a gull rode the breeze overhead. "What was wrong with +it?" he asked. "For a professional monicker, I mean." + +She laughed and shook the long hair back over her shoulders. "I wanted +to live under the name of Sanders," she explained. + +"Oh--oh, yes, of course. Winnie the Pooh." He grinned. "Soulmates, +that's what we are." It was about then that he decided he'd been a +bachelor long enough. + +In the fall she went to New York to begin the upward grind--understudy, +walk-on parts, shoestring-theaters, and roles in outright turkeys. +Fraser returned to Boston for awhile, but his work suffered, he had to +keep dashing off to see her. + +By spring she was beginning to get places; she had talent and everybody +enjoys looking at a brown-eyed blonde. His weekly proposals were also +beginning to show some real progress, and he thought that a month or two +of steady siege might finish the campaign. So he took leave from his job +and went down to New York himself. He'd saved up enough money, and was +good enough in his work, to afford it; anyway, he was his own +boss--consulting engineer, specializing in mathematical analysis. + +He got a furnished room in Brooklyn, and filled in his leisure time--as +he thought of it--with some special math courses at Columbia. And he had +a lot of friends in town, in a curious variety of professions. Next to +Judy, he saw most of the physicist Sworsky, who was an entertaining +companion though most of his work was too top-secret even to be +mentioned. It was a happy period. + +There is always a jarring note, to be sure. In this case, it was the +fact that Fraser had plenty of competition. He wasn't good-looking +himself--a tall gaunt man of twenty-eight, with a dark hatchet face and +perpetually-rumpled clothes. But still, Judy saw more of him than of +anyone else, and admitted she was seriously considering his proposal and +no other. + +He called her up once for a date. "Sorry," she answered. "I'd love to, +Colin, but I've already promised tonight. Just so you won't worry, it's +Matthew Snyder." + +"Hm--the industrialist?" + +"Uh-huh. He asked me in such a way it was hard to refuse. But I don't +think you have to be jealous, honey. 'Bye now." + +Fraser lit his pipe with a certain smugness. Snyder was several times a +millionaire, but he was close to sixty, a widower of notably dull +conversation. Judy wasn't--Well, no worries, as she'd said. He dropped +over to Sworsky's apartment for an evening of chess and bull-shooting. + + * * * * * + +It was early in May, when the world was turning green again, that Judy +called Fraser up. "Hi," she said breathlessly. "Busy tonight?" + +"Well, I was hoping I'd be, if you get what I mean," he said. + +"Look, I want to take you out for a change. Just got some unexpected +money and dammit, I want to feel rich for one evening." + +"Hmmm--" He scowled into the phone. "I dunno--" + +"Oh, get off it, Galahad. I'll meet you in the Dixie lobby at seven. +Okay?" She blew him a kiss over the wires, and hung up before he could +argue further. He sighed and shrugged. Why not, if she wanted to? + +They were in a little Hungarian restaurant, with a couple of Tzigani +strolling about playing for them alone, it seemed, when he asked for +details. "Did you get a bonus, or what?" + +"No." She laughed at him over her drink. "I've turned guinea pig." + +"I hope you quit _that_ job before we're married!" + +"It's a funny deal," she said thoughtfully. "It'd interest you. I've +been out a couple of times with this Snyder, you know, and if anything +was needed to drive me into your arms, Colin, it's his political +lectures." + +"Well, bless the Republican Party!" He laid his hand over hers, she +didn't withdraw it, but she frowned just a little. + +"Colin, you know I want to get somewhere before I marry--see a bit of +the world, the theatrical world, before turning hausfrau. Don't be +so--Oh, never mind. I like you anyway." + +Sipping her drink and setting it down again: "Well, to carry on with the +story. I finally gave Comrade Snyder the complete brush-off, and I must +say he took it very nicely. But today, this morning, he called asking me +to have lunch with him, and I did after he explained. It seems he's got +a psychiatrist friend doing research, measuring brain storms or +something, and--Do I mean storms? Waves, I guess. Anyway, he wants to +measure as many different kinds of people as possible, and Snyder had +suggested me. I was supposed to come in for three afternoons +running--about two hours each time--and I'd get a hundred dollars per +session." + +"Hm," said Fraser. "I didn't know psych research was that well-heeled. +Who is this mad scientist?" + +"His name is Kennedy. Oh, by the way, I'm not supposed to tell anybody; +they want to spring it on the world as a surprise or something. But +you're different, Colin. I'm excited; I want to talk to somebody about +it." + +"Sure," he said. "You had a session already?" + +"Yes, my first was today. It's a funny place to do research--Kennedy's +got a big suite on Fifth Avenue, right up in the classy district. +Beautiful office. The name of his outfit is Sentiment, Inc." + +"Hm. Why should a research-team take such a name? Well, go on." + +"Oh, there isn't much else to tell. Kennedy was very nice. He took me +into a laboratory full of all sorts of dials and meters and blinking +lights and os--what do you call them? Those things that make wiggly +pictures." + +"Oscilloscopes. You'll never make a scientist, my dear." + +She grinned. "But I know one scientist who'd like to--Never mind! +Anyway, he sat me down in a chair and put bands around my wrists and +ankles--just like the hot squat--and a big thing like a beauty-parlor +hair-drier over my head. Then he fiddled with his dials for awhile, +making notes. Then he started saying words at me, and showing me +pictures. Some of them were very pretty; some ugly; some funny; some +downright horrible.... Anyway, that's all there was to it. After a +couple of hours he gave me a check for a hundred dollars and told me to +come back tomorrow." + +"Hm." Fraser rubbed his chin. "Apparently he was measuring the electric +rhythms corresponding to pleasure and dislike. I'd no idea anybody'd +made an encephalograph that accurate." + +"Well," said Judy, "I've told you why we're celebrating. Now come on, +the regular orchestra's tuning up. Let's dance." + +They had a rather wonderful evening. Afterward Fraser lay awake for a +long time, not wanting to lose a state of happiness in sleep. He +considered sleep a hideous waste of time: if he lived to be ninety, he'd +have spent almost thirty years unconscious. + + * * * * * + +Judy was engaged for the next couple of evenings, and Fraser himself was +invited to dinner at Sworsky's the night after that. So it wasn't till +the end of the week that he called her again. + +"Hullo, sweetheart," he said exuberantly. "How's things? I refer to +Charles Addams Things, of course." + +"Oh--Colin." Her voice was very small, and it trembled. + +"Look, I've got two tickets to _H. M. S. Pinafore_. So put on your own +pinafore and meet me." + +"Colin--I'm sorry, Colin. I can't." + +"Huh?" He noticed how odd she sounded, and a leadenness grew within him. +"You aren't sick, are you?" + +"Colin, I--I'm going to be married." + +"_What?_" + +"Yes. I'm in love now; really in love. I'll be getting married in a +couple of months." + +"But--but--" + +"I didn't want to hurt you." He heard her begin to cry. + +"But who--how--" + +"It's Matthew," she gulped. "Matthew Snyder." + +He sat quiet for a long while, until she asked if he was still on the +line. "Yeah," he said tonelessly. "Yeah, I'm still here, after a +fashion." Shaking himself: "Look, I've got to see you. I want to talk to +you." + +"I can't." + +"You sure as hell can," he said harshly. + +They met at a quiet little bar which had often been their rendezvous. +She watched him with frightened eyes while he ordered martinis. + +"All right," he said at last. "What's the story?" + +"I--" He could barely hear her. "There isn't any story. I suddenly +realized I loved Matt. That's all." + +"_Snyder!_" He made it a curse. "Remember what you told me about him +before?" + +"I felt different then," she whispered. "He's a wonderful man when you +get to know him." + +_And rich._ He suppressed the words and the thought. "What's so +wonderful specifically?" he asked. + +"He--" Briefly, her face was rapt. Fraser had seen her looking at him +that way, now and then. + +"Go on," he said grimly. "Enumerate Mr. Snyder's good qualities. Make a +list. He's courteous, cultured, intelligent, young, handsome, +amusing--To hell! _Why_, Judy?" + +"I don't know," she said in a high, almost fearful tone. "I just love +him, that's all." She reached over the table and stroked his cheek. "I +like you a lot, Colin. Find yourself a nice girl and be happy." + +His mouth drew into a narrow line. "There's something funny here," he +said. "Is it blackmail?" + +"No!" She stood up, spilling her drink, and the flare of temper showed +him how overwrought she was. "He just happens to be the man I love. +That's enough out of you, good-bye, Mr. Fraser." + +He sat watching her go. Presently he took up his drink, gulped it +barbarously, and called for another. + + + + +2 + + +Juan Martinez had come from Puerto Rico as a boy and made his own way +ever since. Fraser had gotten to know him in the army, and they had seen +each other from time to time since then. Martinez had gone into the +private-eye business and made a good thing of it; Fraser had to get past +a very neat-looking receptionist to see him. + +"Hi, Colin," said Martinez, shaking hands. He was a small, dark man, +with a large nose and beady black eyes that made him resemble a +sympathetic mouse. "You look like the very devil." + +"I feel that way, too," said Fraser, collapsing into a chair. "You can't +go on a three-day drunk without showing it." + +"Well, what's the trouble? Cigarette?" Martinez held out a pack. +"Girl-friend give you the air?" + +"As a matter of fact, yes; that's what I want to see you about." + +"This isn't a lonely-hearts club," said Martinez. "And I've told you +time and again a private dick isn't a wisecracking superman. Our work is +ninety-nine percent routine; and for the other one percent, we call in +the police." + +"Let me give you the story," said Fraser. He rubbed his eyes wearily as +he told it. At the end, he sat staring at the floor. + +"Well," said Martinez, "it's too bad and all that. But what the hell, +there are other dames. New York has more beautiful women per square inch +than any other city except Paris. Latch on to somebody else. Or if you +want, I can give you a phone number--" + +"You don't understand," said Fraser "I want you to investigate this; I +want to know why she did it." + +Martinez squinted through a haze of smoke. "Snyder's a rich and powerful +man," he said. "Isn't that enough?" + +"No," said Fraser, too tired to be angry at the hint. "Judy isn't that +kind of a girl. Neither is she the kind to go overboard in a few days, +especially when I was there. Sure, that sounds conceited, but dammit, I +_know_ she cared for me." + +"Okay. You suspect pressure was brought to bear?" + +"Yeah. It's hard to imagine what. I called up Judy's family in Maine, +and they said they were all right, no worries. Nor do I think anything +in her own life would give a blackmailer or an extortionist anything to +go on. Still--I want to know." + +Martinez drummed the desk-top with nervous fingers. "I'll look into it +if you insist," he said, "though it'll cost you a pretty penny. Rich +men's lives aren't easy to pry into if they've got something they want +to hide. But I don't think we'd find out much; your case seems to be +only one of a rash of similar ones in the past year." + +"Huh?" Fraser looked sharply up. + +"Yeah. I follow all the news; and remember the odd facts. There've been +a good dozen cases recently, where beautiful young women suddenly +married rich men or became their mistresses. It doesn't all get into the +papers, but I've got my contacts. I know. In every instance, there was +no obvious reason; in fact, the dames seemed very much in love with +daddy." + +"And the era of the gold-digger is pretty well gone--" Fraser sat +staring out the window. It didn't seem right that the sky should be so +full of sunshine. + +"Well," said Martinez, "you don't need me. You need a psychologist." + +_Psychologist!_ + +"By God, Juan, I'm going to give you a job anyway!" Fraser leaped to his +feet. "You're going to check into an outfit called Sentiment, Inc." + + * * * * * + +A week later, Martinez said, "Yeah, we found it easily enough. It's not +in the phone-book, but they've got a big suite right in the high-rent +district on Fifth. The address is here, in my written report. Nobody in +the building knows much about 'em, except that they're a quiet, +well-behaved bunch and call themselves research psychologists. They have +a staff of four: a secretary-receptionist; a full-time secretary; and a +couple of husky boys who may be bodyguards for the boss. That's this +Kennedy, Robert Kennedy. My man couldn't get into his office; the girl +said he was too busy and never saw anybody except some regular clients. +Nor could he date either of the girls, but he did investigate them. + +"The receptionist is just a working girl for routine stuff, married, +hardly knows or cares what's going on. The steno is unmarried, has a +degree in psych, lives alone, and seems to have no friends except her +boss. Who's not her lover, by the way." + +"Well, how about Kennedy himself?" asked Fraser. + +"I've found out a good bit, but it's all legitimate," said Martinez. +"He's about fifty years old, a widower, very steady private life. He's a +licensed psychiatrist who used to practice in Chicago, where he also did +research in collaboration with a physicist named Gavotti, who's since +died. Shortly after that happened-- + +"No, there's no suspicion of foul play; the physicist was an old man and +died of a heart attack. Anyway, Kennedy moved to New York. He still +practices, officially, but he doesn't take just anybody; claims that his +research only leaves him time for a few." Martinez narrowed his eyes. +"The only thing you could hold against him is that he occasionally sees +a guy named Bryce, who's in a firm that has some dealings with Amtorg." + +"The Russian trading corporation? Hm." + +"Oh, that's pretty remote guilt by association, Colin. Amtorg does have +legitimate business, you know. We buy manganese from them, among other +things. And the rest of Kennedy's connections are all strictly blue +ribbon. _Creme de la creme_--business, finance, politics, and one big +union-leader who's known to be a conservative. In fact, Kennedy's +friends are so powerful you'd have real trouble doing anything against +him." + +Fraser slumped in his chair. "I suppose my notion was pretty wild," he +admitted. + +"Well, there is one queer angle. You know these rich guys who've +suddenly made out with such highly desirable dames? As far as I could +find out, every one of them is a client of Kennedy's." + +"Eh?" Fraser jerked erect. + +"'S a fact. Also, my man showed the building staff, elevator pilots and +so on, pictures of these women, and a couple of 'em were remembered as +having come to see Kennedy." + +"Shortly before they--fell in love?" + +"Well, that I can't be sure of. You know how people are about +remembering dates. But it's possible." + +Fraser shook his dark head. "It's unbelievable," he said. "I thought +Svengali was outworn melodrama." + +"I know something about hypnotism, Colin. It won't do anything like what +you think happened to those girls." + +Fraser got out his pipe and fumbled tobacco into it. "I think," he said, +"I'm going to call on Dr. Robert Kennedy myself." + +"Take it easy, boy," said Martinez. "You been reading too many weird +stories; you'll just get tossed out on your can." + +Fraser tried to smile. It was hard--Judy wouldn't answer his calls and +letters any more. "Well," he said, "it'll be in a worthy cause." + + * * * * * + +The elevator let him out on the nineteenth floor. It held four big +suites, with the corridor running between them. He studied the +frosted-glass doors. On one side was the Eagle Publishing Company and +Frank & Dayles, Brokers. On the other was the Messenger Advertising +Service, and Sentiment, Inc. He entered their door and stood in a quiet, +oak-paneled reception room. Behind the railing were a couple of desks, a +young woman working at each, and two burly men who sat boredly reading +magazines. + +The pretty girl, obviously the receptionist, looked up as Fraser +approached and gave him a professional smile. "Yes, sir?" she asked. + +"I'd like to see Dr. Kennedy, please," he said, trying hard to be +casual. + +"Do you have an appointment, sir?" + +"No, but it's urgent." + +"I'm sorry, sir; Dr. Kennedy is very busy. He can't see anybody except +his regular patients and research subjects." + +"Look, take him in this note, will you? Thanks." + +Fraser sat uneasily for some minutes, wondering if he'd worded the note +correctly. _I must see you about Miss Judy Harkness._ _Important._ Well, +what the devil else could you say? + +The receptionist came out again. "Dr. Kennedy can spare you a few +minutes, sir," she said. "Go right on in." + +"Thanks." Fraser slouched toward the inner door. The two men lowered +their magazines to follow him with watchful eyes. + +There was a big, handsomely-furnished office inside, with a door beyond +that must lead to the laboratory. Kennedy looked up from some papers and +rose, holding out his hand. He was a medium-sized man, rather plump, +graying hair brushed thickly back from a broad, heavy face behind +rimless glasses. "Yes?" His voice was low and pleasant. "What can I do +for you?" + +"My name's Fraser." The visitor sat down and accepted a cigarette. Best +to act urbanely. "I know Miss Harkness well. I understand you made some +encephalographic studies of her." + +"Indeed?" Kennedy looked annoyed, and Fraser recalled that Judy had been +asked not to tell anyone. "I'm not sure; I would have to consult my +records first." He wasn't admitting anything, thought Fraser. + +"Look," said the engineer, "there's been a marked change in Miss +Harkness recently. I know enough psychology to be certain that such +changes don't happen overnight without cause. I wanted to consult you." + +"I'm not her psychiatrist," said Kennedy coldly. "Now if you will excuse +me, I really have a lot to do--" + +"All right," said Fraser. There was no menace in his tones, only a +weariness. "If you insist, I'll play it dirty. Such abrupt changes +indicate mental instability. But I know she was perfectly sane before. +It begins to look as if your experiments may have--injured her mind. If +so, I should have to report you for malpractice." + +Kennedy flushed. "I am a licensed psychiatrist," he said, "and any other +doctor will confirm that Miss Harkness is still in mental health. If you +tried to get an investigation started, you would only be wasting your +own time and that of the authorities. She herself will testify that no +harm was done to her; no compulsion applied; and that you are an +infernal busybody with some delusions of your own. Good afternoon." + +"Ah," said Fraser, "so she _was_ here." + +Kennedy pushed a button. His men entered. "Show this gentleman the way +out, please," he said. + +Fraser debated whether to put up a fight, decided it was futile, and +went out between the two others. When he got to the street, he found he +was shaking, and badly in need of a drink. + + * * * * * + +Fraser asked, "Jim, did you ever read _Trilby_?" + +Sworsky's round, freckled face lifted to regard him. "Years ago," he +answered. "What of it?" + +"Tell me something. Is it possible--even theoretically possible--to do +what Svengali did? Change emotional attitudes, just like that." Fraser +snapped his fingers. + +"I don't know," said Sworsky. "Nuclear cross-sections are more in my +line. But offhand, I should imagine it might be done ... sometime in the +far future. Thought-habits, associational-patterns, the labeling of this +as good and that as bad, seem to be matters of established neural paths. +If you could selectively alter the polarization of individual +neurones--But it's a pretty remote prospect; we hardly know a thing +about the brain today." + +He studied his friend sympathetically. "I know it's tough to get +jilted," he said, "but don't go off your trolley about it." + +"I could stand it if someone else had gotten her in the usual kind of +way," said Fraser thinly. "But this--Look, let me tell you all I've +found out." + +Sworsky shook his head at the end of the story. "That's a mighty wild +speculation," he murmured. "I'd forget it if I were you." + +"Did you know Kennedy's old partner? Gavotti, at Chicago." + +"Sure, I met him a few times. Nice old guy, very unworldly, completely +wrapped up in his work. He got interested in neurology from the physics +angle toward the end of his life, and contributed a lot to cybernetics. +What of it?" + +"I don't know," said Fraser; "I just don't know. But do me a favor, will +you, Jim? Judy won't see me at all, but she knows you and likes you. Ask +her to dinner or something. Insist that she come. Then you and your wife +find out--whatever you can. Just exactly how she feels about the whole +business. What her attitudes are toward everything." + +"The name is Sworsky, not Holmes. But sure, I'll do what I can, if +you'll promise to try and get rid of this fixation. You ought to see a +head-shrinker yourself, you know." + +_In vino veritas_--sometimes too damn much _veritas_. + + * * * * * + +Toward the end of the evening, Judy was talking freely, if not quite +coherently. "I cared a lot for Colin," she said. "It was pretty +wonderful having him around. He's a grand guy. Only Matt--I don't know. +Matt hasn't got half of what Colin has; Matt's a single-track mind. I'm +afraid I'm just going to be an ornamental convenience to him. Only if +you've ever been so you got all dizzy when someone was around, and +thought about him all the time he was away--well, that's how he is. +Nothing else matters." + +"Colin's gotten a funny obsession," said Sworsky cautiously. "He thinks +Kennedy hypnotized you for Snyder. I keep telling him it's impossible, +but he can't get over the idea." + +"Oh, no, no, no," she said with too much fervor. "It's nothing like +that. I'll tell you just what happened. We had those two measuring +sessions; it was kind of dull but nothing else. And then the third time +Kennedy did put me under hypnosis--he called it that, at least. I went +to sleep and woke up about an hour later and he sent me home. I felt all +good inside, happy, and shlo--slowly I began to see what Matt meant to +me. + +"I called him up that evening. He said Kennedy's machine _did_ speed up +people's minds for a short while, sometimes, so they decided quick-like +what they'd've worked out anyway. Kennedy is--I don't know. It's funny +how ordinary he seemed at first. But when you get to know him, he's +like--God, almost. He's strong and wise and good. He--" Her voice +trailed off and she sat looking foolishly at her glass. + +"You know," said Sworsky, "perhaps Colin is right after all." + +"Don't say that!" She jumped up and slapped his face. "Kennedy's _good_, +I tell you! All you little lice sitting here making sly remarks behind +his back, and he's so, much bigger than all of you and--" She broke into +tears and stormed out of the apartment. + +Sworsky reported the affair to Fraser. "I wonder," he said. "It doesn't +seem natural, I'll agree. But what can anybody do? The police?" + +"I've tried," said Fraser dully. "They laughed. When I insisted, I damn +near got myself jugged. That's no use. The trouble is, none of the +people who've been under the machine will testify against Kennedy. He +fixes it so they worship him." + +"I still think you're crazy. There _must_ be a simpler hypothesis; I +refuse to believe your screwy notions without some real evidence. But +what are you going to do now?" + +"Well," said Fraser with a tautness in his voice, "I've got several +thousand dollars saved up, and Juan Martinez will help. Ever hear the +fable about the lion? He licked hell out of the bear and the tiger and +the rhinoceros, but a little gnat finally drove him nuts. Maybe I can be +the gnat." He shook his head. "But I'll have to hurry. The wedding's +only six weeks off." + + + + +3 + + +It can be annoying to be constantly shadowed; to have nasty gossip about +you spreading through the places where you work and live; to find your +tires slashed; to be accosted by truculent drunks when you stop in for a +quick one; to have loud horns blow under your window every night. And it +doesn't do much good to call the police; your petty tormentors always +fade out of sight. + +Fraser was sitting in his room some two weeks later, trying +unsuccessfully to concentrate on matrix algebra, when the phone rang. He +never picked it up without a fluttering small hope that it might be +Judy, and it never was. This time it was a man's voice: "Mr. Fraser?" + +"Yeah," he grunted. "Wha'dya want?" + +"This is Robert Kennedy. I'd like to talk to you." + +Fraser's heart sprang in his ribs, but he held his voice stiff. "Go on, +then. Talk." + +"I want you to come up to my place. We may be having a long +conversation." + +"Mmmm--well--" It was more than he had allowed himself to hope for, but +he remained curt: "Okay. But a full report of this business, and what I +think you're doing, is in the hands of several people. If anything +should happen to me--" + +"You've been reading too many hard-boileds," said Kennedy. "Nothing will +happen. Anyway, I have a pretty good idea who those people are; I can +hire detectives of my own, you know." + +"I'll come over, then." Fraser hung up and realized, suddenly, that he +was sweating. + +The night air was cool as he walked down the street. He paused for a +moment, feeling the city like a huge impersonal machine around him, +grinding and grinding. Human civilization had grown too big, he thought. +It was beyond anyone's control; it had taken on a will of its own and +was carrying a race which could no longer guide it. Sometimes--reading +the papers, or listening to the radio, or just watching the traffic go +by like a river of steel--a man could feel horribly helpless. + +He took the subway to Kennedy's address, a swank apartment in the lower +Fifties. He was admitted by the psychiatrist in person; no one else was +around. + +"I assume," said Kennedy, "that you don't have some wild idea of pulling +a gun on me. That would accomplish nothing except to get you in +trouble." + +"No," said Fraser, "I'll be good." His eyes wandered about the living +room. One wall was covered with books which looked used; there were some +quality reproductions, a Capehart, and fine, massive furniture. It was a +tasteful layout. He looked a little more closely at three pictures on +the mantel: a middle-aged woman and two young men in uniform. + +"My wife," said Kennedy, "and my boys. They're all dead. Would you like +a drink?" + +"No. I came to talk." + +"I'm not Satan, you know," said Kennedy. "I like books and music, good +wine, good conversation. I'm as human as you are, only I have a +purpose." + +Fraser sat down and began charging his pipe. "Go ahead," he said. "I'm +listening." + +Kennedy pulled a chair over to face him. The big smooth countenance +behind the rimless glasses held little expression. "Why have you been +annoying me?" he asked. + +"I?" Fraser lifted his brows. + +Kennedy made an impatient gesture. "Let's not chop words. There are no +witnesses tonight. I intend to talk freely, and want you to do the same. +I know that you've got Martinez sufficiently convinced to help you with +this very childish persecution-campaign. What do you hope to get out of +it?" + +"I want my girl back," said Fraser tonelessly. "I was hoping my +nuisance-value--" + + * * * * * + +Kennedy winced a bit. "You know, I'm damned sorry about that. It's the +one aspect of my work which I hate. I'd like you to believe that I'm not +just a scientific procurer. Actually, I have to satisfy the minor +desires of my clients, so they'll stay happy and agree to my major +wishes. It's the plain truth that those women have been only the +minutest fraction of my job." + +"Nevertheless, you're a free-wheeling son, doing something like that--" + +"Really, now, what's so horrible about it? Those girls are in love--the +normal, genuine article. It's not any kind of zombie state, or whatever +your overheated imagination has thought up. They're entirely sane, +unharmed, and happy. In fact, happiness of that kind is so rare in this +world that if I wanted to, I could pose as their benefactor." + +"You've got a machine," said Fraser; "it changes the mind. As far as I'm +concerned, that's as gross a violation of liberty as throwing somebody +into a concentration camp." + +"How free do you think anyone is? You're born with a fixed heredity. +Environment molds you like clay. Your society teaches you what and how +to think. A million tiny factors, all depending on blind, uncontrollable +chance, determine the course of your life--including your love-life.... +Well, we needn't waste any time on philosophy. Go on, ask some +questions. I admit I've hurt you--unwittingly, to be sure--but I do want +to make amends." + +"Your machine, then," said Fraser. "How did you get it? How does it +work." + +"I was practicing in Chicago," said Kennedy, "and collaborating on the +side with Gavotti. How much do you know of cybernetics? I don't mean +computers and automata, which are only one aspect of the field; I mean +control and communication, in the animal as well as in the machine." + +"Well, I've read Wiener's books, and studied Shannon's work, too." +Despite himself, Fraser was thawing, just a trifle. "It's exciting +stuff. Communications-theory seems to be basic, in biology and +psychology as well as in electronics." + +"Quite. The future may remember Wiener as the Galileo of neurology. If +Gavotti's work ever gets published, he'll be considered the Newton. So +far, frankly, I've suppressed it. He died suddenly, just when his +machine was completed and he was getting ready to publish his results. +Nobody but I knew anything more than rumors; he was inclined to be +secretive till he had a _fait accompli_ on hand. I realized what an +opportunity had been given me, and took it; I brought the machine here +without saying much to anyone." + +Kennedy leaned back in his chair. "I imagine it was mostly luck which +took Gavotti and me so far," he went on. "We made a long series of +improbably good guesses, and thus telescoped a century of work into a +decade. If I were religious, I'd be down on my knees, thanking the Lord +for putting this thing of the future into my hands." + +"Or the devil," said Fraser. + +Briefly, anger flitted across Kennedy's face. "I grant you, the machine +is a terrible power, but it's harmless to a man if it's used +properly--as I have used it. I'm not going to tell you just how it +works; to be perfectly honest, I only understand a fraction of its +theory and its circuits myself. But look, you know something of +encephalography. The various basic rhythms of the brain have been +measured. The standard method is already so sensitive that it can detect +abnormalities like a developing tumor or a strong emotional disturbance, +that will give trouble unless corrected. Half of Gavotti's machine is a +still more delicate encephalograph. It can measure and analyze the +minute variations in electrical pulses corresponding to the basic +emotional states. It won't read thoughts, no; but once calibrated for a +given individual, it will tell you if he's happy, sorrowful, angry, +disgusted, afraid--any fundamental neuro-glandular condition, or any +combination of them." + +He paused. "All right," said Fraser. "What else does it do?" + +"It does _not_ make monsters," said Kennedy. "Look, the specific +emotional reaction to a given stimulus is, in the normal individual, +largely a matter of conditioned reflex, instilled by social environment +or the accidental associations of his life. + +"Anyone in decent health will experience fear in the presence of +danger; desire in the presence of a sexual object, and so on. That's +basic biology, and the machine can't change that. But most of our +evaluations are learned. For instance, to an American the word 'mother' +has powerful emotional connotations, while to a Samoan it means nothing +very exciting. You had to develop a taste for liquor, tobacco, +coffee--in fact most of what you consume. If you're in love with a +particular woman, it's a focusing of the general sexual libido on her, +brought about by the symbolizing part of your mind: she _means_ +something to you. There are cultures without romantic love, you know. +And so on. All these specific, conditioned reactions can be changed." + +"How?" + + * * * * * + +Kennedy thought for a moment "The encephalographic part of the machine +measures the exact pulsations in the individual corresponding to the +various emotional reactions. It takes me about four hours to determine +those with the necessary precision; then I have to make statistical +analyses of the data, to winnow out random variations. Thereafter I put +the subject in a state of light hypnosis--that's only to increase +suggestibility, and make the process faster. As I pronounce the words +and names I'm interested in, the machine feeds back the impulses +corresponding to the emotions I want: a sharply-focused beam on the +brain center concerned. + +"For instance, suppose you were an alcoholic and I wanted to cure you. +I'd put you in hypnosis and stand there whispering 'wine, whisky, beer, +gin,' and so on; meanwhile, the machine would be feeding the impulses +corresponding to your reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into your +brain. You'd come out unchanged, except that your appetite for alcohol +would be gone; you could, in fact, come out hating the stuff so much +that you'd join the Prohibition Party--though, in actual practice, it +would probably be enough just to give you a mild aversion." + +"Mmmm--I see. Maybe." Fraser scowled. "And the--subject--doesn't +remember what you've done?" + +"Oh, no. It all takes place on the lower subconscious levels. A new set +of conditioned neural pathways is opened, you see, and old ones are +closed off. The brain does that by itself, through its normal +symbolizing mechanism. All that happens is that the given symbol--such +as liquor--becomes reflectively associated with the given emotional +state, such as dislike." + +Kennedy leaned forward with an air of urgency. "The end result is in no +way different from ordinary means of persuasion. Propaganda does the +same thing by sheer repetition. If you're courting a girl, you try to +identify yourself in her mind with the things she desires, by +appropriate behavior.... I'm sorry; I shouldn't have used that +example.... The machine is only a direct, fast way of doing this, +producing a more stable result." + +"It's still--tampering," said Fraser. "How do you know you're not +creating side-effects, doing irreparable long-range damage?" + +"Oh, for Lord's sake!" exploded Kennedy. "Take your mind off that shelf, +will you? I've told you how delicate the whole thing is. A few +microwatts of power more or less, a frequency-shift of less than one +percent, and it doesn't work at all. There's no effect whatsoever." He +cooled off fast, adding reflectively: "On the given subject, that is. It +might work on someone else. These pulsations are a highly individual +matter; I have to calibrate every case separately." + +There was a long period of silence. Then Fraser strained forward and +said in an ugly voice: + +"All right You've told me how you do it. Now tell me _why_. What +possible reason or excuse, other than your own desire to play God? This +thing could be the greatest psychiatric tool in history, and you're +using it to--pimp!" + +"I told you that was unimportant," said Kennedy quietly. "I'm doing much +more. I set up in practice here in New York a couple of years ago. Once +I had a few chance people under control--no, I tell you again, I didn't +make robots of them. I merely associated myself, in their own minds, +with the father-image. That's something I do to everyone who comes under +the machine, just as a precaution if nothing else, Kennedy is all-wise, +all-powerful; Kennedy can do no wrong. It isn't a conscious realization; +to the waking mind, I am only a shrewd adviser and a damn swell fellow. +But the subconscious mind knows otherwise. It wouldn't _let_ my subjects +act against me; it wouldn't even let them want to. + +"Well, you see how it goes. I got those first few people to recommend me +to certain selected friends, and these in turn recommended me to others. +Not necessarily as a psychiatrist; I have variously been a doctor, a +counsellor, or merely a research-man looking for data. But I'm building +up a group of the people I want. People who'll back me up, who'll follow +my advice--not with any knowledge of being dominated, but because the +workings of their own subconscious minds will lead them inevitably to +think that my advice is the only sound policy to follow and my requests +are things any decent man must grant." + +"Yeah," said Fraser. "I get it. Big businessmen. Labor-leaders. +Politicians. Military men. And Soviet spies!" + + * * * * * + +Kennedy nodded. "I have connections with the Soviets; their agents think +I'm on their side. But it isn't treason, though I may help them out from +time to time. + +"That's why I have to do these services for my important clients, such +as getting them the women they want--or, what I actually do more often, +influencing their competitors and associates. You see, the subconscious +mind knows I am all-powerful, but the conscious mind doesn't. It has to +be satisfied by occasional proofs that I _am_ invaluable; otherwise +conflicts would set in, my men would become unstable and eventually +psychotic, and be of no further use to me. + +"Of course," he added, almost pedantically, "my men don't know how I +persuade these other people--they only know that I do, somehow, and +their regard for their own egos, as well as for me, sets up a bloc which +prevents them from reasoning out the fact that they themselves are +dominated. They're quite content to accept the results of my help, +without inquiring further into the means than the easy rationalization +that I have a 'persuasive personality.' + +"I don't like what I'm doing, Fraser. But it's got to be done." + +"You still haven't said _what's_ got to be done," answered the engineer +coldly. + +"I've been given something unbelievable," said Kennedy. His voice was +very soft now. "If I'd made it public, can you imagine what would have +happened? Psychiatrists would use it, yes; but so would criminals, +dictators, power-hungry men of all kinds. Even in this country, I don't +think libertarian principles could long survive. It would be too +simple-- + +"And yet it would have been cowardly to break the machine and burn +Gavotti's notes. Chance has given me the power to be more than a chip in +the river--a river that's rapidly approaching a waterfall, war, +destruction, tyranny, no matter who the Pyrrhic victor may be. I'm in a +position to do something for the causes in which I believe." + +"And what are they?" asked Fraser. + +Kennedy gestured at the pictures on the mantel. "Both my sons were +killed in the last war. My wife died of cancer--a disease which would be +licked now if a fraction of the money spent on armaments had been +diverted to research. That brought it home to me; but there are hundreds +of millions of people in worse cases. And war isn't the only +evil--there is poverty, oppression, inequality, want and suffering. It +could be changed. + +"I'm building up my own lobby, you might say. In a few more years, I +hope to be the indispensable adviser of all the men who, between them, +really run this country. And yes, I have been in touch with Soviet +agents--have even acted as a transmitter of stolen information. The +basic problem of spying, you know, is not to get the information in the +first place as much as to get it to the homeland. Treason? No. I think +not. I'm getting my toehold in world communism. I already have some of +its agents; sooner or later, I'll get to the men who really matter. Then +communism will no longer be a menace." + +He sighed. "It's a hard row to hoe. It'll take my lifetime, at least; +but what else have I got to give my life to?" + +Fraser sat quiet. His pipe was cold, he knocked it out and began filling +it afresh. The scratching of his match seemed unnaturally loud. "It's +too much," he said. "It's too big a job for one man to tackle. The world +will stumble along somehow, but you'll just get things into a worse +mess." + +"I've got to try," said Kennedy. + +"And I still want my girl back." + +"I can't do that; I need Snyder too much. But I'll make it up to you +somehow." Kennedy sighed. "Lord, if you knew how much I've wanted to +tell all this!" + +With sudden wariness: "Not that it's to be repeated. In fact, you're to +lay off me; call off your dogs. Don't try to tell anyone else what I've +told you. You'd never be believed and I already have enough power to +suppress the story, if you should get it out somehow. And if you give me +any more trouble at all, I'll see to it that you--stop." + +"Murder?" + +"Or commitment to an asylum. I can arrange that too." + +Fraser sighed. He felt oddly unexcited, empty, as if the interview had +drained him of his last will to resist. He held the pipe loosely in his +fingers, letting it go out. + +"Ask me a favor," urged Kennedy. "I'll do it, if it won't harm my own +program. I tell you, I want to square things." + +"Well--" + +"Think about it. Let me know." + +"All right." Fraser got up. "I may do that." He went out the door +without saying goodnight. + + + + +4 + + +He sat with his feet on the table, chair tilted back and teetering +dangerously, hands clasped behind his head, pipe filling the room with +blue fog. It was his usual posture for attacking a problem. + +And damn it, he thought wearily, this was a question such as he made his +living on. An industrial engineer comes into the office. We want this +and that--a machine for a very special purpose, let's say. What should +we do, Mr. Fraser? Fraser prowls around the plant, reads up on the +industry, and then sits down and thinks. The elements of the problem are +such-and-such; how can they be combined to yield a solution? + +Normally, he uses the mathematical approach, especially in machine +design. Most practicing-engineers have a pathetic math background--they +use ten pages of elaborate algebra and rusty calculus to figure out +something that three vector equations would solve. But you have to get +the logical basics straight first, before you can set up your equations. + +All right, what is the problem? To get Judy back. That means forcing +Kennedy to restore her normal emotional reactions--no, he didn't want +her thrust into love of him; he just wanted her as she had been. + +What are the elements of the problem? Kennedy acts outside the law, but +he has blocked all official channels. He even has connections extending +through the Iron Curtain. + +Hmmmm--appeal to the FBI? Kennedy couldn't have control over +them--_yet_. However, if Fraser tried to tip off the FBI, they'd act +cautiously, if they investigated at all. They'd have to go slow. And +Kennedy would find out in time to do something about it. + +Martinez could help no further. Sworsky had closer contact with +Washington. He'd been so thoroughly cleared that they'd be inclined to +trust whatever he said. But Sworsky doubted the whole story; like many +men who'd suffered through irresponsible Congressional charges, he was +almost fanatic about having proof before accusing anyone of anything. +Moreover, Kennedy knew that Sworsky was Fraser's friend; he'd probably +be keeping close tabs on the physicist and ready to block any attempts +he might make to help. With the backing of a man like Snyder, Kennedy +could hire as many detectives as he wanted. + +In fact, whatever the counter-attack, it was necessary to go warily. +Kennedy's threat to get rid of Fraser if the engineer kept working +against him was not idle mouthing. He could do it--and, being a fanatic, +would. + +But Kennedy, like the demon of legend, would grant one wish--just to +salve his own conscience. Only what should the wish be? Another woman? +Or merely to be reconciled, artificially, to an otherwise-intolerable +situation? + +_Judy, Judy, Judy!_ + +Fraser swore at himself. Damn it to hell, this was a problem in logic. +No room for emotion. Of course, it might be a problem without a +solution. There are plenty of those. + +He squinted, trying to visualize the office. He thought of burglary, +stealing evidence--silly thought. But let's see, now. What was the +layout, exactly? Four suites on one floor of the skyscraper, three of +them unimportant offices of unimportant men. And-- + +_Oh, Lord!_ + +Fraser sat for a long while, hardly moving. Then he uncoiled himself and +ran, downstairs and into the street and to the nearest pay phone. His +own line might be tapped-- + +"Hello, hello, Juan?... Yes, I know I got you out of bed, and I'm not +sorry. This is too bloody important.... Okay, okay.... Look, I want a +complete report on the Messenger Advertising Service.... When? +Immediately, if not sooner. And I mean _complete_.... That's right, +Messenger.... Okay, fine. I'll buy you a drink sometime." + +"Hello, Jim? Were you asleep too?... Sorry.... But look, would you make +a list of all the important men you know fairly well? I need it bad.... +No, don't come over. I think I'd better not see you for a while. Just +mail it to me.... All right, so I am paranoid...." + + * * * * * + +Jerome K. Ferris was a large man, with a sense of his own importance +that was even larger. He sat hunched in the chair, his head dwarfed by +the aluminum helmet, his breathing shallow. Around him danced and +flickered a hundred meters, indicator lights, tubes. There was a low +humming in the room, otherwise it was altogether silent, blocked and +shielded against the outside world. The fluorescent lights were a muted +glow. + +Fraser sat watching the greenish trace on the huge oscilloscope screen. +It was an intricate set of convolutions, looking more like a plate of +spaghetti than anything else. He wondered how many frequencies were +involved. Several thousand, at the very least. + +"Fraser," repeated Kennedy softly into the ear of the hypnotized man. +"Colin Fraser. Colin Fraser." He touched a dial with infinite care. +"Colin Fraser. Colin Fraser." + +The oscilloscope flickered as he readjusted, a new trace appeared. +Kennedy waited for a while, then: "Robert Kennedy. Sentiment, Inc. +Robert Kennedy. Sentiment, Inc. Robert Kennedy. Sentiment--" + +He turned off the machine, its murmur and glow died away. Facing Fraser +with a tight little smile, he said: "All right. Your job is done. Are we +even now?" + +"As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser. + +"I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. "I'd +have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch." + +"Well, I was interested," said Fraser. + +"Frankly, I still don't see what you stand to gain by the doglike +devotion of this Ferris. He's rich, but he's too weak and short-sighted +to be a leader. I'd never planned on conditioning him for my purposes." + +"I've explained that," said Fraser patiently. "Ferris is a large +stockholder in a number of corporations. His influence can swing a lot +of business my way." + +"Yes, I know. I didn't grant your wish blindly, you realize. I had +Ferris studied; he's unable to harm me." Kennedy regarded Fraser with +hard eyes. "And just in case you still have foolish notions, please +remember that I gave him the father-conditioning with respect to myself. +He'll do a lot for you, but not if it's going to hurt me in any way." + +"I know when I'm licked," said Fraser bleakly; "I'm getting out of town +as soon as I finish those courses I'm signed up for." + +Kennedy snapped his fingers. "All right, Ferris, wake up now." + +Ferris blinked. "What's been happening?" he asked. + +"Nothing much," said Kennedy, unbuckling the electrodes. "I've taken my +readings. Thank you very much for the help, sir. I'll see that you get +due credit when my research is published." + +"Ah--yes. Yes." Ferris puffed himself out. Then he put an arm around +Fraser's shoulder. "If you aren't busy," he said, "maybe we could go +have lunch." + +"Thanks," said Fraser. "I'd like to talk to you about a few things." + +He lingered for a moment after Ferris had left the room. "I imagine this +is goodbye for us," he said. + +"Well, so long, at least. We'll probably hear from each other again." +Kennedy shook Fraser's hand. "No hard feelings? I did go to a lot of +trouble for you--wangling your introduction to Ferris when you'd named +him, and having one of my men persuade him to come here. And right when +I'm so infernally busy, too." + +"Sure," said Fraser. "It's all right. I can't pretend to love you for +what you've done, but you aren't a bad sort." + +"No worse than you," said Kennedy with a short laugh. "You've used the +machine for your own ends, now." + +"Yeah," said Fraser. "I guess I have." + + * * * * * + +Sworsky asked, "Why do you insist on calling me from drugstores? And why +at my office? I've got a home phone, you know." + +"I'm not sure but that our own lines are tapped," said Fraser. +"Kennedy's a smart cookie, and don't you forget it. I think he's about +ready to dismiss me as a danger, but you're certainly being watched; +you're on his list." + +"You're getting a persecution-complex. Honest, Colin, I'm worried." + +"Well, bear with me for a while. Now, have you had any information on +Kennedy since I called last?" + +"Hm, no. I did mention to Thomson, as you asked me to, that I'd heard +rumors of some revolutionary encephalographic techniques and would be +interested in seeing the work. Why did you want me to do that?" + +"Thomson," said Fraser, "is one of Kennedy's men. Now look, Jim, before +long you're going to be invited to visit Kennedy. He'll give you a spiel +about his research and ask to measure your brain waves. I want you to +say yes. Then I want to know the exact times of the three appointments +he'll give you--the first two, at least." + +"Hmmm--if Kennedy's doing what you claim--" + +"Jim, it's a necessary risk, but _I'm_ the one who's taking it. You'll +be okay, I promise you; though perhaps later you'll read of me being +found in the river. You see, I got Kennedy to influence a big stockowner +for me. One of the lesser companies in which he has a loud voice is +Messenger. I don't suppose Kennedy knows that. I hope not!" + + * * * * * + +Sworsky looked as if he'd been sandbagged. He was white, and the hand +that poured a drink shook. + +"Lord," he muttered. "Lord, Colin, you were right." + +Fraser's teeth drew back from his lips. "You went through with it, eh?" + +"Yes. I let the son hypnotize me, and afterward I walked off with a +dreamy expression, as you told me to. Just three hours ago, he dropped +around here in person. He gave me a long rigmarole about the stupidity +of military secrecy, and how the Soviet Union stands for peace and +justice. I hope I acted impressed; I'm not much of an actor." + +"You don't have to be. Just so you didn't overdo it. To one of Kennedy's +victims, obeying his advice is so natural that it doesn't call for any +awe-struck wonderment." + +"And he wanted data from me! Bombardment cross-sections. Critical +values. Resonance levels. My Lord, if the Russians found that out +through spies it'd save them three years of research. This is an FBI +case, all right." + +"No, not yet." Fraser laid an urgent hand on Sworsky's arm. "You've +stuck by me so far, Jim. Go along a little further." + +"What do you want me to do?" + +"Why--" Fraser's laugh jarred out. "Give him what he wants, of course." + + * * * * * + +Kennedy looked up from his desk, scowling. "All right, Fraser," he said. +"You've been a damned nuisance, and it's pretty patient of me to see you +again. But this is the last time. Wha'd'you want?" + +"It's the last time I'll need to see you, perhaps." Fraser didn't sit +down. He stood facing Kennedy. "You've had it, friend; straight up." + +"What do you mean?" Kennedy's hand moved toward his buzzer. + +"Listen before you do anything," said Fraser harshly. "I know you tried +to bring Jim Sworsky under the influence. You asked him for top-secret +data. A few hours ago, you handed the file he brought you on to Bryce, +who's no doubt at the Amtorg offices this minute. That's high treason, +Kennedy; they execute people for doing that." + +The psychologist slumped back. + +"Don't try to have your bully boys get rid of me," said Fraser. "Sworsky +is sitting by the phone, waiting to call the FBI. I'm the only guy who +can stop him." + +"But--" Kennedy's tongue ran around his lips. "But he committed treason +himself. He gave me the papers!" + +Fraser grinned. "You don't think those were authentic, do you? I doubt +if you'll be very popular in the Soviet Union either, once they've tried +to build machines using your data." + +Kennedy looked down at the floor. "How did you do it?" he whispered. + +"Remember Ferris? The guy you fixed up for me? He owns a share of your +next-door neighbor, the Messenger Advertising Service. I fed him a song +and dance about needing an office to do some important work, only my +very whereabouts had to be secret. The Messenger people were moved out +without anybody's knowing. I installed myself there one night, also a +simple little electric oscillator. + +"Encephalography is damn delicate work; it involves amplifications up to +several million. The apparatus misbehaves if you give it a hard look. +Naturally, your lab and the machine were heavily shielded, but even so, +a radio emitter next door would be bound to throw you off. My main +trouble was in lousing you up just a little bit, not enough to make you +suspect anything. + +"I only worked at that during your calibrating sessions with Sworsky. I +didn't have to be there when you turned the beam on him, because it +would be calculated from false data and be so far from his pattern as to +have no effect. You told me yourself how precise an adjustment was +needed. Sworsky played along, then. Now we've got proof--not that you +meddled with human lives, but that you are a spy." + +Kennedy sat without moving. His voice was a broken mumble. "I was going +to change the world. I had hopes for all humankind. And you, for the +sake of one woman--" + +"I never trusted anybody with a messiah complex. The world is too big to +change single-handed; you'd just have bungled it up worse than it +already is. A lot of dictators started out as reformers and ended up as +mass-executioners; you'd have done the same." + +Fraser leaned over his desk. "I'm willing to make a deal, though," he +went on. "Your teeth are pulled; there's no point in turning you in. +Sworsky and Martinez and I are willing just to report on Bryce, and let +you go, if you'll change back all your subjects. We're going to read +your files, and watch and see that you do it. Every one." + +Kennedy bit his lip. "And the machine--?" + +"I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, God, here's the phone +number of Judy Harkness. Ask her to come over for a special treatment. +At once." + + * * * * * + +A month later, the papers had a story about a plausible maniac who had +talked his way into the Columbia University laboratories, where +Gavotti's puzzling machine was being studied, and pulled out a hammer +and smashed it into ruin before he could be stopped. Taken to jail, he +committed suicide in his cell. The name was Kennedy. + +Fraser felt vague regret, but it didn't take him long to forget it; he +was too busy making plans for his wedding. + + +THE END + + + * * * * * + + + Transcriber Notes: + + This etext was produced from Science Fiction Stories 1953. + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. + copyright on this publication was renewed. + + Obvious punctuation errors have been repaired. + + page 17 original: on the mantel: a midle-aged woman and two young + men + + replacement: on the mantel: a middle-aged woman and two young men + + + page 20 original: inpulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, + fear, and disgust into + + replacement: impulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, + fear, and disgust into + + + page 25 original: Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, + artifically, to an otherwise-intolerable situation? + + replacement: Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, + artificially, to an otherwise-intolerable situation? + + + page 26 original: "As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said + Fraser. + + "Well, I was interested," said Fraser. + + "I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. + "I'd have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch." + + replacement: "As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser. + + "I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. + "I'd have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch." + + "Well, I was interested," said Fraser. + + + page 29 original: "I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, + God, here's the phone-number + + replacement: "I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, God, + here's the phone number (no hyphen used on page 10) + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Sentiment, Inc., by Poul William Anderson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SENTIMENT, INC. *** + +***** This file should be named 37653.txt or 37653.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/6/5/37653/ + +Produced by Greg Weeks, Dianna Adair and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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