recognized a pair of idiotic Martiandolls. He found a tourist map of the ruined cities of Mars. He found amenu from the Red Sands Hotel.
And below all these there was a picture album. Alice at the Red Sands.Alice at the Phobos Oasis. Alice at the Darnella Ruins. He turned thepages of the album with numb fingers. Alice in a dozen Martian settings.Some of them were dated. About two years ago. They had gone together,Alice had said, but there was no evidence of Mel's presence on any suchtrip.
But it was equally impossible that Alice had made the trip, yet here wasproof. Proof that swept him up in a doubting of his own senses. Howcould such a thing have taken place? Had he actually made such a tripand been stripped of the memory by some amnesia? Maybe he had forcedhimself to go with her and the power of his lifelong phobia had wiped itfrom his memory.
And what did it all have to do--if anything--with the unbelievable thingDr. Winters had found about Alice?
Overcome with grief and exhaustion he sat fingering the mementosaimlessly while he stared at the pictures and the ticket envelope andthe souvenirs.
* * * * *
Dr. Winters spoke a little more sharply than he intended. "I don't thinkanything is going to be solved by a wild-goose chase to Mars. It's goingto cost you a great deal of money, and there isn't a single positivelead to any solution."
"It's the only possible explanation." Mel persisted. "Something happenedon Mars to change her from what she once was to--what you saw on youroperating table."
"And you are hoping that in some desperate way you will find there was aswitch of personalities--that there may be a ghost of a chance offinding Alice still alive."
Mel bit his lip. He was scarcely willing to admit such a hope but it wasthe foundation of his decision. "I've got to do what I can," he said."I must take the chance. The uncertainty will torment me all my life ifI don't."
Dr. Winters shook his head. "I still wish I could persuade you againstit. You will find only disappointment."
"My mind is made up. Will you help me or not?"
"What can I do?"
"I can't go into space unless I can find some way of lifting, eventemporarily, this phobia that nearly drives me crazy at the thought ofgoing out there. Isn't there a drug, a hypnotic method, or something tohelp a thing like this?"
"This isn't my field," said Dr. Winters. "But I suspect that the causeof your trouble cannot be suppressed. It will have to be lifted.Psycho-recovery is the only way to accomplish that. I can recommend anumber of good men. This, too, is very expensive."
"I should have done it for Alice--long ago," said Mel.
* * * * *
Dr. Martin, the psychiatrist, was deeply interested in Mel's problem."It sounds as if it is based on some early trauma, which has long sincebeen wiped from your conscious memory. Recovery may be easy ordifficult, depending on how much suppression of the original event hastaken place."
"I don't even care what the original event was," said Mel, "if you ridme of this overwhelming fear of space. Dr. Winters said he thoughtrecovery would be required."
"He is right. No matter how much overlay you pile on top of such aphobia to suppress it, it will continue to haunt you. We can make atrial run to analyze the situation, and then we can better predict thechance of ultimate success."
As a reporter, Mel Hastings had had vague encounters with the subject ofpsycho-recovery, but he knew little of the details about it. He knew itinvolved some kind of a machine that could tap the very depths of thehuman mind and drag out the hidden debris accumulated in mentalbasements and attics. But such things had always given him the willies.He steered clear of them.
When Dr. Martin first introduced him into the psycho-recovery room hisresolution almost vanished. It looked more like a complex electroniclaboratory than anything else. A half dozen operators and assistants innurses' uniforms stood by.
"If you will recline here--," Dr. Martin was saying.
Mel felt as if he were being prepared for some inhuman biologicalexperiment. A cage of terminals was fitted to his head and a thousandsmall electrodes adjusted to contact with his skull. The faint hum ofequipment supported the small surge of apprehension within him.
After half an hour the preparations were complete. The level of lightsin the room was lowered. He could sense the operators at their panelsand see dimly the figure of Dr. Martin seated near him.
"Try to recall as vividly as possible your last experience with thisnightmare you have described. We will try to lock on to that and followit on down."
This was the last thing in the world Mel wanted to do. He lay inagonized indecision, remembering that he had dreamed only a short timeago, but fighting off the actual recollection of the dream.
"Let yourself go," Dr. Martin said kindly. "Don't fight it--"
A fragment of his mind let down its guard for a brief instant. It waslike touching the surface of a whirlpool. He was sucked into thesweeping depths of the dream. He sensed that he cried out in terror ashe plunged. But there was no one to hear. He was alone in space.
Fear wrapped him like black, clammy fur. He felt the utter futility ofeven being afraid. He would simply remain as he was, and soon he wouldcease to be.
But they were coming again. He sensed, rather than saw them. Thesearchers. And his fear of them was greater than his fear of spacealone. He moved. Somehow he moved, driving headlong through greatvastness while the pinpoints of light grew behind him.
"Very satisfactory," Dr. Martin was saying. "An extremely satisfactoryprobe."
His voice came through to Mel as from beyond vast barriers of time andspace. Mel felt the thick sweat that covered his body. Weakness throbbedin his muscles.
"It gives us a very solid anchor point," Dr. Martin said. "From here Ithink we run back to the beginning of the experience and unearth thewhole thing. Are you ready, Mr. Hastings?"
Mel felt too weak to nod. "Let 'er rip!" he muttered weakly.
* * * * *
The day was warm and sunny. He and Alice had arrived early at thespaceport to enjoy the holiday excitement preceding the takeoff. It wassomething they had both dreamed of since they were kids--a vacation inthe fabulous domed cities and ruins of Mars.
Alice was awed by her first close view of the magnificent ship lying inits water berth that opened to Lake Michigan. "It's _huge_--how can suchan enormous ship ever get off the Earth?"
Mel laughed. "Let's not worry about that. We know it does. That's allthat matters." But he could not help being impressed, too, by theenormous size and the graceful lines of the luxury ship. Unlike Alice,he was not seeing it at close range for the first time. He had met theship scores of times in his reporting job, interviewing famous andwell-known personages as they departed or arrived from the fabulousplaygrounds of Mars.
"If you look carefully," Mel pointed out, "you'll see a lot of facesthat make news when they come and go."
Alice's face glowed as she clung to Mel's arm and recognized some of thefamous citizens who would be their fellow passengers. "This is going tobe the most fun we've ever had in our lives, darling."
"Like a barrel of monkeys," Mel said casually, enjoying the bubblingexcitement that was in Alice.
The ship was so completely stabilized that the passengers did not evenhave to sit down during takeoff. They crowded the ports to watch theland and the water shoot past as the ship skimmed half the length ofLake Michigan in its takeoff run. As it bore into the upper atmosphereon an ever-increasing angle of climb, its own artificial gravity systemtook over and gave the illusion of horizontal flight with the Earthreceding slowly behind.
Mel and Alice wandered through the salons and along the spacious decksas if in some fairyland-come-true. All sense of time seemed to vanishand they floated with the great ship in timeless, endless space.
He wasn't quite certain when he first became aware of his own sense ofdisquietude. It seemed to result from a change in the members of thecrew. On the morning
of the third day they ceased their universal anduninterrupted concern for their passengers' entertainment and enjoyment.
Most of the passengers seemed to have taken no note of it. Mel commentedto Alice. She laughed at him. "What do you expect? They've spent twofull days showing us the ship and teaching us to play all the gamesaboard. You don't expect them to play nurse to us during the whole trip,do you?"
It sounded reasonable. "I suppose so," said Mel dubiously. "But justwhat _are_ they doing? They all seem to be in such a hurry to getsomewhere this morning."
"Well, they must have some duties to perform in connection with runningthe ship."
Mel shook his head in doubt.
* * *
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