doctor spoke, the puzzlement turned into horror and fury.
“What Mr. Defoe means,” said Lawton, “is that totipotency—that is, the ability to regenerate lost tissues, as you can, even when entire members are involved—is full of unanswered riddles. We have found, for instance, that X-ray treatment on your leg helps a new leg to form rapidly, just as it does on the leg of the salamanders. The radiation appears to stimulate the formation of the blastema, which—well, never mind the technical part. It speeds things up.”
His eyes gleamed with scientific interest. “But we tried the experiment of irradiating limbs that had not been severed. It worked the same way, oddly enough. New limbs were generated even though the old ones were still there. That’s why the salamander in the photo has four hands on one of its limbs—nine legs altogether, counting that half-formed one just beside the tail. Curious-looking little beast, isn’t it?”
Defoe cleared his throat. “I only mention, Signore, that the standard treatment for malignancy is X-radiation.”
Zorchi’s eyes flamed—rage battling it out with terror. He said shrilly, “But you can’t make a laboratory animal out of me! I’m a policyholder!”
“Nature did it, Signore Zorchi, not us,” Defoe said.
Zorchi’s eyes rolled up in his head and closed; for a moment, I thought he had fainted and leaped forward to catch him rather than let his legless body crash to the floor. But he hadn’t fainted. He was muttering, half aloud, sick with fear, “For the love of Mary, Defoe! Please, please, I beg you! Please!”
It was too much for me. I said, shaking with rage, “Mr. Defoe, you can’t force this man to undergo experimental radiation that might make a monster out of him! I insist that you reconsider!”
Defoe threw his head back. “What, Thomas?” he snapped.
I said firmly, “He has no one here to advise him—I’ll take the job. Zorchi, listen to me! You’ve signed the treatment application and he’s right enough about that— you can’t get out of it. But you don’t have to take this treatment! Every policyholder has the right to refuse any new and unguaranteed course of treatment, no matter what the circumstances. All you’ve got to do is agree to go into suspension in the va—in the clinic here, pending such time as your condition can be infallibly cured. Do it, man! Don’t let them make you a freak—demand suspension! What have you got to lose?”
I never saw a man go so to pieces as Zorchi, when he realized how nearly Defoe had trapped him into becoming a guinea pig. Whimpering thanks to me, he hastily signed the optional agreement for suspended animation and, as quickly as I could, I left him there.
Defoe followed me. We passed the secretary in the anteroom while Dr. Lawton was explaining the circumstances to him; the man was stricken with astonishment, almost too paralyzed to sign the witnessing form Defoe had insisted on. I knew the form well—I had been about to sign one for Marianna when, at the last moment, she decided against the vaults in favor of the experimental therapy that hadn’t worked.
Outside in the hall, Defoe stopped and confronted me. I braced myself for the blast to end all blasts.
I could hardly believe my eyes. The great stone face was smiling!
“Thomas,” he said inexplicably, “that was masterful. I couldn’t have done better myself.”
Chapter Seven
We walked silently through the huge central waiting room of the clinic.
There should have been scores of relatives of suspendees milling around, seeking information—there was, I knew, still a steady shipment of suspendees coming in from the local hospitals; I had seen it myself. But there were hardly more than a dozen or so persons in sight, with a single clerk checking their forms and answering their questions.
It was too quiet. Defoe thought so, too; I saw his frown.
Now that I had had a few moments to catch my breath, I realized that I had seen a master judoist at work. It was all out of the textbooks—as a fledgling Claims Adjuster, I had had the basic courses in handling difficult cases—but not one man in a million could apply textbook rules as skillfully and successfully as Defoe did with Zorchi.
Push a man hard and he will lunge back; push him hard enough and persistently enough, and he will lunge back farther than his vision carries him, right to the position you planned for him in the first place. And I, of course, had been only a tool in Defoe’s hand; by interceding for Zorchi, I had tricked the man into the surrender Defoe wanted.
And he had complimented me for it!
I couldn’t help wondering, though, whether the compliment Defoe gave me was part of some still subtler scheme…
Defoe nodded curtly to the expediter-captain at the door, who saluted and pressed the teleswitch that summoned Defoe’s limousine.
Defoe turned to me. “I have business in Rome and must leave at once. You will have to certify Zorchi’s suspension this afternoon; since I won’t be here, you’ll have to come back to the clinic for it. After that, Thomas, you can begin your assignment.”
I said uncertainly, “What—where shall I begin?”
One eyebrow lifted a trifle. “Where? Wherever you think proper, Thomas. Or must I handle this myself?”
The proper answer, and the one I longed to make, was “Yes.” Instead I said, “Not at all, Mr. Defoe. It’s only that I didn’t even know there was an undercover group until you told me about it a few moments ago; I don’t know exactly where to start. Gogarty never mentioned—”
“Gogarty,” he cut in, “is very likely to be relieved as District Administrator before long. I should like to replace him with someone already on the scene—” he glanced at me to be sure I understood—“provided, that is, that I can find someone of proven competence. Someone who has the ability to handle this situation without the necessity of my personal intervention.”
The limousine arrived then, with an armed expediter riding beside the chauffeur. Defoe allowed me to open the door for him and follow him in.
“Do you understand me?” he asked as the driver started off.
“I think so,” I said.
“Good. I do not suppose that Gogarty has given you any information about the malcontents in this area.”
“No.”
“It may be for the best; his information is clearly not good.” Defoe stared broodingly out the window at the silent groups of men and women on the grass before the clinic. “Your information is there,” he said as they passed out of sight. “Learn what you can. Act when you know enough. And, Thomas—”
“Yes?”
“Have you given thought to your future?”
I shifted uncomfortably. “Well, I’ve only been a Claims Adjuster a little while, you know. I suppose that perhaps I might eventually get promoted, even become a District Administrator—”
He looked at me impersonally. “Dream higher,” he advised.
*
