To Ride Pegasus

To Ride Pegasus

The slick pavement, oily with rain and motor lubricants that had dripped from the hundreds of ill-repaired vehicles utilizing the major north-south artery into Jerhattan, caused the accident. Henry Darrow had not been exceeding the speed limit when he passed the old two-seater. But he had a date with destiny.

And kept it on time.

Had there been no ram that day, or had the lane been closed as scheduled for resurfacing, or had the old two-seater maintained the minimum speed in the left-hand lane, Henry Darrow would not have been exasperated enough to pass, would not have skidded on the slick paving, would not have crashed into the guard rail, would not have fractured his skull so that a bone fragment pressed against the brain pan; had the accident occurred even half a mile further up the arterial road, Henry Darrow would not have been sent to the one hospital in the area equipped with a special electro-encephalograph.

As things came to pass, this was how his accident was to occur: exactly how. In fact, he had jotted down the exact time in his astral notebook: 10:02:50 post meridian. He had also reminded himself that day not to take the arterial route back into Jerhattan but he had not foreseen one slight delay at the gasoline station which caused him to change his mind and take the fateful route, forgetful of his own prognostication.

Of course, since it was a major turning for him as well as millions of other people, he could never have avoided the accident. Which is why his subconscious-or so it is maintained-prevented him from remembering his forecast at the critical moment.

Henry Darrow was therefore injured, seriously, with minor fractures in the left leg as well as the depressed fragment of skull bone. Had Henry been fully conscious during surgery, he would have assured the surgeons that, despite the severity of the wound, he would live. They would have been dubious. Henry Darrow knew when he was going to die-from myocardial infarction, some fifteen years, four months, and nine days in the future.

He couldn’t tell them since the cranial pressure affected his speech center and he was mercifully unaware of his surroundings. Brain surgery can be a harrowing experience.

The operation was technically successful and Henry was assigned a bed in the intensive care ward, cardiac and encephalographic monitors keeping close track of his vital systems. The Southside General Hospital boasted the very latest technology, including one of the ultra-sensitive electroencephalographs, familiarly known as “Gooseggs.” The Goosegg equipment was developed during the

Apollo flights in the 70s, to monitor the effects of the mysterious “lights” which periodically afflicted the astronauts, and to record any suspected damage by cosmic radiation to the brain tissue. The ultra sensitive equipment was primarily used now in hospitals to detect brain damage to newborn infants suffering oxygen starvation during birth, or, as in Henry Darrow’s case, brain injuries where similar oxygen deprivation, bleeding, and pressure must be ascertained.

The intensive care nurse on duty when Darrow regained his sense after surgery was, as Destiny preordained, Molly Mahony, a rather plain girl who good-naturedly bore a lot of teasing from her colleagues for her avowed dedication to nursing. She was invariably assigned the critical cases because she had a knack of pulling them through the crises. “Dr. Scherman, would you look at the printout on

Mr. Darrow’s EEG?” she said when the resident checked in at her station. “The alphas are unusually strong for a man as critically injured as he, aren’t they?”

Scherman looked obediently at the graphs, nodded sagely and then gave her a wink. “He been conscious at all? Giving you a line?”

Molly shook her head, very serious though she knew he was teasing her. Scherman always did. “He’s not regained consciousness. Dr. Scherman. I’m to notify Dr.

Wahlman when he does. But should I give him a ring about these readings?”

“Ah, don’t bother, Molly. That one’s lucky he can print anything out on the Goosegg. You’d’ve thought he’d’ve known better.”

“Better? About what? He was an accident casualty, wasn’t he?”

“Better about going out at all. He’s Henry Darrow, the astrologer. Christ, it costs a fortune to consult him about your future.” Scherman snorted. “And he couldn’t cast his own properly.”

Scherman left after a cursory glance at the other i.e. patients. Molly Mahony looked with renewed interest at the brain injury. She knew of Henry Darrow, though she wouldn’t have admitted it to many. No more than she would have admitted to anyone that she felt she had the gift of healing. Unlike her grandmother who’d had no medical background and ran into problems with her “healing hands,” Molly had professional cachet and knew best how and when to apply her “whammy.”

Having a unique talent. Molly was keenly interested in all the paranormal manifestations. In her lexicon, the astrologist merely used the signs of the zodiac to focus a precognitive gift, one fortunately more scientifically based than tea-leaf reading or card-telling. Just as the nursing profession allowed her to focus her healing talent on a scientific basis. So she knew of Henry

Darrow and now tiptoed, like an awed sycophant, to the bedside and stared down at a face she hadn’t noticed before.

His face had character even in lax-jawed abnormal coma. The eye-sockets were black and blue pits, and here and there a trace of blood had escaped the emergency clean-up. It was unfair of her to look at him in such a condition. She laid the back of her hand gently against his cheek, not liking the color of his skin. She flicked back the sheet, took a fold of the pectoral skin, and gave it a brutal twist. Well, at least he had reactions. She patted the sheet into place and stroked his cheek again.

The cardiograph pulsed slow but regular, though there were traces in the reading that spelled the beginnings of arteriosclerosis. No more than would be apparent in any reading of a forty-two-year-old heart which had lived well and hard.

Now she placed strong, slender fingers on his temples, pressing lightly, trying to “feel” where the real injury was. Not that which the surgeons had corrected when they removed the splinter and released the pressure on the brain. But the psychic injury, the essential blow to the vitalities of the man, which had been shocked by the proximity of death, by the exigency of the operation-that ultimate violation of personal integrity.

So often in her reading of case histories, she’d seen the simple term “heart failure,” or the more complex medical annotation of heart stoppage for a variety of physically inexplicable and unnecessary reasons. Shock, they would term it for lack of better explanation, “the patient died of shock.” Fright, Molly called it. When a patient of hers retreated from reality in this sort of fright,

Molly would draw that violated integrity back again with her Talent.

The response to her healing touch on Henry Darrow’s brow was different and puzzling. The cardiogram etched bolder, stronger peaks and the Goosegg made frantic passes on all four recording bands.

Henry Darrow’s eyelids flickered, opened, and a faint smile crossed his lips.

“What the hell hit me?” he asked.

“You hit you,” Molly replied, “on the center post of your car when you crashed into the guard rails, Mr. Darrow. Head ache?”

“Christ yes!” He moaned and tried to reach upward.

“Don’t. You’ve suffered a severe concussion, head lacerations, your left leg is fractured…”

There was mischief in the clear green eyes that met Molly’s. “You’re not supposed to tell me such things, are you?”

Molly smiled. “You know anyhow. And you really ought to pay more attention to your own predictions, Mr. Darrow.”

The Goosegg chattered crazily and Molly whirled to see what was happening. But Henry Darrow was grabbing her arm, his eyes widening with bewildered surprise and incredulity.

“You’re a Gemini. What’s your name? You’re going to marry me.”

Love at first sight is a rare enough incident, particularly in a hospital setting, despite what the romances say. But far rarer was the scientific accident that proved a long suspected truth. For what had registered on the

Goosegg’s chart was indisputable proof that the parapsychic talent exists. Henry

Darrow had a precognitive experience when he looked at Molly Mahony as a person, not just the nurse in attendance, and “knew” she would be his wife.

They did marry, as soon as his leg was out of the cast. Marriage was not the only thing Henry foresaw for Molly: he knew, too, her date of death, a fact he never disclosed to her. Talents, he learned very shortly, had to discount such precogs in their own lives if they were to operate efficiently for others. Molly was treasured, loved and cherished all the days of her life by her husband because he knew how little of her time he would enjoy.

The significance of the Goosegg’s remarkable activity did not immediately impinge on Henry’s awareness. To Molly Mahony belongs all the credit, therefore, for lifting the parapsychic function from the realm of chicanery to science.

For starters, Molly was fascinated with the unusual strength and pattern of Henry’s EEG charts. She couldn’t dismiss, as Dr. Scherman had, the variations. In her favor was a natural inclination to place Henry Darrow’s mind into an exceptional category. Added to that, she knew Henry’d had the precognition of their marriage at the precise moment the Goosegg went wild. At the very first opportunity she tried an empiric experiment. She attached the electrodes to her own skull the next time she had occasion to exert her own ability in the intensive care ward. A similar variation occurred in her reading; not as intense as Henry’s, but significant. She took several more of herself, and copied those portions of Henry’s records which showed this curious excitation.

She was rather surprised that Dr. Wahlman, Henry’s surgeon, did not cancel the Goosegg monitoring when Henry appeared to have recovered from the worst of the concussion. She wondered if Wahlman was as interested in the EEG variation as she was.

Henry had two more precognitive incidents before she felt she could approach Dr. Wahlman with her private conclusions.

“For my own information, Dr. Wahlman, what is the significance of this activity in an EEG?”

“Well, now,” said Wahlman, taking the graphs diffidently and studying them in a manner which told Molly that he hadn’t a clue. “To be frank, Mahony, I don’t know. This particular sort of print-out usually occurs just prior to death. And Darrow’s very much alive.” The surgeon looked towards Henry’s closed door with some irritation. Henry had insisted on pursuing his avocation of charting horoscopes, had even imported his computer, embarking on a cerebral activity which apparently had no deleterious effects on his rapid recovery but did not strike Wahlman as exactly the sort of occupation suitable to a man recovering from a near-fatal head injury.

“And these?” Molly showed him her own graphs.

“Whose are these? A terminal reading? No, couldn’t be. The alpha’s too intense.

What are you up to, Mahony?”

“I’m not certain, doctor, but I do know that when Mr. Darrow is…hardest at work, that’s when this sort of variation occurs.”

“Jesus help us, the damned Goosegg’s queer for astrology?”

Molly smiled and apologized for bothering the surgeon with anomalies.

“Mahony, if you weren’t the best post-operative nurse we have, I’d tell you to bug off. But if you have any idea, any unreasonable idea, why that kind of reading occurs, would you please let me in on the secret?”

She let Henry in first.

“The moment you woke up after your accident and asked was I Gemini and then said I was going to marry you, was that a precog?”

“Fact, my love-fact!”

“No, Henry, stop that now. Later. Answer me. Was your precognitive faculty at work?”

“Violently.” The modified bandage on his head gave him a slightly rakish look but he stopped caressing her, responding to her serious mood.

“And, for instance, when Mrs. Rellahan was here, you told me that you had an intense prevision…:”

“Hmmmm.” Henry’s mouth tightened slightly with dislike.

“This is what the Goosegg printed out. See, here the rapid needle, strong strokes, the length of the pattern…And, in these…”

“That’s not my pattern, too, is it? Quite a difference.”

“No, that’s my brain waves. And this is what happens when I’m healing.”

Henry looked slowly up at Molly, an incredulous joy brightening his eyes, a light suffusing his face that rewarded Molly for her efforts and intuition.

“Molly, my own heart’s darling, do you know what we have here?”

The world in general remained skeptical. Fortunately Henry Darrow cared very little for the world’s thoughts but he was able to produce proof to a powerful, wealthy few that the parapsychic faculty existed in certain individuals and could be manifested at will.

A whole new line of research was instigated by those private persons and concerns which had long hoped for scientific recognition of the paranormal abilities.

“I’ve always had a presentiment of Destiny, of being on the threshold of some vast important breakthrough,” Henry told Molly during the early hectic days shortly before they formed the first Parapsychic Center. “Most megalomaniacs do, too, and your psychotic paranoids like Nero, Napoleon, Hitler and Kyudu. That’s why I had that team of psychiatrists examine my mental health with fine Freudian tongs. Nonetheless it’s a prejudicial admission. D’you know, I’ve been afraid to forecast my own future too far in advance now? Some details are unwise for any man to know…” He looked with unfocused eyes at the blank wall in front of them for a moment before he smiled reassuringly at her. “I’ve been a dilettante up till now and my critics can say either that I gained my wits in that accident, or lost the few I had, but that event was the threshold of my…of our destiny.”

“Damn the torpedoes and full steam ahead,” Molly replied, gesturing theatrically.

“And torpedoes there will be,” Henry agreed grimly.

“I thought you said you didn’t see far in advance…”

“For myself, I meant. Not for what we must do.” He was silent again for a moment. “God, it’s going to be fun.”

Molly looked at the amusement in his eyes, the anticipatory gleam of malice.

“For whom?” she asked.

His eyes sparkled as he turned his gaze back to her.

“For us,” he said, hugging her affectionately, “for all of us,” and he meant the newly recruited Talents. “We may perceive the outcome, but half the fun, most of the fun in life, is getting there. And I’ve got just enough time.”

As soon as he was sufficiently recovered to argue with his surgeons (and because

Molly assured Wahlman that Henry couldn’t get around her vigilance), he was allowed to go back to work full time. Not, as previously, in his capacity as a dilettante astrologer, but as the manager, organizer, fund-raiser, and recruiter par excellence for the Parapsychic Center.

“Mary-Molly luv, it’s going to be accomplished in steps, this establishment of the Talented in the scheme of things. Not society, mind you, for we’re the original nonconformists,” and he tapped his forehead just below the pink flesh of the newly healed head wound. “And Society will never permit us to integrate.

That’s okay!” He consigned Society to insignificance with a flick of his fingers. “The Talented form their own society and that’s as it should be: birds of a feather. No, not birds. Winged horses! Ha! Yes, indeed. Pegasus…the poetic winged horse of flights of fancy. A bloody good symbol for us. You’d see a lot from the back of a winged horse…”

“Yes, an airplane has blind spots. Where would you put a saddle?” Molly had her practical side.

He laughed and hugged her. Henry’s frequent demonstrations of affection were a source of great delight to Molly, whose own strength was in tactile contacts.

“Don’t know. Lord, how would you bridle a winged horse?”

“With the heart?”

“Indubitably!” The notion pleased him. “Yes, with the heart and the head because Pegasus is too strong a steed to control or subdue by any ordinary method.”

“You couldn’t break our sort of Pegasus anyhow,” Molly said firmly. “Wouldn’t want to even when he flies so high…” She burrowed into Henry’s arms, suddenly frightened by the analogy.

“Yes, luv. When you ride the winged horse, you can’t dismount. Anymore than you can suppress the Talent you’ve been given. We’ll find our bridle, I think, with time and training and more practice at riding.

“That Goosegg was the really important break. Now we can prove parapsychic powers exist and who has them. We can discredit the charlatans and clowns who’ve given the rest of us a bad name. The real Talents will be registered with the

Center, and we’ll have graphs to prove they’ve had valid Incidents. The Center will supply them with the specialized jobs that utilize their Talents. From just a sampling of validly Talented people we’ve already attracted, I can think of hundreds of top jobs.”

“Even Titter Beyley and Charity McGillicuddy?” Molly Mahony Darrow’s eyes danced with mischief because Titter drank continuously and Charity pursued an old profession diligently.

“Takes a thief to catch a thief and Titter’s been stealing for years to support his habit. Remember that Charity’s heart of gold beats in a true telepath’s breast.”

“Size 42-C.”

“Molly!”

“Go on with our future, Henry.”

“I want Watson Claire as our PR man because I know damned well he’s a receiving telepath: he must be to handle clients the way he does. He’s got a positive genius for presenting the campaign a client’ll buy. Claire’s the sort of person we’ve got to enlist, for his sake as well as ours. Ours, because we’ve got the biggest goddamn public relations program on our hands, and the public can make or break us. His sake, because he’s not happy pushing products he despises.”

Molly nodded sympathetically.

“We get an intensive information program going and that will help recruiting.

Then we’ve got to start rescue operations for those hidden Talents and especially those poor misfits in institutions because they heard voices…which they did…or they imagined impossible things, which they didn’t. Or their empathy with the world around them was too great to be endured and they abandoned reality. And we’ve got to figure out the best way to train these

Talents once we’ve got them verified.

“Then we’ve got to get exactly the right place to live in.”

“To live? But this apartment is…”

“Okay for us, for the time being. But not for the rest of us. No, now don’t worry, Molly luv. I know where we’re going.”

Molly regarded him steadily for a second. “But you don’t know exactly how we’ll get there, is that it?”

Henry laughed, nodding.

“That’s the challenge, luv.”

“And then what’s on the agenda? I’d better know the worst.”

Henry chuckled to give himself time to evade. “Then comes one of the harder jobs…”

Molly’s eyes grew round. “You’ve outlined a lifetime’s work and then tell me one of the harder jobs…”

“Will be to establish professional immunity for the Talents so we don’t get sued out of our eyeball sockets because we said something would happen which didn’t because we said it would. Oh, we’ll get it sooner or later, but I’d rather sooner than later when you consider the money that’ll be tied up in suits. But that won’t be my headache.”

“It won’t be?”

“I can’t live forever, luv.”

She clung to him and he gave her only a quick embrace.

“I’ll live long enough, Mary-Molly luv, and so will you.” He put her away from him then, for he had to keep his desire in check with the pressures of his destiny.

“Now, gentlemen, the subject all wired up to the electroencephalograph, familiarly known as the Goosegg, is a telekinetic Talent. That means, gentleman, that he can move objects without any other agency than his mind. Ralph, would you be good enough to demonstrate?”

Ralph, who used to be known as Rat Wilson, was not the most prepossessing of individuals, being skinny to the point of emaciation, with a rodent-like face and a mouth that remained slightly open due to untended tonsils and adenoids; but his rather large grey eyes were dancing with mischief and interest. That he had perfected his art in the variety of correctional institutions which had attempted to remold him to society’s requirements was irrelevant-now.

He sat under the electrode net of the Goosegg at one end of a large hall, a small TV camera throwing a picture of the print-out on the big screen above him.

Forty-seven scientists and businessmen were seated around the room, in the center of which sat a table with a variety of objects: a hammer, nails and a plank of wood; a coffee tray with an urn, cups, cream and sugar; a guitar; and a training set of waldoes, limp and grotesque without hands to fill the gloves.

Henry Darrow walked to the other end of the room, as far from both Ralph and the table as possible.

There was a significant silence in the room, with the audience casting glances from table to Ralph to Henry. Suddenly a cup rattled, rose, was joined to a saucer and aligned itself under the spout of the urn which was tapped almost simultaneously to pour coffee into the cup. Belatedly, a spoon clattered into the saucer.

“Who takes it black?” asked Ralph as cup and saucer veered to the nearest watchers.

“I do,” said one cool businessman, lifting his hand.

“Hang on to it then, mac,” replied Ralph. “Got it?”

“Hey!” The man closed his fingers around the lip of the saucer but when Ralph released it, he was unprepared and the black coffee sloshed over the saucer rim onto his hand.

There was a slight wave of amusement, shattered by the crash of a hammer driving a nail into a block of wood.

“I’ll make the next one white. Who’s for it?”

A second cup was delivered to its receiver as the hammer drove the nail smartly into the wood. At the same tune, the waldoes jerked alive and began to assemble the objects in the tray. The guitar twanged with a bawdy ballad.

With cups sailing around the room, the crack of the hammer to the tempo of the song, the industry of the waldoes leaving everyone gaping, Henry returned to the stage, taking a pointer and starting the sales pitch.

“As you will notice, if you can take your eyes from the flying saucers, Ralph’s use of his Talent results in the hard variations of the alpha waves, here and here. The beta fluctuation is rapid, deep. Note the difference at the beginning of the graph before Ralph started. Notice the increase as he stepped up the output of the parapsychic faculty. Has anyone any doubts about the authenticity of this demonstration? Will you accept this print-out as valid, and that the graph represents Ralph’s paranormal ability?”

“Stop him!”

Henry signalled to Ralph and coffee cups crashed to the floor. The hammer bounced and fell to the table and the waldoes went limp to a discordant twang on the guitar.

“For chrissake,” and the man on whom a cup of coffee had fallen sprang to his feet, wiping at soaked pants and dancing from the hot bath. Instantly the cup righted itself and incredibly refilled with the just-emptied coffee.

“Sorry about that, mac, but someone said stop!”

The abrupt surcease of the parapsychic was recorded on the graph, as was the minor activity of mopping up the spill.

“Hey, my pants are dry!”

“Are there any other questions?” asked Henry, winking surreptitiously to the grinning Ralph.

“Yes,” and a heavy set man towards the rear of the room stood slowly to his feet. “Coffee vending machines handle this sort of service, an idiot can drive a nail; granted a waldo is used for delicate sterile operations, any long hair plays guitar…not all at once, admittedly, but how would someone like Ralph be employed? And incidentally, I know his background.”

“You might say.” Henry said with a smile, “that Ralph is a real product of his background of reform school and correctional institution. That’s how he acquired his Talent. Society wasn’t ready for Ralph or his Talent. We are.

“We’ve demonstrated here that Ralph can do a variety of things simultaneously: tasks requiring multiple action such as assembling coffee implements and teleporting them to the proper destination, as well as exercises requiring a certain strength and/or precision.

“However, Ralph has a limited range. We’ve duplicated today’s fun and games over a distance of half a mile, but not further with any precision or strength. Ralph is not a superman. That’s the first point I wish to impress on you. He has a

Talent but it’s a finite one, suitable for certain, rather limited use. He would be a profitable investment for someone like yourself. Mr. Gregory, for precision assembly under vacuum, sterile or radiation conditions.

“I don’t say that Ralph is a totally reformed character at all,” and Henry grinned at Ralph, “but he is now able to purchase legally the things he used to heist. He is subject, and he knows it, to the mental examination of a strong telepath. He also thoroughly enjoys his present occupation.”

“You bet, mac.” And the scathing look Ralph bent on the audience left no doubts that the little man delighted in disconcerting the men of distinction, rank and position.

“If you can’t cure ‘em, recruit ‘em,” Henry added.

“Are you implying, Mr. Darrow, that half the population of jails and mental institutions are peopled by your misunderstood parapsychics?”

“Not at all. I admit we’re testing many so-called misfits to see if thwarted or yes, misunderstood, paranormal Talents are not partly responsible for their maladjustment. But that does not mean they are all graduates of institutions.

“Talent, gentlemen, can include something as simple as being a born mechanic.

We’ve all known or heard of the guy who just listens to the sound of an engine and knows what’s wrong with it. Or the plumber who can dowse the exact location of a break in water pipes. Or the pyromaniac who “knows” when and where a fire will break out and has so often been accused of starting it; the woman whose hands ease a fever or soothe a pain, the worker who knows instinctively what the boss needs, the person who can always find what’s been mislaid or lost. These are everyday, but valid, evidences of the parapsychic Talent. These are the people we want to include in our Centers-not just the more dramatic mind-readers and clairvoyants. The Talented are rarely supermen and women, just people who operate on a different wavelength. Employ them in the proper capacity and utilize their Talents to your advantage.”

“Besides money, what do you want from us, Darrow?”

“Doctor Abbey, isn’t it? From you and your colleagues all over the world, I want the public admission that Talent has left the tearoom and entered the laboratory. We have scientific evidence that the parapsychic faculty exists and can be used, at will, with predictable result. Science, gentlemen, by definition, is any skill that reflects a precise application of principles. The principle in Ralph’s case is moving objects without artificial aid.”

“I might buy the teleportation, Darrow,” replied Doctor Abbey, slightly contemptuous, “but go back to the tearoom a minute. Give me an example of the science behind precognition.”

“I knew you’d ask that, Doctor Abbey. And I predict that you will receive a favorable answer to your latest inquiry into the problem-“ Henry raised his hand to suppress Abbey’s exclamation, “I’m discreet enough, Doctor Abbey-into the problem you’re investigating with Doctors Schwarz,

Vosogin and Clasmire. That, Doctor Abbey, is predictable, scientific and accurate enough-since your correspondence with the three men is a closely guarded secret-to be convincing. Right?

From the stunned expression on Dr. Abbey’s face as he sank into his chair, Darrow knew he was right and Abbey was convinced.

“Now,” Henry asked the audience in general, “all of you have had problems which I believe some of our Talents can solve. What am I offered?”

“Why, after fourteen years and nine rent increases-which I didn’t protest by the way-will you not renew my lease?”

“Mister Darrow, I’ve been told that your lease is not renewable and that’s what I’ve been told to tell you.”

“How come the ‘Mister Darrow,’ Frank? Now look, I’ve paid my rent right on the button for fourteen years. I’ve had no more than legitimate redecorating, why am

I not able to renew my lease?” Henry knew the problem, had foreseen this situation, but he was human enough to like to see people squirm. Particularly if it might let in a little wisdom and understanding of Talent.

Frank Hummel looked very uncomfortable.

“C’mon, Frank. You know. Don’t try to kid me you don’t.”

Frank looked up with a miserable expression in his eyes. “And that’s it, Hank.

That’s just it. You do know. You know too goddamned much and the other tenants are scared.”

Henry threw back his head and roared with laughter. “No one’s conscience is clear? My God, Frank, do they really think I know or care, for that matter, about their petty intrigues and affairs?” Then he saw he’d offended Frank and wished he were a telepath, not a precog. “Frank, I ‘see’ no more than I did when I used astrology to focus my

Talent. No one was afraid of me when I was just a star-gazer.”

Frank did squirm at Henry’s choice of phrase because that’s how the man thought of Henry.

“I can’t read minds,” Henry went on, “and come to that, Frank, I don’t really know what’s going on under my nose. My Talent is not for individuals: it’s for mass futures. Oh, yes, important individuals who will affect the lives of millions. But not if Mrs. Walters in 4-C is going to have a baby…not unless I have cast her individual horoscope…and she’s too scared of her husband to come to me for that.” Henry sighed for even that piece of common sense insight was now being misconstrued by the apprehensive real estate agent.

“Look, everyone in the building knows Walters’s opinion of me, and how scared she is of him. That takes no Talent at all, Frank. And it takes no Talent either to know that Walters is probably one of the prime instigators in getting me evicted.”

“You’re not being evicted, Mr. Darrow.”

“Oh no?”

“No! It’s just that your lease is not being renewed.”

“How much of an extension can I have to find new quarters? You know how tight the housing situation is in Jerhattan.”

Frank looked everywhere but at Henry.

“Frank…Frank? Frank, look at me,” and reluctantly, hesitantly, the man obeyed. “Frank, you’ve known me for fourteen years. Why, suddenly, are you afraid of me?” Henry knew the answer but he wanted Frank to admit it. One man, one Frank Hummel, wouldn’t change the struggle of the Talented for acceptance but it might change one other mind now, three next week. Every ally was valuable. And to have allies one had to admit to enemies.

“It’s just that…that…hell, you’re not a star-gazer anymore, Mister

Darrow. You’re for real.” The apprehension in Frank Hummel’s face was equally real.

“Frank, thank you. This isn’t easy for you and I will make it less easy but I want you to remember fourteen years of a very pleasant relationship. I knew you’d be here today. I knew it four months ago when Molly and I had that series of graffiti painted on the door and the so-called burglary attempts. I’ve a lease on new quarters. We’re moving tomorrow.”

Frank already had too much to think about “You mean, you knew? Already? But I just got the orders yesterday and you told me that you didn’t see individual…and you’re-“

“I’m not lying about what I can see, Frank, but I’d certainly better see what affects myself, or a fine star-gazer I’d be. Right?”

Hummel was slowly backing out of the apartment, less and less convinced. Once again Henry wished he were a telepath-or at least empathic-and could know what was running through Frank’s mind and counter it.

“Do me one favor, Frank,” Henry said. “On the 18^th of next month, in the fourth race at Belmont, bet every credit you’ve been saving on a horse named Mibimi.

Only don’t place your bet until the last minute before the race. Will you do that for me? And then when Mibimi wins, remember Talent is useful.”

Frank had retreated to the elevator and Henry wondered if the confused man had taken in his tip. He didn’t often give them but for a friend you can do a favor…if it’ll cement his friendship.

Henry shrugged as he closed the door. The scene just played in his living room had been repeated over and over, with acknowledged Talents as reluctant dramatis personae.

Just another of those paradoxes which assailed them from all sides now that

Talent was respectable. By removing the onus of haphazard performance, by having

Talents registered with the Center, they could contract for premium wages. But suddenly the Talents were also elevated into the genus “pariah,” found themselves untouchables, unwelcome and feared, all through misunderstanding.

Watson Claire was mounting a massive soft-sell public information program, abetted by his contacts in the media profession who were delighted at something newsworthy. Judiciously applied blackmail kept the worst newsmongers at bay. But it would take time, Claire said (and Henry understood), for the program to seep down to the level where it was most required…in the housing developments which were now ousting anyone suspected of possessing Talent.

Well, the immense warehouse Henry had leased in the dock area would suffice until he’d figured out how to appeal to George Henner. That financial wizard had an accounting to make and Henry was vastly amused by recent findings. It was going to be fun watching Henner’s reactions.

He picked up the comunit to call the warehouse: the shielding had been in place a week ago so there had been just the finishing of the living quarters. Maybe he should have used telekinetics to move his furnishings? No, that would be a bad scene, however personally satisfying it might be. Some things even Talents had better do the usual way.

“My name is Henry Darrow, Commissioner Mailer. This is my wife, Molly; Barbara

Holland is our finder, and Jerry comes along to lug the Goosegg. I believe this is your list of most wanteds?”

“Just what is this?” The Commissioner for Law Enforcement and Order had risen in indignation from his paper-free desk. “My appointment was with James Marshall, not you, Darrow.”

“I know. Jim got it for us because you’ve refused to see…”

“A bunch of tearoom crackpots!”

“Well, we’re here and you’re going to listen…”

“Not if I have any say…” The Commissioner was fumbling with his desk set and swore when the telltale lights did not wink on at his touch.

“It won’t work, Commissioner Mailer,” Henry told him. “I forgot to mention that Jerry’s telekinetic and keeps closing the switches as soon as you press. Sorry. You’re incommunicado until you listen. And watch. Barbara, if you would, please?

Here’s the list. Just sit here. Ready, Molly?”

The Commissioner’s raging did him no good since his office was soundproofed. He continued to fumble futilely with his comunit, unable to believe that it wouldn’t function because some nondescript young man stared at it. He didn’t notice that Molly was quietly placing the electrode net on Barbara’s head. The girl adjusted it into the scalped spots in her hair and nodded to Henry.

“I gather these are in order of preference?” Henry asked the Commissioner. Henry perched on the desk, unperturbed by the Commissioner’s belligerence and profanity.

“Preference? What’n hell are you talking about, Darrow? Get your circus out of here. This is a law enforcement and order…”

“Neither of which you are able to maintain with the current restrictions on your men,” said Henry, interrupting with such a forceful tone that the Commissioner’s sputtering died and he stared at Darrow in amazement. Few people had addressed the LEO man in that tone of voice. “That’s why I’m here, to render assistance you can’t get from any other agency. Now sit down, shut up, and listen. Who do you want us to find for you first?”

“Find?”

“Find!”

The two men locked eyes and there was a quality in Henry’s that wrought a sudden change in the Commissioner.

“All right,” Mailer said in a tight hard voice, “find me the man they call Joe Blow.”

“The Joy Pill man?”

“That’s him.”

Henry flicked out the second IBM card and handed it to Barbara Holland.

“Enough for you, Babs?”

The girl studied the sketch drawn by police artists from verbal descriptions of victims of the elusive Joe Blow. She read the notations on his most frequented locations, his general modus operandi. Then she looked up at Henry with a grin.

“This isn’t a really fair test, Henry,” she said.

“Ha!” exclaimed the Commissioner, an unholy delight in his eyes.

“No,” said Barbara, “because I’ve encountered him so it’s easy to track him down.” She closed her eyes, clasping the card between her hands. The needles on the Goosegg began to whip across the graph paper. Her smile widened and she opened her eyes. “He’s on the corner of 4^th Avenue New East and 197^th Street.

He’s wearing a long blue duty mac, with waterproofed shoulders, and a long blond wig. No moustaches today. He’s carrying nothing illegal but he has a great deal of money on him and some folded papers.”

The Commissioner was fumbling with his comunit. “For God’s sake release it or whatever. I’ve got to get…”

“Why?” asked Barbara. “You want him with dust or acid or the Brown Joy, don’t you?”

“I want him in any way.”

“Can you charge him?”

“I’ve only got to get him…”

Suddenly the comunit came alive on every previously pressed band, but the Commissioner got it sorted out and had a squad vehicle dispatched to the coordinates, to apprehend a man answering Barbara’s description. Then he turned back, smiling sourly at the four people. “We’ll see what we’ll see. If such a man is there, we’ll have him in three minutes. My people are quick and efficient.”

“So are mine,” said Henry and looked expectantly at Barbara, who nodded.

“What’s that all about?” demanded the Commissioner.

“I’m keeping track of him,” Barbara replied, and suddenly the third band began to show activity.

“That is the Goosegg at work, Commissioner Mailer,” said Henry.

“Are you reading my mind?” Mailer looked alarmed and angrier.

“Not at all,” Henry replied. “I’m not a telepath. I’m a tea leaf reader on a grandiose scale…”

The Commissioner pursed his lips to hear his own description of Henry Darrow thrown back at him.

“All right, then, tell me now if my men’ll succeed?”

“Barbara can tell you better than I. I don’t deal generally with individuals. My specialty is mass movement. But Barbara can find Joe Blow for you now and any time you want to check on his whereabouts…”

“They have him,” Barbara said, and held out her hand for another card.

The Commissioner stared at her suspiciously.

“Oh, let’s let his men tell him, Babs.”

She shrugged and settled back in her chair. Then brightened and smiled sweetly at Mailer. “You left your pipe in your ski jacket, Commissioner, the blue one which you don’t usually wear. If you call home right now, you’ll find your wife there. And remind her the coat is under your red dressing robe in the first closet.”

Mailer regarded her with narrowed eyes. “I thought you said you weren’t a mind reader.”

“I never said that,” Barbara replied, then pointed to Henry. “He did. And I can only get impressions of lost articles. You did lose the pipe and were just now thinking where had you put it. And the only reason I know about your wife is because you say you can never find her when you need her.” Barbara kept her face very straight but Henry knew her to be possessed of a sense of devilment, very much in evidence under that air of innocent helpfulness.

This “finding” was making far more impression on the Commissioner than her location of Joe Blow.

The comunit buzzed.

“They picked up a man, answering that description. What do they do with him?

He’s demanding rights.”

Mailer was unprepared for only one moment. “Search him. There’s been a local robbery and a man answering his description was seen nearby. You’re supposed to find a wad of credits and papers. Invoke citizen search prerogative.”

“He’s carrying roughly 8000 credits, sir,” said Barbara.

“The heist was 8000.”

There was a second long tense silence.

“He’s got it, sir.”

“Book him!”

The fleeting expressions on Mailer’s face now told of intense mental conflict.

He was a man to whom a miracle had been offered and he was too scared to accept it.

“Barbara is parapsychic, Commissioner. We brought Goosegg in to prove to you on a scientific basis as reliable as ballistics, without a tea leaf in sight, that her mind generates a specific type of electrical impulse when she uses her parapsychic Talent. She can’t read your mind except when you, or anyone, are worrying about something lost, strayed or stolen…”

“Stolen-“ The Commissioner pounced on the word.

“If you mean that hijacked shipment of crowd gas, Commissioner,” said Barbara, “it’s in a warehouse, with a southside feel. It’s very dark inside, which hampers me: I can’t see in shadows. I can make out some white airfreight containers, they’ve a plastic feel, rather than wood or steel. There’s a geometric design in dark paint in the lower left hand side.” She frowned and the

Goosegg chattered rapidly for a moment and then toned down to a mild, normal swing. “I’m sorry. There simply isn’t enough light there.”

The Commissioner snorted but her information had obviously given him something to work on. “South side…air freight…white…” His fist slapped down an end key. “Jack…what air freight companies use white containers with geometric designs in lower left hand…Oh, they do. Now, what air freight companies use southside depots…Oh. Hmmm. Well, check your contacts like right now.” He turned a cold dispassionate look on Barbara. “You can’t be more specific?”

Barbara gave Henry a quick glance before answering. “I’ve already narrowed the search to a small section of the city with as many specifics as I can see. There can’t be that many warehouses for air freight! I’ve done more than you’ve been able to, Mr. Mailer.”

“Now, just a minute, young lady…”

“You’ve had more than a minute, Commissioner, and my time is valuable.” Barbara was on her feet, the electrode net in her hand. “We’re wasting time with this one, Henry. And I don’t like him. Miserable vibes from him, just miserable!”

She left the room. Molly quietly began to pack up the Goosegg while the Commissioner stared first at the open door and then at Henry.

“She operates more efficiently with an occasional word or two of thanks, Mailer.

Most people do.” Henry gathered Molly into the curve of his arm, motioned courteously to Jerry to take the Goosegg and wishing Mailer a pleasant good-day, left.

“Hey, just a minute…”

Henry turned at the door. “As Babs said, Mailer, you’ve had more than a minute and our time is valuable.”

“Does Charity have to be sedated again, Gus?” Henry asked the Center’s physician. “We’ve got her a temporary contract to find out the troublemaker in the Arrow Shirt Company.”

Gus ducked his head, his face twisted into a grimace, wanting to say no and having to say yes. He leaned against the now flagged door to Charity McGillicuddy’s two roomed accommodation on the living floor of the Center’s warehouse building.

“Even with the shielding we’ve got, Hank, it’s not enough privacy for the empaths and telepaths. Not enough physical distance. No way to get out and away from ourselves, if you get what I mean. We’re sort of all crammed into this warren despite the conveniences and amenities. You might say, it’s too much of a good thing…too close a buddy-buddy act. Like an overdose of euphorics..Everyone’s high here on sheer good fellowship. And it’s much too much for Charity.”

Henry looked towards the corridor window with the projection of sunlight on the grass, a huge spreading beech tree, russet against an autumnally blue sky.

Though it was so realistic that the leaves moved gently and the angle of sunlight altered slowly, Henry knew it to be only a projection and his mind would not accept the fantasy that deluded millions of warren dwellers.

“Talent requires certain realities not obtainable in this age,” Gus went on.

“And one of the most important is physical freedom and elbow room.” He snorted, aware of the impossibility of fulfilling that requirement in Jerhattan’s overcrowded boundaries.

“We’ve been offered that old game preserve in…”

“Too goddamned far to commute and most of us gotta.” Molnar was head neurologist at the Midtown Hospital Center although he spent more time as the Center’s physician.

“Okay,” Henry said, “I’ll do what I can.”

“Henry?” Gus eyed his friend suspiciously. “What are you up to now?”

“Me? Nothing.” Then Henry Darrow assumed a crouched stance and rubbed his hands together, chuckling evilly. “But Destiny…haha HA! I know when we twain shall meet. Soon!”

Gus rolled his eyes heavenward to deal with Henry Darrow in this whimsical mood.

“Oh, don’t worry, Gus,” Henry said in a normal voice. “I usually call ‘em, you know.”

Gus nodded sourly.

“Content yourself,” Henry continued, “with the enticing thoughts of dissecting my brain when I die, and trying to figure out just how I do it.”

“Ha!”

“You can’t subpoena Barbara Holland, not on those grounds, Commissioner Mailer,” Henry Darrow said. “But you can hire her services from the Center…”

“What Center?” demanded Mailer, looking scornfully around the minuscule space that served as Henry’s office.

“The Center we’ll shortly acquire with the wages you’ll be paying Talents like Barbara, and Titter Beyley and Gil Gracie and…”

“Titter Beyley?” The Commissioner hovered on the verge of apoplexy.

“Yes, Titter. He drank to stop finding things. Alcohol affects the parapsychic faculty, sometimes it inhibits, as in Titter’s case; sometimes it sharpens.”

“Now, just a minute, Darrow…”

“My minutes are valuable, Mailer. I only have so many. You want things and people found: Barbara has that faculty and so does Titter Beyley. Actually

Titter’s much better for inanimate objects than Barbara. He doesn’t like people.

And the day you find out he’s been drunk on duty, then complain.”

“And you mean to stand there, young man, and tell me that I’m going to get shot at Saturday? Again!” Governor Lawson tipped his chair back and roared with laughter: an exercise he broke off abruptly to glare with an intensity akin to hatred at Darrow and the wraith-like Steve Hawkins. “So what else is new?”

“The predictive Incident says that a.38 slug will penetrate the right ventricle.” Steve’s voice shook slightly. Henry wondered if he’d made a mistake in bringing Steve, who was very new to his gifts and the Center’s staff. “The man will approach from the left…”

“What does it matter where he comes from?” The Governor said, sharply, hostilely. “Oh, I don’t disbelieve you, Darrow. Or you, Hawkins. I’ve heard too much about you people to be skeptical anymore. But, if I don’t appear…”

“You have to appear,” Henry replied. “We ran the alternates through a probability computation and find that your appearance at that Forum Meeting must take place to sway a currently uncommitted 8% of the popular vote to your party.

Without that 8%, you fail to receive the critical majority and if you fail, the Laborites can obtain the plurality they need to effect a counter-measure that would have disastrous consequences on the economy.”

Governor Lawson began a chuckle, his belly shaking first before the amusement was shunted up the rotund abdomen to the chest and finally became audible in the head cavity. Finally Lawson’s lips parted to emit a rich, juicy laugh.

“So, that’s the way it’ll be, huh?”

“Yes, if your eloquence doesn’t falter with foreknowledge.”

“Huh? How’s that?”

“You have been given a prescience of the immediate future. Such knowledge could, in itself, alter the circumstances of me future. We do not always have either the personnel or the foresight to modify the future. In your case, we make an exception. A Laborite Majority is not a good thing for the Talented.”

Governor Lawson nodded in appreciation of that expediency.

“Your man will intercept the bullet?”

Henry nodded.

“And the nut will be put away? That’s better than leaving him free for another shot. Good! How many political figures does your group protect?”

“Those who need it. And we’d appreciate a kindly word for the Center when Steve diverts that bullet.”

Lawson nodded agreement. “Those who need protection? Or those whom you need, Darrow? No, don’t answer that one. Answer this…will I win this election?”

Henry smiled slowly. “You know the answer to that one, Governor, but the fun lies in making certain you’ve played the game right.”

“How far do you guys play fun and games?”

“Just far enough!”

“Now, Mr. Rambley, what seems to be your problem?”

“Not my problem, Mr. Darrow. Yours!” The Internal Revenue Department man smiled a thin smug smile and began to pull IBM cards from his neat fake-pig case.

“Really?”

“We have here WT forms from the Department of Law Enforcement and Order, from Johns Hopkins, Bethel General, Midtown, from Dupont, Merck Pharmaceuticals…need I go on?”

“Just as you please.”

“These salary chits represent the earnings of Barbara Holland, Titter Beyley,

Charity McGillicuddy, Gil Gracie, Frank Negelsco, Augustus Molnar…” Again the IRD representative regarded Henry Darrow with a cute expression on his fleshless face. “I could continue…”

“Just as you please. I give every government official the courtesy due his office.” Henry inclined his head towards Mr. Rambley who, for the first time since he’d minced into Henry’s tiny lair, looked nonplussed. “After all, some of my best people are employed by the government.”

With an irritated sigh, Rambley closed the stack of cards and tapped them in an admonitory fashion on the desk.

“Come now, Mr. Darrow. These people,” and he brandished the cards, “earn tremendous salaries and yet there is no record of a single tax deduction, no returns…”

“They donate their salaries in toto to the Parapsychic Center. They lease their services contractually to the various employers. The Parapsychic Center files a corporate form to cover them. Under Corporation Law…”

“No one in their right minds would…” Rambley bounced on the end of his chair with indignation and disbelief.

“I never said any of the parapsychic Talents were in a right mind. In fact,”

Henry went on with gentle amusement, “there is every reason to believe that the core of the parapsychic is, if anywhere, in the left hand part of the brain.”

“Mr. Darrow,” Mr. Rambley was on his feet. “You did say that you gave government officials the courtesy due their office?”

“Yes, didn’t I? Consequently, you’re wasting time, your government’s and mine,

Mr. Rambley. The individuals represented by those neatly slotted cards do donate their total income to the Parapsychic Center. Our accountant will be glad to show you the appropriate records and contractual agreements…”

“But…but I know that that Titter Beyley creature is driving a four passenger 350 horsepower vehicle!” Such an incongruity shocked Mr. Rambley.

“Yes, Titter’s always wanted to drive a big one. The car belongs to the Center.

You can check the registration papers.”

“And that…that Charity McGillicuddy has a blue ranch mink coat.”

“Indeed she has. She requisitioned it from Stores about four months ago.”

“She requisitioned…from Stores?”

“She has a position to maintain now and her appearance is of great concern to the LEO office. Think how embarrassing it would be for someone employed by the

LEO Commission to be arrested for wearing stolen furs. Of course, Charity says that now she can buy ‘em instead of ‘lifting’ ‘em, half the fun’s gone. But it gives her a great moral boost to wear blue ranch mink in the LEO Block. We try to keep our workers happy.”

Rambley had stared at Henry Darrow through this ingenuous explanation but his indignation rose with every gently spoken word.

“This won’t be the last you’ll hear from me, Mr. Darrow. You do not mock the Internal Revenue Department, Mr. Darrow.” He slammed the file cards into his case, hands trembling with outraged dignity. “You’ll hear from us.”

“That’s fine by me. Just call ahead for an appointment. Only consider the fact that Senators Maxwell, Abrahams, Montello and Gratz approved our corporate structure.”

Rambley’s eyes widened.

“And the presidential advisor, Mr. Killiney, acted as our financial assistant.

Don’t you have his card in that file?”

Rambley exited, reduced to mutterings.

“Do you often trick your way into a private home, Mr. Darrow?”

“When I’ve been unable to secure an appointment any other way, yes, Mr. Henner.”

Henry smiled pleasantly, trying not to glance with obvious envy at the spaciousness of the magnificently furnished living room. Such accommodation was almost archaic.

George Henner appeared more amused than irritated by Henry Darrow’s impertinence as he leaned back in his Italian brocade armchair.

“If it’s money for your palm-reading, table-tilting crystal-gazing tricks, forget it.”

“On the contrary, sir. I’ve affirmation that I can ask you to join our happy band.” Henry smiled at the surprise in Henner’s yellowed eyes.

“Join you?” Henner burst out laughing. His head went back showing a veritable gold field of fillings in his upper teeth. “By God, Darrow, you’ve made my day!

If you can’t, lick ‘em, recruit ‘em?”

“Actually,” Henry went on smoothly, seating himself and crossing his legs, counterfeiting an ease he didn’t feel. He noted the flicker of irritation in Henner’s face but the financier had a reputation of letting a man have enough rope to hang himself. “Actually, Mr. Henner, your abilities in the financial world are as solidly derived from the parapsychic as my own. Incidentally, you’re the crystal ball reader…although I see you’ve got a modern computer for stock market print-out instead of the old glass case.”

Henner gave an amused grunt but said nothing, his silence a subtle prod to keep Henry talking.

“You’re known,” Henry continued obediently, because that was the way the interview ought to proceed, “to have a genius, a second sight into what stocks are going to rise, which will fall, what bond issues will pay the keenest long-term profit. And I can prove that you’re parapsychic.”

Henner cocked his head slightly to one side, his amusement deepening, as he tacitly encouraged Henry to produce his proof. Darrow spread the graph out on the table. “I know you’ve followed the news media coverage on us, so you’re familiar with this sort of graph. What you may not immediately appreciate is the fact that this is your graph.”

Henner became immobile with attention.

“When you had your last routine physical a month ago, your physician employed a Goosegg. He didn’t realize that it wasn’t his own office model so he’s blameless. You did, however, experience what we call an Incident and it is recorded on this graph, here and here. I believe the Incident was in connection with the Allied Metals and Mining merger in which you managed quite a ‘killing.’ “

“You don’t read thought from an EEC graph, Darrow.”

“Hardly. But you placed a phone call directly you were through your physical to your office and within the next few hours the merger was announced…but not before you had acquired a tidy pile of Allied stock. Are my facts correct?”

Henner nodded slowly, his eyes, narrowed to intense slits, watching Henry Darrow’s face.

“That’s proof,” Henry said, rustling the graph paper, “that you’re parapsychic, Mr. Henner.”

The silence which ensued, designed to make Darrow exceedingly uncomfortable, did not. For a long space, Henry returned George Henner’s stare, then folded his arms and gazed around the beautiful room. Finally he turned back to Henner and smiled.

“Blackmail?” asked Henner.

Darrow shook his head,

“No. You’d be far too clever for that. No, I’d hazard the guess that you want to borrow my Talent, as you call it, to make your fortunes? That would still be essentially blackmail, wouldn’t it, Darrow?”

Henry pursed his lips a little, expressing dubiety.

“Well, then what is it you want from me? It’s something.”

“Actually, it’s the twelve acre tract of land on the Palisades.”

Once again Henry wished he were a telepath to read the emotions swiftly passing through George Henner’s mind. He had startled the financier, he had touched the most vulnerable point of the shrewd man’s life: his intense love, and need for, the beautiful estate of Beechwoods. It had been in Henner’s family for a hundred and forty years, was a showplace which few saw. And Henner’s need of Beechwoods was as great and for the same reasons as Henry Darrow’s.

“How could you know?” demanded Henner in a hoarse whisper.

“That the State intends to confiscate all privately held lands within a hundred mile radius of the Jerhattan city limits? I know because it is as important to me as it is to you to know these things.”

Henner was on his feet, pacing to release the energy of his anger. In a barely audible monotone he inventively assigned destinations to the State en masse, the needs of the unhoused, unwashed multitudes in general and those particular officials who had failed to keep Henner’s ancestral home inviolate.

“If, however, the property is already owned by a religious, medical, educational or charitable institution which will accommodate a sufficient number of our ever-expanding population, they cannot confiscate your property even under the terms of Section 91, Paragraph 12 of the Housing Act of 1998.”

“This is 1997, man. That Act isn’t passed yet. I can still defeat it.”

“No. It will be passed.”

Henner tried to stare that knowledge out of Henry’s mind.

“And you know the inevitability, Mr. Henner. None of your contacts can hold out any hope of defeating that measure, nor of defending your Beechwoods.”

“And it’s your table-tilting tea-leaf readers who’ll infest my home?”

“Your physical condition is poor, Mr. Henner, and your nerves damned near the breaking point. The solitude and privacy of this house and its grounds are vital to your life. It would be to any parapsychic mind forced to tune in on the emotional chaos that haunts the very air we breathe. You know you’ve been living on borrowed time for the past year. You know what alternative dwelling accommodations will do to you.”

“Do you happen to know,” asked Henner casually for he’d got control of himself again, “the exact date of my death?”

“As I know the exact time of mine, Mr. Henner. You will die of a heart attack, the aorta will be closed by a globule of the atherosclerotic matter coating your veins, at nine-twenty-one PM, exactly one year, nine months and fourteen days from now.”

A gleam of challenge livened the deadly intent of Henner’s gaze. “And if I don’t?”.

“If you don’t, then revoke the grant of Beechwoods to the Center. In the meantime, you’ll have secured your last days in the ancestral home, which is your prime concern at the moment.”

“I could have a heart transplant…” Henner was clearly enjoying this.

“Not with a diseased liver and the condition of your arteries.”

“And that’s your prophecy, Darrow?”

“A medical certainty,” Henry said. “I’ve toyed with the notion of a transplant myself since my death will also occur from myocardial infarction on a certain

May twelfth, at ten-fifty-two PM. But by May twelfth of that year, I intend to have accomplished the major part of what needs to be done to establish a viable, self-sufficient Parapsychic Center in North America…”

“On the Beechwoods estate?”

“On the Beechwoods estate. By May twelfth, I shall be grateful for the peace and tranquility of my grave.”

Henner’s eyes flicked from Darrow’s to some inner middle distance, the harsh cynical lines of the financier’s face softened.

“ ‘Ease after war, death after life does greatly please’?” The words were softly spoken but there was no quarter in the hard look Henner then turned on Henry

Darrow.

“In your scheming where does this house end up?”

“As an integral part of the Center.”

Henner’s expression was ironic. “And my money? I’ve no next of kin.”

Darrow laughed. “You keep harping on your money, Mr. Henner. We don’t need your money. Check our books on that. But only the Center can offer one of its own members what his money hasn’t been able to secure for him.”

For a long time Henner gazed out the French windows that gave on the flagged terrace, towards the sweep of magnificent lawn and the superb beech trees. When

Henner finally turned back to Henry, his hand was extended. The two men shook three times in the ancient custom of binding a bargain.

“Answer me one thing, Darrow! Did you foresee winning?”

“I knew that we would eventually secure Beechwoods, Mr. Henner,” he said, permitting regret to tinge his voice. “But I wanted your cooperation.”

“Cooperation? You goddamn well know I had no choice!”

“Didn’t you?”

George Henner had wandered into the Graph room just as the first of the three Incidents was recorded. He had the habit of appearing in the various departments, taking what he called a perverse interest in the eventual eviction of the Center from Beechwoods. In point of fact, Henner had admitted to Molly

Darrow that the Center had given him something to live for. He’d been feeling much better since Henry’d conned him out of Beechwoods. Despite his professed intention of harassing Henry, George Henner’s passing suggestions were usually solid advice. And despite his crotchety and often irascible manner, the Talents became fond of him.

“Got a strong Incident,” Ben Avedon, the duty officer, told Henry on the intercom just as George Henner wandered into the Graph room. “Patsy Tucker.”

In moments, Henry and Molly arrived in time for Patsy’s phone call of such details as she’d “seen.”

“I’m on the water again,” she said, breathless in an attempt to verbalize before details escaped her. “And there’re boats. Four. Sun’s at a late afternoon angle, on my left so I must be looking north. There’s land beyond the boats, pines, a bluff. And oil on the water. I can see it all rainbowy. The oil scares me. It’s going to ignite, and then the water’s covered with flames and the boats are eaten up and…oh, it’s going to be wicked, Ben. Can you locate? Have I given you enough? I can’t remember anymore and the flames cover any details.”

“It is a sooner?”

“Awful soon. Today. I’m sure of it But it’s morning, and I saw late afternoon…is there time enough?”

“Sure. Plenty of time. I’m feeding the computer with the data right now. Old didactic will pin the place down, Pat. But have you a notion about the size of the boats involved?”

“Oh, yes, of course. How stupid of me. I forget you haven’t seen. One’s small, a pleasure craft…a power boat…no sails. That’s the one that goes on fire.

Two long low boats…I guess they’d be tankers. And a higher boat…I mean, one higher above the water…And they’re all much too close together. That’s the problem because they’ll all catch fire.”

“A pleasure boat, two tankers and a freighter in the late afternoon. That’s fine, Pat. And the pines and bluff and being close together indicate a channel of some description. Now…think hard again, Pat. Did you see any markings on the boats, funnel markings, ensigns, names?”

After a silence Pat mournfully admitted “seeing” nothing because the fire and smoke occluded.

“Get one of the pyros on it,” Henry told Ben. “Patsy, Henry here. That’s a good job, lass. Now take it easy.

We’ll buzz you back with confirmation. Grand work, Pat.” Henry disconnected her line, shaking his head, knowing how worried the girl would be until she heard they’d prevented the collision. If only there’d been markings to speed up identification, and then if the participants could be dissuaded from arriving on the previewed scene…He moved deliberately to the computer panel and began tapping out queries. “Undoubtedly a seaway. Could be Sheepshead Bay area, East

River…no, not there. Or one of the canals…”

“St. Lawrence, with tankers and freighters…” suggested Ben.

“Or the Great Lakes…” said Molly.

Before there’d been a print-out on possible locations or what traffic was already in the St. Lawrence Seaway, a second graph began to chatter.

“Right on time,” said Ben. “Here’s Terry, our local friendly reliable pyro.”

“How come you don’t know, Hank?” George Henner asked, settling himself on a stool in the corner.

“Not enough people involved, George, and too close a range for me. That’s Patsy’s specialty-cliff-hangers. Besides, don’t you agree that the good executive makes all the long-range decisions and leaves the picayune nitty-gritty details to keep his staff occupied?”

George grinned but he said nothing more, listening as intently as the others to Terry Cle’s verbalization of his “sight.” The broad outline correlated with

Patsy’s although he “saw” the event from a different perspective. He had sufficient detail on one tanker and the small craft to result in exact IDs for both from Ship Registration. And there was a tanker of the Iricoil Line proceeding down the Seaway en route for Toronto, ETA 7:48 PM at that port. The small craft, the Aitch Bee, was registered to an A. Frascati, and was at that moment moored in a small boat basin on the American side of the Seaway.

Probability figured the cost of the collision and fire at several millions and a thirty-six hour tie-up of Seaway traffic, plus delayed cargoes which would complicate schedules and routines for ninety-two companies, involving work-loss of some eighteen thousand people.

“Okay, Ben, get out the usual warning format. See if Iricoil will listen to us.”

“And if Iricoil doesn’t want to believe?”

“We get after this Frascati. In fact, he’d be easier to bully than Iricoil but we’ve got to warn them, too.”

Iricoil was suspicious and uncooperative and, in phrases just short of insult, refused to consider diverting the tanker. Its supplies were urgently required in Toronto by late evening. Frascati was not at his home nor in his business office. Urgent messages were left for the man to contact the Center before taking out his pleasure craft. Henry was dialing the Seaway Authority Control when George cut the connection.

“I’ve got an idea, Hank,” George said. “I’ve watched this routine so often and seen you insulted, ignored, and calumniated. No one trusts the altruist anymore, whether he’s Talented or not. You’ve warned Iricoil, tried to do them a favor.

They aren’t buying. Well, like the puppy who leaves too many messages, let’s rub their nose in it.”

“You mean, let the accident occur?”

“More or less. Considering what’s involved in terms of credit and work-loss, and considering that I have shares in four of the companies to be effected by the snarl-up, will you play it my way, this once?”

Henry began to relax. “What have you in mind, George?”

“You did leave timed messages at Iricoil and for Frascati, didn’t you?”

Ben Avedon tapped the computer panel. “All time-sealed, George.”

“Fine. Now, issue a telex warning to Seaway Authority. Then give me a few comlines to work from and Molly to help me. Irenee was telling me about their new oil-pollutant at Dupont. This would be good PR for him. Always like to oblige friends. Which reminds me, you get on to Jim Lawson…our revered Governor owes you a favor or two for that bullet Steve stopped. And ask him for a few more VTOLs and a couple of frogmen.”

“Why?”

“You don’t know?”

Henry grinned. “Would you believe an educated guess?”

Henner chuckled. “My, my, how the mighty have fallen…Guessing!”

“Run the show your way, George.”

“Yes, let a pro show you how, Henry Darrow. You’re too damned soft. You talk too much. Action speaks louder than a hundred of your Talented words.”

At exactly 16:32 hours of a bright spring afternoon, an Iricoil tanker proceeding down the St. Lawrence Seaway fouled its propeller on a tangle of steel cables, origin unknown. The tanker drifted athwart the current as a United

Line freighter entered the narrow channel from the opposite direction. A second tanker, also United Line, making speed enough to reach Toronto port by dark, cruised into the danger zone, although it was apparent that the Iricoil boat was in distress. Both United Line ships continued, evidently hoping to pass the injured vessel, one on the port, the other on the starboard. Likely they would have succeeded but the Aitch Bee, also impatient to reach port, came bucketing down the searoute. It swung rather close to the distressed vessel. As Frascati ever after maintained, he wanted to see if he could be of any assistance in getting a message ashore: a ridiculous alibi since the tanker was well equipped by radio and ship-shore telephone. Frascati’s propellor became fouled on the same villain cable. The freighter began to pass the disabled pair and her wash slammed the small craft into the Iricoil tanker. The United Line tanker was broadside of the Iricoil when her bow swung out. Tanker #2 swung to starboard to avoid a collision and her stern banged into

Iricoil, splitting a seam in the aft oil hold just as the small craft was ground between the two bigger hulls. Its galley fires caught old grease and spread in the cabin as the yacht’s gasoline tank was breached. Oil pouring from the

Iricoil vessel would shortly ignite from that flame.

At this point the hovering rescue copters intervened as news media cameras recorded the event from every angle. Foam quickly doused the yacht fire, the oil-pollution material gobbled up the spilt petroleum and kinetics held back additional oil loss by pressure until the teleports could get the conveniently handy plates into position. Other kinetics and the frogmen worked loose the steel cable and it was hoisted out of the way. “Captain” Frascati and the two crew members (his sons) of the damaged yacht were lifted up and another team of kinetics kept the little ship floating until the belatedly arriving coast guard cutter could tow it into port.

The Seaway was not blocked since all four vessels were cleared out of the narrow channel before others made the passage. There was no loss of life and no long-term pollution of the water. The Parapsychic teams were volubly and embarrassingly thanked for preventing a major disaster, and by cocktail time everyone was pleased by the denouement, especially Patsy Tucker and Terry Cle.

The congratulatory euphoria lasted twelve hours, at which point the Seaway Authority began to realize that matters had come to near-disaster in an unprecedented way.

“What was the meaning of sending us only a telex to announce a major disaster?” the Seaway Commissioner demanded in such stentorian tones that George Henner need not have listened in on the second comunit in Henry’s office.

“You were informed by telex, as usual,” Henry replied in a mild tone of voice.

“By telex! When countless millions of credits were at stake? And blockage of the most important waterway in North America? And do you realize that we have only just balanced the sealife ecology in that strip of waterway? That oil…”

“You were informed…”

“Well, I’m informing you that you’re in for a suit of criminal negligence…”

“Negligence of what, Commissioner? You were informed nine hours and thirty-eight minutes prior to the accident by this ex-officio group, which is not a government sponsored or accredited agency. We act for and in the public interest. But we are understaffed and overworked. You could have queried this office for more particulars, although all we had were included in that telex.

Your Authority could have held back any one of the four vessels involved, thus preventing the…”

“Are you accusing the Seaway Authority of negligence?”

Henry held the receiver away from his ear, shook his head, and replied in his mildest manner, “Forewarned is forearmed, sir.” He caught George Henner giving the high sign of approval.

“You’ll hear from us, Darrow. You people can’t get away with irresponsible behavior like this.”

The connection was rudely and noisily broken.

“Did you figure a lawsuit in your calculations, George?” asked Henry.

Henner rubbed his hands together in glee. “If they sue, we’d win.”

Henry couldn’t exactly share in Henner’s gleeful anticipation. The precog knew of the multitude of lawsuits which would be served on Talents in the next decades and the sheer cost of inspired defense made him shudder. The money would be available but it was credit that could be used to better advantage in training and identifying Talent, not defending against misunderstanding and greed. By late afternoon, Henry’s premonitions of immediate disaster were borne out by additional suits of negligence which arrived from United Line, Iricoil Tankers and A. Frascati.

“Let me handle this,” George Henner told Henry and his hastily convened executive staff. “I don’t need any crystal ball or anerodic graph needle to tell me how to manage this sort of crap.”

Before he had Henry’s voiced approval, he was on the wires to the major media networks, chatting familiarly with presidents and commissioners. By the time the films of the Parapsychic Center ’s assistance had been widely aired, with a few choice comments on how the Center operated to forestall major disasters, the threatened legal action against the Talents was withdrawn. Suits were entered against the Seaway for criminal negligence. Then the Center, on George Henner’s advice (“Make ‘em pay for it, when they don’t listen to you.”), sent bills for the rescue operations to Frascati, United Line and Iricoil Tankers.

“And from now on, Henry,” George said, “don’t ever follow up your telex warnings with personal phone calls. Don’t be the supplicant, damn it. Be the prelate!”

Henry watched with inner amusement as George Henner paced up and down the floor, his eyes flashing, even his stride firm and aggressive so that Henry could see traces of the strengths which had amassed George Henner his considerable fortune and which had overwhelmed less determined adversaries in the business world.

“There’s no point in you bruising your larynx with persuasion. You’ve proved your worth over and over again and this Seaway bollix ought to make a validated

Parapsychic warning worth the paper it’s printed on, even at the dreadful price of paper these days.”

“A sound argument, George, and I appreciate your help…”

George stopped midstride, glaring at Henry through narrowed lids.

“Yes, I am helping you, aren’t I? Shouldn’t do that, should I?”

“My friendly enemy,” replied Henry with a laugh.

“Ha! Tell me that when my executors snatch the rug of Beechwoods from under your telepathetic feet…”

“And we need you, George,” Henry raised his voice to overwhelm Henner’s snide remarks. “If I can convince a skeptic like you, I’m well away to swaying John Q.

Public to my side. He’s more variable than you, and he will be the hardest to win over.”

John Q. Public, however, quixotically decided the Seaway Authority had been foolish to ignore the Parapsychic warning. Criticism was heaped on the Seaway from every quarter. Later the Authority was somewhat exonerated of primary guilt since the Court felt that good judgment on the part of any one of the other three skippers would have prevented the accident and no costs were awarded the claimants. The official records cited and credited the Para-psychic Center with averting a major calamity, and loss of life and property. All Transport Authorities were severely enjoined to heed any warnings from the Center which involved public transport.

For the next few weeks all precogs of traffic problems, possible fire, storm or spring floods throughout the world were instantly acted upon. The Center was besieged with anxious calls about whether Mr. S could undertake that long distance flight, or Mrs. J could safely make her annual pilgrimage from Florida to Wisconsin, and if there had been any precog about the transfer of cyanide cylinders to the authorized Atlantic Trench dump. Thousands of hopeful people applied for the simple tests which would indicate if they possessed some useful Talent.

“It’s an ill wind that blows no good,” Henry remarked to Molly after another hectic day answering urgent calls and dealing with anxious queries.

“I suppose so,” she said, sinking wearily into the armchair of their private suite in the main house. “But I wish we had more Gooseggs or a surer way of spotting the live ones.”

“Any today?” Henry fixed Molly a stiff drink.

“Yes,” and she brightened as if she’d temporarily gotten the event. “One very strong receiving telepath out of forty-five aspirants.” She accepted the drink, turning the glass in her hand as if the amber liquid held some other answer.

“Henry, they come in so hopeful…and some of them leave so angry and disappointed. As if we ought to be able to find what doesn’t exist…”

“Not your fault, love. Everyone wants to be, in some way, unique, and can’t realize that being unique is a responsibility as well as a privilege. You can’t cure that How strong’s the telepath?”

Molly brightened. “I think he’s very strong, but he’s been blocking thoughts, the way they all do. Out of fear. He may need a lot of training.”

“No, not too much,” Henry said easily, pulling his chair close to Molly and clasping her free hand. “Young fellow, isn’t he? Welsh extraction, Welsh name.

Right?”

“I just sent the report in…” Molly began, startled, and stopped mid-sentence, arrested by Henry’s knowing look. “Not another one, Henry?”

“They do seem to appear right on schedule,” Henry grinned at her but there was a shadow in his eyes. “Right on schedule. One day I’ll be wrong.”

“Don’t, Henry.” She clasped his hand tightly, reassuringly, knowing the strain of his unfortunate infallibility, knowing that some of the events he foresaw he’d rather not have seen. “And, he is, as you predicted, Welsh,” she went on in a light voice, “by name, Daffyd op Owen. Very likeable chap. He’s important?”

Henry nodded. “He won’t need more than some basic pointers and a few quiet weeks here to wash the ‘noise’ out of his mind and learn to project as well as receive.”

“Well, that’s one on the plus side of the ledger.” She rotated her shoulders to ease the day’s strains but Henry’s disclosure about young op Owen made her feel much better about her labors.

“When is he moving in?”

“Don’t you know?” she asked in a bantering fashion,

“What I know I wish I didn’t. What I’d give anything to know, I have to wait and see.”

She smiled at him lovingly. “You mean, if we retain Beechwoods?” When he nodded, she chided him gently. “How often have you been wrong in the merest detail?”

“It’s not how often I’m right, Molly luv, it’s will I be wrong this time, this once? This important, crucial, critical once? Such a terrible gift, luv.

Terrible when your knowledge means the loss of a friend…”

“Henry, your recognition, the very challenge of the Center,” and her arm gesture encompassed all of Beech-woods, “have kept George Henner alive…and kicking.” She peered into Henry’s face, reassuring him by touch, word and look.

“He’s determined to do you out of Beech-woods, if only by a minute. That determination alone has strengthened his hold on life. I’ve seen his medical reports, Henry. I know.” She leaned back in her chair. “You’ve done him quite a favor and he knows it. I shouldn’t be surprised if he hasn’t left the Center Beechwoods anyway.”

“He hasn’t. He showed me the will.”

Molly opened her mouth to say something then thought better of it.

“All right,” Henry went on, catching her look of mischief, “so he could write a second one in secret…No, we’ve a wager on and…”

“I know what you mean, hoping to win the wager loses a friend.”

“I can see horizons wider than mortality but I cannot always see the sparrow fall.”

“So young op Owen will be your successor?” George Henner was in a very testy mood that morning. “Yes, but of course, not for some time yet…” “You’ve got it all foreseen, have you?” “Certainly the basic problems…”

“Ha! I thought you’d already solved the basic problems…”

“By no means, my friend,” and Henry’s laugh was mirthless. “I’ve had the easy part. No, really. The establishment of the Center-and others in time in strategic parts of the globe…is only the first bit: scarcely the worst,

“Once we’d elevated parapsychic Talents to a demonstrable, scientific basis, it was only a question of some decent organizational effort to make us self-sufficient and independent. We did dodge the governmental attempt to take control because we operate more efficiently as a private agency and because you could imagine the tax payers’ shrieks about funding tea-leaf readers? Funding was no real problem once we could prove Talent. Training, now…that is a long term program. We’ve got to develop more efficient techniques in recognizing and training Talent and that takes Talented personnel. Getting industry and the government to accept our workers was child’s play with what we can offer.” Then Henry sighed. “The suspicions of the general public can’t be totally allayed but with the help of a discreet PR program, people can become accustomed to the Talented.

“No, George, some of our biggest problems are yet to be solved. The knottiest one is establishing legal protection for Talent. Without that, all we’ve carefully built could be wiped away in legal fees, damages and law suits…particularly against the precogs. Oh, I see that we’ll get professional immunity sooner or later. I’m greedy. I want it sooner. And that’s why a telepath like Dai op Owen is required as Director. He’s more sensitive to the immediate situation. By God, the times I’ve wished I were a telepath…”

George snorted.

“It’s easier for a man who can delve into thoughts, not the future. That’s assured.”

“Ha!” Light flittered from George Henner’s sunken eyes, “Not yet. You’ve three days, four hours and five minutes to go.”

“No,” Henry replied gently, “no, old friend, you’ve three days, four hours and five minutes to go. And I shall miss you.”

“Ha to that as well! See any new signs of decay?” George jerked his head this way and that.

Henry shook his head slowly. “I will miss you, you old bastard.”

“Will you? Will you when I defy your prediction and you and your Talents are thrown out into the mass noise again?”

Henry summoned a laugh. “Then why haven’t you died long ago?”

George glared at him. “I intend to make you sweat, Henry Darrow. Sweat. Bleed.

Die a little.”

“AW you wonder I want a telepath as a Director?” He gripped George firmly by the shoulder and gave him an affectionate shake. “Play the enemy if it pleases you: if the choler makes the blood continue to run in your veins. You’re more our friend than enemy. And I know it.”

“Ha! You are nervous. You’re worried that you’re wrong. That this time you’re wrong! I’ll prove you wrong if it’s the last thing I do.”

Henry cocked his head at George, grinning ironically. “You may at that, you old bastard. I’ve never claimed infallibility, George. And you’ve heard me state time and again that fore-knowledge of the future can alter it…”

“Cop out! Rationalization!” Henner shook with triumph. “You’re admitting defeat!

Ha!”

“Have I made your day, George? Fair enough! I’ve got to go placate that tax man again. See you later.”

“Don’t waste your time with him. He’s stupid. No way they can tax the Talents with the structure I helped you build. And don’t miss the party! The Death Party!”

“Christ, Hank,” Gus Molnar complained to Darrow, “he’s had me checking him over on the hour all day! And then that gaggle of ‘impartial physician witnesses’ check on me.” Molnar ran his hand nervously through his long fair hair, his eyes restless with anxiety and irritation. “And suddenly he won’t let Molly out of his sight.

Said her healing hands would turn the trick. Give him the minute he needs.

Goddamn old bastard!”

“Cool it, Gus. It’s what he needed to keep him alive.” Henry chuckled and straightened his tunic jacket, poked at his softly tied scarf.

Gus made a disgusted noise in his throat. “You’re so damned sure?”

“Not at all. Unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately? With the future of the Center at stake on one man’s heart beat?”

“I’ve seen that we do get the property. I regret that it has to be validated by the death of an old and valued friend. I could almost wish that he does live past the appointed minute…”

“Minute…” Molnar corrected him. “Bastard’s got a huge alarm clock rigged, to the Greenwich-mean-time minute!”

“C’mon, Gus. Let’s go to the wake and cheer the corpse on!”

“My God, Darrow, how do you do it?”

The Death Party was assembling, reluctantly, in the vault-roofed lounge of the Beechwoods mansion. George had invited a select few to be “in at the death.”

Indeed, as he said himself, he had outlasted most of his contemporaries and those three represented today were more enemies than friends. George quipped that business enemies had a reputation of being in at the death. He was dressed in his Vietnam campaign battle dress, remarking that he’d cheated Him then as a twenty-year old, so it behooved him to keep the appointment now suitably attired. Most of those present were Talents or connected with the Center. Young

Daffyd op Owen was present. So were LEO Commissioner Mailer, trying hard not to look uncomfortable, Governor Lawson, several Senators, representatives from four charitable organizations (probably benefiting under the will, Henry decided when he saw the guest list), and the four physicians who’d been chosen at random from the AMA directory by George and flown into Jerhattan for the event. That was George’s way of solving any medical question. With a touch of ghoulish humor, George had decreed-not that he didn’t trust the Talents implicitly, but one had to protect oneself-that the autopsy would be performed on his corpse immediately after death had been assumed.

The party consequently generated little joviality despite the abundance of liquor and exotic foods on the sideboard. George ate sparingly, drank slowly.

Anything he consumed these days, he complained, tasted sour or flat or insipid and caused heartburn.

Conversations were conducted in sepulchral tones and languished easily. The occasional laugh was quickly suppressed. Only Henry Darrow contrived to look at ease though Molly knew, by the way he rubbed his thumb and index finger together constantly, that he was in a highly nervous condition. She didn’t dare touch him since she was not a whit less distraught herself, and would only double Henry’s tension. The person who was suffering most was young Daffyd op Owen. She had become very fond of the sensitive young man and wished that he didn’t have to be present. He’d not had tune to learn to shield himself, certainly not in such an emotionally loaded situation as this. Daffyd was visibly sweating, yet gamely trying to simulate proper party behavior as he chatted with another young

Talent, a precog named Mara Canning.

As the appointed time drew nearer, any semblance of normality dwindled: efforts to keep party talk going faltered. Everyone had one eye on the clock and the other on George Henner.

“You’re supposed to be happy,” George Henner complained when the current silence remained unbroken for sixty-four seconds. “My death means you’re all safely ensconced here.” His scowl was ambiguous. Then he pointed a finger at Henry. “So tell me, Hank, if you lose the wager, where will you go? I…” and he laughed hollowly, “or my executors expect you to vacate the premises…immediately.”

“And we will. I’ve assembled every telekinetic we’ve got…and a flock of physical muscle men. We can clear the premises in an hour, I’m told. You will grant us that much time?”

Henner grunted, then brightly asked where the new Center would be located.

“I’ve a site upstate seventy miles: woods, a small lake, very pastoral. The disadvantage being the distance to commute. You know what copter traffic is like over the City and the Talents are contracted to be at work on time…no matter what.”

Henner’s chair had been wired to monitor his life-systems, and the results were broadcast on a screen visible anywhere in the room. George glanced up at it incuriously.

“All systems still go?” he asked, swinging around to the nearest medical man who, startled, nodded. “Three minutes and counting, Henry?”

“George, may I remind you that this excitement is bad for you?” Henry said.

“Excitement bad for me? Goddamn you, Darrow, it’s kept me alive months past the estimate those jokers gave me. You’ve kept me alive, damn your eyes.”

“Damn ‘em?” Henry laughed. “That was the point, George, and you’ve admitted it before impartial witnesses, too.”

Henner pursed his thin, bloodless lips, glaring at various people in the room, unsatisfied with his present victim’s reactions and unable to vent his feelings on anyone better suited than Henry. His restless, probing glance fell briefly on Molly.

“Having to leave here will put your program back, won’t it?”

Henry shrugged. “For this decade, perhaps yes. The new location will be too far for prospective Talents in the subbie class to come for the test. We can have mobile units…once we have the personnel. Trouble is the units have to be especially constructed…”

“Yes, yes, you’ve told me all that.” George flounced around in his chair, seeking a new or comfortable position as well as another victim. But he returned to Henry. “You’ll be sorry you’ve kept me alive. In exactly two minutes and four seconds…”

“No, George, I won’t ever be sorry for your life. Only sorry for your death.”

“I can believe that!”

“Indeed you can!” cried Molly, unable to bear George’s taunting acrimony.

“Molly…” George’s voice entreated her and she instinctively stepped toward him, her hands outstretched to give the comfort which had often eased him. But he leaned away, suddenly suspicious even of her. Her hands flew to her mouth as the rebuff wounded her. But his reaction broke Henry’s tight control.

“Damn it, George, she only wants to help.”

“Help me? Live? Or die!?”

Molly began to cry, turning towards the wall. But Henry took her in his arms, for once the comforter.

“Molly didn’t deserve that from you, George. The wager was with me!”

“He didn’t mean it that way, Henry,” said young op Owen, the words bursting from his lips, as if he’d been holding back for some time the desire to speak out.

Henner nodded, his face flushed with what Dai op Owen afterwards said was remorse. But the monitors began flashing warning signals.

“Hell, Molly,” George began in a choked voice, “I don’t distrust you.” Then the death alarm went off. “Ha! The appointed minute…And I’m alive! You’re wrong, Henry Darrow. You and all your tea-leaf, table-tipping crystal-gazing…”

At precisely 9:00:30, George Henner’s heart gave a massive contraction and stopped. Cameras on the dead man recorded that his hand raised slightly, towards Henry and Molly before the dead body collapsed.

Accustomed as they were to the death processes, the physicians in attendance were held motionless by the dramatic circumstances. Gus Molnar reacted first, hand moving towards the adrenalin syringe.

“No!” cried Dai op Owen, stepping forward, his hand outstretched. “He wants to die. He doesn’t want to win the wager.”

“My God,” cried one of the physicians, pointing to the screen. “Look at the Goosegg. It’s gone wild. The mind’s still alive…No. Consciousness has gone. But God, look at the graph.”

“Let him go. He wants to go,” Daffyd op Owen was saying.

Molnar looked first towards Henry whose face was expressionless, then at the other physicians staring at the monitor readings.

“That means the brain’s dead, doesn’t it?” asked LEO Commissioner Mailer, pointing to the Goosegg graph now scribing straight lifeless lines.

Two of the medical men nodded.

“Then he’s dead,” said Mailer, glancing towards the Governor who nodded accord.

“I’d say you won the bet, Darrow.”

“The wager said ‘minute’, I trust, not second?” asked one of the Senators.

“He shouldn’t’ve excited himself like that,” a doctor muttered. “This party was a mistake. Of course we weren’t consulted on that. But it set up circumstances which would obviously result in overstimulation, certain death for a man in Henner’s condition.”

“Or, there’s the voodoo element in this,” another physician said without rancor.

“Tell a victim often enough that he’ll be dead at such and such a time and the subconscious takes over and kills the man.”

“Not in this instance,” said Gus Molnar, loudly and belligerently. “And there’s ample medical substantiation, including your own remarks,” he added, pointing at the voodoo adherent, “that the stimulation provided by the original bet kept George Henner alive long past his own medical men’s estimate. The bet did not cause his death, it caused his life.”

No one ventured to refute that statement.

“I believe,” spoke up one of the attorneys present, “that the autopsy was to be performed immediately?”

As if on cue, two men appeared from the hallway, wheeling a stretcher. Silently they approached, their passage unimpeded as guests stepped aside hastily. The body was laid on the stretcher in silence. But, as the men took their positions to leave, Molly broke from Henry’s embrace. With gentle fingers, she closed the dead man’s eyes. The tears streamed down her face as she kissed George on the forehead. The stretcher glided out of the room. No one spoke until the last sound of footsteps in the hall was gone.

“Mr. Darrow,” said the attorney, his voice sounding abnormally loud after the requiem silence, “I was enjoined by Mr. Henner to make a few announcements at this time usually reserved until several days hence. I was to tell you that this was one wager he didn’t wish to win and hoped he wouldn’t: no matter what indication he gave to the contrary. He said that you were sportsman enough, Mr. Darrow, to appreciate the fact that he had to try to win.” The attorney turned to the physician who had brought up the voodoo insinuation. “He also ordered me to counteract any attempt to bring charges resulting from a misinterpretation of today’s sad occasion. He empowered me to say that he had implicit trust in the integrity of all members of the Parapsychic Center. We,” and he gestured towards his colleagues, “are to be the executors of Mr. Henner’s estate, the bulk of which, excluding a few behests and excluding these grounds now the irrevocable property of the North American Center for Parapsychic Talents, is to go into a

Trust Fund, providing legal assistance to anyone registered with the Center who may be imprisoned or charged with damages or lawsuits following the professional use of their Talent, until such time as specific laws are promulgated to give the Talents professional immunity.”. The lawyer gave Henry a wry grin. “He said, and

I quote, ‘If you ride a winged horse, you’d better have a wide net when you fall. And that takes money!’

“He also said that after he was dead,” and the lawyer faltered, embarrassed by the inadvertent rhyme, “he said the party was to begin. That this was to be considered a joyous occasion…”

“He was glad,” Daffyd op Owen said, and his rather homely face lit with happiness. “That was so astonishing. His mind, the thoughts were happy, so happy at the moment of death. He was happy, I tell you. I know he was glad!”

“Thank God!” was Henry Darrow’s fervent prayer. He raised his untouched drink.

“A toast, ladies and gentlemen.” Glasses obediently were lifted. “To those who ride the winged horse!”

One after another the glasses followed Henry’s into the fireplace of Beechwoods to preserve the tribute to George Henner’s memory.