thedoor. "Shari, I know I've acted nuts, but they nearly got me toflip! Thanks for helping me. I couldn't have stood it to know Iwas a snake. You got my mind back on the track again."
"Not enough to keep from going right back to the poker table,"she observed.
There didn't seem any point to telling her how badly I needed thedough. Anyway, I had to prove a point. I was a Normal. I left.
* * * * *
There were already seven at the table when I got to Nick's afterdinner. He didn't want to deal me in.
"Seven's a full table, huh, Tex?" he said.
"Not for stud, it isn't," I told him. "You can deal to tengamblers."
"Dealer's choice tonight," he protested, while some of thegamblers eyed me curiously. "Can't deal to more than seven forthree-card draw."
"I told you where I stood on this thing last night," I snapped.
"All right," Nick said warmly. "So maybe I'd like the whole stinkto cool down a little, huh?"
"Not with my dough in it, Nick!" I told him, being pretty freewith something I didn't have much of any more. "You'll deal me intonight or I'll find another banker!"
A gink with a long, scrawny neck put down his highball and rosefrom the table. "Gosh, fellows," he said. "I'm sort of a fifthwheel around here, I guess. Here, neighbor," he insisted. "Takemy place." He was all grins and teeth and bobbed his head aroundwith a rural awkwardness.
"You don't have to do that, Snead," Nick started to say.
"Just as soon kibitz," he insisted, drawing up a chair behind meas I took his seat. "You don't mind, neighbor?" he askedanxiously. I shook my head and yanked out my much-depleted walletto pay for chips. It took all that the Lodge hadn't.
Four hands were enough. On the first, at stud, I had aces back toback and picked up a pair of sevens on the next two cards. Twopair, aces high, will win about ninety-nine out of a hundred studhands. I chewed down on the panetella in my teeth and bet themlike I had them. The tilt of my cigar showed just a little toomuch confidence as a way to convince some of the gamblers that Iwas bluffing. It must have been a good act, for three of themstayed with me all the way. None of them had much showing, andregardless of what their hole cards were, by the time we had ourfifth cards, I had them all beaten.
It was raise against raise, but somebody finally called, and Iturned over my ace in the hole. "Aces and sevens, gamblers," Igrinned, reaching for the pot.
"I see the sevens," a fat-faced man across the table said aroundhis cigar. "But what's this jazz about aces?"
So help me Hannah, my hole card was a two! I tried to cover itup. "You'll have to admit I bet them like aces," I said.
Somebody laughed, but not very hard.
I paid mighty close attention to what I was dealt the next hand, and turneddown a drink to make sure I was cold sober. Unfortunately, I got allscrewed up over what one of the _other_ gamblers had. It had been a bunchof spinach when I'd been betting my pair against it, but it was onegood-looking straight when he flipped the card in the hole.
The third hand I dropped out before the fourth card. After agambler raked in that pot, my kibitzer asked me: "How much do youhave to have on the first three cards to stay in the pot?"
"Any pair would convince me," I said. "Why?"
"What was the matter with the kings you had showing?" he asked.They were still on the table in front of me, king of hearts andking of clubs.
I scarcely dared bet the fourth hand. We had switched tothree-card draw. I discarded two small diamonds, keeping a pairof nines and an ace for a kicker. On the draw I got one cardthat claimed to be the fourteen of eagles and one on which therewas a message reading: "These hallucinations are sent to you withthe courtesy of the Manhattan Chapter of the Lodge. Are youfinding it practical?"
I threw the hand in and stood up, shaking. "Since when don't youbet a full house?" my kibitzer demanded, after the hand was won.He picked up what I had thrown in. The fourteen of eagles turnedout to be a nine, and the card with the hallucination message theother ace.
"Got to confuse the other bettors," I said. "One of thefundamentals of poker."
There really weren't enough chips left in front of me to bothercashing in. I just left them lying there and wandered down to thestreet, flat broke.
* * * * *
Wally Bupp was right. I hadn't found it practical. All of asudden I saw that it really didn't matter whether I were a psi ornot. The important question had always been whether Lefty and theothers were psis. If so, they might be on the level about my psipowers--which meant I was right back being a snake again. And ifthey weren't, it was a simple case of blackmail, which at leastlet me rejoin the human race. On that basis, I was in toughshape. Occam's razor has no answer for hallucinations. Eitheryou've had them or you hadn't. I had. Nobody would change my mindon that score. That made Snead, and presumably Lefty, a psi. Andme, too.
But--what if they were mistaken? Shari's tests looked conclusiveto me. I saw that as the only way out. I had to insist on a testin their presence. And that meant I had to get in touch withWally Bupp.
My kibitzer came stalking out of the building, gangling andgawky. "Didn't mean to spoil your luck, neighbor," he said.
"Don't give it a second thought, Snead," I said.
"Call me Mortimer," he said. "You mind a word of advice,neighbor?" he asked, bobbing his head around and grinning in aself-conscious way. "Next time, bet that fourteen. Highest cardin the deck. Beats all the others!"
"You lousy snake!" I gasped. I'd learned better than to take apoke at him. Lefty had taught me my lesson on that one. Sneadmight turn out to be a TK as well as a hallucinator, and I wantedno more heart attacks.
He handed me a card. "There'll be somebody at this number allnight, neighbor. Gamblers Anonymous."
He faded off down the dark street. The card merely said:
"Manhattan Chapter NO 5-5600"
* * * * *
Shari must have had a swell time at dinner with some guy whodidn't gamble, because she didn't come home until nearlymidnight. I know because I dialed her apartment every ten minutesuntil I got her face on the screen.
She was still dressed for dinner and had a sort of tiara over herthick tresses. "What is it?" she said.
"I'm not a psi?" I demanded.
"No!" she said. "Hasn't this gone--?"
"Well, then, am I crazy?" I cut in on her.
Her lips compressed. "It's a lot more likely," she decided."Why?"
"Either I'm nuts," I told her. "Or those characters really arepsis." She was reaching up to cut the image when I caught herinterest. "Is there such a thing as a psi who can inducehallucinations?" I demanded.
"No." Flatly.
"They've got me sold that they can do it," I said. "What doesOccam's razor say about that?"
"You idiot!" she exploded. "They don't believe you are a PC anymore than I do!" She was sure sensitive about my having anyprecognition!
"O.K.," I said. "Then _you_ make them eat it. Aren't you the onewho knows all about exposing charlatans?"
That was the right button. "Certainly," Shari said.
"I'll pick you up in ten minutes," I said.
"Now? Midnight?"
"This is the pay-off," I said, and cut the image. I dialed thenumber Snead had given me.
"Manhattan Chapter," the Operator cartoon said.
"This is George Robertson," I said. "Mortimer Snead told methere'd be somebody there to talk to me. Maybe Lefty."
"Snead?" the cartoon said, frowning. "No one here by that--Oh!Wait a moment. Dr. Walter Bupp will talk to you," the cartoonsaid, and Wally's face appeared on the screen.
"It wasn't practical," I admitted.
"Six days early," he observed.
"Nuts," I said. "Look, you've got me convinced you are a psi.That Snead puts on a terrific show."
"Snead?" he frowned. "Oh!" He laughed. "Yeah," he agreedcondescendingly. "He's red hot, every now and then."
"But you haven't sold me that _I'm_ a PC," I growled. "I've beentested. I'm not. Now I want you to get off my back. You and therest of them! Lay off!"
He shook his head. "The Lodge acts unilaterally on this," he saidsoberly. "You've got psi powers. You'll accept our direction intheir use. Or else, Tex."
"All I ask is a fair test," I said desperately. "Under laboratoryconditions."
He gave me an address. "Come any time," he said.
"That's me walking in," I told him.
* * * * *
Shari had to pay off the 'copter when we got there. It wasn't thebrownstone I had seen the night before. This place was amedium-sized office building, say a hundred stories or so, quitenew. There was no identification on its front other than thestreet number. The Directory in the silent and unpopulated lobbywas names, all names. But Dr. Walter Bupp was one of them, in7704. Shari and I rode the elevator to seventy-seven in chillysilence.
The corridor was dim, with its lights on night-time setting.Stronger light came from an open door quite a way down the hall.It had to be Bupp's office, and it was.
Wally certainly wasn't surprised to see Shari. He shook handswith her briefly, pushing his sharp chin out at her in hisgamecock fashion. "Your mate?" he asked me.
"Certainly not," she told him. "We're ... uh ... colleagues atthe University."
"That's not what Pheola says," he told her sourly, pointing tochairs we could take.
"Pheola?" Shari questioned.
"A powerful PC," Wally said. "She predicted you would accompanyTex tonight."
"Oh, _really_," Shari said scathingly.
"I was there," I told her. "She really did."
"Let's not be diverted by sideshows," Shari said. "We're here tomeasure the psi powers of Tex Robertson, not to talk over thereputed clairvoyance of some dim and misty character."
"Precognition," Wally corrected her. "Stick around, Dr. King.Pheola will be down a little later. She thinks Tex is somethingspecial."
That was not going to make a good interchange, so I cut in. "Dr.King is a professional in this field--" I started.
Wally waved a disgusted hand. "We know all about Dr. King and herfield," he said. "Proving that psi powers don't exist, right, Dr.King?"
Shari bristled. It was hard to stay friendly in any talk withBupp. "You know my field," she said, about twenty degrees belowzero. "I accept any and all evidence, regardless what it proves!There's a lot of talk about psi powers, but precious little thatcan ever be detected under laboratory conditions!"
"Oh, well," Wally Bupp grinned. "That's not so strange. All members of theLodge are cautioned to stay away from laboratories. You've been testingNormals. What do you expect for results?"
"Then _you_ show me!" she stormed.
"Go on with you," he grinned. "I thought it was Tex's powers youwanted tested. Mine are irrelevant."
"I _thought_ so," she said triumphantly. "Charlatan!"
For a moment the grin flickered off his face and I tensed tocatch Shari if she should start to drop. But I guess he thoughtbetter of it.
"Some other time," he said. "Let's get this over with. Make itsimple. You may have some statistical objections to my techniquetonight, but I'm not looking for fringe effects. If this hot-eyedswain of yours is any good at all, he'll bat a thousand." He gota deck of cards out of his desk drawer and fanned it out face upso that he could pluck the two of spades and the two of heartsfrom the deck. The rest he put back in his desk.
He put his hands under the desk, with the two cards in them,produced the cards again, face down, and laid them in a thinstack on the desk before all of us.
"What's on top?" he said. "Red or black?"
"How will you score?" Shari insisted. He scowled at her andtossed a squeeze counter across the desk.
"You score," he said. "It really isn't necessary. Tex will eitherbe right all the time or it won't matter."
But before I could call the top card, the office door openedbehind us. I looked around, expecting Pheola. Instead it wasMilly with the down, down hose. Only this time she was decentlydressed in a dark two-piece suit and wore make-up. She certainlywas no more talkative than before, nor did Wally introduce her.Shari was perfectly equal to the occasion and looked throughMilly with composure. This takes about three generations ofoverbreeding.
"Try it," Wally insisted. "What's on top?"
I hit it. Then I missed it. Then I hit three in a row. It wasn'tfast work, because Wally hid the cards under his desk after eachguess, shuffled the two cards around and then laid them before meagain. This went on for about twenty minutes. At that point Sharispoke.
"That makes exactly three hundred tries," she said, looking atthe counter in her hand. "Have you been keeping score, Mr. Bupp?"
"I thought _you_ were."
"So I was," she snapped, throwing up her tiaraed head. He surebrought out the worst in people. "Tex has been right exactly onehundred and fifty times. He's never been more than five tries tothe good in the whole series."
"Interesting," Wally said.
I took my first decent breath in the day. "This ought to let meoff the hook," I said to him. "Are you convinced?"
He shrugged. "How about it, Milly?" he asked.
"A random sample," she said. "He doesn't want to score. He didn'ttry."
Shari was ready for that one. She turned and spoke to Milly: "Youhave ways of knowing what Tex was thinking?" she asked sweetly.
"Yes."
"Name any three!" Shari lashed at her furiously. The solid womanwasn't the least bit bowled over.
"Read his mind," she said matter-of-factly. "Just like I can tellthat you're getting ready to screech 'Charlatan!' at me, and likeyou think I got a cast-iron girdle and homely shoes. Well,they're comfortable, dearie, which is more than you can say forthose high-heeled slippers of yours. That left little toe ofyours is killing you, dearie!"
Shari's lips moved, but her mouth was as empty of sound as herface was of blood. Milly had hit the bull's-eye.
"Everybody relax a moment," Wally said. "Tell me, Dr. King,what's your attitude toward PC?"
"I don't have any!" she snapped. "It's a phenomenon. I have asmuch attitude toward it as I do toward osmosis or towardperistalsis. None."
"Would you consider a person fortunate to possess the power ofprecognition?" Wally asked her.
Shari's head came up. "If there were such a thing," she said,much more quietly. "Yes. I should imagine that precognition wouldbe a powerful talent."
"If you have no emotional bias against psi as such," he went onsmoothly, "you'd be happy for Tex if he were a PC."
Her eyebrows drew together. She looked at me, veiling her violeteyes as if to hide her thoughts from us. "I would consider Texquite fortunate. But only if you could show that such a thingreally existed," she said more loudly.
"How about you, Tex?" Wally asked me.
"Nuts," I said. "You can't make me like the idea of being asnake, no matter how you dress it up." I shook my head. "Psipowers are the mark of a diseased mind, for my dough. They'repure poison. What have they ever done for you?" I insistedrudely.
"Made me a surgeon," he said.
"Never!" Shari said hotly.
"Ask Tex," Wally suggested. "He felt me put a lift on hiscoronary artery. I'm a TK surgeon--I've got enough TK to putclamps on inaccessible arteries and feel out mechanical disordersof the body. Check it. I'm on the staff at Universal Hospital."
"And what are you doing here?" she argued.
"Meeting my obligation to the Lodge," he said. "This is where Igot my training, right in this building."
"I thought that brownstone house was the Lodge," I said.
"No," he said. "That's just the Grand Master's residence. TheLodge provides quarters for its brass. This building is the realchapter house."
He heaved a long sigh and dug into his drawer again. "You canbeat it, Milly," he said. "Thanks."
"I know," she told him from the door. She had started out longbefore he spoke.
Impressive stuff, but it got a sniff from Shari.
What Wally got out of his desk had a refreshing shape and color.It was oblong. It was green. It was money. It was, for a fact, astack of one thousand dollar bills.
Wally shuffled the two cards under his desk again and piled themtwo-deep in front of Shari and me.
"You heard what Dr. King said," Wally reminded me. "She'll loveyou no less for being a PC. Now we'll play the game a little morerealistically. Every time you guess the top card right, Tex, I'mgoing to give you a thousand dollars. No strings attached. Whenyou miss,