drifted nearer also, as though drawn by a mutual attraction.

The man with the gun raised his weapon and pressed the trigger.

With the action the perspective shifted again. He was watching the face of the man he shot jerk and twitch, expand and contract. The face was unharmed, yet it was no longer the same. No longer his own features.

The stranger face smiled approvingly at him.

“ODD,” Bergstrom said. He brought his hands up and joined the tips of his fingers against his chest. “But it’s another piece in the [p138]  jig-saw. In time it will fit into place.” He paused. “It means no more to you than the first, I suppose?”

“O

[p

138

]  

“No,” Zarwell answered.

He was not a talking man, Bergstrom reflected. It was more than reticence, however. The man had a hard granite core, only partially concealed by his present perplexity. He was a man who could handle himself well in an emergency.

Bergstrom shrugged, dismissing his strayed thoughts. “I expected as much. A quite normal first phase of treatment.” He straightened a paper on his desk. “I think that will be enough for today. Twice in one sitting is about all we ever try. Otherwise some particular episode might cause undue mental stress, and set up a block.” He glanced down at his appointment pad. “Tomorrow at two, then?”

Zarwell grunted acknowledgment and pushed himself to his feet, apparently unaware that his shirt clung damply to his body.

THE sun was still high when Zarwell left the analyst’s office. The white marble of the city’s buildings shimmered in the afternoon heat, squat and austere as giant tree trunks, pock-marked and gray-mottled with windows. Zarwell was careful not to rest his hand on the flesh searing surface of the stone.

The evening meal hour was approaching when he reached the Flats, on the way to his 

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