I'm sure of
it, because he was interested at first in the IBM Alcoholic Reliever,
until I talked him out of it. He had red hair, you know, and I've had a
theory for some time about red-headedness and alcoholism. It seems--"
"Excellent," Rath said. "Alcoholism will be on his records. It narrows
the search considerably."
As he dialed the NYRT Corporation, the expression on his craglike face
was almost pleasant.
It was good, for a change, to find that a human could retain some
significant facts.
-- -- -- -- --
"But surely you remember your goricae?" the Regenerator was saying.
"No," Caswell answered wearily.
"Tell me, then, about your juvenile experiences with the thorastrian
fleep."
"Never had any."
"Hmm. Blockage," muttered the machine. "Resentment. Repression. Are you
sure you don't remember your goricae and what it meant to you? The
experience is universal."
"Not for me," Caswell said, swallowing a yawn.
He had been undergoing mechanotherapy for close to four hours and it
struck him as futile. For a while, he had talked voluntarily about his
childhood, his mother and father, his older brother. But the
Regenerator had asked him to put aside those fantasies. The patient's
relationships to an imaginary parent or sibling, it explained, were
unworkable and of minor importance psychologically.
Pages:
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29