Zelazny, Roger - Novel 07 (17 page)

 
          
 
"It could be something like an idiot
savant function," Alec offered. "Something he heard, something he
absorbed long ago from some mind he touched, just now surfacing."

 
          
 
"But it is fully consistent, Alec, and he
did more than repeat facts. He engaged in intelligent—extremely
intelligent—conversation. He was talking about his— rather, the Marquis'—
Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind. He did not
just recite the points. He answered questions and he expanded on the thoughts
which exist in the essay itself. It is more than fanciful utopianism, you know.
He went on about the perfection of man as a consequence of the diffusion of
knowledge, about science as a way of mind which would raise the material level
of mankind as well as enhance the intellect of the individual, about—"

 
          
 
"A moment," Alec said, raising his
hand. "We have already established that he is not oriented with respect to
person and time. What about place, though? How did he justify being on the moon
and in late-eighteenth-century
France
simultaneously?"

 
          
 
Marcel smiled.

 
          
 
"A cell is a cell," he said. "The
Marquis spent his last days in prison. That is where he thought he was."

 
          
 
"Victim of the Revolution, wasn't
he?"

 
          
 
"Yes. Though it is still a debatable
point whether he was executed or took his own life rather than—"

 
          
 
Alec stiffened.

 
          
 
"What—?" Marcel began.

 
          
 
"I don't know. But that bothers me.
Whatever the source of his information, that might be there."

 
          
 
"Surely you do not think ... ?"

 
          
 
Alec stood.

 
          
 
"I am going to check on him. It troubles
me."

 
          
 
"I'll come with you."

 
          
 
They strode across the compound.

 
          
 
"He has never exhibited any—tendencies—in
that direction, has he?"

 
          
 
"Not since he has been here," Alec
said, "and there is nothing in the record to that effect. But the way his
personality reshuffles itself, it is difficult to guess what he might be like
at any given time. My God!"

 
          
 
'What?"

 
          
 
"I'm reading him!"

 
          
 
Alec broke into a run.

 
          
 
They reached Dennis' room to find him on the
floor. Using his belt, he had attempted to hang himself from a light fixture.
The fixture, however, had given way. Unconscious, he lay beside the chair on
which he had stood to make the arrangements.

 
          
 
Marcel checked him quickly.

 
          
 
"His neck does not seem broken," he
said, "but I want X-rays. Go get something to transport him. I will stay
here."

 
          
 
"Right."

 
          
 
A thorough examination showed that Dennis had
sustained no major injuries. It did not show why he had entered a coma, in
which he remained for over two days. During this time, he remained in the
clinic being fed from a dripping bottle, monitored by observers human and
mechanical.

 
          
 
When on the third day he awakened, Dennis
clutched at his side and moaned. A nurse appeared, observed his distress and
sent for a doctor. A gross examination showed nothing amiss, and more elaborate
test were undertaken. While their results were being considered, Marcel and
Alec arrived at the bedside and determined that Dennis was no longer the
Marquis de Condorcet. A telepathic examination revealed that he believed
himself lying in a meadow near a rocky out-crop, bleeding from a wound
inflicted by the horn of a fabulous beast from the sea. He also felt that his
former therapist Lydia Dimanche was with him and frequently addressed the
attending nurse by her name.

 
          
 
"All the tests are negative," said
an older doctor who had come into the room during the TP scan.

 
          
 
"It is another of his—delusions,"
Alec said. "There are instructions in his file for breaking something like
this. I think it would help if he had a sedative."

 
          
 
"I don't know," the older doctor
said. "He has been out for quite some time. He is weak.... What about a
simple relaxant?"

 
          
 
"All right. Let's try that."

 
          
 
The doctor sent for the necessary drug,
administered an injection. The nurse held Dennis' hand. After a few minutes, a
certain tension seemed to go out of him. His moans grew weaker, ceased. Alec
moved then, carefully, firmly, to break a hypothetical connection. The mind he
regarded suddenly swam, then drifted. Dennis closed his eyes and his breathing
grew regular. The doctor moved to take his pulse.

 
          
 
"A normal sleep, I'd say," he
announced half a minute later. "You found a way to separate him from the
anxiety source?"

 
          
 
"I guess that is as good a way to put it
as any. Yes. Unless he comes up with something new awfully fast he should be his
old self when he awakens—if he sticks to what seems the pattern he has been
following."

 
          
 
"Then the best thing we can do is let him
sleep right now—and keep the monitors on." He regarded the flashboard.
"His functions are well above the previous coma level."

 
          
 
Alec nodded.

 
          
 
"It seems best. Have them call me right
away, though, if there are any changes in his condition."

 
          
 
"Of course," the doctor said.

 
          
 
They went away and left him sleeping.

 
          
 
On awakening, Dennis seemed returned to his
more innocuous, earlier self. He walked with Alec about the facility, regarding
with slightly enhanced attention those objects presented to him. He considered
the flowers in the gardens and the stars beyond the dome, the Earth far away.
His communicative abilities grew slowly during the weeks that followed, though
he still did not initiate conversations, did not ask questions.

 
          
 
Dennis returned to his art class. He continued
to draw geometric figures, but now he began embellishing them, and surrounding
them with curlicues and elaborate filigree work. The hard, decisive lines he
had originally drawn were softened in the basic figures and more of an element
of freehand became apparent in the elaborations.

 
          
 
Alec then decided it was time to ask him,
"What is your name?"

 
          
 
Dennis did not answer him, but continued
staring at the atmosphere regulation plant across the way from where they were
seated.

 
          
 
Alec rested his hand on his shoulder.

 
          
 
"Your name?" he repeated softly.
"Would you tell me your name?"

 
          
 
"Name—" Dennis whispered.
"Name—"

 
          
 
"Your name. What is it?"

 
          
 
Dennis' eyes narrowed, his brows lowered,
tightened. He began to breathe rapidly.

 
          
 
Alec squeezed his shoulder.

 
          
 
"It is all right. It is all right,"
he said. "I will just tell you. Your name is Dennis. Dennis Guise."

 
          
 
The signs of tension vanished. Dennis sighed.

 
          
 
"Can you say it? Can you say Dennis
Guise?"

 
          
 
"Dennis," Dennis said. "Dennis
Guise."

 
          
 
"Good! Very good," Alec told him.
"If you can remember that you will be doing well."

 
          
 
They walked on.

 
          
 
About fifteen minutes later, Alec asked him,
"Now, what is your name?"

 
          
 
Dennis' face took on a look of anguish. Again,
his breathing increased.

 
          
 
"We talked about it just a little while
ago," Alec said. "Try to remember."

 
          
 
Dennis began to cry.

 
          
 
"It is all right," Alec said, taking
his arm. "It is Dennis Guise. Dennis Guise. That is all."

 
          
 
Dennis gasped, sighed. He said nothing.

 
          
 
The next day he did not recall it, and Alec
abandoned the problem of identity establishment for the time being. Dennis
showed no ill effects from the small trauma.

 
          
 
Several days passed, and then the instructor
of the art class noticed a totally incongruous sketch on Dennis' pad. His
pencil was moving to the completion of an amazing caricature of one of the other
students.

 
          
 
"That is extremely good," she
remarked. "I was not aware that you did faces."

 
          
 
Dennis glanced up at her and smiled. It was
the first time she had ever seen him smile.

 
          
 
"When did you begin using your left
hand?"

 
          
 
He performed a palms-up gesture with both
hands and shrugged.

 
          
 
Later, the instructor showed some of the new
drawings to Alec.

 
          
 
Alec whistled.

 
          
 
"Was there anything leading up to this
sort of work?" he asked.

 
          
 
"No. It happened quite suddenly, along
with his switching hands."

 
          
 
"He's a southpaw now?"

 
          
 
"Yes. I thought you would be interested
in that—as an indication of some neurological development, perhaps—a possible
shifting of control from one brain hemisphere to the other—"

 
          
 
"Yes, thanks," he said. "I'll
have
Jefferson
, over in neuropsych, check him over again.
Were there any behavioral shifts accompanying this?"

 
          
 
She nodded.