Conway left O’Mara feeling more confused than ever.
He was still trying to make the odd bits and pieces of information add up to something which made sense, but either he was too tired or too stupid. And definitely he was tired; these past two days his brain had been just so much thick, weary fog…
There must be an association between the two factors, Arretapec’s coming and this unaccountable weariness, Conway thought: he was in good physical condition and no amount of muscular or mental exertion had left him feeling this way before. And had not Arretapec said something about the itching sensations he had felt being symptomatic of a disorder?
All of a sudden his job with the VUXG doctor was no longer merely frustrating or annoying. Conway was beginning to feel anxiety for his own personal safety. Suppose the itching was due to some new type of bacteria which did not show up on his personal tell-tale? He had thought something like this when his fidgeting had caused Arretapec to send him away, but for the rest of the day he had been subconsciously trying to convince himself that it was nothing because the intensity of the sensations had diminished to practically zero. Now he knew that he should have had one of the senior physicians look into it. He should, in fact, do it now.
But Conway was very tired. He promised himself that he would get Dr. Mannon, his previous superior, to give him a going over in the morning. And in the morning he would have to get on the right side of Arretapec again. He was still worrying about the strange new disease he might have caught and the correct method of apologizing to a VUXG life-form when he fell asleep.
Iv
Next morning there was another two-inch hollow eaten in the top of his desk and Arretapec was nestling inside it. As soon as Conway demonstrated that he was awake by sitting up, the being spoke:
“It had occurred to me since yesterday,” the VUXG said, “that I have perhaps been expecting too much in the way of self-control, emotional stability, and the ability to endure or to discount minor physical irritants in a member of a species which is-relatively, you understand-of low mentality. I will therefore do my utmost to bear these points in mind during our future relations together.”
It took a few seconds for Conway to realize that Arretapec had apologized to him. When he did he thought that it was the most insulting apology he had ever had tendered to him, and that it spoke well for his self-control that he did not tell the other so. Instead he smiled and insisted that it was all his fault. They left to see their patient again.
The interior of the converted transport had changed out of all recognition. Instead of a hollow sphere covered with a muddy shambles of soil, water and foliage, three-quarters of the available surface was now a perfect representation of a Mesozoic landscape. Yet it was not exactly the same as the pictures Conway had studied yesterday, because they had been of a distant age of Earth and this flora had been transplanted from the patient’s own world, but the differences were surprisingly small. The greatest change was in the sky.
Where previously it had been possible to look up at the opposite side of the hollow sphere, now one looked up into a blue-white mist in which burned a very lifelike sun. The hollow center of the ship had been almost filled with this semi-opaque gas so that now it would take a keen eye and a mind armed with foreknowledge for a person to know that he was not standing on a real planet with a real sun in the foggy sky above him. The engineers had done a fine job.
“I had not thought such an elaborate and lifelike reconstruction possible here,” said Arretapec suddenly. “You are to be commended. This should have a very good effect on the patient.”
The life-form under discussion-for some peculiar reason the engineers insisted on calling it Emily-was contentedly shredding the fronds from the top of a thirty foot high palm-like growth. The fact of its being on dry land instead of pasturing under water was indicative of its state of mind, Conway knew, because the old-time brontosaur invariably took to the water when threatened by enemies, that being its only defense. Apparently this neo-brontosaurus hadn’t a care in the world.