The Hibited Man
(1949)*
L. Sprague de Camp

CHAPTER I

	As Thomas Otterburn entered the offices of the laboratory that Friday morning and hung his hat on the rack, he heard somebody call, "Tom!" behind him.

	It was Eduard Dubrowsky from the Psychoelectronic Section, looking more like a disheveled hawk than usual. Dubrowsky barked, "Busy this morning?"

	"Good morning, Ed," murmured Otterburn with his usual formality. "Yes, I've got to get out the weekly project-hour sheet, the biweekly news-letter, the monthly project report, the quarterly appropriations estimate, the—"

	"Okay, okay—after lunch then."

	"What after lunch?"

	"You know, you know." Dubrowsky lowered his voice and came closer. "We're ready for the first human test with the materiostat. And you're going to be it. Remember?"

	"Uh—yes, I suppose I do. But—"

	"But nothing. See you after lunch in my section."

	"Oh, all right." Otterburn, wondering if he had been smart in volunteering for the first human tryout on Project Styx, sought his desk and spread out his papers.

	On top of the pile in his in-box lay the envelope containing his pay-check. Jimmy the office-boy must have been around early. He slit the envelope and looked at the check to make sure, put the envelope in his pocket and plunged into his work despite the fact that he had ten minutes to go before the working day officially commenced.

	Behind him he heard McQueen's loud: "Hi, genius!" as McQueen scaled his hat ten feet onto a hook beside Otterburn's.

	"Good morning, Donald," said Otterburn.

	McQueen found his own desk, put his feet on it, ran a hand through his red hair and opened his newspaper. Presently he said, "It says here—say, for gossakes, Tom, why don't you relax? There's nobody here to be impressed by your industry except me, and heaven knows I'm not."

	Otterburn looked at him briefly and went on working without reply. Then' McQueen's feet came down off his desk with a bang. That meant that Seymour Barlow, head of the Fluid Mechanics Section and the mutual boss of Otterburn and McQueen, had arrived. McQueen, after a brief glance at the clock, continued reading his newspaper. Five minutes to go.

	Otterburn looked up long enough to say, "Good morning, Mr. Barlow." Everybody else in the section called Barlow "Seymour," "Sey," or even "Fats."

	Then, rapidly pro-rating hours of work among his various projects, he heard the sounds of the arrival of the other engineers in the section. From the glassed-in section of the big room devoted to the Stenographic Department came the clack of female tongues as the space filled up with stenos.

	The bell sounded. At a certain click of heels Otterburn caught his breath and peered slantwise through his glasses without turning his head enough so you'd notice. Lucy Kneipf was coming in, one minute late as usual.

	Otterburn called, "Good morning, Lucy," but so softly that the girl apparently did not hear it.

	Otterburn told himself that Barlow, as usual, would do nothing about Lucy's lateness. Good-looking girls really had no business going in for engineering and then disrupting the routine. However, if he were in Barlow's position he would no doubt do the same. He'd even take advantage of his position to date Lucy.

	His mind left the figures to wander off into a fantasy in which he married Lucy in the teeth of competition from the entire section and settled down with her in some suburban paradise to raise a vast family and be the envy of the whole laboratory. He had never expected to fall in love with a short dark plump girl, especially since he was on the tall thin sandy side, but there it was.

	His daydream was shattered by McQueen's bawl, "Hi, gorgeous! How's the lady engineer this morning? Boy, we sure spray-painted the town last night, didn't we?"

	Lucy smiled and said something that Otterburn missed. Otterburn pressed his lips together angrily and forced his mind back to his figures. He despised himself. Here that booming extravert was no section head but he managed to date Lucy all right while he, Otterburn, had never nerved himself to get beyond the how-are-you-this-nice-morning stage.

	Despite the fact that he was more intelligent than McQueen and a better engineer too. Barlow had practically told him so—that he was the smartest man in the section except old Matthias back in the corner there. And if he were going to get married ever he'd better start soon. He was going to be thirty.

	"It's Friday in case any of you have forgotten," said Seymour Barlow.

	McQueen gave a dramatic groan. "Paperwork day! I wish you guys with the brass would figure a way to let us poor mad scientists do our science instead of this glorified bookkeeping. Say, Tom!"

	"Yes, Donald?" Otterburn turned his head. He thought that McQueen would probably not treat him so genially if he suspected that Thomas Otterburn was a rival for the esteem of Lucy Kneipf—even if only a latent rival.

	"I sometimes wonder. Is it as bad as this in private industry? Or are all these blasted reports and dope-sheets and things a disease peculiar to government?"

	"I wouldn't know," said Otterburn. "I've worked for the government ever since I finished college, eight years ago."

	Matthias cackled from his corner, "I can answer that one. Some big private companies are even worse. Every time some new super or manager comes in he thinks of a new periodical report he's simply got to have, so he sends out an order establishing it.

	"The only trouble is he never thinks to abolish any of the old reports, so they accumulate until the personnel spend all their time filling them out and haven't any time for useful work."

	Otterburn forced his mind back to his work again—no easy feat, since this kind of paperwork was the dullest task he had to do. His mind wandered off into apprehensive speculation as to what might happen this afternoon when Dubrowsky tried out his darned gadget on him. He'd been foolish to accede to Dubrowsky's urgings. If he could only say, "No!" and make it stick ...

	Lunch came before Otterburn realized it. He put away the small remainder of his paperwork, stopped at the check-cashing window to cash his paycheck and shuffled over to the cafeteria with the others of his section. He slouched along with nervous little steps, hands in pockets and eyes on the ground, mumbling polite responses to the helloes of his acquaintances from the other departments.

	At the cafeteria he carefully let all the others of his section precede him through the door of the portion of the room partitioned off and marked Executives, Engineers and Guests Only.

	Then, by quickly dodging around a table, he managed to reach Lucy Kneipf's chair in time to pull it out for her. She thanked him, and while he stood blushing and trying to think of a witty reply McQueen took the place on one side of her and another engineer that on the other.

	McQueen made his usual complaints, long grown banal from repetition, about the food and the service. Then he barked at Otterburn, "Don't you think so too, Tom?"

	Otterburn studied his plate and answered modestly: "Oh, I don't know. I've seen better and I've seen worse."

	McQueen snorted, "Try and get you to criticize anything or anybody!" and turned his attention to giving Miss Kneipf a shamelessly public buss.

	Otterburn felt a hand on his shoulder, and there was Dubrowsky looking down at him. "Coming to our lab right after you finish, Tom?"

	"We-ell," said Otterburn hesitantly, "I do have some more to do on the quarterly estimate."

	"Oh, fertilize the estimate! It'll keep till Monday and we can't wait around. You promised you'd help us, didn't you?"

	"Why, sure, you know that."

	"All right then, come over to the lab with me when you finish."

	Otterburn wiped his mouth, folded his paper napkin neatly, rose and followed the engineers of the Psychoelectronic Section to their own part of the building. This laboratory had a No Admittance sign on the door.

	In front of the door stood a desk at which sat a police woman with a register. Otterburn signed the register, and followed the others in. These were Dubrowsky, Dubrowsky's young P-l assistant, and Dubrowsky's associate, de Castro, a bald and burly psychologist.

	The test was to be the first tryout on a human being of what some mythological-minded functionary in the Bureau had christened Project Styx. Otterburn had become involved in this project by solving a minor but baffling problem in the design of the apparatus—a matter of getting an actuator-mechanism into a small space—for the regular engineers on the project.

	Since the project was classed as Secret he had had to be cleared for secret information outside of his own immediate field. And because the plan had fascinated him—although he was not an electronics man—he had kept in touch with it ever since and had let Dubrowsky talk him into volunteering for the first tests on a live man.

	Dubrowsky ambled over to his section of the laboratory and extracted from the general clutter on the workbench a mess of straps and cables, saying, "This is her. Want to take off your coat and shirt?"

	Otterburn, while stripping to the waist, asked, "How did those live tests come out?"

	Dubrowsky said, "Fine, except that the field seems to extend in from the surface of the skin as well as out."

	"What does that do?"

	"Nearly as we can figure from the effects on the animals it affects parts of their brains."

	"Huh?" said Otterburn in a tone of alarm.

	"Nothing serious. Has an effect like a little alcohol. Doc can tell you."

	"Yes," said de Castro. "It appears to affect mainly the frontal lobes and also some of the cortex, so as to decrease inhibitions and promote the thalamic functions. The dog, for instance, tended to forget that he was housebroken while he had it on."

	Otterburn said, "Boy, I sure hope it doesn't—"

	"I do not think so. Of course we do not really know with a human being. The effect on the forebrain might suppress the superego."

	"The what? I'm sorry, but that's out of my line."

	"Of course, of course," said de Castro. "The superego is the name given in the old Freudian psychology to the section of the ego, mostly on the unconscious level, that criticizes one's performance by comparing it with some ideal and punishes one by making one unhappy when one fails to live up to the ideal."

	"Do you mean the conscience?" said Otterburn. Dubrowsky was fastening. the thing around his bare torso. There was a little flat black-enameled box in front, over his solar plexus, and another in back. The two were connected by a number of straps radiating from each, so that they looked not unlike a pair of enormous black spiders embracing Otterburn's trunk between them.

	"No, not exactly the conscience," said de Castro. "That is on the conscious level."

	"Let's not get off into psych terminology," said Dubrowsky. "Been listening to it for years now and I still don't understand it. The point is that it may temporarily uninhibit you a little, like a prefrontal lobotomy. Or hibit you, if you prefer." He smiled at his little joke.

	"That's why I wanted you to be the first subject, because heaven knows if there's anybody on the station who's over-inhibited it's you. Gives us a margin of safety to play with."   .

	De Castro smiled agreement. "Yes, Tom, you even stand out among a crowd of research scientists, who tend to be inhibited introverts—you know, the quiet, subdued, intellectual type—-to begin with."

	Dubrowsky said, "All right, she's ready to go. Are you?"

	"Okay," said Otterburn, feeling a little like the Earl of Essex giving his own executioner the signal to swing the ax. Despite the excitement inside him, however, he kept his voice as low and steady as always.

-

CHAPTER II

	Dubrowsky clicked the switch on the chest-section of the materiostat, saying: "We'll try it on low power first." He turned the knob control to the first index figure. "Feel anything?"

	"No, not a thing—wait, it tingles a little," said Otterburn.

	They waited several minutes in silence. "Anything now?" asked Dubrowsky.

	"No. I got used to the tingle so I don't notice it."

	"How about your brain?"

	"Hasn't affected it at all as far as I can tell."

	"All right, let's begin testing. Brace yourself." Dubrowsky put his hand out and touched the skin of Otterburn's face, neck, and thorax. Then he began slapping lightly, making a note on a pad after each slap.

	As long as he moved his hand slowly nothing out of the ordinary happened, but as he slapped harder, some force manifested itself just before his hand reached his subject's skin, so that his slaps were slowed and cushioned before they reached their target.

	"Try intermediate," suggested de Castro.

	Dubrowsky turned the control a notch higher. "Any feeling?"

	"No, sir," said Otterburn. "A little more tingle but that's going away now. Okay, go ahead, sock me one."

	Dubrowsky tried more slaps. This time, when he struck hard, his hand bounced back before it reached Otterburn's skin at all. Finally Dubrowsky doubled his fist and threw a stiff punch at Otterburn's jaw.

	The fist bounced off empty air. Otterburn's head rocked a bit as the energy of the fist was transferred to it through the cushioning medium of the materiostat field, but he grinned.

	"Hot spit!" he said. "That didn't hurt at all. Here, you, give me a whack with that stick!"

	De Castro raised an eyebrow—after all he was nearly twice Otterburn's age—but wordlessly picked up the sawed-off broomstick and swung on Otterburn. The stick swooshed through the air and bounced harmlessly away.

	Otterburn's grin became broader. "Say, this is the thing to wear when you're attending a riot! Too bad we haven't got a bow and arrow," he said. "We could put on a William Tell act. I know, how about a baseball? I don't suppose there'd be one around the lab, would there?"

	"Come to think of it, one of the mechs has one they play catch with in the lunch hour," said Dubrowsky. "Hey, John!"

	The mechanic presently produced one very dirty hard baseball out of his tool-box. "You want I should lend you the gloves too?" he said.

	"No thanks," said Dubrowsky. "Stand by, everybody!" He wound up and hurled the ball at Otterburn in a very creditable pitch.

	The ball ricocheted off the field and went through a pane of glass separating Dubrowsky's part of the laboratory from that adjoining. The tinkle of falling glass mingled with shouts of alarm and indignation from the engineers in the next section.

	"Oh-oh," said Dubrowsky. "Must be getting kind of hibited myself." He recovered the baseball, pacified the occupants of the adjacent booth as best he could and returned the ball to its owner.

	"Now," he said with artificial solemnity, "let's try high."

	When he turned the control as far as it would go, the results were similar only more so. Even a light tap was repulsed, and the subject's clothes showed a tendency to bag out from his body as he moved.

	Dubrowsky said, "With that setting you'd have to be careful about eating. If you shoved a forkful of grub at your face too fast it would fly off at a tangent."

	Otterburn, moving tentatively, said, "Wouldn't be practical unless I were going to jump off a high building or something. Now let's try the stat at various settings with all my clothes on."

	Two hours later de Castro asked, "You say you do not feel any effect, any mental effect that is?" 

	"Not a bit. I never felt better."

	"It might be that you are afflicted with euphoria," said de Castro, "like that induced by alcohol or anoxemia."

	Otterburn shook his head vigorously. "Nonsense, Doc. I've drunk liquor and I've been anoxic in the altitude chamber and I know what euphoria feels like. I feel perfectly normal. Want me to do some simple addition to show you?"

	De Castro looked at his watch. "That is a good idea for another series of tests, but I fear we cannot start them tonight."

	"Jeepers, nearly quitting time!" said Otterburn. "Say, why don't you guys let me wear this thing overnight, just to make sure it has no mental effects?"

	"Oh, couldn't do that," said Dubrowsky quickly. "Secret equipment."

	"And you could not return it until Monday," said de Castro.

	"So what? It's under my clothes where it doesn't show/' Otterburn stood up in a marked manner and buttoned his coat.

	"I've made up my mind. It'll take Ed half an hour to get this thing off me and I've got a date this evening—that is, I hope to have a date—and don't want to be late. It'll be perfectly safe, because as you said yourself nothing can happen to me. Even bullets would bounce off, and the faster they come the harder they bounce."

	He grinned. "Anyway I don't see how you guys can stop me. All I have to do is turn the control to high and to heck with you!"

	He walked out, leaving the men staring at one another in wonderment and alarm, uncertain what to do about his highhanded action.

	On his way back to his own department, Otterburn paused to take out his wallet and check the currency in it. His routine had always been to go home, calculate his expenses for the next two weeks and take the rest of his pay down to the bank during their Friday evening open hour and deposit it. He had never, at least consciously, thought of blowing all his pay in one tremendous binge. Well, why shouldn't he? He was only young once.

	He strode into the space occupied by his own section. The engineers were standing around the hatrack, gassing and watching the clock. Otterburn tapped Lucy Kneipf firmly on the shoulder. "This way," he said with a jerk of his head. "Doing anything tonight, gorgeous?"

	"Why—uh—let me think. No, I—"

	"Okay, then how about dinner and a show with me?"

	"Well, I—I'd like to, but Don said he might come around."

	"Oh, bolt Don McQueen! Why should you let him keep you dangling? Come on, what do you say?" He managed to put such an unexpected man-of-distinction air into the invitation that the girl stammered: "Wh-Why, all right."

	"Good. Pick you up at eighteen-hundred." Why had he ever been afraid to ask her out? And why had he ever cringed before McQueen? When he threw put his chest and straightened his back he was fully as large as the redhead.

	The bell rang, and he passed McQueen on the way out. The latter looked at him with an expression compounded of puzzlement and suspicion.

	Otterburn swung his arm to give McQueen a hearty clap on the back and roared, "Good night, you old weasel! Have a crummy week-end!"

	The only hitch was that his slap on the back failed to make contact. His hand bounced back without ever touching McQueen's sports jacket, though McQueen staggered a little from the transmitted force of the blow.

-

	Otterburn showed up at Lucy Kneipf's house at six-fifteen. When she came downstairs she paused at the sight of his dinner-jacket, from which floated a faint odor of naphthalene.

	"It won't do," he said sternly. "Go back up and put on a dinner-dress."

	"But—I'm sorry. Why didn't you tell me? After all—" Resentment made itself heard in her voice.

	However, he cut her off with, "That's all right. One if these days I shall probably ask you to marry me and you will probably accept. So you might—"

	"What?"

	"Sure. You don't think I'd let a pretty girl like you spend the rest of your life running a slide-rule, do you? So you might as well get in practice now."

	She stood with her mouth open as if one of the experimental rabbits in the Psychoelectric Laboratory had roared at her with the voice of a lion. Then she quietly went upstairs and reappeared ten minutes later in a longer dress.

	He ushered her out and into a taxi with a lordly air as if he did this sort of thing all the time. "We're eating at the Troc," he said. "It's probably a clip-joint but just let 'em try to clip me and see what happens. It's only a block from the show."

	"What show is it?"

	"Crinolina. Oh, it just occurred to me—I hope you haven't seen it?" 

	"N-no."

	"You like musicals, I trust. I phoned Bergen's and got two on the aisle, fifth row. If we don't like it we can walk out in the middle. Hey, driver, a little more speed, please! Say, have you heard about Dillworth in the Metallurgical Lab and his wife? Darndest thing—"

	He rattled on about office gossip, his own opinions on everything and his plans for his—that is to say their—future. Finally she got a word in edgewise.

	"You know, Tom, you've talked more in the last fifteen minutes than in all the six months I've known you?"

	"Is that so? I talk rather well, don't you think? Now—oh, here we are. Just a min while I fling a purse of gold to our charioteer."

	In the restaurant he told the headwaiter, "Two please. Your very best table, and not too near the music."

	When the music started he said, after a slight hesitation, "Dance?"

	"But there's nobody else on the floor. Let's wait—" 

	"All the better. We're less likely to bump people. What do we care if they look at us?"

	"Oh, but please, Tom. Wait till there are at least a few—" Otterburn's eyes took on a dangerous glitter. "If you won't dance with me, Lucy," he said, "I shall get out there and do a solo!" He rose. "Are you corning?"

	She hastily followed him to the floor. After a couple of turns she said, "Why, you're not as bad as I—I mean, you're good!"

	He smiled tolerantly. He had thought, himself, that his coordination seemed exceptionally good this evening. "For a man who hasn't danced in nearly a year I get along. I find I can do practically anything I want to if I put my mind to it. The only trouble is that I know only a couple of simple steps.

	"You'll have to teach me some of those fancy Latin American numbers. You know, like this!" He stamped his feet and wagged his fundament to indicate his idea of a South American dance, ignoring the fact that he was still the only man on the dance floor.

	However, more were now coming in from all sides. Presently the floor became crowded, and Otterburn said, "Our cocktails have arrived, I see. To heck with dancing. Let's drink!"

	She said, "Tom, what on earth has come over you? It's as if some other personality had suddenly taken over your body."

	"What? Why? Nothing's come over me. I'm perfectly normal and never felt better in my life. If you don't believe me I can recite my past history for the last fifteen years to show you I remember it. Ahh, good cocktail. Waiter, the menu. Hey, waiter!" His voice rose to a near-shout to emphasize his point.

	When dinner was slow in coming, Otterburn made unpleasant comparisons between the Troc and the government cafeteria where they ate lunch. Then he shouted and banged on his glass until he got attention. The headwaiter and all the other waiters were by now beginning to bend black looks upon him as if he had chosen their place to start a public temperance lecture.

	When the noise of the music and the general chatter made it hard for him to make himself heard he simply sat back and raised his voice to a bellow.

	"Look at those four fat slobs at the table in back of you, Lucy! The ones with the red faces and the loud voices. Must be a bunch of salesmen figuring how to trim their customers. Anybody who makes that much racket ought to be hove out. For a nickel I'd heave a roll at 'em."

	"Please don't," wailed Miss Kneipf. "Control yourself, Tom! They're not doing any harm and they're not making a bit more noise than you are!"

	"Heck," growled Otterburn, "I've controlled myself too much." He attacked the remains of his steak. "Hey, waiter! Dessert, please!"

-

CHAPTER III

	When the check finally arrived Otterburn looked at it closely, then called, "Waiter, come here! What's this charge? I thought you had a big sign out front, 'No Cover Charge.' How about it?"

	The waiter looked. "Oh, sir, that's the minimum liquor charge."

	"What's that? I haven't seen anything about it on your menu."

	The waiter turned the menu over and pointed to a line of three-point type, barely visible. By holding the menu up to the light and straining his eyes, Otterburn made out the words Minimum liquor charge, $5.00 per person.

	Otterburn said, "Lucy, run along and meet me in front of the ticket-agency. Know where Bergen's is? Same block as the theater but on the corner of Fifteenth."

	"But why, Tom?"

	"Because I'm going to make a disturbance. I told you I wouldn't let these gyp-artists clip me. So if you don't want to get caught in a riot be on your way. No argument now!"

	Then, turning back to the waiter, he roared, "You mean you expect me to read that line of flyspecks? To heck with' you! I'll pay for the one cocktail apiece the young lady and I had and for our dinners and that's all."

	"Shall I getta the manager, sir?"

	"Yes, bring on your manager! Here's what I owe you, and not another cent do you get. Get out of my way!"

	Finding his path blocked by a couple of very large waiters, and hearing the headwaiter cry, "Get that guy!" Otterburn seized the corner of the tablecloth that covered the table at which sat the four noisy fat red-faced men. They were noisy no longer, however, since like all the other customers they were watching Thomas Otterburn.

	He pulled the tablecloth, which came off the table with a frightful crash of plates and glasses, and threw it over the heads of the burly waiters.

	Waiters rushed at him from all points of the compass. Although Otterburn kicked a couple of tables over to block their path, a couple did get close enough to throw punches and kicks, which however merely bounced off his force-screen.

	"Gyp me, eh?" he yelled. "I'll show you crooks. Come on, why don't you hit me?" He pushed a large waiter, who had been vainly trying to punch his face, so that the man fell backwards, carrying a couple more tables with him.

	As Otterburn dodged about the throng of waiters trying to get at him and customers trying to get away, the air became filled with plates, glasses and a chair or two flying at him. All bounced off.

	As he heard a waiter yell: "E un' diavolo!" he plunged through the door of the men's washroom. Seeing the window open, he climbed out, dropped to the ground and walked the length of the alley to the street.

	A waiter was leading a policeman into the Troc. Otterburn shrank back into the shadow until they had passed out of sight. Then he took stock of himself.

	The Troc still had his hat but perhaps he had better not try to reclaim it just yet. It wasn't much of a hat anyhow. He must buy one of those snappy black-felt numbers, like the hats priests wore, to wear with his tux.

	Said tux had several spots made by water, liquor and food that had not come at him so fast as to be deflected off by the field, and his knees were dusty from the climb through the window. He dusted his knees and worked on the spots for some seconds with his handkerchief.

	Then, considering himself presentable enough for practical purposes, he stepped out of his alley and melted into the throng just as the policeman stuck his head out the window of the men's washroom to see what had become of il diavolo.

	Since Otterburn's watch told him that he had plenty of time yet he strolled slowly toward Bergen's, ogling the crowds as they passed. He had always been puzzled by stories of men accosted or picked up by girls on the street, since nothing of the sort had ever happened to him.

	The reason, he now realized, was simply that he had never made a practice of ogling but instead had always walked with a quick and businesslike step, his eyes glued dutifully to the pavement in front of him.

	Now he was surprised to observe how many of the girls were walking slowly and unaccompanied and how they returned his stare with an expression that seemed on the verge of breaking into a welcoming smile if he would only encourage them. He must look into this matter some time when he didn't have Lucy on his hands. Speaking of whom—

	Lucy was not in front of Bergen's. Otterburn picked up his tickets and waited outside the speculator's for five minutes, becoming more and more impatient. She must have stood him up, though he couldn't imagine why. It wasn't as if he'd done anything offensive or out of the ordinary. Oh well, there were just as good fish in the sea and he couldn't fool around all evening.

	He started down the street towards the theater, scanning the crowd for another pickup. There didn't seem to be so many now that he was actually looking for them. However, two doors short of the theater he spotted a girl standing still in the doorway—a tall bleached-blonde, good-looking despite a beaky nose, heavy makeup and a distinctly used look.

	"Good evening, miss," he said politely, showing his tickets. "I beg your pardon but my girl just stood me up. Would you like to go to the show next door with me?"

	"Why—" she hesitated, giving him a calculating eye. "Sure, I don't mind. My boy-friend has let me down too. My name's M'rie; what's yours?"

	By the time they reached their seats Otterburn was telling the girl whatever came into his head. He rattled on, "Got a date after the show? No? Fine. We'll come up to my place. Heck of a dump but it's home to me.

	"I can't ask you to see my etchings because I only own one and that's not very good but I'll show it to you if you insist. We might stop at the liquor store on the way and get a bottle of anti-freeze. Make a real night of it."

	"Why Mister Otterburg," she said coyly, "I only just know you."

	"It occurs to me," he said as they sat down, "that I don't even know whether this show's any good. I haven't been reading the reviews. Say, that gives me an idea! I won't be gypped twice in one evening—three times, if you count my girl's running out on me. You wait here a minute. I'll be right back."

	Five minutes later, as the music started he returned with a large paper bag. He gave M'rie a peek inside. It was full of tomatoes. "Now," he said, "the show had better be good."

	Alas, Crinolina was not good—at least not according to Thomas Otterburn's hypercritical taste. During the first act he commented on the low quality of the performance so audibly that people shushed him. It began to dawn upon him that if it had been a better show he probably couldn't have obtained such good seats on short notice.

	During the second act a heroine in crinoline and a hero in the garb of a pre-Civil-War South'n gentleman engaged in an endless love-duet that went round and round without getting anywhere. When the hero finally kissed the heroine's dainty hand, and then placed a tall beaver hat on his yellow curls, Otterburn stood up.

	He cried, "It stinks!" and let fly with a tomato.

	The first missile splashed against the backdrop. The second carried away the hero's top-hat and the third disappeared into the folds of the heroine's vast skirts.

	The aria died as if beheaded. Shouts resounded through the house. Feeling a hand snatch at him from behind, Otterburn turned quickly to face a man in the audience who had risen to grapple with him, and let him have a tomato in the face.

	M'rie cowered away from him as if he were an inhuman monster. He stepped out into the aisle and threw his two remaining tomatoes at the ushers pounding down it towards him, then ran.

	His flight took him to the orchestra in three long steps. He had some vague idea of leaping to the stage and escaping out the wings. Now, however, he saw a small door at one side of the orchestra-pit, below the level of the footlights. Into this he bolted and slammed it shut behind him.

	Inside the door steps led down and to the left. He found himself in a big room below the stage, a room full of ropes and pieces of scenery. There was machinery for moving the stage itself and things whose names he did not even know.

	Off to the-left, where the scenery was piled thickest, there seemed to be a space cleared for a workroom.

	He ran that way. No exit—only a middle-aged man touching up a piece of stage-scenery with green paint. Apparently he was in that undiscovered country called backstage though he had always thought of it as being literally in back of the stage and not underneath.

	The man, looking at him mildly as he approached, said, "What goes on, mister?"

	Steps resounded on the stairs Otterburn had just descended and he saw a couple of ushers sprinting towards him. For some reason the painter's equipment fascinated him—what fun couldn't he have with a can of that lovely green paint? He snatched up the large can the painter was using, wrenched the 4-1/2 -inch paint-brush out of the astonished man's hand—and then started running again.

	He dropped the paint-brush into the can so as to have a free hand, toppled a couple of pieces of scenery in the path of his pursuers and came out the other end of the workroom, back in the large room again.

	To the other side of the stairs by which he had come down he saw a passage and ran for it.

	The passage went straight on for a short distance. Then there was a little flight of steps leading up to another door and the passage did a square turn to the right. At the sight of something moving in front of him, Otterburn started so hard he spilled paint before realizing that the moving thing was his reflection in a huge full-length mirror beside a double door.

	He ran on down the passage to the right to where it did another turn, to the left this time, and ended with a door marked Green Room. No admittance except to theater personnel.

	As he took in this message the door flew open and a couple more ushers boiled out.

	They checked as they saw him facing them, giving him time to turn and flee back the way he had come.

	But when he got back to the big mirror and the double door, here came the other two ushers who had followed him the way he had come. There seemed to be no way to go except through the double door.

	Therefore he wrenched it open and plunged in.

	He found himself in a large room full of lockers, mirrors, long dressing-tables and a score or more of girls in all stages of nudity, some sitting at the tables and working on their makeup while others struggled into and out of articles of costume.

	As soon as his entrance became obvious the girls set up a chorus of screams.

	Some held garments in front of them while others simply yelled at him. Knuckles pounded the door.

	It took Otterburn a few seconds to decide on his next course of action while fragments of stories he had read and movies he had seen floated through his head. Deciding that terror tactics were in order, he twisted his face into a horrid grimace and raced about the room, screaming at the top of his lungs and slapping wildly with his dripping brush at every patch of bare skin he saw—which under the circumstances included a great deal.

	The shrieks of the girls rose to a. deafening crescendo. A few threw bottles and jars of cosmetics at him, which he heeded not at all. By showing his teeth and foaming a bit he soon had the entire mob rushing out the double door, bowling over the ushers standing there or else carrying them along in the torrent. Otterburn, counting on just that, followed them closely out of the room.

-

CHAPTER IV

	Once outside, the crowd streamed off in all directions. Some ran for the Green Room, others for the circular staircase at the back of the scenery room that led up to the stage—Otterburn later wondered what the audience must have thought when the females boiled out onto the stage yelling their heads off.

	Others ran up the little stairs near the mirror and threw open the door which, as Otterburn could see, was the main backstage exit, the Stage Door. He ran up the steps after them and followed them down another alley to the street.

	Since it was the middle of the theater hour with most of the customers in their seats, the crowd on the sidewalks had thinned. Otterburn, thinking it about time he went away from there, looked around for means of transportation.

	In front of him he saw a policeman's horse, standing calmly with one forefoot on the curb. No doubt the cop had parked the animal while he went into the theater to investigate the disturbance. Well, he might as well have one more fling.

	Otterburn, still clutching his paint-can, swung into the saddle. He collected the reins into his left hand—(which also held the paint-can)—and kicked the horse into motion. At first the beast showed signs of fractiousness at being mounted by a strange rider, but in his present exalted mood Thomas Otterburn was no man to let a mere horse buffalo him. He whacked the animal's rump with the paint-brush and set it to cantering down the avenue.

	Ahead of him, screaming, ran three of the chorus-girls. One wore a petticoat with wire stiffening, another a brassiere, and the third a pair of shoes and a broad green stripe across her backside.

	Otterburn took a good schloop of paint on his brush and, as his horse passed a bald pedestrian, brought the brush down with a smack on the man's head. He swung at another man afoot but missed and almost swung himself out of the saddle. A third dodged behind an automobile when he saw Otterburn's intention.

	Then the three babes had disappeared and from behind him rose a clamor of yells, whistles and sirens. It was time to switch again. He pulled up at a comer and jumped off the horse. The force-field, as he expected, saved him from the jar when he hit pavement.

	He threw the paint-can as far as he could and, with the brush, again slapped the horse, which took off down the avenue. Looking hastily around, Otterburn sighted a fire-box. He quickly pulled a false alarm by way of diversion and ran down the side-street.

	Since this street, on the edge of the theatrical district, was occupied almost entirely by office-buildings and garment-lofts, it had hardly any pedestrians. The few there were looked at Otterburn as he ran past, but made no move to stop him. At the next corner he turned again. The most promising refuge was an all-night barber shop. He leaped down the four steps that led to it.

	When police and firemen swarmed over the neighborhood five minutes later, Thomas Otterburn lay blissfully in a barber-chair with his face covered by lather. He had just finished saying, "Don't shave the upper lip. Think I'll grow a mustache."

	By the time the barber had finished the commotion had died. Otterburn looked ruefully at his suit, which now bore several smears of green paint in addition to the spots from its earlier misadventures. He asked, "Have you got some turpentine?"

	As it happened the barber did have some turpentine. When Otterburn had abated the worst of the paint-stains he thanked the barber, paid up and strolled back to the street. Everything seemed normal.

	He stretched his muscles a little. A shade tired, yes, but not the least bit sleepy. Who said go home? The night was yet young and even if Lucy and M'rie were gone beyond recovery there were plenty more ...

-

	Next morning at about ten Thomas Otterburn opened his front door in answer to a knock. Before he could move, strong arms shot in and seized his wrists. Handcuffs clicked.

	"We got him, Professor," said one of the cops, holding tight. "Okay, now you turn the gadget off."

	Otterburn started to remonstrate when he recognized Seymour Barlow, Eduard Dubrowsky and Dr. de Castro. Dubrowsky opened the front of Otterburn's pajamas wide enough to get his fingers on the switch of the materiostat.

	Click!

	"All right," he said. "He's no longer invulnerable, and if you'll unlock these handcuffs and hold his arms I'll get the contraption off him."

	"Am I pinched?" asked Otterburn innocently.

	"You sure are, brother," said one of the cops.

	"What for? That little fun I had last night?"

	"Whew! Just about everything. Disorderly conduct, assault, stealing a cop's horse, a can of paint and et cetera."

	Otterburn's eyes lighted up. "You know, I've never been pinched in my life, even for speeding? This'll be swell. I've always wondered what it would be like to be tried and sentenced."

	"No, no," wheezed Barlow. "Don't say such dreadful things, Tom. We'll prove to the court that it was all the fault of this infernal machine of Ed's, which affected you so that all your brain was numb except the thalamus. How do you feel now, you poor boy? Ed, if you've ruined his mind I'll never forgive you."

	"I'm all right," said Otterburn. "A little tired maybe. But you know, I didn't sleep a wink all night?"

	"That is as I thought it might be," said de Castro. "Since sleep is an inhibitory process the field, by suppressing that process, prevents sleep."

	Otterburn waved the explanation aside. "Say, how did you guys find out I was the culprit?" If they were looking for a sudden return of his mousy-meek former personality with the switching off of the materiostat, they were disappointed. He faced them with a grin, thoroughly at ease and willing to talk forever on any subject they chose.

	Barlow explained. "Lucy—you know, she went home when you first started acting up in that night-club. She thought you'd gone crazy. Anyway, she read in the paper this morning about the dangerous madman who terrorized the theatrical district last night. She figured you must be it, and called me on the phone. I got the cops, because we couldn't let you go on that way, you know. What did you do the rest of the night?"

	'Tell you some time," said Otterburn with a leer.

	"Oh. Look him over, Doc. You can't move him until he's been examined, officer. No telling what state the poor boy's health is in."

	De Castro gave Otterburn a brief once-over—pulse, temperature, knee-jerk, and other elementary tests. He removed the stethoscope from his ears and said, "He seems in perfect condition to me. As for his mental condition I should have to give him more extensive tests."

	"Very well officer," said Barlow. "Guess we go down to the magistrate and speak our piece as soon as poor Tom gets his clothes on—oh, who are you?"

	A man had stepped into the apartment, saying, "Good morning. You Mr. Otterburn? Got something for ya. G'bye."

	Otterburn turned the papers that had been thrust into his hands over a few times before he unfolded them and started to read them.

	Barlow looked over his shoulder and whistled. "Summons for a civil suit by the Trocadero Restaurant and another by the Mayfair Theater. You poor, poor fellow! I'll try to find a good lawyer."

	Otterburn carelessly stuck the papers in the pocket of the coat he was putting on. "Okay, it doesn't worry me any. Let's go, gents."

-

	Two hours later they were at the laboratory. Because the judge was not sitting that Saturday morning Otterburn was out on bail, pending his hearing.

	De Castro, who had been giving Otterburn psychological tests, said, "He reacts normally for a man of extraverted type. Not the extreme state he was in while he had the harness on, but still an uninhibited type with little superego control.

	"However, with his high intelligence the suppression of the superego is not too harmful because he will avoid antisocial actions on a basis of calculated self-interest."

	"Does that mean he's safe to let run loose?" asked Barlow.

	"Surely. If I had met him for the first time I should have said he was a natural-born salesman or actor type. Whether in his present state he is suitable for scientific research is another matter."

	"What's the prognosis?"

	"I have no idea, since the case is without precedent. He may remain as he is or revert to his former condition."

	Dubrowsky spoke up. "Afraid that's the end of Project Styx. Idea was to provide a light psychoelectronic armor for soldiers to deflect bullets and things approaching the surface of an organic substance at high speed. Obviously won't do if the harness makes men into maniacs."

	"Of course," said de Castro, "this was an extreme case. This young man has led a very repressed life, so under the influence of the field he tried to throw off all the inhibitions and repressions of the last ten years at once."

	"Still wouldn't be practical," said Dubrowsky.

	"Not for you, perhaps," said de Castro, "but for me I see all sorts of possibilities. For melancholies, where the inhibitory process has been carried to the point of catatonia."

	"Tom," said Barlow, "you've got two or three weeks' leave accumulated. Why don't you take your vacation now? And if there's any question at the end of that time take some leave without pay on top of it. I'll shuffle the papers so you can come back to your job when you're up to it."

	Otterburn yawned. "Okay, Fats, I'm up to anything."

	"Well—uh—that's not all. This business will give us bad publicity. Arrests, civil suits and the like. We might even have a Congressional Committee snooping around and it would be just as well if you weren't here when they were. See what I'm getting at?"

	"I see all right," said Otterburn, rising. "And I can say this, Seymour—take your job and stick it. I'm through. Have one of the girls type me out a resignation and send it to my apartment and I'll sign it. So long, twerps!" He went out whistling.

-

	A month later Thomas Otterburn, having made his peace with the law, turned up unexpectedly at the laboratories.

	Grinning, poised and dressed well if a shade loudly, he shook hands and slapped backs all around.

	"Hey there, Lucy!" he cried. "Give us a kiss—that's a good girl. You engaged to Don yet? Why, what's holding you up? Don't look at me that way. I'm having too much fun as a professional wolf.

	"Hi, Seymour! I just dropped in to make arrangements with the paint lab for submitting samples for tests under the new ND specs. Yeah, I'm a paint-salesman now. Straight commish plus bonus and I'm making twice as much as you are and three times as much as I ever did. Oh, there's my man now. So long."

	"Wait a second," said Barlow. "What happened to those civil suits? The restaurant and the theater?" 

	"Oh, I talked them out of it." 

	"You what?"

	"Sure, I convinced 'em the publicity was worth more than the damage they'd suffered. They're not bad guys when you get to talk to them. Same way I got my job. I went after the company that made the paint I used to decorate those babes' behinds. Well, be seein' ya."

	They stared after the departing demon salesman. Lucy said, "I'm afraid I liked him better the way he was before. Now he makes even Donald seem like a quiet meek sort by comparison."

	"Me meek?" snorted McQueen. "Why—"

	Barlow said, "I guess that's our answer; he's changed for good. And to think the poor boy was one of my most brilliant intellects. That's a real tragedy—our most promising young engineer a martyr to science."

	Donald McQueen interrupted. "What d'you mean, martyr? Didn't you get that about the dough he's making? He looks prosperous, don't he? Well then, who's crazy, him or us?"

	Barlow started, then looked very uncomfortable. "Well, I suppose if you put it that way—"

The End