Breakthrough, p.6
Breakthrough, page 6
‘Just relax, I think,’ she said. ‘Shut your eyes if that’ll help. Try to make your mind blank to start with. Imagine you’re looking at a huge, black velvet curtain. Don’t think of anything at all.’
There was a long moment of silence during which I endeavoured to carry out her instructions. It was an eerie sensation, like sitting in the dark waiting for something to hap pen, but it was nothing to what followed. I suddenly felt as though a thread of gossamer was being drawn across the raw surface of my mind, but a thread which, in some extraordinary way, was alive! It lasted for perhaps the hundredth part of a second and then, purely reflex, I tensed and it was gone. I flicked open my eyes and met hers. For a long, long moment we just gazed at one another and then I shut my eyes again and gradually willed the tenseness out of me. No sooner had it ebbed than die phantom thread was back again. By a supreme effort I contrived not to reject it, though I remained acutely aware of it as it drifted backwards and forwards, seemingly rocked by invisible tides. Suddenly there was another, and then a third, each separate and distinct, like notes plucked from a harp, trembling and ineffably fragile, floating, now together and now apart, seen and yet not seen, on the farthest fringes of my awareness. Eventually they seemed to fade, growing fainter and fainter, until finally they merged into the beating of my own heart, while the rosy darkness of which I was the centre began to pulse outwards in long, slow, languorous waves.
How long this lasted I have no idea, it seemed altogether outside time in the accepted sense, but I suddenly became aware of something like a twinkling star which appeared to hover above the middle darkness. As I watched it it seemed to flicker and grow brighter and larger and even to flap once or twice like a candle flame chivvied by a draught. Then it steadied and grew firmer in outline, still moving towards me—or I towards it—and I recognized it for the glittering globe of mirrors that turns on the top of ’The Palace of Fun’. At that instant a veil seemed to be drawn away and I was standing there on the pier just as I had stood the night before. So real was the illusion that I could feel the salt breeze on my face, and beside me I was aware of my companions. Exactly as we had before, we surged forwards, arms linked, and there, of course, were the videoscopes waiting for us. Then I was being pulled towards the gambling machine and was standing watching my friend first win and then lose. The illusion—if it was an illusion—was so real that I no longer knew whether it was happening now or had happened then. The whole fantastic sequence unfolded itself around me, right up to the moment when I found myself propped up against the pin table with the coins trundling and spinning round my feet. And then, as though I were viewing it through a heat haze, the scene suddenly wobbled, swirled into a vortex and was engulfed by the inrushing darkness.
I drew a deep, shuddering breath and opened my eyes. She was still there, still looking at me, but her face was deathly pale and there was a dew of sweat across her forehead and beneath her eyes. She ran her tongue along her bottom lip. ‘Do you want me to tell you about it?’ she whispered. ‘I will if you like.’
I drew my hand across my face as though I were still conscious of those weird threads. ‘God in heaven,’ I muttered, ‘I’ve even got the same ache in my arm.’
‘Do you want me to tell you what happened?’ she repeated.
I shook my head. ‘Can you do that to anyone?’ I asked.
‘Not to anyone,’ she corrected. ‘With anyone. No, I can’t.’
‘Just me, huh?’
She nodded.
‘And how long have you been able to do it?’
‘I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘I thought it had only started during those tests, but now I’m not sure. Some things I used to think were just odd dreams…’
‘But me!’ I said. ‘Why with me? Do you know?’
She shook her head. ‘Doctor Dumpkenhoffer seemed to think we might have some sort of psychic affinity. He said it was like chemical affinity—you know, two elements having to unite. But I don’t know anything about that.’ She suddenly heaved an enormous sigh. ’Oh, I’m so glad I reached you,’ she said. ‘You can’t think what it’s been like being all on my own. But I tried and tried to keep away. All this last month it’s been awful—simply awful! In the end I had to do it—I just had to! It was getting worse and worse.’
‘I’m not sure I follow you,’ I said. ‘What was getting worse?’
’The aloneness,’ she said simply.
I nodded, still not really understanding. ‘So you went along to my digs to try to tell me about it?’
‘I went to Doctor Dumpkenhoffer first and asked him what I should do.’
‘And he told you to come?’
‘No,’ she said, ‘not exactly. He asked me a lot of questions about myself and so on, and then he told me about this “affinity” business.’
‘Now I come to think of it, he said something about that to me too,’ I told her. ‘But I’ve hardly set eyes on him since the tests.’
‘I told him about a dream I’ve been having,’ she said, ‘but I couldn’t tell him very much. I liked him though—much more than I did before. He didn’t pretend he understood when he didn’t.’
‘Maybe we ought to go along and see him together,’ I suggested. ‘It strikes me that neither of us is going to straighten out this tangle without help from someone, and he’s the only likely person I can think of.’
She looked at me queerly. ‘But maybe,’ she said hesitantly, ‘maybe, now, we won’t need to. Maybe now we both know, it’ll be all right.’
‘Give it a try on our own you mean?’
She nodded emphatically.
‘All right,’ I agreed with a laugh. ‘If you’re happy.’
She sighed. ‘Last night when I got to your lodgings and you weren’t in I thought I’d just die. I’d walked round and round the block for hours trying to pluck up the courage to ring the bell. Your landlady looked at me as though I was a prostitute or something.’
‘But she did let you in.’
She nodded. ‘I told her I’d got an important message from the University and asked if I could wait in your room for a bit. Goodness knows what she thought, but she let me. And then, as soon as I was alone, I just flopped out on your bed and tried to reach you. I’d never done it before except for that test evening, and then I couldn’t help myself. But this time I knew what I was doing and I didn’t care. It wasn’t a bit difficult either—I suppose you hadn’t got any barriers up or anything. I just went like a homing pigeon.’
I couldn’t help smiling at her. All her colour had come back and her eyes were shining with the light of life. ‘What did you make of “Her Big Surprise”?’ I grinned.
She giggled. ’That nightie! 1925 at least.’
‘But how did you make me win?’ I asked. ’That’s what beats me. Do you know?’
She looked vaguely troubled. ‘No,’ she said, ‘not really. I did do it though. And yet, I don’t know, it was as though something was making me choose those particular colours.’ ‘And you were making me Where does this chain end for heaven’s sake?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘All I know is that we’re somehow part of it. I don’t think it’s anything bad though. Really I don’t.’
’There doesn’t seem much we can do about it, anyway,’ I said. ’On the whole, I suppose it’s better to know we’re in it together.’
‘Yes,’ she said fervently. ’Oh, yes. Ever so much better.’
I held out my hand and she put hers gravely into it. ’Then may I look forward to a closer acquaintance?’ I enquired with a smile.
She nodded and the colour rushed up into her cheeks. Not until some time later did it strike me that, considered in the context of what I had already experienced, ‘closer’ might have had an unintended connotation.
EIGHT
I realize it may well be objected that Miss Bernstein had not given me proof of any indisputably paranormal ability, since all that had happened in the Annexe was that I had recalled a recent vivid experience—though possibly while acting under some sort of hypnotic stimulus. What I should have done, I suppose, was concentrated on a list of random numbers which she should have recorded, then a suitably sceptical third party should have been found to compare the two lists, etc., etc. Nevertheless, I am quite certain that had some test of this sort been devised, nothing—apart perhaps from further tearful frustration—would have resulted. Yet I was wholly convinced that she had succeeded in establishing some sort of telepathic contact with me—though by what means I couldn’t begin to explain. To borrow a line from Dumps’ favourite author; ‘A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.’ Well, if I was to be a fool, then I was prepared to go the whole distance and be one of those who persisted in his folly.
I arranged to meet Miss Bernstein again that evening. At the same time I made a private resolution to drop in at Brankfield House and have a quiet word with Dumps. Accordingly, at about half past eleven I climbed the three flights of stairs to the attics and knocked on the door, which, I observed, was now tricked out with a discreet label bearing the legend: ‘Liverhome Foundation Parapsychological Research Department. Principal: F. W. Dumpkenhoffer M.A. D.Sc.’ A high-pitched whirring noise, like that of a powerful vacuum cleaner, was coming from within. I knocked again, cautiously turned the handle, and then poked my head round the door.
Expecting to find myself in the testing room, I was astonished to find it transformed almost beyond recognition. The desks and chairs had disappeared, and their place taken by 60 two wide metal benches which extended nearly the full length of the room. One of these appeared to be almost totally occupied by a long, grey metal cabinet from which an incredible assortment of wires depended, each carrying a plastic tag on which was a letter and a number. These wires were gathered into groups and plugged into a further series of smaller cabinets which were mostly housed on shelves under the bench. From these cabinets ran yet more wires, though fewer and thicker, which appeared to snake away and congregate round a sort of dais. The other bench was cluttered with a number of miscellaneous pieces of electrical apparatus whose use I couldn’t even begin to guess, though one looked something like an outsize television receiver. Against the wall behind this second bench was fixed an enormous plastic panel into which was set a series of large and small dials, each having its attendant group of switches and knobs.
I closed the door behind me and picked my way cautiously down to the office, from whence were issuing the sounds I had heard outside. This door was already standing ajar, so, after knocking, I again poked my head round. A figure in a khaki overall was standing with his back to me, bending over a workbench. At his elbow stood a sort of porter’s trolley bearing two tall metal cylinders, each topped with a dial from which a flexible tube descended. As I peered in, an intense violet-blue flame jetted sudden grotesque shadows across the wall. I waited until the flame died down then called, ‘Doctor Dumpkenhoffer?’
The figure at the bench straightened up and turned his head. I saw that his face was masked by a sort of visor. When he caught sight of me he stretched out his hand and pressed a switch. The whine died swiftly away, leaving behind it a strange, padded silence. ‘Doctor Dumpkenhoffer?’ I repeated.
‘You’ve missed him,’ said a muffled voice which I recognized as Peter Klorner’s. ‘He caught the ten twenty-five train.’ He laid down the welding torch he had been using and pushed up the visor till it looked as if he was wearing a small aluminium coal scuttle. ‘Can I be of help?’ he asked.
I shook my head. ‘I just dropped in on the off chance. Do you know when he’ll be back?’
‘Monday afternoon,’ he said, ‘but I shouldn’t bank on that if I were you. He’s gone to Cambridge. Miss Aston can probably give you a phone number if it’s urgent.’
‘It can easily wait,’ I said and gestured around. ’There appear to have been some changes since I was here last.’
He nodded. ’The office and the E.S.P. stuff have been shifted along. You can get through this way, but it’s easier to go round.’
‘I didn’t realize parapsychology entailed this sort of thing,’ I said. ‘What is it you’re working on, or shouldn’t I ask?’
He shrugged. ’This is a frame for an oscilloscope bank. That thing’—he pointed past me to an intricate network of interlaced glass tubing—’is a low-pressure fluorescent neuroimpulse amplifier, and this—’
‘What’s it for?’ I asked.
’The amplifier? Turning brain waves into colour. I’ll show you if you like.’
He squeezed past me, clicked down a row of switches and adjusted two dials. ‘You have to give it a moment to warm up,’ he said. ’There, now watch.’
I gazed at the instrument and saw the hitherto colourless network of tubes begin to glow softly. Some became pink, some red; others blue, green and violet. Klorner waited until they seemed to have reached optimum intensity and then began gradually to turn up one of the dials. A series of bright ‘blips’ appeared and started chasing one another down the tubes, wriggling round the bends, squeezing themselves along the coiling loops of glass, weaving in and out in a fantastic ballet of rainbow light.
‘Pretty, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘Piccadilly Circus on Boxing Night.’ He twisted the dial still farther and the blips began to race faster and faster until, quite suddenly, they seemed to set up a strange, apparently static, pulsing rhythm of their own, like ripples which, though moving, give the watcher the impression that they’re standing still. Finally, they began moving backwards against the flickering current. Klorner touched the other dial and immediately two separate circulations took shape, the pinks and reds appearing to flow in one direction and the greens, blues and violets in another. ‘No end to the fun one can have with one of these things,’ he grinned. ‘No modem home should be without one.’
‘What do you use it for?’ I asked.
He flipped up the switches. The tubes died. ‘Research-wise it’s been a washout,’ he said. ’The Doctor was hoping it would help him to establish definite correlations between Psi phenomena and encephalic voltages.’
‘Psi phenomena and what?’
’Encephalic voltages,’ he repeated mildly. ’Electrical discharges in the brain. We took some tapes of encephalic impulses, stepped them up and played them back through this.’
‘Good God! What happened?’
‘Just what you’ve seen there—more or less.’
I laid my finger gingerly on one of the glass tubes. ‘Did you make it?’ I asked him.
He shook his head. ‘I’ve just tinkered about with it. But it’s a pretty toy, isn’t it?’
’Astonishing,’ I agreed. ‘And what are you working on now?’
‘Another notion of the Doctor’s,’ he said vaguely. ‘A bit more complex perhaps. You’ll have to get him to explain it.’
I took the hint. ‘Well, I mustn’t keep you from your alchemy,’ I said. ‘I’ll just pop along and pay my respects to Miss Aston.’
‘If you go back the way you came,’ he said, ‘you’ll find her in the fourth room along.’
’Thanks,’ I said. ‘And thank you for showing me that. I won’t forget it in a hurry.’
He smiled. ‘Any time, Mr. Haverill.’
‘You remember my name?’
’Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘I always remember names.’ And with that he clicked his visor back into place and returned to his bench.
I followed his directions and soon ran Miss Aston to ground. She looked up from her typewriter and smiled. ‘Good morning, Mr. Haverill. You are a stranger.’
‘I’d hoped I might find the Doctor here,’ I said, ‘but I gather I’m too late.’
‘Yes, he’s gone to Cambridge, I’m afraid. He’ll be back on Monday.’
I nodded. ‘Mr. Klorner told me. He’s just been entertaining me with some technological magic. I didn’t realize what a revolution had been taking place.’
‘It’s impressive, isn’t it?’ she agreed. ’The workmen only left on Tuesday.’
I took out my cigarettes and offered them to her. ‘How are the tests going?’
’The programme took rather a beating while the alterations were going on,’ she said. ‘But we managed to keep ticking over.’
‘Any more spectacular results?’
‘No, thank goodness.’ She sounded genuinely relieved.
‘I gather Miss Bernstein felt she’d done enough damage,’ I said. ‘Did you ever get to the bottom of that?’
She shook her head.
‘Hasn’t she been along since, then?’
‘Not to my knowledge.’
I digested this and moved on. ‘What is going on in the technical section?’ I asked. ‘It doesn’t look like any E.S.P. procedure I ever heard of.’
She smiled. ‘I’m not a hundred per cent au fait myself. The fundamental aim is to reproduce thought patterns, and from them to discover precisely which areas of the brain are responsible for Psi phenomena. It’s all a bit too way out for me.’
‘Aren’t you in on it too then?’
‘My contribution is to find suitable subjects by the well-tried methods.’
‘And then Mr. Klorner takes over?’
‘Doctor Dumpkenhoffer’s in charge,’ she said levelly. ‘Peter works under him.’
I nodded. ‘And have you found many suitable subjects?’
’One or two. We’ll be casting our net wider in October.’
‘You’re shutting down for the Vac, are you?’
‘Good Lord, no. It’s just that we won’t have the students I There’ll be plenty of odd bods around though. You’d be surprised how many people actually like the idea of being an E.S.P. subject.’
‘You’d be surprised how many people read their own horoscopes! ’
Miss Aston chuckled. ‘Maybe the department could institute a little collateral research along those lines too. I’m Scorpio myself.’
‘I’m Taurus,’ I said. ‘I wonder what Doctor Dumpkenhoffer is?’
‘I wouldn’t care to ask him.’
The telephone rang and she reached out for the receiver. It was a long-distance call and she started scribbling down the message in rapid shorthand. She had flipped over the first page of her notebook and was halfway down the second when I nodded a goodbye and tiptoed out.
