slip and stockings.
He looked solemn. 'Are you sure you want to?'
She was afraid he would become paralyzed by moral misgivings. 'I have to, I have to, please don't stop!' she cried.
He pushed her gently back to the bed. She lay on her back and he lay on top of her, resting his weight on his elbows. He looked into her eyes. 'I've never done this before.'
'That's all right,' she said. 'I haven't either.'
The first time was over quite quickly, but an hour later they wanted it again, and this time it took longer. She told him she wanted to do everything, give him every pleasure he had ever dreamed of, perform every possible act of sexual intimacy. They made love all weekend, frantic with desire and sorrow, knowing they might never meet again.
After Luke left on Monday morning, Billie cried for two days.
Eight weeks later she discovered she was pregnant 6.30 P. M.
Scientists can only guess at the extremes of heat and cold the satellite will suffer in space as it moves from the deep darkness of the earth's shadow into the glare of naked sunlight. To mitigate the effects of this, the cylinder is partially coated with shiny aluminum oxide in stripes one-eighth of an inch wide, to reflect the sun's scorching rays, and insulated with glass fibre, to keep out the ultimate cold of space.
Yes, we dated,' Billie said as they went down the stairs.
Luke's mouth was dry. He imagined holding her hand, looking at her face over a candlelit table, kissing her, watching her slip out of her clothes. He felt guilty, knowing he had a wife, but he could not remember his wife, and Billie was right here beside him, talking animatedly and smiling and smelling faintly of scented soap.
They came to the door of the building and stopped. 'Were we in love?' Luke asked. He looked hard at her, studying her expression. Until now, her face had been easy to read, but suddenly the book had been closed, and all he could see was a blank cover.
'Oh, sure,' she said, and although her tone was light, there was a catch in her voice. 'I thought you were the only man in the world.'
How could he have let a woman like this slip away from him? It seemed a tragedy worse than losing all his memories. 'But you learned better.'
'I'm old enough now to know there's no Prince Charming, just a bunch of more or less flawed men. Sometimes they wear shining armour, but it's always rusty in spots.'
He wanted to know everything, every detail, but there were too many questions. 'So you married Bern;'
Yes.'
'What's he like?'
'Clever. All my men have to be smart Otherwise I get bored. Strong, too - strong enough to challenge me.' She smiled the smile of someone with a big heart.
He said: 'What went wrong?'
'Conflicting values. It sounds abstract, but Bern risked his life for the cause of freedom in two wars, the Spanish Civil War and then the Second World War -and for him, politics came above all else.'
There was one question Luke wanted to ask more than any. He could not think of a delicate, roundabout way of putting it, so he blurted it out 'Do you have anyone now?'
'Sure. His name's Harold Brodsky.'
Luke felt foolish. Of course she had someone. She was a beautiful divorcee in her thirties, men would be queuing up to take her out He smiled ruefully. 'Is he Prince Charming?'
'No, but he's smart, he makes me laugh, and he - adores me.'
Envy stabbed Luke's heart. Lucky Harold, he thought. 'And I guess he shares your values.'
'Yes. The most important thing in his life is his child - he's a widower - and after that comes his academic work.'
'Which is?'
'Iodine chemistry. I feel the same about my work.' Billie smiled. 'I may not be starry-eyed about men, but I guess I'm still idealistic about unravelling the mysteries of the human mind.'
That brought Luke back to his immediate crisis. The reminder was like an unexpected blow, shocking and painful, 'I wish you could unravel the mystery of my mind.'
She frowned, and despite the weight of his problems he noticed 'how pretty she was when her nose wrinkled in puzzlement 'It's strange,' she said. 'Maybe you suffered a cranial injury that left no visible trace, but in that case it's surprising you don't still have a headache.'
'Nope.'
'You're not an alcoholic or a drug addict, I can tell by looking at you. If you'd suffered some terrible shock, or been under prolonged stress, I probably would have heard about it, either from you or from our mutual friends.'
'Which leaves...?'
She shook her head. 'You certainly aren't schizophrenic, so there's no way you could have been given the combination drug-and-electrotherapy treatment that could have caused-'
She stopped suddenly, looking alluringly startled, mouth open, eyes wide.
'What?' Luke said.
'I just remembered Joe Blow.'
'Who's he?'
'Joseph Bellow. The name struck me because I thought it sounded made up.'
'And?'
'He was admitted late yesterday, after I'd gone home. Then he was discharged in the night - which was real strange.'
'What was wrong with him?'
He was a schizophrenic.' She paled. 'Oh, shit'
Luke began to see what she was thinking. 'So this patient...'
'Let's check his file.'
She turned and ran back up the stairs. They hurried along the corridor and entered a room marked Records Office. There was no one inside. Billie turned on the light.
She opened a drawer marked 'A-D', flipped through the file, and pulled out a folder. She read aloud: 'White male, six feet one inch tall, one hundred and eighty pounds, thirty-seven years old.'
Luke's guess was confirmed. 'You think it was me,' he said.
She nodded. 'The patient was given the treatment that causes global amnesia.'
'My God.' Luke was dismayed and intrigued at the same time. If she was right, this had been done to him deliberately. That explained why he had been followed around - presumably by someone keen to make sure the treatment had worked. 'Who did this?'
'My colleague, Dr Leonard Ross, admitted the patient Len's a psychiatrist I'd like to know his rationale for authorizing the treatment. A patient should normally be kept under observation -for some time, usually days, before any treatment is given. And I can't imagine the medical justification for discharging the patient immediately afterwards, even with the consent of relatives. This is very irregular.'
'Sounds like Ross is in trouble.'
Billie sighed. 'Probably not. If I complain, people will accuse me/of sour grapes. They'll say I'm bitter because Len got the job I wanted, Director of Research here.'
'When did that happen?'
'Today.'
Luke was startled. 'Ross got promoted today?'
'Yes. I guess it's not a coincidence.'
'Hell, no! He was bribed. He was promised the promotion in return for doing this irregular treatment'
'I can't believe it Yes, I can. He's real weak.'
'But he's, someone else's tool. A superior in the hospital hierarchy must have got him to do it'
'No.' Billie shook her head. 'The trust that's funding the post, the Sowerby Foundation, insisted on Ross for the job. My boss told me. We couldn't figure out why. Now I know.'
