"Sounds as though a quiet cottage in the forest would be very welcome indeed," Shea commented.
"Another glass?" Chalmers held up a flask of ruby liquid.
They were sitting in hourglass chairs, sipping wine and nibbling little cakes, in Florimel's solar—a spacious, high-ceilinged room with tall clerestory windows facing the morning sun. The walls were hung with tapestries, and a rich Oriental carpet covered the floor.
"I thank you, but I've scarcely tasted the first," Belphebe said, dimpling prettily.
"I'm still nursing mine." Shea looked around at the decor. "You've done very well for yourselves. Doc'
"Why, thank you." Chalmers nodded, looking around. "My experiments have been progressing quite nicely"
"Experiments?" Shea swung back to him, staring. "You mean you made all this?"
"Oh no, certainly not! But furnishings like these are not available for purchase this far into the interior of France, quite yet; I have had to work out spells for transporting myself to Flanders, for the tapestries, and to Persia, for the carpets." Chalmers frowned. "Though the inhabitants are quite insistent that I not call them 'Persians'; apparently, their ancestors drove out the people of Xerxes long ago, and they were the only ones who could properly be referred to by the name ..."
Shea saw a need to steer the conversation back onto the tracks. "But once you were there, what did you pay with?"
"Oh, money is no problem," Chalmers assured him. "I mastered the spell for transforming pebbles into gems very early in my sojourn here, though lead into gold still eludes me ..."
"Probably be radioactive if you could bring it off," Shea agreed. "It's about those experiments that I wanted to talk to you, Doc."
"Surely you can have no need for them in Ohio! ... You are still living in Ohio, are you not?"
"Yes, and I'm the only full-time psychologist at the Garaden Institute—which means I'm also half of the teaching staff in psychology.
"Really!" Chalmers frowned. "I hadn't realized I was leaving you in quite so hard a bind."
" 'Fraid so, and I can't even hire new people unless Polacek and Bayard resign."
"Not to mention myself," Chalmers said, with chagrin. "As to Bayard, of course, I can't say—but in reference to Polacek, I have only the most irresponsible conduct to report."
"What else could we expect, from Polacek?" Shea asked. "The exuberant enthusiasms of youth and all that, Doc. What's he been doing?"
Chalmers sighed. "He has gone off with a peasant wench, and only contacts me every few months, so I can not say where he is just at the moment. I am always aware of where he has been, though—I have only to listen for minors of bizarre happenings."
"So the Rubber Czech is still bouncing, eh?" Shea smiled. "And if I know him, he's working magic with the delight and abandon of a kid with a new toy."
"Yes, and with no greater sense of responsibility," Chalmers said, disapproving. "If he restricted his efforts to established spells, there really would not be terribly much of a problem. But ..."
"He insists on doing research, huh?" Shea shook his head. "Poor Votsy! Has he managed to conjure up a demon that carried him off, vet?"
"No, but I have heard reports of a dragon with a rather large pair of jaws. Apparently Polacek acquired an excellent opportunity to study reptilian anatomy from the inside. Piecing together reports, I gather that he managed to project himself outside the beast in the nick of time, then banish it back to whatever realm it had come from." Chalmers shook his head. "I fear that magic, Polacek, and the spirit of free inquiry, are a very volatile combination."
"A recipe for disaster," Shea agreed.
"Yes, though so far, he has not quite managed to follow the recipe accurately, thank Heaven," Chalmers sighed. "I have urged Polacek to restrict his studies to the investigation of theory, and to refrain from experiments unless he is in my company, but from the tales I hear of very singular events, I do not believe he has paid much heed to my exhortations."
"It is really quite foolish of him," Florimel said indignantly. "Can he not see that you are the senior magician?"
"I'm afraid Votsy never did pay too much attention to seniority and respect for experience," Shea sighed. "Well, I think I can forget about his coming back, anyway." He said it with a certain amount of relief.
"I can understand his point of view on that matter, at least," Chalmers said. "There is no real chance of my wishing to return to Ohio for any considerable amount of time, Harold, so I shall surely write you a letter of resignation."
"Uh, let's not be hasty, Doc." Shea held up a palm. "There's another dimension to the problem. Besides, I already checked in with Walter."
"Really! And how is he getting on?"
"Just fine. He's studying Celtic magic, and thinking of becoming a druid."
"Oh, my." Chalmers sat back down. "How odd a course, for a man who did not take religion sufficiently seriously to even become a confirmed agnostic."
"That's why he's still considering. But he did give me a letter of resignation—and a promise of year-end reports."
"Year-end reports?" Chalmers frowned. "Whatever for?"
"Well, I had to come up with some excuse for all three of you being gone." Shea took a deep breath. "So I concocted a research project that we're all engaged in, and promised Athanael that it might yield publishable results."
Chalmers only smiled, amused. "Ingenious! And not far from the truth, though we would scarcely dare publish the matters we are truly researching. What aspect of it have you said you could make public?"
"The relationship of alternate universes to reality. You remember, that's how you first got the idea for the syllogismobile—by realizing that some of our delusional patients were living only half in our own universe, and half in some other one that had an entirely different logic, and a different set of natural laws."
"Yes, of course I remember." Chalmers frowned. "Surely you don't think you could make the profession take the idea seriously?" But before Shea could answer, his eyes widened. "Of course! If the patient's delusional universe can be described in symbolic logic, you can work out intermediate steps to gradually bring his personal universe back into coincidence with the real one! ... Well, real in terms of twentieth-century Ohio."
Shea's heart sank. "Pardon me for feeling dumb."
"Eh? Oh no, my boy, quite the opposite! You saw it much sooner than I did, and without the slightest hint from anyone else, such as the push you just gave me! What a stroke of genius, to create a polite fiction that will allow our colleagues to treat the whole matter as though it were not real at all, but still make use of the concept! Really, Harold, a master-stroke!"
Shea smiled, pleased, reflecting that this universe was having a wonderful mellowing effect on Chalmers; he never would have been so fulsome in his praise, back in Ohio. This universe, or Florimel.
"But I take it that the project would require my more or less active participation?"
"Well, yes." Shea glanced at him uneasily. "Fact is, the Board of Trustees isn't too happy about having a mere assistant professor in charge of the project, and one who hasn't even published his first article, at that."
Chalmers stared. "They're not thinking of bringing in a new man to coordinate it!
"They're definitely thinking of bringing in a new man —but we might be able to keep him away from the project, if we can convince Athanael that you're officially coordinating it. In a consultant's capacity, of course, not back in Ohio physically. At least, not full time."
Chalmers smiled. "Harold, is this a delicate way of asking me to pay a small visit to my erstwhile precincts?"
Shea heaved a sigh that ended in a grin. "That's right. Doc. I in putting the touch on you. Just a week or so, until we have the project set up formally, to the satisfaction of the Trustees. Then we can hire new psychologists without cutting them in on the project."