Mercy’s appearance was a giveaway to the kind of person she was. Three facets, which sometimes conflicted, formed the major part of her character. The first was a naturally superior intellect, finely trained, which took itself and any project on which it embarked most seriously. The second was an equally natural depth of emotional and sexual feeling which she sometimes repressed, but which was never very far from the surface of her personality and which drew reactions from most men that elicited counter reactions from Mercy with which she frequently had diffìculty coping. The third was a timidity which made her ill-at-ease outside the confines of the laboratory or classroom, and particularly uncomfortable in social situations involving young men. Sometimes, even in the laboratory, as with “Fig” Newton, she found herself torn between an undeniably sexual interest and a fear of acting out fantasies she hardly dared admit to herself.
Now “Fig” turned off his own fantasies concerning Mercy and got back to business. “Wow!” he commented. “Think of the equipment we'll be able to get with a million bucks.” He ran his fingers over his blond crew cut and grinned a boyish grin. “Vascular recording instruments and cardiograph apparatus and movie cameras and tape recorders and olfactory measurement devices and-- yeah, most important of all -- a giant computer to correlate all our data, to keep track of the subjects, and match them up, and make comparisons under a variety of circumstances and using a variety of stimuli. Why, with a really good computer, we can reduce each subject to a punchcard with an almost infinite variety of physiological keys.”
“It sounds wonderful,” Mercy agreed. “But just where are we going to get our research-subject population from? I mean, if we want to study people during the actual sex act, even if we have money, how are we going to get people who are willing to be studied?”
“I never thought about that,” Professor Woocheck admitted. He pondered it now and absent-mindedly strolled over to the sink and began washing his hands again. “I suppose that we shall have to rely on volunteers,” he mused.
“But do you think people will be willing to volunteer to come to the laboratory and cohabit while we observe them?” Mercy wondered.
“Maybe if we paid them for their trouble . . .” Professor Woocheck suggested dubiously.
“Trouble? What trouble?” There was some slight indignation — or was it envy? — in “Fig” NeWton’s voice. “Nobody ever offered to pay me!”
“I think that's a wonderful idea,” Dr. Peerloin told the Professor. “Some trinkets, a few strings of beads -- that's all it took to elicit coital cooperation from the Indians in the Peruvian jungle."
“This,” “Fig” pointed out, “is not the Peruvian jungle."
“Sti1l,” the Professor countered, “the principle is the same. Once we've had a few volunteers, I suspect the word will spread."
“I'll just bet it will!” “Fig” hooted. “Hey, fellas, you want to go to an orgy? And get paid for it yet!”
“That’s not funny, Mr. Newton.” The scowl creasing Dr. Peerloin’s face stressed her sixty-six years. “One expects that certain elements of society at large will misunderstand one’s motivations and one’s modus operandi when one is dealing with human sexuality,” she continued coldly. “But one has the right to expect that one’s colleagues should not err in such judgments. Nor should they make light of one’s serious approach and dedication.”
“Now, now, Doctor.” Professor Woocheck poured oil on troubled waters. “I’m sure that Mr. Newton was only joshing. He’s as dedicated to our work as you and I are. Still, he has a point. The executors of the Venus Estate will certainly insist on certain proprieties being observed. I don’t see how we can exactly advertise for volunteers. The initial subject group is going to present certain recruiting problems.”
Dr. Peerloin nodded and thought about it a moment. “How about soliciting cooperation from doctors all over the country?” she suggested finally.
“But won’t that give us a highly slanted subject population?” Mercy interjected. “I mean, what may be sexually atypical of doctors may not be so of the population as a whole.”
“You misunderstand me, Mercy. I don’t mean that we should solicit the doctors themselves,” Dr. Peerloin explained. “Just their cooperation in getting volunteers for us.”
“If I know the medical profession, it will take a long time before that sort of recruitment brings any significant results,” “Fig” pointed out.
“That’s true,” Professor Woocheck agreed. “Nevertheless, it can be a productive means of recruitment for the long-range program and I shall arrange to take steps to get it started immediately. However, we’re going to have to enlist our initial subjects more directly.”
“What do you mean?” Mercy asked.
“I mean we’re going to have to operate on a personal level with people we know. Each of us will have to go over his or her list of friends and acquaintances and select those enlightened ones to be approached for participation in the program.”
“Well, I guess I’ve got a headstart.” “Fig” took a little black address book from his pocket and riffled the pages.
“Can’t you be serious?” Dr. Peerloin complained.
“I am serious!”
“Dr. Peerloin means that we must all maintain an air of scientific detachment in a project of such a delicate nature,” Professor Woocheck remonstrated. “Your flipness is really out of place, Mr. Newton.”
“Sorry,” “Fig” muttered.
“It’s just that undue levity might drive possible subject volunteers away,” Professor Woocheck told him in a kindly fashion. He glanced at his watch. “It’s getting late,” he observed. “I suggest we all go home and sleep on it for the night. Tomorrow we can discuss actual methods to be used in the recruitment phase of the program.”
Mercy, “Fig” and Dr. Peerloin started out of the lab. Dr. Peerloin paused in the doorway. “Aren’t you coming too, Professor?” she called. “I want to lock up the building for the night.”
“I’ll be along in a minute. I just want to wash my hands first.”
“Again?”
“In a minute.”
“Fig” Newton had left already, but Mercy was still in the hallway waiting for Dr. Peerloin. “Where’s the Professor?” she asked as the older woman emerged.
“Washing his hands.”
“Again?”
“We all have our idiosyncrasies.” Dr. Peerloin shrugged. “His is particularly understandable,” she added. “After all, thirty-odd years a practicing gynecologist —”
“Of course.” Mercy nodded her understanding.
“You just fun along,” Dr. Peerloin told Mercy. “I’ll lock up as soon as the Professor is ready to leave.”
“All right. I’ll see you in the morning then.” Mercy left.
A moment later Professor Woocheck emerged and he and Dr. Peerloin walked down the hall together. “You know,” he told her, “I didn’t want to discuss it in front of the others until you and I had a chance to talk it over privately, but there is one section of the population which might fall in very well with our subject needs.”
“What section is that, Professor?”
“The section composed of professional prostitutes.”
“Of course!” Dr. Peerloin’s face lit up. “Why didn’t I think of that? But how do we go about contacting them?”
“We don’t. I do,” the Professor told her. “This is strictly the sort of approach which must be made by a male.”
“That’s pure male chauvinism!” Dr. Peerloin was miffed. “Just like when they tried to tell me that no woman could go into the Peruvian jungle. I wish you would remember, Professor, that I am a social scientist first and a woman second. To imply such artificial barriers because of my sex is unworthy of you.”