No Charge for Alterations Read online

things straighter."

  Mrs. Kalmar was grimly disapproving and Miss Dupont was close tohysteria. Only Dr. Kalmar retained his awed respect for Dr. Lowell. Ifthe old man said it was all right, it was, even if he couldn't see thereason.

  "Go ahead," urged Dr. Lowell.

  "Dr. Hoyt!"

  "Yes, Dr. Kalmar?"

  "You will come with us!"

  "Yes, Dr. Kalmar."

  Dr. Lowell took them back to the hospital.

  "Now what?" asked Dr. Kalmar.

  "You actually don't know?" Miss Dupont demanded. "He wants to put Leothrough the Ego Alter."

  "That's absurd," Dr. Kalmar said angrily, "and an outright slander. Dr.Lowell wouldn't consider such a thing--the boy didn't ask for it and itwasn't authorized by Social Control."

  Dr. Lowell smiled genially and opened the door to the Ego Alter room. "Ihate to disillusion you, Dr. Kalmar. That's exactly what I have inmind--the same thing I did to you."

  "That's absurd," Dr. Kalmar repeated, but with less conviction and moreconfusion than before.

  "It worked. Tell him to sit down."

  Dr. Kalmar did, and automatically fitted the wired plastic helmet to Dr.Hoyt's head.

  "You can't!" cried Miss Dupont as he reached for the dials on thecontrol console. "It's not fair!"

  "Let's not get involved in a discussion on ethics," Dr. Lowell said."Deneb can't afford to lose him; we need every doctor we have. If hegoes back to Earth it may be years before we get a replacement."

  "But you can't do it without his consent!"

  "There's time for that later," the old man grinned. "Keep his eyes onyou, Dr. Kalmar, while you build up his father image. Cut down onhostility, aggression and power drive. Boost social responsibility andadventurousness. But make sure he's looking at you constantly."

  "I won't allow it," said Mrs. Kalmar flatly. "You won't make my husbandviolate his oath."

  "I did it to him, didn't I?" Dr. Lowell replied jovially. "It got you ahusband."

  Miss Dupont grabbed at Dr. Kalmar's hand, but he had already turned onthe current.

  "Anything else?" he asked.

  "Well, he has to get married, of course," Dr. Lowell said. "Let him lookat Miss Dupont--she's scheduled for this year, isn't she?--while yougive him a shot of mating urge. Now, wipe out the memory of thisincident and put him on a joy jag. We can validate that by liquoring himup afterward. When you're finished, bring him to."

  Dr. Hoyt came out of it almost with a whoop. He lurched out of theinsulated seat, stared at Miss Dupont for a moment with eyes that almostglittered, and seized and kissed her.

  "My goodness!" she gasped.

  "Now, what were you saying about ethics?" Dr. Lowell asked.

  There was no answer. Both Miss Dupont and Mrs. Kalmar had frozen.

  "You drugged them, too?" Dr. Kalmar weakly wanted to know.

  "A bit slower-acting," admitted the old man. "All you have to do withthem is wipe out the last half hour. Don't want any witnesses to anunethical act, you know. Oh, and put them on a jag also."

  Dr. Kalmar followed instructions.

  Finished, they left the three uproariously drunk in the waiting room andwent to wash up. Dr. Kalmar went along bewilderedly. The old man was asunconcerned as if he did this sort of thing daily.

  "I was as arrogant and belligerent as this squirt was?"

  "Worse," Dr. Lowell said. "He was willing to finish out his internship.You weren't. Still worried about the ethics?"

  "Yes. Naturally."

  "All right, apply some logic, then. Are you happier on Deneb than you'dhave been on Earth?"

  "Well, certainly. I'd have been lucky to get a job doctoring in a summercamp. I wouldn't trade a roomy planet like this for the jammed cubiclesof Earth. And I like our methods better than terrestrial dogma. Butthose are my preferences. I can't inflict them on anybody else."

  "The hell they were your preferences. You bickered more about ourmethods and longed more loudly for the tenements of Earth than this ladever did. All it took was a slight Ego Alter and you have a happier lifethan you would have had. Right?"

  Dr. Kalmar felt his tension ease. If the old man said it was right, itwas. He became momentarily resentful when he realized that that reactionhad been installed by Dr. Lowell, but then he smiled. It really wasright. A bit arbitrary, perhaps, but for the good of Dr. Hoyt and Denebin the long run, just as it had been for himself.

  "Look," he said, drying his arms. "I've been wanting my wife to gothrough a slight rephysical."

  "Why don't you ask her?"

  "The fact is that I'm afraid she'll think I'm dissatisfied and I don'twant her to get resentful."

  "Maybe she'd like you to do some changing, too."

  "What for? I'm all right."

  "She probably feels the same way about herself."

  "But all I want are a few changes in her. She's as high as a space pilotnow. It would be a cinch to--"

  Dr. Lowell flung down the towel and gave him an outraged glare. "There'ssuch a thing as professional ethics, Dr. Kalmar!"

  "But you--"

  "That's different. It was a social decision, not a selfish one. If youask her and she agrees, that's up to her. But you can't take advantageof her in an egocentric, arbitrary way. You just try it and I'll haveyou sent back to Earth."

  Dr. Kalmar felt his knees grow weak in alarm. "No, no. It's not thatimportant. Just an insignificant kind of wish."

  And it was, he discovered when they went out to the waiting room. Unusedto jags, Mrs. Kalmar was more affectionate than she'd been since theywere first married; he'd have to remember to go on them periodicallywith her. Miss Dupont, unwilling to budge out of Dr. Hoyt's tight arms,had glassily joyous eyes. Dr. Hoyt didn't let her go until he caughtsight of Dr. Kalmar.

  "Greatest doctor I ever met," he said enthusiastically. "Won'ful planet,Deneb. Just wanna marry Miss Dupont, stay here and learn at your feet.Okay?"

  Dr. Kalmar's glance at the old man was no less worshipful. "It couldn'tbe okayer," he said.