Primus blinked slowly. "Yes. Yes, I did," he said in his profoundly heavy voice.
"Tell me all you can remember about it."
"Well," said Primus, sinking back onto the couch, "I dreamed I was in a room with a large bed. It had heavy wooden posts and a big bolster. I wanted to lie down and rest in the bed, but the bolster made me uncomfortable. It was too dark to see, to rearrange the bed, so I tried to light a candle, but the matches kept going out...."
Herman took it all down, word for word, with growing excitement and growing dismay. The dream was too good. It might have come out of Dr. Freud's original case histories. When Primus had finished, Herman searched back through his notes. Did Primus know what a bed was, or what a bolster was, or a candle? How much had Herman told him?
"Bed" was there, of course. Primus: "What are 'dreams?'" Herman: "Well, when a human being goes to bed, and sleeps...." "Bolster" was there, too, but not in the same sense. Herman: "To bolster its argument, the unconscious—what we call the id—frequently alters the person's likes and dislikes on what seem to be petty and commonplace subjects...." And "candle?" Herman: "I want you to understand that I don't know all about this subject myself, Mr. Primus. Nobody does; our knowledge is just a candle in the darkness...."
Herman gave up. He glanced at Secundus, who was watching him expectantly. "May I talk to you privately?"
"Of course." Secundus nodded to Primus, who stood up awkwardly and then vanished with a pop. Secundus tut-tutted regretfully.
Herman took a firm grip on himself. "Look," he said, "the data I have now suggest that Primus had some traumatic experience in his infancy which arrested his development in various ways and also strengthened his Oedipus complex—that is, intensified his feelings of fear, hatred and rivalry toward his father. Now, that may sound to you as if we're making some progress. I would feel that way myself—if I had the slightest reason for believing that Primus ever had a father."
Secundus started to speak; but Herman cut him off. "Wait, let me finish. I can go ahead on that basis, but as far as I'm concerned I might just as well be counting the angels on the head of a pin. You've got to give me more information, Secundus. I want to know who you are, and who Primus is, and whether there's any other being with whom Primus could possibly have a filial relationship. And if you can't tell me all that without giving me the Secret of the Universe, then you'd better give it to me whether it's good for me or not. I can't work in the dark."
Secundus pursed his lips. "There is justice in what you say, Doctor. Very well, I shall be entirely frank with you—in so far as it is possible for me to do so of course. Let's see, where can I begin?"