The small psychoanalyst looked nattily professional in the old-fashioned business suit, white shirt and necktie affected by some doctors. There was even a vest buttoned over his little paunch. His left cheek was as smooth as his gleaming bald head; evidently he'd covered the scratches with skin film. His expression radiated fatherly good will and reasonableness, though he kept the stun-gun pointed straight at Phil and every now and then his gaze flickered to Dytie.
"Phil," he began, "I shall not deny the statement my daughter just made about me, for if you will only consider carefully, it will make us allies and comrades. Who could know as well as you, Phil, how hideously psychotic American civilization has become? You've personally experienced what it can do to the brain, the body, the sense organs. And who could appreciate as well as you, Phil, the sanity of the Workers' Republics, where under the first firm rule of Marxist fact and absolute science, all psychosis is impossible—because all irrationalisms, all illusion (including the mad vaporings of a gangrened capitalism and its pseudo-science) are inconceivable."
Phil found himself goggling his eyes and vaguely nodding. He shook himself. Romadka's cheery voice was remarkably hypnotic.
"Of course, I should have realized all this last night, Phil, and appealed to your reason," said Romadka as he kept the stun-gun trained on Phil's neck with geometric precision. "But I was hurried and emotionally upset—even our agents are not wholly immune to the American infection when living with it—and I made several mistakes. Among other things I did not take my unfortunate daughter into account early enough, though I am certainly glad she came to warn you, since it enabled me to locate you. Which in turn will enable you, Phil, and your charming companion, to enjoy the bracing sanity of the Soviets."
The small psychiatrist smiled and carefully propped himself on the arm of the foam chair. His voice became genially confidential. "And now, children," he said, for the first time including Dytie in his nod, "I am going to tell you how you can do a great service to the illusion-immune state and win an undying welcome when you reach its realistic shores. Psychotic capitalism, faced by total defeat in the next war, has loosed against the Workers' Republics a final filthy weapon: its own collective madnesses and herd delusions, catalyzed by subtle electronic and chemical bombardments of the collective Soviet nerve tissue. To date this capitalist poison in the Soviet Pan-Union has largely taken the form of delusions involving green cats. Don't mistake me, these green cats are undoubtedly real. It is my firm belief that they are ordinary cats with tiny electronic senders surgeried into their bodies, and with hormone spraying capacities comparable in their vileness to those of skunks. Although the green cats are possibly not the most important element in the assault on the Soviet psyche, they are the main stage props in that assault. Unfortunately, we have not been able to lay our hands on one of these creatures, in order to confirm our deductions and shape proper counter measures. It is absolutely essential that we do so."
"But there's only one green cat," Phil objected, genuinely puzzled, "and it's supposed to be attacking America. It isn't, of course."
"I'll say it isn't. My boy, I am giving you the Marxist facts," Romadka assured him gravely. "Those stories you have heard are merely blinds put out by the capitalist government to conceal from its own work slaves and pseudo scientists the enormity of its actions. What has happened is that a green cat has escaped from a government laboratory here. You led me to that cat once, Phil. You can do it again."
"I can't," Phil said mildly.
"Phil, you can," Romadka assured him.
"But you got him once," Phil objected, "and all you did was let him go again."