“Some pressure?”
“Oh, don’t be afraid of speaking out. I don’t mind the worst. Will an operation remove that pressure?”
“If, as I imagine, there is some pressure from the inner table of the skull on the brain, it will.”
“Well, now,” said Berselius, “I want you to listen to me attentively; ever since that accident, or, at least, since I regained memory, I have felt that I am not the same man. Only in sleep do I become myself again—do you understand me? I have quite different aims and objects; my feelings about things are quite different; my past before the accident is ruled off from my present—that is, when I am awake.
“When I dream I become my old self again—is that not strange?”
“No,” said Thénard, “every man is double. We have numerous cases where, from accident or other circumstances, a man’s personality changes; one side of his nature is suppressed. There is one strange point about your case, though, and that is the waking up of the suppressed personality so vividly during sleep; but in your case it is perhaps not so strange.”
“Why not?”
“Because, and excuse me for being personal even though I am complimentary, your personality as I knew you before your accident was so profound, and vivid, and powerful, that even though it is suppressed it must speak. And it speaks in dreams.”
“So!—perhaps you are right. Now tell me, if you operate and remove the pressure, may I become myself again?”