“You’re doing that operation tonight, aren’t you? I wanted to wish you luck.”
“How’d you know?”
“Bob,” she said, “we’ve been married long enough so I can read your mind a little. I don’t know what the operation is, but I know it’s important. So—for luck!”
She kissed him again. Then, with a smile and a nod, she slipped out and was gone. Dr. Robert Bruno sighed, not unhappily, and sat behind his desk. He used the annunciator to check the sanitarium’s routine, made certain everything was running smoothly, and clicked his tongue with satisfaction.
Now—the experiment....
Surgery Three had some new equipment for the experiment. Bruno’s collaborator, Andrew Parsons, the atomic physicist, was there, small and untidy, with a scowling, wrinkled face that looked incongruous under the surgeon’s cap. There was to be no real surgery; trepanning wasn’t necessary, but aseptic precautions were taken as a matter of course.
The anesthetist and two other nurses stood ready, and Morrissey, in his white gown, seemed to have forgotten his worry and had settled down to his usual quiet competence. Gregson was on one of the tables, already prepped and unconscious. Intravenous anesthesia would presently supplement the apomorphine in his system, as it would also be administered to Bruno himself.
Ferguson and Dale, two other doctors, were present. At worst quick cerebral surgery might be necessary, if anything went badly amiss. But nothing could, Bruno thought. Nothing could.
He glanced at the sleek, shining machines, with their attachments and registering dials. Not medical equipment, of course. They were in Parsons’ line; he had planned and built them. But the idea had been Bruno’s to begin with, and Bruno’s psychiatric knowledge had complemented Parsons’ technology. Two branches of science had met, and the result would be—a specific for insanity.