e you are a PC any
more than I do!" She was sure sensitive about my having any
precognition!

"O.K.," I said. "Then _you_ make them eat it. Aren't you the one
who knows all about exposing charlatans?"

That was the right button. "Certainly," Shari said.

"I'll pick you up in ten minutes," I said.

"Now? Midnight?"

"This is the pay-off," I said, and cut the image. I dialed the
number Snead had given me.

"Manhattan Chapter," the Operator cartoon said.

"This is George Robertson," I said. "Mortimer Snead told me
there'd be somebody there to talk to me. Maybe Lefty."

"Snead?" the cartoon said, frowning. "No one here by that--Oh!
Wait a moment. Dr. Walter Bupp will talk to you," the cartoon
said, and Wally's face appeared on the screen.

"It wasn't practical," I admitted.

"Six days early," he observed.

"Nuts," I said. "Look, you've got me convinced you are a psi.
That Snead puts on a terrific show."

"Snead?" he frowned. "Oh!" He laughed. "Yeah," he agreed
condescendingly. "He's red hot, every now and then."

"But you haven't sold me that _I'm_ a PC," I growled. "I've been
tested. I'm not. Now I want you to get off my back. You and the
rest of them! Lay off!"

He shook his head. "The Lodge acts unilaterally on this," he said
soberly. "You've got psi powers. You'll accept our direction in
their use. Or else, Tex."

"All I ask is a fair test," I said desperately. "Under laboratory
conditions."

He gave me an address. "Come any time," he said.

"That's me walking in," I told him.

* * * * *

Shari had to pay off the 'copter when we got there. It wasn't the
brownstone I had seen the night before. This place was a
medium-sized office building, say a hundred stories or so, quite
new. There was no identification on its front other than the
street number. The Directory in the silent and unpopulated lobby
was names, all names. But Dr. Walter Bupp was one of them, in
7704. Shari and I rode the elevator to seventy-seven in chilly
silence.

The corridor was dim, with its lights on night-time setting.
Stronger light came from an open door quite a way down the hall.
It had to be Bupp's office, and it was.

Wally certainly wasn't surprised to see Shari. He shook hands
with her briefly, pushing his sharp chin out at her in his
gamecock fashion. "Your mate?" he asked me.

"Certainly not," she told him. "We're ... uh ... colleagues at
the University."

"That's not what Phe