DEATH OF A PSYCHOLOGIST

After that there were only two weeks left to the life of Ebling Mis.

And in those two weeks, Bayta was with him three times. The first time was on the night after the evening upon which they saw Colonel Pritcher. The second was one week later. And the third was again a week later—on the last day—the day Mis died.

First, there was the night of Colonel Pritcher’s evening, the first hour of which was spent by a stricken pair in a brooding, unmerry merry-go-round.

Bayta said, “Torie, let’s tell Ebling.”

Toran said dully, “Think he can help?”

“We’re only two. We’ve got to take some of the weight off. Maybe he can help.”

Toran said, “He’s changed. He’s lost weight. He’s a little feathery; a little woolly.” His fingers groped in air, metaphorically. “Sometimes, I don’t think he’ll help us much—ever. Sometimes, I don’t think anything will help.”

“Don’t!” Bayta’s voice caught and escaped a break, “Torie, don’t! When you say that, I think the Mule’s getting us. Let’s tell Ebling, Torie—now!”

Ebling Mis raised his head from the long desk, and bleared at them as they approached. His thinning hair was scuffed up, his lips made sleepy, smacking sounds.

“Eh?” he said. “Someone want me?”

Bayta bent to her knees, “Did we wake you? Shall we leave?”

“Leave? Who is it? Bayta? No, no, stay! Aren’t there chairs? I saw them—” His finger pointed vaguely.

Toran pushed two ahead of him. Bayta sat down and took one of the psychologist’s flaccid hands in hers. “May we talk to you, Doctor?” She rarely used the title.

“Is something wrong?” A little sparkle returned to his abstracted eyes. His sagging cheeks regained a touch of color. “Is something wrong?”

Bayta said, “Captain Pritcher has been here. Let me talk, Torie. You remember Captain Pritcher, Doctor?”

“Yes—Yes—” His fingers pinched his lips and released them. “Tall man. Democrat.”

“Yes, he. He’s discovered the Mule’s mutation. He was here, Doctor, and told us.”

“But that is nothing new. The Mule’s mutation is straightened out.” In honest astonishment, “Haven’t I told you? Have I forgotten to tell you?”

“Forgotten to tell us what?” put in Toran, quickly.

“About the Mule’s mutation, of course. He tampers with emotions. Emotional control! I haven’t told you? Now what made me forget?” Slowly, he sucked in his under lip and considered.

Then, slowly, life crept into his voice and his eyelids lifted wide, as though his sluggish brain had slid onto a well-greased single track. He spoke in a dream, looking between the two listeners rather than at them. “It is really so simple. It requires no specialized knowledge. In the mathematics of psychohistory, of course, it works out promptly, in a third-level equation involving no more—Never mind that. It can be put into ordinary words—roughly—and have it make sense, which isn’t usual with psychohistorical phenomena.

“Ask yourselves—What can upset Hari Seldon’s careful scheme of history, eh?” He peered from one to