"I never trusted anybody with a messiah complex. The world is too big to change single-handed; you'd just have bungled it up worse than it already is. A lot of dictators started out as reformers and ended up as mass-executioners; you'd have done the same."
Fraser leaned over his desk. "I'm willing to make a deal, though," he went on. "Your teeth are pulled; there's no point in turning you in. Sworsky and Martinez and I are willing just to report on Bryce, and let you go, if you'll change back all your subjects. We're going to read your files, and watch and see that you do it. Every one."
Kennedy bit his lip. "And the machine--?"
"I don't know. We'll settle that later. Okay, God, here's the phone number of Judy Harkness. Ask her to come over for a special treatment. At once."
A month later, the papers had a story about a plausible maniac who had talked his way into the Columbia University laboratories, where Gavotti's puzzling machine was being studied, and pulled out a hammer and smashed it into ruin before he could be stopped. Taken to jail, he committed suicide in his cell. The name was Kennedy.
Fraser felt vague regret, but it didn't take him long to forget it; he was too busy making plans for his wedding.
This etext was produced from Science Fiction Stories 1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
Obvious punctuation errors have been repaired.
page 17 original: on the mantel: a midle-aged woman and two young men
replacement: on the mantel: a middle-aged woman and two young men
page 20 original: inpulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into
replacement: impulses corresponding to your reactions of hate, fear, and disgust into
page 25 original: Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, artifically, to an otherwise-intolerable situation?
replacement: Another woman? Or merely to be reconciled, artificially, to an otherwise-intolerable situation?
page 26 original: "As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser.
"I wish you'd trust me," said Kennedy with a hint of wistfulness. "I'd have done the job honestly; you didn't have to watch."
replacement: "As even, as we'll ever get, I suppose," said Fraser.