The Dark Door | Page 7

wrong, completely wrong, ever since he had discovered
the not-men. Because he had thought they had been the ones who
hunted and tortured him for so long. And now he knew how far he had
been wrong. For the face of the shadowy man, the man behind the
nightmare he was living, was the face of Dr. George Webber.
* * * * *
"You're a fool," said Dr. Manelli sharply, as he turned away from the
sleeping figure on the bed to face the older man. "Of all the ridiculous
things, to let him connect you with this!" The young doctor turned
abruptly and sank down in a chair, glowering at Dr. Webber. "You

haven't gotten to first base yet, but you've just given Scott enough
evidence to free himself from integrator control altogether, if he gives it
any thought. But I suppose you realize that."
"Nonsense," Dr. Webber retorted. "He had enough information to do
that when we first started. I'm no more worried now than I was then.
I'm sure he doesn't know enough about the psycho-integrator to be able
voluntarily to control the patient-operator relationship to any degree.
Oh, no, he's safe enough. But you've missed the whole point of that
little interview." Dr. Webber grinned at Manelli.
"I'm afraid I have. It looked to me like useless bravado."
"The persecution, man, the persecution! He's shifted his sights! Before
that interview, the not-men were torturing him, remember? Because
they were afraid he would report his findings to me, of course. But now
it's I that's against him." The grin widened. "You see where that leads?"
"You're talking almost as though you believed this story about a
different sort of people among us."
Dr. Webber shrugged. "Perhaps I do."
"Oh, come now, George."
Dr. Webber's eyebrows went up and the grin disappeared from his face.
"Harry Scott believes it, Frank. We mustn't forget that, or miss its
significance. Before Harry started this investigation of his, he wouldn't
have paid any attention to such nonsense. But he believes it now."
"But Harry Scott is insane. You said it yourself."
"Ah, yes," said Dr. Webber. "Insane. Just like the others who started to
get somewhere along those lines of investigation. Try to analyze the
growing incidence of insanity in the population and you yourself go
insane. You've got to be crazy to be a psychiatrist. It's an old joke, but
it isn't very funny any more. And it's too much for coincidence.

"And then consider the nature of the insanity--a full-blown
paranoia--oh, it's amazing. A cunning organization of men who are
not-men, a regular fairy story, all straight from Harry Scott's agile
young mind. But now it's we who are persecuting him, and he still
believes his fairy tale."
"So?"
Dr. Webber's eyes flashed angrily. "It's too neat, Frank. It's clever, and
it's powerful, whatever we've run up against. But I think we've got an
ace in the hole. We have Harry Scott."
"And you really think he'll lead us somewhere?"
Dr. Webber laughed. "That door I spoke of that Harry peeked through,
I think he'll go back to it again. I think he's started to open that door
already. And this time I'm going to follow him through."

4
It seemed incredible, yet Harry Scott knew he had not been mistaken. It
had been Dr. Webber's face he had seen, a face no one could forget, an
unmistakable face. And that meant that it had been Dr. Webber who
had been persecuting him.
But why? He had been going to report to Webber when he had run into
that golden field in the rooming-house hallway. And suddenly things
had changed.
Harry felt a chill reaching to his fingers and toes. Yes, something had
changed, all right. The attack on him had suddenly become butcherous,
cruel, sneaking into his mind somehow to use his most dreaded
nightmares against him. There was no telling what new horrors might
be waiting for him. But he knew that he would lose his mind unless he
could find an escape.
He was on his feet, his heart pounding. He had to get out of here,

wherever he was. He had to get back to town, back to the city, back to
where people were. If he could find a place to hide, a place where he
could rest, he could try to think his way out of this ridiculous maze, or
at least try to understand it.
He wrenched at the door to the passageway, started through, and
smashed face-up against a solid brick wall.
He cried out and jumped back from the wall. Blood trickled from his
nose. The door was walled up, the mortar dry and hard.
Frantically, he glanced around the room. There were no other doors,
only the row of tiny