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his forehead; it was cold and greasy with sweat. Ah, I’ve forgotten to eat again, he thought. Jumping up again, he threw a few punches: his arm, developed by five years’ work on the Y.M.C.A. sandbag, felt as strong as ever. When he lay down again he was seized by a rigor, shook for a full minute, and fell fast asleep. When he awoke, he felt refreshed but weak and hungry. It was growing late. The light in the window was yellow and from the park there drifted up the four-o’clock sound of sparrows.
    After washing his face in cold water, he clamped the telescope to the window jamb, selected a terrestrial eyepiece, and screwed it in place. He focused on a building clear across the park and beyond Fifth Avenue. There sprang into view a disc of brickwork perhaps eight feet in diameter. Now stripping to his shorts, he drew up a chair, made himself comfortable, and gazed another five minutes at the bricks. He slapped his leg. It was as he had hoped. Not only were the bricks seen as if they were ten feet away; they were better than that. It was better than having the bricks there before him. They gained in value. Every grain and crack and excrescence became available. Beyond any doubt, he said to himself, this proves that bricks, as well as other things, are not as accessible as they used to be. Special measures were needed to recover them.
    The telescope recovered them.
    7 .
    He dressed and paid his last visit to Dr. Gamow, his psychoanalyst.
    For the thousandth time he took his seat in a reclining chair that had been purposely set in a position that was neither up nor down, neither quite faced the doctor nor faced away. Dr. Gamow, who had had it specially designed and constructed, called it his “ambiguous” chair. He learned a great deal about a patient from the way he sat in the chair. Some would walk in and sit straight up, swivel around to face the doctor across his desk like a client consulting a lawyer. Others would stretch out and swivel away to face the corner in conventional analytic style. It was characteristic of the engineer that he sat in the ambiguous chair ambiguously: leaving it just as itwas, neither up nor down, neither quite facing Dr. Gamow nor facing away.
    For the thousandth time Dr. Gamow looked at his patient—who sat as usual, alert and pleasant—and felt a small spasm of irritation. It was this amiability, he decided, which got on his nerves. There was a slyness about it and an opacity which put one off. It had not always been so between them. For the first year the analyst had been charmed—never had he had a more responsive patient. Never had his own theories found a readier confirmation than in the free (they seemed to be free) associations and the copious dreams which this one spread out at his feet like so many trophies. The next year or so left him pleased still but baffled. This one was a little too good to be true. At last the suspicion awoke that he, the doctor, was being entertained, royally it is true and getting paid for the privilege besides, but entertained nevertheless. Trophies they were sure enough, these dazzling wares offered every day, trophies to put him off the scent while the patient got clean away. Sourer still was the second suspicion that even the patient’s dreams and recollections, which bore out the doctor’s theories, confirmed hypotheses right and left, were somehow or other a performance too, the most exquisite of courtesies, as if the apple had fallen to the ground to please Sir Isaac Newton. Charged accordingly, the patient of course made an equally charming confession, exhibited heroic sweats and contortions to overcome his bad habits, offered crabbed and meager dreams, and so made another trophy of his disgrace.
    The last year of the analysis the doctor had grown positively disgruntled. This one was a Southern belle, he decided, a good dancing partner, light on his feet and giving away nothing. He did not know how not to give away