Read The Rendezvous for Free Online Page A

home with him!” Then she got very upset, so I left it.’
    â€˜All right,’ Bradford said. ‘What’s the outlook? What chance has she got of leading a normal life?’
    Kaplan shrugged. ‘That’s hard to say. It might take a year, two years, to get her orientated properly, and even then she’ll probably have permanent nervous disabilities. You can’t break a leg in six places and then expect to run a mile. If I had the time, and she was back home in a proper clinic with good psychiatric nursing and facilities, I’d say she might be able to live outside in about a year. But here – there’s not a chance. Bob. I’ve got to tell you straight, the girl hasn’t a hope in hell of anything but a life spent under care in some institution.’
    â€˜If I got her to the States,’ Bradford said, ‘she can have the best …’ He looked up at Kaplan. ‘Joe, I’ve got to help her. I’ll do anything!’
    Kaplan didn’t answer immediately. ‘How involved are you with this girl? You’re not kidding yourself you’re in love with her, are you?’
    â€˜No, I’m not kidding myself,’ Bradford said. ‘Because I know damn well I am. All right, I know you’re going to start talking about pity, and me feeling guilty because I was born rich and all the rest of the crap, but whatever the reason, I’m in love with Terese. I’ve got another couple of months before I get a posting and I’m not leaving her here for the Red Cross to pick up and send to some lunatic asylum. If I can get her to the States …’
    â€˜Not a chance,’ Kaplan said. ‘The only way you’d get her in would be to marry her, and I won’t let you do it. I’ll go to your colonel if necessary and that’ll be the end of that. Besides, she’s too sick to take outside the hospital. You think she’s a lot better than she is, but that’s because she’s inside; she associates the hospital with being safe. You wouldn’t get her past the door.’
    â€˜Then you won’t help,’ Bradford said angrily. ‘Is that it?’
    â€˜No, no, I didn’t say that,’ Kaplan held up his hand. ‘Sit down and don’t lose your temper. I didn’t say I wouldn’t help. I was just trying to explain the problem to you. I know what’s been happening between you and that girl. You’ve gone and got yourself all snarled up over her, and she’s come to depend on you so much I don’t know what effect it’ll have on her when you leave the area. I’m thinking of both of you. I’ve had an idea – it’s pretty experimental, Bob, but I think it might just work. Even if it didn’t, she won’t be any worse off.’
    â€˜What is it? You wouldn’t have any Scotch around here, would you?’
    â€˜In the desk – right-hand drawer. Help yourself. Do you know what the human mind does when it finds a fact too much to bear? It forgets it. That’s pretty normal, we all do it. If there’s something unpleasant – something we’re ashamed of, some awful grief – we forget it as soon as we can: or we try to. Amnesia is an extension of that, only it’s an extreme measure taken by the mind, and it wipes out everything as well as the subject causing the problem. Often if that didn’t happen the person would go crazy. There’s a new theory, it hasn’t been practised much, one or two cases have come up – it’s called therapeutic amnesia. In other words the memory is erased scientifically, deliberately. This frees the patient of their immediate psychotic pressures and lets the doctor start from scratch. I think this might work with Terese Masson. If I can wipe out the last year or two – she might get well.’
    Bradford poured out a second Scotch into the glass and drank it. ‘Is this really possible? You