Calhoun gagged in purely instinctive revulsion. The things in the plastic container were gray and small. Had they been still, they might have been no worse to look at than raw oysters in a cocktail. But they squirmed. They writhed.
"I will show you," said Doctor Lett amiably.
He turned to the glass plate which divided the room into halves. The man beyond the thick glass now pressed eagerly against it. He looked at the container with a horrible, lustful desire. The thick-eyeglassed man clucked at him, as if at a caged animal one wishes to soothe. The man beyond the glass yawned hysterically. He seemed to whimper. He could not take his eyes from the container in the doctor's hands.
"So!" said Doctor Lett.
He pressed a button. A lock-door opened. He put the container inside it. The door closed. It could be sterilized before the door on the other side would open, but now it was arranged to sterilize itself to prevent contagion from coming out.
The man behind the glass uttered inaudible cries. He was filled with beastly, uncontrollable impatience. He cried out at the mechanism of the contagion-lock as a beast might bellow at the opening through which food was dropped into its cage.
That lock opened, inside the glass-walled room. The plastic container appeared. The man leaped upon it. He gobbled its contents, and Calhoun was nauseated. But as the para gobbled, he glared at the two who—with Murgatroyd—watched him. He hated them with a ferocity which made veins stand out upon his temples and fury empurple his skin.
Calhoun felt that he'd gone white. He turned his eyes away and said squeamishly:
"I have never seen such a thing before."
"It is new, eh?" said Doctor Lett in a strange sort of pride. "It is new! I—even I!—have discovered something that the Med Service does not know."
"I wouldn't say the Service doesn't know about similar things," said Calhoun slowly. "There are—sometimes—on a very small scale—dozens or perhaps hundreds of victims—there are sometimes similar irrational appetites. But on a planetary scale—no. There has never been a—an epidemic of this size."
He still looked sick and stricken. But he asked:
"What's the result of this—appetite? What does it do to a para? What change in—say—his health takes place in a man after he becomes a para?"
"There is no change," said Doctor Lett blandly. "They are not sick and they do not die because they are paras. The condition itself is no more abnormal than—than diabetes. Diabetics require insulin. Paras require—something else. But there is prejudice against what paras need. It is as if some men would rather die than use insulin and those who did use it became outcastes. I do not say what causes this condition. I do not object if the Minister for Health believes that jungle-creatures creep out and—make paras of men." He watched Calhoun's expression. "Does your Med Service information agree with that?"
"No-o-o," said Calhoun. "I'm afraid it inclines to the idea of a monstrous cause, and it isn't much like diabetes."
"But it is!" insisted Lett. "Everything digestible, no matter how unappetizing to a modern man, has been a part of the regular diet of some tribe of human savages. Even prehistoric Romans ate dormice cooked in honey. Why should the fact that a needed substance happens to be found in a scavenger—"
"The Romans didn't crave dormice," said Calhoun. "They could eat them or leave them alone."
The man behind the thick glass glared at the two in the outer room. He hated them intolerably. He cried out at them. Blood-vessels in his temples throbbed with his hatred. He cursed them—
"I point out one thing more," said Doctor Lett. "I would like to have the cooperation of the Interstellar Medical Service. I am a citizen of this planet, and not without influence. But I would like to have my work approved by the Med Service. I submit that in some areas on ancient Earth, iodine was put into the public water-supply systems to prevent goiters and cretinism. Fluorine was put into drinking-water to prevent caries. On Tralee the public water-supply has traces of zinc and cobalt added. These are necessary trace elements. Why should you not concede that here there are trace elements or trace compounds needed—"
"You want me to report that," said Calhoun, flatly. "I couldn't do it without explaining—a number of things. Paras are madmen, but they organize. A symptom of privation is violent yawning. This—condition appeared only six months ago. This planet has been colonized for three hundred years. It could not be a naturally needed trace compound."
Doctor Lett shrugged, eloquently and contemptuously.
"Then you will not report what all this planet will certify," he said curtly. "My vaccine—"
"You would not call it a vaccine if you thought it supplied a deficiency—a special need of the people of Tallien."
Doctor Lett grinned again, derisively.
"Might I not supply the deficiency and call it a vaccine? But it is not a true vaccine. It is not yet efficient. It has to be taken regularly or it does not protect."
Calhoun felt as if he had gone a little pale.
"Would you give me a small sample of your vaccine?"
"No," said Doctor Lett blandly. "The little that is available is needed for high officials who must be protected from the para condition at all costs. I am making ready to turn it out in large quantities to supply all the population. Then I will give you—suitable dosage. You will be glad to have it."
Calhoun shook his head.
"Don't you see why Med Service considers that this sort of thing has a monstrous cause? Are you the monster, Doctor Lett?" Then he said sharply, "How long have you been a para? Six months?"
Murgatroyd said, "Chee! Chee! Chee!" in great agitation, because Doctor Lett seized a dissecting scalpel from a table-top and crouched to spring upon Calhoun. Calhoun said:
"Easy, Murgatroyd! He won't do anything regrettable!"
He had a blaster in his hand, bearing directly on the greatest and most skillful physician of Tallien Three. And Doctor Lett did not do anything. But his eyes showed the fury of a madman.
III
Five minutes later, or possibly less, Calhoun went out to where the Minister for Health paced miserably up and down the corridor outside the laboratory. The Minister looked white and sick, as if despite himself he'd been picturing the demonstration Lett would have given Calhoun. He did not meet Calhoun's eyes. He said uneasily:
"I'll take you to the Planetary President, now."
"No," said Calhoun. "I got some very promising information from Dr. Lett. I want to go back to my ship first."
"But the President wants to see you!" protested the Minister for Health. "There's something he wants to discuss!"
"I want," said Calhoun, "to have something to discuss with him. There is intelligence back of this para business. I'd almost call it a demoniac intelligence. I want to get back to my ship and check on what I got from Doctor Lett."
The Minister for Health hesitated, and then said urgently:
"But the President is extremely anxious—"
"Will you," asked Calhoun politely, "arrange for me to be taken back to my ship?"
The Minister for Health opened his mouth and closed it. Then he said apologetically and—it seemed to Calhoun—fearfully:
"Doctor Lett has been our only hope of conquering this—this epidemic. The President and the Cabinet felt that they had to—give him full authority. There was no other hope! We didn't know you'd come. So—Doctor Lett wished you to see the President when you left him. It won't take long!"