The Best Made Plans Part 7

The woman looked at him curiously.

"Oh, yes," she said. "Just a minute."

She got up and went into an inner room. After a moment, she came out and reclaimed her seat behind her desk.

"He's busy right now," she said. "I'll let you know when you can go in."

Don shrugged and sat down in one of the chairs that lined the wall. It wasn't a very comfortable chair.

"The anxious seat," he growled to himself. "Nice, time-tested trick."

There was no reading material at hand, and the walls of the oddly shaped room were blank. He amused himself by directing a blank stare toward the secretary. After a few minutes, she looked up from her work and jerked her head indignantly.

"Stop that," she ordered.

"Stop what?" Don looked innocent.

"Stop staring at me like that."

"Not staring at you," he told her. "I have to look somewhere and the chair faces your way. That's all."

The woman moved her hands. "Well, then face some other way."

"But I'd have to move the chair, and that would disturb your arrangements," Don told her reasonably. He continued his blank stare.

The woman resumed her work, then twitched her shoulders and looked at him resentfully for a few seconds. Finally, she got up and went to the inner office again. Don waited.

Again, she came out.

"They'll see you now," she said.

Don got up.

"Thank you."

He went through the door.

To his right, a man sat behind a wide, highly polished desk. The other was across the room, at a smaller desk. Both looked up as the door opened.

The man to Don's right nodded pleasantly.

"Well, so you're Donald Michaels? I'm Dr. Rayson."

"Yes, sir."

"That's good. Sit down." Rayson waved. "Right over there." He smiled confidently.

"Ah, that's fine. I'm the school psychologist, you know. You have met Mr. Masterson, the self-government faculty advisor, of course?"

Don nodded. "Of course. I'm in one of his cla.s.ses."

"Well, that's good. Now, how do you feel this morning?"

"Quite well, thank you, sir."

"Well, then, we can talk about that little affair in the locker room, can't we? Your memory is clear on it by now, isn't it?"

Don nodded.

"Well, that's fine. Now, suppose you give us the whole story. Don't leave out a thing. Then, we'll see what we can do for you."

Don smiled thinly, then flicked out a finger.

"I think that paper on your desk, sir, is the report I wrote last night. It's complete as it stands."

Masterson broke in, frowning. "We don't mean that thing," he said coldly. "What we want is a true, complete account of what actually happened."

Don faced him, his face tightening a little.

"Dr. Rayson has just that, sir," he said. "On his desk. I wrote it. I signed it."

Rayson raised a hand slightly.

"Just a moment," he said reprovingly. "There's no need for excitement or anger here. We're simply looking for a full, correct account." He cleared his throat. "Perhaps it would be well for me to make things clearer to you. Then, you'll recognize the problem." He looked down at the paper on the desk.

"You see, Donald," he continued, "we have already talked to a number of other students about this. And we have a complete account of the incident in so far as it concerned Petoen Waern." He smiled indulgently.

"What we are now concerned about is your own well-being. We need to know something of what happened to you after you were alone with the Waern boy." He spread his hands, then held them out, palms up.

"As to the actual physical action, that's quite simple. You see, there were a number of witnesses to the affair, and most of them have come forward." He rubbed his hands together, then laid them on the desk.

"So, we know precisely what happened that far.

"And we have a pretty good idea of what happened to you later, of course. This sort of thing has happened before. But by this time, you should have had time to recover to a great extent. At least, you should remember things much more clearly than you did when you wrote this report last night." He touched the paper with a smile.

"And with a little prompting and information, you should be able to fully recover your memory."

The smile became sympathetic. "Of course, I can understand your present confusion and your complete disbelief in your change of orientation.

And I know it's quite an effort for a young man to admit he's been ...

well ... shall we say influenced? But believe me, it's no disgrace.

It's happened to quite a few others before you." He nodded thoughtfully.

"In fact, we are beginning to believe this Petoen Waern, like his uncle, is something of an adept at this sort of thing."

Don looked at him steadily.