Astounding Science Fiction, August 1955 (British Edition) — page 100: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

98 i ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION “The Opposition’s claiming, now, that we drugged and hypnotized Salgath into making that visiscreen confession,” Dalla said. ““Can you think of any way you could do that without making the subject incapable of lying?” ‘“Pseudo-memories,’’ the psychist said. “It would take about three times as long as the time between Salgath Trod’s departure from his apartment and the time of the telecast, though—” ‘You know much high math?’’ Vall asked the psychist. “Well, enough to handle my job. Neuron-synapse inter-relations, memory- and-association patterns, that kind of thing, all have to be expressed mathematically.” Vall nodded and handed him the time-line designation list. ‘See any kind of a pattern there?’’ he asked. The psychist looked at the paper and blanked his face as he drew on hypnotically-acquired information. “Yes. I'd say that all the numbers are related in some kind of a series to some other number. Simplified down to kindergarten level, say the difference between A and B is, maybe, one-decillionth of the difference between X and A, and the difference between B and C is one-decillionth of the difference between X and B, and so on—”’ A voice came out of one of the communication boxes: “Dr. Nentrov; the patient’s out of the drug, and he’s beginning to stir about.” “That’s it,”’ the psychist said. “I have to run.” He handed the sheet back to Vall, took a last drink from his coffee cup, and bolted out of the room. Dalla picked up the sheet of paper and looked at it. Vall told her what it was. “If those time lines are in regular series, they relate to the base line of operations,”’ she said. “‘Maybe you can have that worked out. I can see how it would be; a stated interval between the Esaron Sector lines, to simplify iransposition control settings.” “That was what I was thinking. It’s not quite as simple as Dr. Nentrov expressed it, but that could be the general idea. We might be able to work out the location of the base line from that. There seems to be a break in the number sequence in here; that would be the time line Skordran Kirv found those slaves on.”’ He reached for the pipe he had left on the desk when he had gone to Police Terminal and began filling it. A little later, a buzzer sounded and a light came on on one of the com- munication boxes. He flipped the switch and said, ““Verkan Vall here.” Sothran Barth’s voice came out of the box. “They’ve just brought in Salgath Trod’s servants. Picked them up as they came out of the house conveyer at the apartment building. I don’t believe they know what’s happened.” Vall flipped a switch and twiddled a dial; a viewscreen lit up, showing the landing stage. The police car had just landed; one detective had gotten out, and was helping the girl, Zinganna, who had been Salgath Trod’s housekeeper and mistress, to descend. She was really beautiful, Vall thought; rather tall, slender, with dark eyes and a creamy light-brown skin. She wore a_ black | comichbooksicom