I stared at him in bewilderment.
"Please sit down," the Dean said. "I always look forward to these talks, Dr. Montgomery." The smile on his face seemed permanently frozen.
I sat down, feeling nervous and edgy.
"I'm glad to have a chance to talk to you," I said. "I have made some recent discoveries that I need to talk to you about. The research may require travel funds."
"Discoveries?" The frozen smile somehow seemed slightly more frozen.
I began with the events of the conference and told him of my research since then.
"And you have drawn conclusions from this?"
"Conclusions?" I said angrily. "Conclusions? Getting conclusions from this evidential mess is impossible. Even to begin to get a hold on this problem, I'll need to go to Hanique myself and...."
"Where is this 'Hanique'?"
I was at a complete loss, suddenly realizing for the first time that I hadn't the faintest notion of where Hanique was located. The only evidence I had that it actually existed at all, and was not a corruption like 'Boulagnon' was usually assumed to be, as the obscure statement of the man at the conference. A man I could not contact, as I did not even know his name.
I was still caught up in the puzzle this presented when the voice of the Dean broke in.
"Dr. Montgomery," he asked, "have you been taking your medications?"
Startled by the odd, and rather insulting, question, I replied indignantly, "I don't take medications; I haven't had anything recently except a few aspirin."
"Aspirin," he said, the frozen smile turning suddenly into a frown. "Do you mean the white pills? You are only taking the white pills?"
"Aspirin are usually white," I replied sarcastically. "But I don't see what business it is of yours what I'm taking or not."
"And the others?"
"What others?"
"The red and the yellow pills," he replied. "What have you been doing with the red and yellow pills?"
"Look," I said. "You're just a Dean. You're not my doctor, so I don't understand why you keep talking about medications."
The frozen smile returned to the his face.
"Dr. Montgomery," the Dean said, "we both know that I am not the Dean."
I stared at him in bewilderment.
to be continued
