ha Franklin had engineered the death of
Rambaugh and she'd almost engineered the rubbing-out of Scarmann. A
mental, Martha Franklin. A high-grade mental, capable of controlling her
thoughts so that her cohorts could be led by the mind into doing her dirty
work.

My mind chuckled. I'd be gone before they caught up with Martha, but
they'd catch up all right. She'd leave the apartment positively radiating
her act of violence and then the cops would have a catch. And you should
see how a set of Court Mentalists go to work on a guilty party these days.
Once they get the guy that pulled the trigger on the witness stand, in
front of a jury consisting of mixed mentals and espers, with no holds
barred, the court record gets a full load of the killer's life,
adventures, habits, and attitude; just before the guilty party heads for
the readjustment chamber.

Things were growing blacker. Waves of darkness clouded my mind and I found
it hard to think straight. My esper sense faded first and as it faded I
let it run once more over Martha's attractiveness and found my darkening
mind wishing that she were the girl I'd believed her to be instead of the
female louse she was. It could have been fun.

But now I was about to black out from stun-gun paralysis, and Martha was
headed for the readjustment chamber where they'd reduce her mental
activity to the level of a menial, sterilize her, and put her to work in
an occupation that no man or woman with a spark of intelligence, ambition,
or good sense would take.

She would live and die a half-robot, alone and ignored, her attractiveness
lost because of her own lack-luster mind.

And I'd been willing to go out and plug Scarmann for her.

Hah!

And then she was at my side. I perceived her dimly, inconstantly, through
the waves of blackness and unreality that were like the half-dreams that
we have when lying a-doze. She levered my frozen body over on its hard
back and went to work on my chest. Her arms went around me and she
squeezed. Air whooshed into my dead lungs, and then she was beating my
breastbone black and blue with her small fists. Beat. Beat-beat. Beat. I
couldn't feel a thing but I could dig the fact that she was hurting her
hands as she beat on my chest in a rhythm that matched the beat of her own
heart.

I dug her own heartbeat for her, and she read my mind and matched the beat
perfectly.

Then I felt a thump inside of me and dug my own heart. It throbbed once,
slugg