"It might be," he said. "But I want to know my possible options before I start."

He returned to his work, his mind filling up with technical thoughts... but even so he couldn't hide the fact that his last statement had been at best a half truth. He had another reason for wanting to do this experiment, a reason I couldn't quite pick up at the distance I was at.

I thought about it for several minutes in silence. Two days ago I'd been willing to let Green do anything he wanted as long as he got me a shield, but now I was having second thoughts. After all, the telepath finder was Amos's final legacy to all the rest of us, and I had a certain amount of responsibility to make sure it wasn't ruined.

I puzzled at the question for a minute, then came to a conclusion. Leaning back against the wall, I sent out a call. Calvin? Are you there, Calvin?

Who's that-Dale? Calvin answered, a bit groggily.

I grimaced; I'd forgotten Saturday was Calvin's only morning to sleep in and that it was only a little after eight Pueblo time. Yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. I'll call back later.

No, that's all right, he assured me. I got to bed at a reasonable hour last night. What's on your mind?

I wondered if Gordy had finished going through all of Amos's things, both at Eureka and at his mountain cabin. Specifically, I wanted to know if he found anything else relating to the telepath finder-notes, schematics; that sort of thing.

Um... you got me. I can call and ask, if you'd like.

Okay. Calvin hesitated. I talked to Colleen yesterday. She said you'd had another daymare.

Yes. It wasn't too bad, though.

Calvin didn't buy that any more than Colleen had. Uh-huh. Any changes in the vision? Content, texture, length-anything?

I sighed. Not really, I admitted, unless you want to count the fact that my doorbell got incorporated into it. Aside from that it was just a straight replaying of Nelson's attempt to kill both of us. And before you try to think up a euphemistic way to ask, yes, I still get some of it from Nelson's point of view.

He was silent for a long moment, but it wasn't hard to guess what he was thinking. Among the candle flickers of ordinary humans, we telepaths stand out like carbon-arc searchlights, the strength of our mental broadcast and sensitivity enabling us to communicate over hundreds of miles. But the price for this unique companionship is a heavy one: at anything less than a hundred miles apart the contact is strong enough to be painful, and at a theoretical distance of twenty miles both personalities would disintegrate totally under the strain. Nelson and I had been close to that limit when he finally took a wrong turn and crashed the plane he was chasing me with into a mountain. I'd survived the encounter... but not unscathed. The Dale Ravenhall I'd once been had been bent and altered by the force of the mental collision, changed into something that was part Dale and part Nelson. Permanently? No one knew. But the fact that some of each daymare still came heavily flavored with Nelson's memories was ominously suggestive.

Well, Calvin said at last, it's only been five months, after all. A lot of simpler psychological problems take longer than that to heal.

I snorted. Thanks a whole bunch.

Sorry, he said quickly, and I grimaced. In earlier days he would have recognized that kind of statement as the banter it was. Now, he was bending over backwards to avoid stepping on any toes, real or otherwise. Nelson had been the touchy sort.

It's okay, I reassured him. I know you were trying to be encouraging. Uh... you don't have any plans to travel east in the near future, do you?

I could come over any time. Why?-do you need some close-approach contact?

Not really. I wasn't ready yet to have all my surface thoughts open to another person, good friend or not.

I just thought maybe you'd be willing to stay in Minneapolis or Dubuque or somewhere for a week or two and let Colleen get back to Regina for a while.

That could probably be arranged. Are her friends in Chillicothe getting tired of her company, or is she just homesick?

No to the former; probably to the latter. Not that she'll admit it, of course-she takes her baby-sitting duties seriously.

Uh-huh. Well, look-I'll talk to her and check the location log to make sure I wouldn't be flying in on top of anyone else and then get back to you. Okay?

Sure. Thanks; I really appreciate it. And don't forget to check with Gordy about any other telepath locater stuff.

Right. Talk to you later.

I came out of the contact and glanced around the room, reorienting myself. Everything was as I remembered it... except that Green was gazing sideways at me from the work bench, his expression wary. "It's okay," I assured him. "I'm not going to faint or anything."

"I know," he said. "Who were you talking to?"

"Uh-Calvin Wolfe."

"Pueblo, Colorado; right?"

"Yes." Frowning slightly, I touched his thoughts. What I found surprised me. "You've been reading up on us lately, haven't you?"

Again, there was that little flicker of resentment that seemed to come whenever I demonstrated my telepathic ability on him. "For a couple of days, yeah. I wanted to know what I was getting myself into. It must be nice to be able to talk to someone that far away so easily."

"You can do almost as well by telephone," I told him shortly, "and without the disadvantages we've got."

He shrugged. "Not much of a disadvantage. All you have to do is stay out of each other's way. Big deal."

If I'd been a violent man I probably would've hit him. Instead, I suddenly felt a need to get far away from such stupidity. "I'll be upstairs if you need me," I told him with as much civility as I could manage. Without waiting for a response, I left.

The call I was expecting came about eight hours later, after Green had gone home for the day; and to my mild surprise it was Gordy himself who made it. Gordy, where are you? was my first question.

On a plane somewhere near Billings, Montana, I believe, he said. I'm on my way to Minneapolis; going to be doing some work there for the next couple of weeks.

Such fortuitous timing, I told him. Calvin couldn't get away?

Even eight hundred miles away I could sense his embarrassment. You make it sound like we're all conspiring to put one over on you, he protested. We're your friends, Dale.

Yeah, I know. Feeling like a heel was becoming a full-time job here lately. What's the word on Amos's things?

I've gone through everything from top to bottom and back again. No notes, no plans, no schematics, no extra equipment other than what you've already got. Either he deliberately destroyed all the documentation or the design of the finder was so obvious to him that he could just sit down and cobble one together. Sorry.

My telepath shield, for example?

Gordy broke into my musings. Look, Dale, don't you think it's about time, you let the rest of us in on what you're doing with all that stuff?

My first impulse was to tell him that they'd find out when I was good and ready and not a solitary second sooner. But that was clearly Nelson talking. I don't know, I said instead. I'm trying to make something new out of the things Amos developed for his finder. If it works-well, it'll benefit all of us. Let's leave it at that for now.

Gordy was silent for a long moment. You know, Dale, it's possible to play these things too close to the chest. If we'd known that Amos had caught Nelson making quiet trips to Las Vegas we might have implicated him in Amos's death before he had the chance to try to kill you. You could be running the same kind of risk here.

I'm being careful, I told him stubbornly. My doubts about Green rose unbidden before my eyes; ruthlessly, I crushed them down. I just don't want to raise any false hopes, that's all.