two letters were waiting on lessing's desk that morning. the first was from roberts bros., announcing another shift of deadline on the book, and demanding the galley proofs two weeks earlier than scheduled. lessing groaned. as director of psionic research at the hoffman medical center, he had long since learned how administrative detail could suck up daytime hours. he knew that his real work was at the farm—yet he hadn't even been to the farm in over six weeks. and now, as the book approached publication date, lessing wondered if he would ever really get back to work again.

the other letter cheered him a bit more. it bore the letterhead of the international psionics conference:

dear dr. lessing:

in recognition of your position as an authority on human psionic behavior patterns, we would be gratified to schedule you as principle speaker at the conference in chicago on october 12th. a few remarks in discussion of your forthcoming book would be entirely in order—

they were waiting for it, then! he ran the galley proofs into the scanner excitedly. they knew he had something up his sleeve. his earlier papers had only hinted at the direction he was going—but the book would clear away the fog. he scanned the title page proudly. "a theory of psionic influence on infant and child development." a good title—concise, commanding, yet modest. they would read it, all right. and they would find it a light shining brightly in the darkness, a guide to the men who were floundering in the jungle of a strange and baffling new science.

for they were floundering. when they were finally forced to recognize that this great and powerful force did indeed exist in human minds, with unimaginable potential if it could only be unlocked, they had plunged eagerly into the search, and found themselves in a maddening bramble bush of contradictions and chaos. nothing worked, and everything worked too well. they were trying to study phenomena which made no sense, observing things that defied logic. natural laws came crashing down about their ears as they stood sadly by and watched things happen which natural law said could never happen. they had never been in this jungle before, nor in any jungle remotely like it. the old rules didn't work here, the old methods of study failed. and the more they struggled, the thicker and more impenetrable the bramble bush became—

but now david lessing had discovered a pathway through that jungle, a theory to work by—

at his elbow the intercom buzzed. "a gentleman to see you," the girl said. "a dr. melrose. he's very impatient, sir."

he shut off the scanner and said, "send him in, please."