A smoking gun if ever he’d seen one. No right or wrong answers—yeah, sure. If he answered in the positive, the ranking on his schizophrenia scale would increase. He shaded in the “strongly disagree” o.
3. I never lose my temper.
Lash recognized this question type by its use of the word “never.” All personality tests contained so-called validity scales: questions that could indicate whether the test-taker was lying, or exaggerating, or faking something like bravery (for police department applicants) or mental illness (for disability compensation). Lash knew that if you claimed too often never to feel fear, never to have told a fib, never to be moody, your lie scale would become elevated and your test thrown out as invalid. He shaded in the “disagree” o.
4. Most people tell me I’m an outgoing person.
This question skewed toward the extrovert/introvert scale. In such tests, extroversion was looked upon as a favorable trait. But Lash preferred his privacy. He again shaded the “disagree” oval.
The pencil point snapped and he cursed under his breath. Five minutes had already passed. If he was going to do this, he’d have to take the test like a typical person, filling in the answers instinctively rather than analyzing each one. He reached for a fresh pencil and reapplied himself to the task.
By ten o’clock, he had completed the battery of questions and been given a five-minute break. Then Vogel seated him again at the desk, left for a moment, and returned with another white envelope and the coffee Lash had requested: decaffeinated, the only kind offered. Lash opened the new envelope and found it contained a battery of cognitive intelligence tests: verbal comprehension; visual-spatial; a memory battery. Once again, the tests were longer and more thorough than he’d experienced before, and by the time he was done it was nearly eleven.
Another five-minute break; another cup of decaffeinated coffee; and a third white envelope. Rubbing his eyes blearily, Lash opened it and pulled out the stapled pamphlet within. This time, the test consisted of a long set of incomplete sentences:
I wish my father _________________________________
My second favorite food is _______________________
My greatest mistake was __________________________
I feel that children are __________________________
I’d like it if other people _____________________
I believe that mutual orgasm _______________________
I feel that red wine _______________________________
I would be completely happy if only _______________
Some areas of my body are very ___________________
Mountain hiking in spring is _______________________
The book with the greatest influence on me was ____
Here they were at last: the personal, intimate questions that had been noticeably lacking from the first test. Once again, Lash guessed there were close to a thousand. As he scanned the unfinished sentences, his instincts—both professional and personal—warned him to be disingenuous. But he reminded himself half-measures would not work here: if he was to fully understand the process, he had to experience it with the kind of commitment that the Wilners and the Thorpes had made. He took a fresh pencil, considered the first sentence, then completed it:
I wish my father had taken the time to praise me more often.
It was almost twelve-thirty by the time he filled in the last sentence, and Lash felt the beginnings of a headache creeping along his temples and behind his eyes. Vogel came in with a long, narrow sheet in his hand, and for a terrible moment Lash thought another test was coming. Instead, it was a lunch menu. Although he felt little appetite, he dutifully made his choices and handed it back to Vogel. The man suggested Lash take a bathroom break, then stepped out of the room, leaving the door open.
By the time Lash returned, Vogel had brought in a folding chair and placed it perpendicular to his own. Where the cube of pencils had been was now an oblong box of black cardboard.
“How are you feeling, Dr. Lash?” Vogel asked as he sat in the folding chair.
Lash passed a hand across his eyes. “Sandbagged.”
A smile flitted briefly across Vogel’s face. “It seems grueling, I know. But our studies have shown that a single, intensive day of evaluation yields the best results. Please sit.” He opened the box, revealing a stack of large cards face down.
The moment he saw a small number printed on the top card, Lash knew what lay ahead. He’d been so engrossed in the first three tests he’d almost forgotten about what he himself had examined in the blind just a few days before.
“We’re now going to do an inkblot test, known as the Hirschfeldt. Are you familiar with it?”
“More or less.”
“I see.” Vogel drew out a blank control sheet from the box, made a notation. “Let’s begin. I’ll show you the inkblots, one by one, and you tell me what they look like.” He lifted the first card from the box, turned it over, and placed it on the table, facing Lash. “What might this be?”
Lash looked at the picture, trying to empty his mind of prior associations—especially the terrible images that had jumped unbidden into his mind back at the Audubon Center. “I see a bird,” he said. “Up at the top. It’s like a raven, the white part is its beak. And the whole card looks like a warrior, Japanese, a ninja or samurai. With two swords in scabbards—you can see them sticking out there, left and right, pointed downwards.”
Vogel scribbled on the control sheet, taking down—Lash knew—his remarks verbatim. “Very good,” he said after a moment. “Let’s go on to the next one. What might this be?”
Lash worked his way through the cards, fighting a growing weariness, trying always to make the responses his own rather than what he knew to be common replies. By one o’clock, Vogel had finished both the response and inquiry phases of the test, and Lash’s headache had grown worse. As he watched Vogel put the cards away, he found himself wondering about all the other applicants who had streamed into the building this morning: were they all squirreled away somewhere on this floor, in their own little testing suites? Had Lewis Thorpe felt as exhausted as he himself did now, as tired of staring at the blank white walls?
“You must be hungry, Dr. Lash,” Vogel said as he closed the box. “Come on. Your lunch is waiting.”
Though he felt no hungrier now than before the inkblots, Lash followed him across the small central space to one of the doors in the far wall. Vogel swiped his card through the reader, and the door sprang open to reveal yet another white room. This, however, had prints on three of its walls. They were simple, well-framed photographs of forests and seacoasts, bereft of people or wildlife, yet Lash’s gaze rested hungrily on them after the sterile emptiness of the morning.
His lunch was laid out on a crisp linen tablecloth: cold poached salmon with dill sauce, wild rice, a sourdough roll, and coffee—decaffeinated, of course. As he ate, Lash felt his appetite return and the headache recede. Vogel, who had left him to dine in peace, returned twenty minutes later.
“What next?” Lash asked, dabbing at his mouth with a napkin. He held out little hope his question would be answered, but Vogel surprised him.
“Just two more items,” Vogel said. “The physical examination and the psychological interview. If you’ve finished, we can proceed immediately.”
Lash laid the napkin aside and rose, thinking back again to what the man in the class reunion had said about his own day of testing. So far it had been tiring, even enervating, but nothing worse. A physical exam he could handle. And he’d given enough psychological interviews to know what to expect.
“Lead on,” he said.
Vogel ushered Lash back out into the central space and pointed at one of the two blank doors not yet opened. Vogel swiped his card through the reader, then began scratching something into his palm device with the plastic stylus. “You may proceed, Dr. Lash. Please remove your clothes and put on the hospital gown you’ll find inside. You can hang your things on the door hook.”
Lash entered the new room, clo
sed the door, and looked around as he began undressing. It was an examination room, small but remarkably well equipped for its size. Unlike the previous rooms, there were plenty of items here, but most were of a kind Lash would have preferred not to see: probes, curette and syringe packets, sterile pads. A faint smell of antiseptic hung in the air.
Lash had no sooner donned the gown before the door opened again and a man stepped in. He was short and dark-complexioned, with thinning hair and a bottle-brush moustache. A stethoscope hung from the side pocket of his white coat.
“Let’s see,” he said, examining a folder in his hand. “Dr. Lash. Medical doctor, by chance?”
“No. Doctorate in psychology.”
“Very good, very good,” the doctor said, putting the folder aside and pulling on a pair of latex gloves. “Now just relax, Dr. Lash. This shouldn’t take more than an hour.”
“An hour?” Lash said, but fell silent when he saw the doctor poking his finger into a jar of petroleum jelly. Maybe $100,000 isn’t such an outrageous fee, after all, he thought to himself.
The doctor’s estimate proved correct. Over the next sixty minutes, Lash endured a more comprehensive and painstaking physical examination than he’d ever thought possible. EKG and EEG; echocardiogram; samples of urine, stool, mucus membranes, and the epithelial lining of his mouth; an extensive background medical history of both himself and two generations of forebears; checks of reflexes and vision; neurological testing and fine motor control; an exhaustive dermatological examination. There was even a point when the doctor gave him a glass beaker and, leaving the room, asked for a sample of Lash’s ejaculate. As the door closed, Lash stared at the tube—chill in his fingers—and felt a sense of unreality creep over him. Makes sense, a small voice said in his head. Infertility or impotence would be an important concern.
Some time later, he told the doctor he could come in again, and the examination resumed.
“Just the blood work now,” the doctor said at last, arranging a tray containing at least two dozen small glass tubes, currently empty. “Please lean back on the examining table.”
Lash did so, closing his eyes as he felt a rubber tube tightening above his elbow. There was a cold swab of Betadine, a brief probing fingertip, then the sting of a needle sliding home.
“Make a fist, please,” the doctor said. Lash did so, waiting stoically while at least half a pint of blood was drawn. At last, he felt the tension of the rubber release. The doctor slipped out the needle and applied a small bandage in one smooth motion. Then he helped Lash into a sitting position. “How do you feel?”
“I’m okay.”
“Very well. You may proceed to the next room.”
“But my clothes—”
“They’ll be waiting here for you at the close of the interview.”
Lash blinked, digesting this a moment. And then he turned away, toward the central cubicle.
Vogel was there, once again scribbling something on his digital device. He looked up as Lash emerged from the examination room. The normally unflappable face now held an expression Lash couldn’t quite read.
“Dr. Lash,” Vogel said as he slipped the device back into his lab coat. “This way, if you please.” But Lash needed little guidance: there was only one door in the suite that had not yet been opened, and he could guess where the final interview would take place.
When he turned toward it, he found the door already ajar. And the room beyond was unlike any of the others he had seen that day.
THIRTEEN
L ash hesitated in the doorway. Ahead lay a room almost as small as the others, simply furnished: a chair in the center with unusually long armrests; a metal cabinet beside it; a table with a laptop near the rear wall. But Lash’s attention was drawn immediately to the leads that snaked away from the chair to the laptop. He’d sat in on enough interrogations to recognize the setup as a lie detector.
A man was seated behind the table, reading from a folder. Seeing Lash, he stood and came around the table. He was tall and cadaverously thin, his head covered with iron-gray hair, closely cropped. “Thank you, Robert,” the man said to the hovering Vogel. Then he closed the door and wordlessly motioned Lash toward the center chair.
Lash complied, feeling disbelief as the man attached clips to his fingertips, fitted a blood pressure cuff to his wrist.
The man moved out of Lash’s vision for a moment. When he returned, he was holding a red cap in one hand. A long, rainbow-hued ribbon cable was affixed to one side. Dozens of clear plastic discs, each about the size of a dime, had been sewn into the cloth. Two dozen, to be exact, Lash thought grimly. He recognized it as a “red cap,” adult headgear for the Quantitative EEG test, or QEEG, which monitored the frequencies of brain activity. It was usually used for neurological disorders, dissociation, head trauma, and so forth.
This was not like any psych interview he had ever heard of.
The man injected conducting gel into each of the twenty-four electrodes, attached the cap to Lash’s head, and fitted ground leads to each of his ears. Then he returned to the table and attached the ribbon cable to the laptop. Lash watched, the cap on his head feeling uncomfortably snug.
The man sat down and began typing. He peered at the screen, typed again. He had not shaken Lash’s hand or acknowledged him in any way.
Lash waited, numb, feeling exposed and undignified in his hospital gown. He knew from experience that, at heart, psych evaluations were often battles of wit between shrink and patient. One was trying to learn things that, many times, the other did not want to have known. Perhaps this was just some unique form of that game. He remained silent, waiting, trying to clear the fatigue from his head.
The man shifted his gaze from the laptop to the folder on his desk. Then, at long last, he lifted his head and looked Lash directly in the eyes.
“Dr. Lash,” he said. “I’m Dr. Alicto, your senior evaluator.”
Lash remained silent.
“As senior evaluator, I’m privy to a little more background information than Mr. Vogel. Information, for example, that would indicate your prior job no doubt familiarized you with a lie detector test.”
Lash nodded.
“In that case we’ll dispense with the usual business of demonstrating its effectiveness. And are you also familiar with the neurofeedback device I’ve placed on your head?”
Lash nodded again.
“As a clinician, you’re probably curious about its use in this environment. You know lie detectors only measure heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, and so forth. We’ve found the factor-analyzed data from the QEEG an excellent complement. It allows us to go far beyond the normal ‘yes’ and ‘no’ responses of a lie detector.”
“I see.”
“Please keep your arms motionless on the armrests and your back straight. I’m going to ask some baseline questions. Answer only yes or no. Is your name Christopher Lash?”
“Yes.”
“Do you currently reside at 17 Ship Bottom Road?”
“Yes.”
“Are you thirty-nine years old?”
“Yes.”
“Now I’m going to show you a playing card. Whatever color it is, red or blue, I want you to tell me the opposite color. Understand?”
“Yes.”
Alicto picked up a deck of cards, withdrew a red card, held it up. “What color is this card?”
“Blue.”
“Thank you.” Alicto put the deck away. “Now then. Have you completed today’s tests in as honest and complete a manner as possible?”
The man was looking at him with a quizzical, almost dubious expression. “Of course,” Lash said.
Alicto looked back down at the folder, let the silence build a moment. “Why are you here, Dr. Lash?”
“I should think that would be obvious.”
“Actually, it’s not obvious at all.” Alicto flipped over some pages in the folder. “You see, I’ve never done an evaluation on a psychologist before. For some reason, they nev
er become Eden candidates. Internists, cardiologists, anesthesiologists by the truckload. But never psychologists or psychotherapists. I have a theory about that. But in any case, I’ve been going over your test results of the morning, particularly the personality inventory.” He raised a scoring sheet, giving Lash the merest glimpse:
“It’s intriguing, to say the least.” Alicto replaced the sheet in the folder.
Normally, psychometric evaluators would not reveal information like this to subjects. Lash wondered why Alicto was treating him in an almost cavalier way. “If you want to know more about my taste in movies, or if I prefer cognac to whisky, you should be concentrating on the preference test.”
Alicto glanced at him. “See, that’s another thing,” he said. “Most candidates are cooperative, eager to help, candid. Sarcastic responses are most unusual and, frankly, a matter of concern.”
Annoyance began bubbling up through the haze of weariness. “In other words, you intimidate your candidates and they act like sycophants in return. I can see how that would be gratifying to one’s ego. Particularly if that ego had been inadequately nurtured in earlier life.”
A flash of something—irritation, or perhaps suspicion—flickered in Alicto’s eyes. As quickly as it had come, it was gone again.
“You seem angry,” he said. “What is it about my questions that makes you angry?”
It occurred to Lash this very line of questioning could already be providing the responses Alicto was searching for. He fought back his annoyance. “Look,” he said in as reasonable a tone as he could muster. “It’s hard to feel cooperative when strapped to a lie detector, wearing nothing but a biofeedback cap and a hospital gown.”
“Actually, most candidates appreciate the lie detector, once they’ve gotten over the initial surprise. They find it reassuring to know that any partner they are matched with has been as honest as they’ve been.”