She looked almost pretty then, and I wanted her the way I'd always wanted women. But I knew better. She wasn't going to get me into any trouble. "No, thanks. Good-by." I walked away from her. For the first time, I could see what my life would be like if I wasn't hexed. Now I could realize that I knew how to do things right if I was only let alone. * * * * * The intern took the blood smear. He reeled off a long string of questions about diseases I wasn't allowed to have. "No," I said, "and I haven't given blood in the last thirty days." He took my sample of blood and left. I had to have eighteen dollars and seventy-five cents. They paid you twenty dollars a pint for blood here. One government bond held for centuries would pile up a fortune in interest. The smallest bond you can buy is twenty-five dollars face value, and it costs eighteen seventy-five. If I had kept that twenty, I would have had a buck and a quarter change. But if I hadn't have gotten cleaned up, the hospital might not have accepted me as a donor at all. They had had some bad experiences from old bums dying from giving too often. I only hoped I could force myself to let that bond go uncashed through the rest of my life. The intern returned, his small mustache now pointing down. "Mr. Hagle, I have some bad news for you. Very bad. I hardly know how to tell you, but--you've got lukemia." I nodded. "That means you won't take my blood." Maybe it also meant that I would never be allowed to have eighteen dollars and seventy-five cents in one lump again as long as I lived. "No," the intern finally managed. "We can't accept your blood--" I waved him off. "Isn't there some fund to take care of lukemia victims? Feed them, house them, send them to Florida to soak up the sun?" "Certainly there is such a fund, and you may apply, Mr. Hagle." "I'd certainly benefit a lot from that fund. Doctor, humor me. Test me again and see if I still have lukemia." He did. I didn't. "I don't understand this," the intern said, looking frightened. "Transitory lukemia? It must be a lab error." "Will you buy my blood now?" "I'm afraid as long as there is some doubt--this must be something new." "I suppose it is," I told him. "I have all sorts of interesting symptoms." "You do?" The intern was vitally interested. "Feel free to tell me all about them." "I see and hear things." "Really?" "Do you believe in ESP?" "I've sometimes wondered." "Test me as much as you like. You'll find that in any game of chance, I score consistently far below the level of wins I should get by the law of averages. I'm psionically subnormal. And that's just the beginning." "This must be _really_ new," the intern said, eyes shining. "It is," I assured him. "And listen, Doctor, you don't want to turn something like me over to your superiors, to leave me to the mercies of the A.M.A. This _can_ be big, Doctor, _big_." * * * * *