Pollard smiled again. "Sorry," he said. "I thought it was simple. It may be me, but I will try to show you that the mechanics of the mind are as logical in madness as in sanity--or in plain cause-and-effect mechanical systems. "Somehow during his researches in the Lawson Radiation he stumbled upon the truth. He studied it, not daring to believe at first the possibility of a negative mass. Yet the facts were there and in some manner Carroll managed to develop a system of physical mathematics that tended to prove his point. "I have no doubt, Rita, that if we find any tampering with the Lawson Laboratory records, they will have been tampered with by Carroll himself, who refused to let this bizarre affair be known until he was certain. "You see, Carroll knew the storm of protest that would arise if any physicist tried to promulgate such a theory without almost certain proof. So he concealed it. But he studied it thoroughly. And in his studies he discovered that this negative mass was heading for Terra." Majors cleared his throat. "Tell me, Doctor Pollard, how you make these vast assumptions? Aren't you like the classical definition of a physicist? You know, a man of limited reason who can leap from an unfounded theory to a foregone conclusion?" Pollard laughed. "Rita was not there. But you were. Did you note how quickly Carroll picked out the point? One look at the photographs, one look at the Lawson Record and one statement of fact--all tied in to absolute perfection. Carroll knew that his theory was terribly thin--also he knew the futility of trying to stop a cosmic body approaching Terra. The combination drove him into hallucination." "Amnesia?" "Yes. It all ties in. Every bit." "Go ahead and tie, Doc." Pollard nodded. "His is a classic form of schizophrenia. For his years of study he is presented with the knowledge of certain destruction. This is terrible to face per se. It is terrible to think of one's self telling the world that he has just discovered the first true and provable link in the ending of the Solar System. It is like uttering the clarion of doom. "Now remember," said Pollard, pointing off the pertinent spots on his fingers, "that Carroll probably tampered with the records or at least did not list the truth. Tampered with or falsified. That's point number one. Secondly, the true schizophrenic-paranoid cannot rail against a mechanistic fate. "He must find some sentience to fight, some evil mind to combat. For the paranoid feels that he can win in the end, which of course would be impossible against a case of mechanistic doom. Therefore Carroll needed some sentient manifestation of this doom, something that he could strike at, fight against. Therefore he has accused an 'alien culture' of tampering with the records to prevent us from knowing the truth.