Destination Unknown - Agatha Christie [47]
‘Well, that seems to be all for this department. Now we’ll hand you over to Doctor Schwartz for medical examination.’
‘Really!’ said Hilary. ‘Is all this necessary? It seems most absurd.’
‘Oh, we believe in being thorough, Mrs Betterton. We like to have everything down in the records. You’ll like Dr Schwartz very much. Then from her you go on to Doctor Rubec.’
Dr Schwartz was fair and amiable and female. She gave Hilary a meticulous physical examination and then said:
‘So! That is finished. Now you go to Dr Rubec.’
‘Who is Dr Rubec?’ Hilary asked. ‘Another doctor?’
‘Dr Rubec is a psychologist.’
‘I don’t want a psychologist. I don’t like psychologists.’
‘Now please don’t get upset, Mrs Betterton. You’re not going to have treatment of any kind. It’s simply a question of an intelligence test and of your type-group personality.’
Dr Rubec was a tall, melancholy Swiss of about forty years of age. He greeted Hilary, glanced at the card that had been passed on to him by Dr Schwartz and nodded his head approvingly.
‘Your health is good, I am glad to see,’ he said. ‘You have had an aeroplane crash recently, I understand.’
‘Yes,’ said Hilary. ‘I was four or five days in hospital at Casablanca.’
‘Four or five days is not enough,’ said Dr Rubec reprovingly. ‘You should have been there longer.’
‘I didn’t want to be there longer. I wanted to get on with my journey.’
‘That, of course, is understandable, but it is important with concussion that plenty of rest should be had. You may appear quite well and normal after it but it may have serious effects. Yes, I see your nerve reflexes are not quite what they should be. Partly the excitement of the journey and partly, no doubt, due to concussion. Do you get headaches?’
‘Yes. Very bad headaches. And I get muddled up every now and then and can’t remember things.’
Hilary felt it well to stress this particular point. Dr Rubec nodded soothingly.
‘Yes, yes, yes. But do not trouble yourself. All that will pass. Now we will have a few association tests, so as to decide what type of mentality you are.’ Hilary felt faintly nervous but all appeared to pass off well. The test seemed to be of a merely routine nature. Dr Rubec made various entries on a long form.
‘It is a pleasure,’ he said at last, ‘to deal with someone (if you will excuse me, Madame, and not take amiss what I am going to say) to deal with someone who is not in any way a genius!’
Hilary laughed.
‘Oh, I’m certainly not a genius,’ she said.
‘Fortunately for you,’ said Dr Rubec. ‘I can assure you your existence will be far more tranquil.’ He sighed. ‘Here, as you probably understand, I deal mostly with keen intellects, but with the type of sensitive intellect that is apt to become easily unbalanced, and where the emotional stress is strong. The man of science, Madame, is not the cool, calm individual he is made out to be in fiction. In fact,’ said Dr Rubec, thoughtfully, ‘between a first-class tennis player, an operatic prima-donna and a nuclear physicist there is really very little difference as far as emotional stability goes.’
‘Perhaps you are right,’ said Hilary, remembering that she was supposed to have lived for some years in close proximity to scientists. ‘Yes, they are rather temperamental sometimes.’
Dr Rubec threw up a pair of expressive hands.
‘You would not believe,’ he said, ‘the emotions that arise here! The quarrels, the jealousies, the touchiness! We have to take steps to deal with all that. But you, Madame,’ he smiled. ‘You are in a class that is in a small minority here. A fortunate class, if I may so express myself.’
‘I don’t quite understand you. What kind of a minority?’
‘Wives,’ said Dr Rubec. ‘We have not many wives here. Very few are permitted. One finds them, on the whole, refreshingly free from the brainstorms of their husbands and their husbands’ colleagues.’
‘What