A Window on the Soul

A WINDOW ON THE SOUL

  by

  Peter D. Wilson

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  Disclaimer

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance therein to persons, events or situations in past or present reality is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  Start

  Laboratory

  Reaction

  Notebook

  Subterfuge

  Conference

  Proposition

  About the author

  A WINDOW ON THE SOUL

  “What a gorgeous picture!”

  “Not bad, is it?” John Hardcastle paused for a while in manipulating the latest batch copied from his camera and joined his wife in admiring this particular image on the computer screen, trying to avoid looking intolerably smug but not succeeding very well. “Ready to move on?”

  “No, hang on a bit.”

  Sandra gazed at the screen for what seemed an age, then relaxed with a contented sigh and lapsed into an unwonted silence.

  “Are you all right, dear?”

  “What?”

  “I said, are you all right?”

  “Oh, yes, John, I’m sorry. I was miles away.”

  “Where?”

  “Goodness knows. But it was really good. I had a marvellous feeling that all was well, and all manner of things were well ... Heavens, I never thought I’d find myself quoting Julian of Norwich.”

  “Who?”

  “Oh, never mind.”

  “Don’t leave me in suspense!”

  “All right. A mediaeval mystic – I read about her years ago. But you know how anxious I was about Mother ...”

  “I told you there was no need to worry. It’s a perfectly standard operation.”

  “Yes, but there’s always the ‘What if ...?’, isn’t there? But suddenly it seemed that everything was bound to be all right, and the relief was incredible.”

  “Well, that’s something to be thankful for. Can I move on now?”

  John continued his task, with particular attention to possible entries in the club’s monthly competition, but nothing that altogether fitted the specification really satisfied him. He kept coming back to the one that had so fascinated Sandra, and eventually decided that if he was to enter anything at all, that had to be it. He needed a title and after racking his brains without success, asked her for ideas.

  “Does it have to be descriptive?”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “Then how about ‘Juliana’?”

  “Why that?”

  “Because of it making me think of Julian. It’s only a label, after all.”

  “Well, I suppose, why not?”

  The club’s practice was to attach all entries for the competition to a special page on its web site a week before the judging, with an invitation to comment, and during that time several favourable remarks were posted, though generally with some reservations about eligibility. The judge evidently shared them. About a fortnight later, however, John was surprised by a message from a Dr. Julius Norstein of Serenethica Limited, whatever that might be, suggesting a meeting with particular reference to “Juliana” and giving a telephone number to arrange details.

  “What on earth can that be about?” wondered Sandra.

  “Only one way to find out,” so John rang the number. After a couple of failed attempts, he got through, and Norstein explained himself to be an experimental psychologist based some distance away, but very willing to travel.

  He proved to be a little American bubbling over with energy, in fact something of a whirlwind, and after the introductions got quickly down to explaining his business. With increasing levels of stress and anxiety among Health Service patients – no, not just brought on by the service itself! – the cost of tranquillisers had become alarming and managers were looking for alternative treatments, especially since there were signs of a developing addiction problem. Serenethica had been set up, as a joint non-profit-making subsidiary of several big pharmaceutical companies, to look into possibilities outside the usual kinds of alternative medicine, which were being studied elsewhere. The search hadn’t got very far, and the contract was under threat. However, by chance Norstein’s somewhat hyperactive son had come across John’s competition entry and been fascinated by it; since then his behaviour had improved remarkably. It might of course be pure coincidence, but the possibility of a causal link was just the kind of thing he was looking for, and if it seemed to be at all genuine, it would be well worth investigating more thoroughly. Had John noticed any such calming effect himself?

  “Not personally, but my wife ...”

  “May I talk to her?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Sandra described her experience as clearly as she could, which was not actually very illuminating, but that didn’t seem to worry Norstein. “The fact of your having the experience is the important thing, in the first instance. Is it the same whenever you look at it?”

  “It depends rather on my mood at the time. But it nearly always seems to calm down any worries that I have.”

  “Right. We really need a systematic study – try to cut out the random variation, or rather smooth it over. Would you be willing to spend some time in our laboratory while we examine the pattern of brain activity?”

  “How long? I do have a fair amount of commitments already.”

  “It’s hard to tell, but we’d need at least a day just to establish a base line. Better several days spread over say a month. After that it would depend on what turns up. Of course, anything personally sensitive that comes out of it would remain strictly confidential. We’d pay all expenses, naturally, and an honorarium for your time.”

  “Just what would that examination involve? I’m not too keen on the idea of having electrodes stuck in my skull!”

  “No need for that. The technique is completely non-invasive; you’ll wear a sort of cap with the sensors, and it shouldn’t be particularly uncomfortable.”

  “Would that mean having my head shaved?” Sandra was particularly proud of her hair, with good reason, and this was not a trivial issue.

  “Probably not – it would be a crying shame, wouldn’t it? – but do you mind if I have a look at your scalp? I’ll try not to muss you up too much.”

  After some muttering to himself while he examined various critical points, he decided that it should be possible to manage without serious disturbance, as long as she kept a smooth hair-do. “Oh, there’s one other thing, Mr. Hardcastle. We’ll need a licence to use your photograph. Our work will probably involve making some digital alterations, purely to test their effect, so I hope you’d have no objection.”

  “It hardly affects me, does it?”

  “I don’t see how it could, but we have to be covered. It might be as well to get your solicitor to check the terms. Or do you have an agent?”

  He didn’t, but the terms looked sensible and the fee Norstein suggested was ten times as high as John would have dared to ask, so agreement was soon reached.

  When Sandra turned up for the first day of tests, Norstein showed her into the laboratory and explained the procedure. To avoid fatigue, sessions would be short, a few minutes at a time, at least during the basic exploratory phase; later that might change according to the results obtained, but they
needed to get a feel for it before setting up anything like a fixed programme. Her seat was provided with a head-rest that would actually prevent movement – “Does that bother you?”

  “No, not at all.”

  – so that cameras on either side of the screen facing her could record eye movements.

  “Why?”

  “Because they can sometimes give additional indications of what’s going on in the brain. We want all the information we can get. Now during the first phase of the test the image will remain as you’ve already seen it; we may vary other things that can affect mood, such as music or ambient lighting. There’s a microphone on the wing of the chair, and I’d like you to record how you feel before the image appears and any effects as they occur. It probably won’t be very precise, but be as objective as you can. You may be a bit nervous at first, but for our purposes that could be all to the good. OK so far?”

  “Yes. But you said ‘During the first phase ...’ What after that?”

  “Ah, that’s when it may start to become interesting. We’ll be making some more or less subtle changes to the image, without telling you exactly when, and I’d like you to record any changes in mood that you may notice, however slight they may be. It’s possible that they could be disturbing, so there’s a button to press in the arm of the chair if you want to stop immediately.”

  “A panic button?”

  “Well, I hope it won’t get to anything like panic, but we have to allow for the possibility, though of course you’ll probably be able to warn us if the