Page 34 - Unlikely Stories 3

Cyberceutics Deletes Obsessogens with Ping-a-Ding

globalization of capital and satellite communications. Each is one leg of
a stool dependent on all three. I sit here above them like a puppet-
master, orchestrating their parts in a very profitable play. As you seem
to have little knowledge of the product, I will start with the basics.
First—”
“Just a minute, Dad. Mom told me about your salesmanship, and
not in terms of praise. Before I agree to anything, I need the real
answer to a question that has haunted me all my life: why are we both
Doctors?”
Barfuss’s smile never left his face. He signaled to a servant to bring
lime and chilled soda water.
“No doubt your mother explained it as a foolish whim, further
proof of my irresponsibility. I was not born a Doctor. I legally changed
my first name—never mind from what—years before you were born,
and I determined to start you out in life with that advantage already
conferred.”
The younger Doctor frowned. “What advantage? I had nothing but
trouble during my childhood. I had to pretend ‘Doc’ was a nickname
rather than an abbreviation.”
“Just as I planned,” said Barfuss, Sr. triumphantly. “As well as
toughening you it kept you away from any professional field requiring a
doctorate. Instead you went to business school. And now I will give
you the chance to exploit your name to the fullest.”
“At least you’ve got me interested, Dad. What do you mean?”
“You see this gown I’m wearing? Yes it’s a gown, and not a dressing
gown or bathrobe. It’s made of an extremely fine and costly fabric
from the Himalayas, shatoosh. It is, in fact, a robe of honor, a tradition
established by the great potentates of Asia more than a thousand years
ago. I wear it because I am a Doctor, and not an ordinary one. Listen:
despite our modern secular life, who is entitled yet to wear a gown?
Surgeons, judges, academics, priests. All of them doctors: of medicine,
of law, of philosophy, of divinity. I have trumped the whole category,
because I can be, at will, any or all of them. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, so far it does.” Doctor Barfuss, Jr. radiated perplexity. “I
didn’t think you had any degrees, much less advanced ones.”
“I don’t, and had to learn the hard way what you already know
about finance, business plans, cost accounting and budgets—the skills
to run a multinational enterprise. But being a Doctor has made that

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