His voice was starting to shake. He stopped talking for a moment and glanced at Ed Behr, who nodded and moved to a corner of the office where only the Father General could see him draw a finger across his throat.

"So that, in essence, is what this kind of linguistic analysis involves," Emilio continued, returning his arms to his lap. "Finding the pattern of thought underlying the grammar and vocabulary and relating it to the culture of the speakers."

"And Askama would not have understood why you had difficulty with such simple concepts," Felipe Reyes speculated dryly.

"Exactly. Just as I was frustrated by her inability to understand that I required privacy at certain times of the day and night. The Runa are intensely social. Father Robichaux and Dr. Edwards believed that their social structure was closer to that of a herd than a primate society's looser kinship and social alliances. The Runa found it difficult to accept that we ever wanted to be alone. It was exhausting."

He wanted to go. His hands felt scalded, and it was getting harder to push the morning's news out of his mind. It had helped to have something impersonal to talk about, to give a lecture, but they'd been at this now for three hours, and he was finding it difficult to concentrate…

The trouble with illusions, he thought, is that you aren't aware you have any until they are taken from you. There had been a new doctor, several hours of tests. The hands, he was told, could be improved cosmetically but not functionally; the nerves had been severed too long ago to be repaired, the destruction of muscle was too extensive and complete. The burning sensation, which he was experiencing now and which came and went unpredictably, was probably similar to that endured by amputees, a sort of phantom-limb phenomenon. He could straighten the digits almost normally and he had some useful hook grip in two fingers of each hand. That was it. That was how it was going to be—

He realized then that Johannes Voelker had spoken and a denser silence had fallen on the room. How long have I been sitting like this? he wondered. Emilio reached for the coffee cup again, stalling for time. "I'm sorry," he apologized, looking at Voelker after a few moments. "Did you say something?"

"Yes. I said it was interesting how often you change the subject from the child you killed. And I wondered if you were developing another convenient headache."

The cup shattered in Emilio's hand. There was a small fuss as Edward Behr brought a cloth to soak up the spilled coffee and John Candotti collected the broken china. Voelker simply sat and stared at Sandoz, who might have been carved from rock.

They are so different, Vincenzo Giuliani thought, looking at the two men seated across the table from one another: the one, obsidian and silver; the other, butter and sand. He wondered if Emilio had any idea how much Voelker envied him. He wondered if Voelker knew.

"…power surge," Felipe Reyes was saying, explaining Emilio's lapse to them, covering the embarrassment. "You can get erratic electric potentials when your muscles are tired. This kind of thing used to happen to me all the time—"

"If I keep my feet, Felipe," Sandoz said with soft venom, "who are you to crawl for me?"

"Emilio, I just—"

There was a brief ugly exchange in gutter Spanish. "I think that will be enough for today, gentlemen," the Father General broke in lightly. "Emilio, a word with you, please. The rest of you may go."

Sandoz remained in his seat and waited impassively as Voelker, Candotti and a white-faced Felipe Reyes left. Edward Behr hesitated by the door and gave the Father General a small warning look, which went unacknowledged.

When they were alone, Giuliani spoke again. "You appear to be in pain. Is it a headache?"

"No. Sir." The black eyes turned to him, cold as stone.

"Would you tell me if it were?" A pointless question. Giuliani knew before it was out of his mouth that Sandoz would never admit it, not after what Voelker had just implied.

"Your carpets are in no danger," Emilio assured him with undisguised insolence.

"I'm glad to hear it," Giuliani said pleasantly. "The table suffered. You are hard on decor. And you were hard on Reyes."

"He had no right to speak for me," Sandoz snapped, the anger visibly flooding back.

"He's trying to help you, Emilio."

"When I want help, I'll ask for it."

"Will you? Or will you simply go on night after night, eating yourself alive?" Sandoz blinked. "I spoke to Dr. Kaufmann this morning. It must have been upsetting to hear her prognosis. She doesn't understand why you have tolerated these braces for so long. They are too heavy, and poorly designed, she tells me. Why haven't you asked for improvements? A tender concern for Father Singh's feelings," Giuliani suggested, "or some kind of misbegotten Latino pride?"

It was subtle, but you could tell sometimes when you hit home. The breathing changed. The effort at control became slightly more visible. Suddenly, Giuliani found he had simply run out of patience with Sandoz's damnable machismo and demanded, "Are you in pain? Yes or no."

"Am I required to say, sir?" The mockery was plain; its target was less clear.

"Yes, dammit, you are required. Say it."

"My hands hurt." There was a pause. "And the braces hurt my arms."

Giuliani saw the quick shallow movement of the chest and thought, My God, what it costs this man to admit he's suffering!

Abruptly, the Father General stood and walked away from the table, to give himself time to think. Emilio's sweat and vomit were familiar now, his body's fragility mercilessly exposed. Giuliani had nursed him through night terrors and had watched, appalled, as Sandoz pulled himself back together, holding the pieces in place with who knew what emotional baling wire. One could not forget all that, even when Sandoz was at his most aggravating, when one felt as though the man perceived the simplest effort to help him as insult and abuse.

For the first time it occurred to him to wonder what it was like to be so frail in what should have been the prime of life. Vince Giuliani had never known illness more debilitating than a cold, injury more damaging than a broken finger. Perhaps, he thought, if I were Sandoz, I too would hide my pain and snarl at solicitude…

"Look," he said, relenting, returning to the table. "Emilio. You are, bar none, the toughest sonofabitch I ever met. I admire your fortitude." Sandoz glared at him, furious. "I am not being sarcastic!" Giuliani cried. "I personally have been known to request general anesthesia after a paper cut." A laugh. A genuine laugh. And buoyed by that small triumph, Giuliani tried a direct appeal. "You've been through hell and you have made it abundantly clear that you are not a whiner. But, Emilio, how can we help you if you won't tell anyone what's wrong?"

When Sandoz spoke again, the words were barely audible. "I told John. About my hands."

Giuliani sighed. "Well. You may take that as evidence that Candotti can keep a confidence." The idiot! It was not the sort of revelation that came under the seal of confession. Although it might have felt like that to Sandoz, he realized.

Giuliani got up and went to the private lavatory adjacent to his office. He came back with a glass of water and a couple of tablets, which he placed on the table in front of Sandoz. "I am obviously not among those who believe it is noble to suffer needlessly," Giuliani told Emilio quietly. "From now on, when your hands hurt, take something." He watched as Emilio struggled to pick up the pills, one by one, and wash them down with water. "If this doesn't work, you tell me, understand? We'll get you something stronger. I've already sent for Singh. I expect you to let him know exactly what is wrong with these braces. And if he can't make them right, we'll bring in someone else."