“But you’re wondering what it has to do with the price of tea in China, right?”

Ponter looked completely baffled, and Mary smiled. “Just a metaphor,” she said. “It means, ‘With the topic at hand.’ ”

“And the answer,” said Veronica, “is that we now understand well enough how the brain creates religious experiences to reliably reproduce them in the lab…at least in Homo sapiens. But what I’m dying to find out is whether I can induce one in Ponter.”

“My own curiosity is not fatal,” said Ponter, smiling, “but nonetheless I would like it assuaged.”

Veronica looked at her watch again, then frowned. “My grad student hasn’t shown up yet, unfortunately, and the equipment is quite delicate—it needs to be recalibrated daily. Mary, I don’t suppose you’d be willing…?”

Mary felt her spine stiffen. “Willing to what? ”

“To take the first run; obviously, I need to know that the equipment is functioning properly before I can take any results from Ponter as significant.” She held up a hand, as if to forestall an objection. “With this new equipment, it only takes five minutes to do a complete run.”

Mary felt her heart pounding. This wasn’t something she wanted to investigate scientifically. Like the late, lamented Stephen Jay Gould, she’d always believed science and religion were—to use his musical phrase—“nonoverlapping magesteria,” each having relevance, but one having nothing to do with the other. “I’m really not sure that—”

“Oh, don’t worry; it’s not dangerous! The field I use for the transcranial magnetic stimulation is just one microtesla. I rotate it counterclockwise about the temporal lobes, and like I said, almost all of the people—of the Homo sapiens, I should say—who try this have a mystical experience.”

“What…what’s it like?” asked Mary.

Veronica said, “Excuse us” to Ponter, and she led Mary away from him—her test subject—so that the Neanderthal would not overhear. “The experience usually involves the perception that there’s a sentient being standing behind them or near them,” said Veronica. “Now, the form of that experience depends a lot on the individual’s own preconceptions. You put a UFO fanatic in there, and he’ll sense the presence of an alien. Put in a Baptist, and she might say she sees Christ himself. Someone who’s lost somebody recently may see that dead person. Others say they’ve been touched by angels or God. Of course, the experience is totally controlled here, and the test subjects are fully aware that they are in a lab. But imagine the same effect being triggered late at night when our friends Bubba and Clete are out in the middle of nowhere. Or while you’re sitting in a church or mosque or synagogue. It really would knock your socks off.”

“I really don’t want…”

“Please,” said Veronica. “I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to check a Neanderthal—and the baseline has to be set first.”

Mary took a deep breath. Reuben had indeed certified the process as safe, and, well, she certainly didn’t want to let down this eager young woman who thought so highly of her.

“Please, Mary,” said Veronica again. “If I’m right about what the results will be, this will be a huge step forward for me.”

Canadian women taking the world by storm. How could she say no?

“All right,” said Mary reluctantly. “Let’s do it.”

“Are you all right?” said Veronica Shannon over the speaker next to Mary’s ear. “Comfortable?”

“I’m fine,” said Mary, speaking into a little microphone that had been clipped to her shirt. She was seated on a padded chair inside a darkened chamber about the size of a two-piece bathroom. The walls, as she’d seen before the lights were turned out, were covered with little pyramids of gray foam rubber, presumably to deaden sound.

Veronica nodded. “Good. This won’t hurt a bit—but at any time if you want me to shut the equipment off, just say so.”

Mary was wearing a yellow headset that had been fashioned from a motorcycle helmet, with solenoids on the sides, directly over her temples. The helmet was attached by a bundle of wires to a rack of equipment leaning against one wall.

“Okay,” said Veronica. “Here we go.”

Mary had thought she would hear a buzzing, or feel a tickling between her ears, but there was nothing. Just darkness and silence and—

Suddenly Mary felt her back tense and her shoulders hunch up. Someone was there, in the chamber with her. She couldn’t see him, but she could feel his eyes boring into the back of her skull.

This is ridiculous, thought Mary. Just the power of suggestion. If Veronica hadn’t primed Mary with all her talk, she was sure that she wouldn’t be experiencing anything. Christ, the things you could get research funding for sometimes amazed her. It was nothing more than a parlor trick, and—

And then she knew who it was—who was there, in the chamber with her.

And it wasn’t a him.

It was a her.

It was Mary.

Not Mary Vaughan.

Mary.

The Virgin.

The Mother of God.

She couldn’t see her, not really. It was just a bright, bright light, moving now in front of her—but a light that didn’t sting the eyes at all. Still, she was sure of who it was: the purity, the serenity, the gentle wisdom. She closed her eyes, but the light did not disappear.

Mary.

Mary Vaughan was her namesake, and—

And the scientist in Mary Vaughan came to the fore. Of course she was seeing Mary. If she’d been a Mexican named Jesus—Hay-sooz —she’d perhaps think she was seeing the Christ. If her name were Teresa, it would doubtless be Mother Teresa she’d think she was seeing. Besides, she and Ponter had been talking about the Virgin Mary just yesterday, so—

But no.

No, that wasn’t it.

It didn’t matter what her brain was telling her.

Her mind knew that this light was something else.

Her soul knew it.

It was Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

And why not? thought Mary Vaughan. Just because she was here, at a university, in a lab, inside a test chamber, that didn’t mean anything.

Part of Mary had been skeptical of modern-day miracles, but if miracles did happen, well, then the Virgin Mary could appear anywhere.

After all, she’d supposedly come to Fatima, Portugal.

She’d supposedly come to Lourdes, France.

And to Guadalupe, Mexico.

And La’Vang, Vietnam.

So why not to Sudbury, Ontario?

Why not to the campus of Laurentian University?

And why not to talk to her?

No. No, humility was what was called for, here in the presence of Our Lady. Humility, following her grand example.

But…

But still, did it make so little sense that the Virgin Mary would visit Mary Vaughan? Mary was traveling to another world, to a world that didn’t know of God the Father, a world that was ignorant of Jesus the Son, a world that had never been touched by the Holy Spirit. Of course, Mary of Nazareth would take an interest in someone who was doing that!

The pure, simple presence was moving to her left now. Not walking, but moving—hovering, never touching the soil.

No. No, there was no soil. She was in the basement of a building. There was no soil.

She was in a lab!

And transcranial magnetic stimulation was affecting her mind.

Mary closed her eyes again, scrunching them tightly shut, but that did nothing. The presence was still there, still perceptible.

The wonderful, wonderful presence…

Mary Vaughan opened her mouth to speak to the Blessed Virgin, and—

And suddenly she was gone.

But Mary felt elated, felt like she hadn’t since her first Eucharist after her confirmation, when, for the one and only time in her life, she’d really felt the spirit of Christ coming into her.