“Not on Franco DiChario’s watch, that’s for sure,” said Doncaster. “This is a Church under siege, and it is fortifying its traditional barricades, not tearing them down.”

“So no likelihood of a softening of rules about divorce, then, either?”

Mary held her breath, even though she knew what the answer must be.

“Not a chance,” said Doncaster.

Mary had put her TV remote control away in a drawer back at the beginning of the summer; she was trying to lose weight, and that had seemed a simple enough way to force herself to move around more. She got up off the couch, crossed over to the fourteen-inch RCA set, and touched the button that turned it off.

When she turned back around, she saw that Ponter was looking at her. “You’re not pleased by the choice of new Pope,” he said.

“No, I’m not. And a lot of other people won’t be, either.” She lifted her shoulders slightly, a philosophical shrug. “But, then again, I suppose there’s rejoicing going on in many places, too.” She sighed.

“What will you do?” said Ponter.

“I—I don’t know. I mean, it’s not like I’m about to be excommunicated; I did promise Colm that I’d agree to an annulment rather than a divorce, but…”

“But what?”

“Don’t get me wrong,” said Mary. “I am glad that our child will have the God organ. But I am getting tired of all these ridiculous restrictions. It’s the twenty-first century, for Christ’s sake!”

“This new Pope may surprise you,” said Ponter. “As I understand it, he has made no announcements of his own since being named to the office. All we have heard is speculation.”

Mary sat back down on the couch. “I know that. But if the cardinals had wanted a real change, they would have elected somebody different.” She laughed. “Listen to me! That’s the secular view, of course. The choice of Pope is supposed to be divinely inspired. So what I should be saying is if God had wanted a real change, he would have selected somebody different.”

“Regardless, as that woman said, you have a Pope—and he looks young enough to serve for many tenmonths to come.”

Mary nodded. “I will get an annulment. I owe that to Colm. I’m the one who left the marriage, and he doesn’t want to be excommunicated. But even if an annulment means I could stay in the Catholic Church, I’m not going to. There are lots of other Christian denominations, after all—it hardly means giving up my faith.”

“This sounds like a big decision,” said Ponter.

Mary smiled. “I’ve been making a lot of those lately. And I can’t stay Catholic.” She was surprised at how easily the words came. “I can’t.”

“Hello, Jock,” said Mary Vaughan as she came into his office at the Synergy Group.

“Mary!” Jock exclaimed. “Welcome back!” He got up out of his Aeron chair, crossed in front of his desk, and shook her hand. “Welcome back.”

“It’s good to see you.” She motioned outside the door, and her two traveling companions stepped into view. “Jock, you remember Envoy Ponter Boddit. And this is Scholar Adikor Huld.”

Jock’s bushy gray eyebrows shot up toward his pompadour. “My goodness!” he said. “This is a surprise.”

“You didn’t know we were coming?”

Jock shook his head. “I’ve been wrapped up with…other matters. I get reports on all Neanderthal comings and goings, but I’m behind in looking at them.”

Mary thought briefly of an old joke: the bad news is that the CIA reads all your e-mail; the good news is that the CIA reads all your e-mail.

“Anyway,” said Jock, moving in and shaking Ponter’s hand, “welcome back.” He then shook Adikor’s hand. “Welcome, Dr. Huld, to the United States of America.”

“Thank you,” said Adikor. “It is…overwhelming.”

Jock managed a thin smile. “That it is.”

Mary indicated the two Barasts. “Lonwis Trob asked for Ponter to return, and this time to bring Adikor with him.”

Ponter smiled. “I’m sure that I’m too much of a theoretician for Lonwis’s tastes. But Adikor actually knows how to build things.”

“Speaking of Neanderthal ingenuity,” said Mary, pointing at a worktable that had been set up in a corner of Jock’s office, “I see you’ve been examining the codon writer.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Jock. “It’s an astonishing piece of equipment.”

“That it is,” said Mary. She looked at Jock, wondering whether to tell him. Then, too excited not to, she said, “It’s going to allow Ponter and me to have a baby, despite our differing chromosome counts.”

Jock sat up straight in his Aeron chair. “Really? My…goodness. I didn’t…I didn’t think that would be possible.”

“Well, it is!” said Mary, beaming.

“Um, well, ah, congratulations,” said Jock. “And to you, too, of course, Ponter. Congratulations!”

“Thank you,” said Ponter.

Suddenly Jock frowned, as if something important had occurred to him. “A hybrid between Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalensis,” he said. “Will it have twenty-three pairs of chromosomes or twenty-four?”

“You mean, will it be Gliksin or Barast, according to the test I worked out?” asked Mary.

Jock nodded. “Just—you know—an idle curiosity.”

“We talked about that a lot. We finally decided to give it twenty-three pairs of chromosomes. It’ll appear as a Gliksin—a Homo sapiens —at that level.”

“I see,” said Jock. He seemed slightly displeased at the notion.

“Given that the embryo is going to be placed in my womb”—she patted her belly—“we’re trying to avoid triggering any immunological responses there.”

Jock glanced down. “You’re not pregnant now, are you?”

“No, no. Not yet. Generation 149 won’t be conceived until next year.”

Jock blinked. “So the child is going to live in the Neanderthal world? Does that mean you’re going to move there permanently?”

Mary looked over at Ponter and Adikor. She hadn’t expected to get into this just yet. “Actually,” she said slowly, “I’m going to mostly stay in this world…”

“It sounds like there’s a ‘but’ coming,” said Jock.

Mary nodded. “There is. You know I finished the task you hired me for here at Synergy much faster than we’d originally anticipated. I’m thinking it’s time I moved on. I’ve been offered a full-time tenured position in the genetics department at Laurentian.”

“Laurentian?” said Jock. “Where’s that?”

“It’s in Sudbury—you know, where the portal is. Laurentian is a small university, but it’s got a great genetics department—and it does DNA forensic work for the RCMP.” She paused. “I find myself interested in that area these days.”

Jock smiled. “Who’d have thought ‘location, location, location’ would ever apply to Sudbury?”

“Hello, Mary.”

Mary dropped the mug she was holding. It shattered, and coffee laced with chocolate milk splattered across the floor of her office. “I’ll scream,” said Mary. “I’ll call for Ponter.”

Cornelius Ruskin closed the door behind him. “There’s no need for that.”

Mary’s heart was pounding. She looked around for anything she could use as a weapon. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Cornelius managed a small smile. “I work here. I’m your replacement.”

“We’ll see about that,” said Mary. She scooped up the handset of her desk phone.

Cornelius moved closer.

“Don’t you touch me!” said Mary. “Don’t you dare!”

“Mary—”

“Get out! Get out! Get out!”

“Just give me two minutes, Mary—that’s all I ask.”

“I’ll call the police!”

“You can’t do that. You know you can’t, not after what Ponter did to me, and—”

Suddenly Cornelius stopped talking. Mary’s heart was pounding furiously, and her face must have betrayed something that Cornelius detected.