The stupid part now was the way she still didn't want to think all the way to the end of it, about how if there was an enemy and he Got maman, she didn't really know whether maman was all right; and she was scared.

She remembered arguing with uncle Denys about the party last year. And her not wanting Giraud to come; and uncle Denys said: That's not nice, Ari. He's my brother.

That was scary too.

That was scary, because uncle Giraud might get uncle Denys to do things. Uncle Giraud had Security; and they might get into her letters. They might just stop the letters going to maman at all.

And that tore up everything.

Stupid. Stupid.

She felt sick all over. And she couldn't ask uncle Denys what was true. Denys would say: He's my brother.

iv

Giraud poured more water and drank, tracking on the reports, bored while the tutors argued over the relative merits of two essays, one out of archives, one current.

Denys, Peterson, Edwards, Ivanov, and Morley: all of them around a table, discussing the implications of vocabulary choice in eight-year-olds. It was not Giraud's field. It was, God help them, Peterson's.

"The verbal development, " Peterson said, in the stultifying murmur that was Peterson in full display, "is point seven off, the significant anomaly in the Gonner Developmentals.... "

"I don't think there's any cause for worry, " Denys said. "The difference is Jane and Olga, not Ari and Ari. "

"Of course there is some argument that the Gonner battery is weighted away from concept. Hermann Poling maintained in his article in—"

It went on. Giraud drew small squares on his notepaper. Peterson did good work. Ask him a question, he had a pre-recorded lecture. Teacher's disease. Colleagues and strangers got the same as his juvenile subjects.

"In sum, " Giraud said, finally, when the water was at half in his glass, and his paper was full of squares. "In sum, in brief, then, you believe the difference was Olga. "

"The Poling article—"

"Yes. Of course. And you don't think corrective tape is necessary. "

"The other scores indicate a very substantial correspondence—"

"What John means—" Edwards said, "is that she's understanding everything, she knows the words, but so much of her development was precocious, she had an internal vocabulary worked out that for her is a kind of shorthand. "

"There may be a downside effect to insisting on a shift of vocabulary, " Denys said. "Possibly it doesn'tdescribe what she's seeing. She simply prefers slang and her own internal jargon, which I haven't tried to discourage. She does know the words, the tests prove that. Also, I'm not certain we're seeing the whole picture. I rather well think she's resisting some of the exams. "

"Why?"

"Jane, " Denys said. "The child hasn't forgotten. I hoped the letters would taper off with time. I hoped that the azi could make a difference in that. "

"You don't think, " Edwards said, "that the way that was handled—tended to make her cling to that stage; I mean, a subconscious emphasis on that stage of her life, a clinging to those memories, a refusal—as it were, to leave that stage, a kind of waiting. "

"That's an interesting theory, " Giraud said, leaning forward on his arms. "Is there any particular reason?"

"The number of times she says: 'My maman said—' The tone of voice. "

"I want a voice-stress on that, " Denys said.

"No problem, " Giraud said. "It's certainly worth pursuing. Does she reference other people?"

"No, " Edwards said.

"Not family members. Not friends. Not the azi. "

"Nelly. 'Nelly says. ' When it regards something about home. Sometimes 'my uncle Denys doesn't mind' this or that.... She doesn't respect Nelly's opinions, she doesn't respect much Nelly says, but she evidences a desire not to upset her. 'Uncle Denys' is a much more respectful reference, but more that she uses the name as currency. She's quite willing to remind you that 'my uncle Denys' takes an interest in things. " Edwards cleared his throat. "Quite to the point, she hints her influence with 'uncle Denys' can get me a nicer office. "

Denys snorted in surprise, and laughed then, to Edwards' relief. "Like the party invitation?"

"Much the same thing. "

"What about Ollie?" Giraud asked.

"Quite rarely. Almost never. I'm being precise now. I'd say she used to mention Ollie right after Jane left. Now—I don't think I've heard that name in a long time. Maybe more than a year. "

"Interesting. Justin Warrick?"

"She never mentions him. I did, if you recall. She was quite anxious to quit the subject. That name never comes up. "

"Worth the time on the computers to run a name search, " Denys said.

On all those tapes. On years of tapes. Giraud let his breath flow out and nodded. More personnel. More time on the computers.

Dammit, there was pressure outside. A lot of pressure. They were prepared to go public finally, to break the story; and they had an anomaly; they had a child far less serious than the first Ari, far more capricious and more restrained in temper. The azi had not helped. There was a little more seriousness to the child lately, a little gain in vocabulary: Florian and Catlin were better at essay than she was, but the hard edge was not there, maman was still withAri in a very persistent sense, and the Warrick affair, Yanni's sudden revelation that young Justin had handed them something that stymied the Sociology computers—

Give it to Jordan, Denys had suggested. Send himto Jordan. The Warricks are far less likely to cause trouble with the Project if they're busy, and you know Jordan would work on the damned thing, no matter what it was, if it gave him a chance to see his son.

Which was trouble with Defense: they were jealous of Warrick's time. There was a chance Defense would take official interest in Justin Warrick: there was no way to run him past their noses unnoticed, and in the way of Defense, Defense wanted anything that might seem to be important, or useful, or suddenly anomalous.

Damn, and damn.

Ari wanted him,Yanni had said. And, dammit, there's something there.

There was the paradox of the Project: how wide the replication had to be. How many individuals, essential to each other? Thank God the first Ari's society had been extremely limited in terms of personal contacts—but it had been much more open in terms of news-services and public contact from a very early age.

"We've got to go ahead, " Giraud said. "Dammit, we've got to take her public, for a whole host of reasons, Lu's out of patience and we're running out of time! We can't be wrong, there's no way we can afford to be wrong. "

No one said anything. It was too evident what the stakes were.

"The triggers are all there, " Petros said. "Not all of them have been invoked. I think a little more pressure. Academic will do. Put it on her. Frustrate her. Give her things she's bound to fail in. Accelerate the program. "

That had consistently been Petros' advice.

"She hasn't met intellectual frustration, " Denys said, "—yet. "

"We don't want her bloody bored with school, either, " Giraud snapped. "Maybe it isan option. What do the computers say lately, when they're not running Warrick's school projects?"

"Do we run it again?" Peterson asked. "I don't think there's going to be a significant change. I just don't believe you can discount the results we have. Accelerating the program when there's an anomaly in question—"