Here? In this house. Curiosity took his hand to the knob on the closet door. He held it, turned it and opened it slowly. The voices were louder now, clear. Shouting even, that would be his uncle Seamus.

"A bloody sodding nerve to come here! Nerves of brass, you blackguard. Come here right to the house where she died and all. Bloody nerve-"

"There is no need to shout, Mr. Ryan. I told you why I came. This."

That was the new voice. American. Not really American. As Irish as everyone, but somet imes American.

This was too unusual to miss. Brian forgot his anger at being sent to his room so early, forgot his tantrum that had sent him to the closet, into the darkness to bite his knuckles and cry where no one could see or hear him.

On tiptoes he crossed the tiny room, the wood cold on his bare feet, warm on the rag rug by the door. Five years old, he could look out through the keyhole now without standing on a book. Pressed his eye close.

"This letter came a few weeks back." The man with the accent had red hair, freckles. He looked angry as he waved the piece of paper. "And there's the postmark on the envelope. Right here, Tara, this village.

Do you want to know what it says?"

"Get out," the heavy, phlegmy voice rumbled, followed by a deep cough. His grandfather. Still smoked twenty a day. "Can you not understand the simple words-you're not wanted here."

The newcomer slumped back, sighed. "I know that, Mr. Ryan, and I don't wish to argue with you. I just want to know if these allegations are true. This person, whoever it was, has written that Eileen is dead-"

"True enough, by God-and you killed her!" Uncle Seamus was losing his temper. Brian wondered if he would hit this man the same way he hit him.

"That would be difficult since I haven't seen Eileen in over five years."

"But you saw her once too often, you twisting sonofabitch. Got her with child, ran out, left her here with her shame. And her bastard."

"That's not quite true-nor is it relevant."

"Get away with your fancy words!"

"No, not until I've seen the boy."

"I'll see you in hell first!"

There was a scrape and crash as a chair went over. Brian clutched the doorknob. He knew that word well enough. Bastard. That was him, that's what the boys called him. What had this to do with the man in the parlor? He did not know; he had to find out. He would be beaten if he did. It didn't matter. He turned the knob and pushed.

The door flew back and crashed against the wall and he stood in the doorway. Everything stopped. There was Grandfer on the couch, torn gray sweater, the cigarette end in his lips sending a curl of smoke into his half- closed eye. Uncle Seamus, fists clenched, the fallen chair behind him, his face red and exploding.

And the newcomer. Tall, well dressed, suit and tie. His shoes were black and shiny. He looked down at the boy, his face twisted with strong emotions.

"Hello, Brian," he said, ever so quietly.

"Watch out!" Brian shouted.

Too late. His uncle's fist, hard from years in the mine, caught the man high on the face, knocked him to the floor. Brian thought at first that it was going to be one of those fights, like on Saturday night outside the pub, but it wasn't going to be like that, not this time. The newcomer touched his hand to his cheek, looked at the blood, climbed to his feet.

"All right, Seamus, maybe I deserved that. But just that once. Put your fists down, man, and show some intelligence. I've seen the boy and he's seen me. What's done is done. It's his future I care about-not the past."

"Look at the two of them," Grandfer muttered, holding back a cough. "Alike as two pennies, the red hair and all." His temper changed abruptly and he waved his arms, sparks flying from his cigarette. "Get back into your room, boy! Nothing here for you to see-nothing here for you to hear.

Inside before you feel my hand."

Incomplete, disjointed, adrift in time. Memories, long forgotten, disconnected. Surrounded and separated by blackness. Why was it still dark? Paddy Delaney. His father.

Like slides in a cinema, flickering and quick, too quick to see what was happening. The blackness. The slides, suddenly clear again.

A loud roaring, the window before him bigger than any window he had seen before, bigger even than a shop window. He clutched tightly at the man's hand. Frightened, it was all so strange.

"That's our plane," Patrick Delaney said. "The big green one there with the bump on top."

"747-8100. I seen a pitcher in the paper. Can we go into it now?"

"Very soon-as soon as they call it. We'll be the first ones aboard."

"And I'm not gonna go back to Tara?"

"Only if you want to."

"No. I hate them." He sniffled and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. Looked up at the tall man at his side. "You knew my mother?"

"I knew her very well. I wanted to marry her but-there were reasons we couldn't get married. When you are older you will understand."

"But-you're my father?"

"Yes, Brian, I am your father."

He had asked the question many times before, never really sure that he would really get the right answer.

Now, here, in the airport with the big green plane before them, he believed it at last. And with the belief something seemed to swell up and burst inside him and tears welled out and ran down his face.

"I never, never want to go back."

His father was on his knees, holding him so tightly that he could barely breathe-but that was all right.

Everything was all right. He smiled and tasted the salt tears, smiling and crying at the same time and unable to stop.

4.

February 12, 2023.

Erin Snaresbook was tired when she entered the operating room the next day. Yet when she saw Brian she forgot the fatigue. So much had been done; so much was left to do. The wrecked brain tissue, mostly white matter, had been removed. "I am about to begin the implanting series," she said, almost in a whisper to herself. This was for the record, not for the edification of the others working in the O.R. The sensitive microphones would pick up her words, no matter how softly or loudly she spoke, and record everything. "All of the dead tissue has now been removed. I am looking at a severed section of white tissue. This is the area where the axons of many neurons have been severed. The proximal end of each cut nerve will still be alive because the cell body will be located there.

But the distal end, the other part of the axon that goes on to join the synapses of other cells, all these will be dead. Cut off from food and energy supplies. This necessitates two different techniques. I have made molds of the surfaces of the cleanly cut and transected areas of white matter. Flexible PNEP microfilm chips have been fabricated from these molds. The computer remembers each mold so will know where each matching chip is to go.

Connective tissue cells will anchor the chips into place. First the proximal fibers will be freed up to make contact with the connection chips as I insert them. Each axon stump will be coated with growth-stimulating protein. The chip film is coated with chemical spots that when electrically released will attract each growing axon to extend and then attach itself to the nearest film-chip connection pad. That is what I will begin doing now."

As she talked she activated the connecting machine and instructed it to move over the open skull, told it to descend. When she did this the tiny, branching fingers slowly widened, spread apart, moved slowly downward. The computing capacity of the machine's computer was so great that every single one of the microscopically fine fingers was separately controlled. The fingertips themselves did not contain the lenses, which needed a larger number of wavelengths of light to form an image. So the lenses themselves were a few branches back. The image from the lens on each finger was relayed back to the computer, where it was compared with the other images to build an internal three-dimensional model of the severed brain. Down the tendrils went again, some moving slower man the others until they were close to the surface, spread out and obscuring the surgeon's view of the area.

Snaresbrook turned to the monitor screen, spoke to it.

"Lower. Stop. Lower. Tilt back. Stop."

Now she had the same view as the computer. A close-up image of the severed surfaces that she could zoom in on-or move back to get an overall view.

"Begin the spray," she ordered.

One in ten of the tendrils was hollow; in reality they were tiny tubes with electronic valves at the tip. The spray-it had to be a microscopically fine spray so small were the orifices-began to coat the surface of the severed brain. It was an invisible electrofluorescent coating.

"Turn down the theater lights," she ordered, and the overall illumination dimmed.

The connection machine was satisfied with its work and had stopped spraying. After selecting the lowest area of the wound, Snaresbrook sent the tiniest amount of ultraviolet light down the hair-thin fiber optics.

On the screen a pattern of glowing pinpoints speckled the brain's surface.

"The electroluminescent coating has now been sprayed onto all the nerve endings. Under UV light it emits enough photons to be identified. Only those nerves that are still alive cause the reaction that is activated by the UV. Next I will put the implants into place."

The implants, specially manufactured to conform to the contours of the raw surfaces of Brian's brain, were now in a tray in which they were immersed in a neutral solution. The tray was placed on the table next to Brain's head and the cover removed. With infinitely delicate touch the tendrils dropped down into it.

"These PNEP implants are custom-made. Each consists of layers of films, flexible organic-polymer semiconductor arrays. Flexible and stretchable because the severed tissues of the brain will have changed slightly since they were measured for the manufacture of these chips. That is what is going to happen next. The chips appear to look identical, but of course they are not. The computer measured and designed each of them to fit precisely to a selected area of the exposed brain. Now it is able to recognize and match each of them to the correct area. Each film has several optical-fiber connecting links that will be attached to adjoining chips multiplexing in-out cross-communication signals between parts of the brain. If attention is directed to the upper surface of the films it will be seen that there is also an I-O wire on each of them. The importance of this will be explained at the next operation. This particular session will be completed when all ten thousand of the implants are in place. The process will now begin."

Although Snaresbrook was there to supervise, it was the computer that controlled the implants, the fingers moving so fast that they blurred into invisibility. In flashing procession the thin-film chips were guided one after the other into place, until the last one was secure. The fingers withdrew and Snaresbrook felt some of the tension drain away. She straightened and realized that the pain in her back was sharp as a knife point. She ignored it.

"The next stage, the connecting process, has now begun. The film surfaces are a modification of active matrix display technology. The object is for each semiconductor, when activated by the luminescence, to identify a live nerve. Then to make a physical connection with that nerve. The films are coated with the correct growth hormones to cause the incoming nerve fibers to form synapses with the input transistors. The importance of these connections will be made manifest at the next implant procedure. Each dead distal fiber must be replaced by a fetal cell that is genetically engineered to grow a new axon inside the sheath of the cell it is replacing-then grow new synapses to replace the old, dying distal ones. At the same time as the fetal cells, dendrites will grow to contact the output pad on the film chip."

The operation took almost ten hours. Snaresbrook was present the entire time.

When the last connection had been made the fatigue hit like a locomotive. She stumbled and had to clutch the door frame as she left the room. Brian required constant monitoring and attention after the operation-but the nursing staff could handle this.

The procedures to mend Brian's brain were exhausting- yet she still had other patients and scheduled operations that had to be done. She rescheduled them, sought out and received the best assistance from the top surgeons, took only the most urgent cases. Yet she was still working a full twenty-four hours, had been for days.

Her voice trembled as she made verbal notes on the procedure just finished. Her desk computer would record and transcribe them. Dexedrine would see her through the day. Not a good idea but she had little choice.

Finished, she yawned and stretched.

"End of report. Intercom on. Madeline." The desk computer accepted the new command and bleeped the secretary.

"Yes, Doctor."

"Send in Mrs. Delaney now."

She rubbed her hands together and straightened her back. "Switch on and record as file titled Dolly Delaney,"

she said, then checked to see that the tiny red indicator in the base of the desk light came on. The door opened and she smiled at the woman who hesitantly entered. "It was very good of you to come," Snaresbrook said, smiling, standing slowly and indicating the chair on the other side of the desk. "Please make yourself comfortable, Mrs. Delaney."

"Dolly, if you please, Doctor. Can you tell me how he is?" Her voice had a tight edge to it as though she was working hard to keep it under control as she spoke. A thin, sharp-eyed woman clutching her large handbag in her lap with both hands; a barrier before her.

"Absolutely no change, Dolly, not since I talked to you yesterday. He is alive and we must be grateful for that.

But he has been gravely injured and it is going to be weeks, possibly months, before we will know the outcome of the procedures. That is why I need your help."

"I'm not a nurse, Doctor. I don't see what I can possibly do." She straightened the purse on her lap, keeping the barrier in place. She was a good-looking woman-would have looked better if the corners of her mouth hadn't turned down sharply. She had the appearance of a person the world had not been kind to and who resented it. "You say you need help- yet I don't have any idea at all what has happened to Brian. Whoever called me simply said that there had been an accident in the laboratory. I had hoped that you would be able to tell me more. When will I be able to see him?"

"Just as soon as possible. But you must realize that Brian has suffered extensive cranial damage. Severe trauma of the white matter of his brain. There is-memory impairment. But he can be helped if I find a way to evoke enough of his early memories. That is why I need more information about your son..."

"Stepson," she said firmly. "Patrick and I adopted him."

"I didn't know, I'm sorry."

"Don't be, Doctor, there is certainly nothing to be sorry about. It is common knowledge. Brian is Patrick's natural son. Before we met, before he left Ireland, he had this... liaison with a local girl. That was Brian's mother." Dolly took a lace hanky from her bag, touched it to her palms, pushed it back into the bag, which closed with a loud snap.

"I would like to know more about that, Mrs. Delaney."

"Why? It's past history, nobody's business now. My husband is dead, has been for nine years. We had...

separated by that time. Divorced, I have been living with my family in Minnesota. He and I did not communicate. I didn't even know that Paddy was ill, no one ever told me anything. You can understand my being a little bitter. The first I knew that something was wrong with his health was when Brian called me about the funeral. So that is all in the past as you can see."

"I am very sorry to hear about the separation. But, tragic as this is, it does not alter in any way the earlier details about Brian's life. That is what you must tell me about. It is Brian's developing years that I want to understand. Now that your husband is dead, you are the only person in the world who can supply this information. Brian's brain has been severely injured, large areas have been destroyed. He needs your help in restoring his memories. I admit that much of what I am doing is experimental, never tried before. But it is the only chance he has. In order to succeed I must know where to look-and what to look for in his past.

"The problem is that in order to reconstruct Brian's memories I will have to retrace his mind's development from his infancy and childhood. The enormous structure of a human mind can be rebuilt only from the bottom up. The higher-level ideas and concepts cannot be activated until their earlier forms again become able to operate. We will have to reconstruct his mind-his mental societies of ideas-in much the way they were built in the first place, during Brian's childhood. Only you can guide me at this point. Will you help me give him back his past in the hopes that he will men have a future?"

Dolly's mouth was clamped t ightly shut, her lips white with the strain. And she was shivering. Erin Snaresbrook waited in patient silence.

"It was a long time ago. Brian and I have grown apart since then. But I raised him, did my best, all that I could do. I haven't seen him since the funeral..." She took her handkerchief out again and touched it to the corners of her eyes, put it away, straightened up.

"I know that this is very difficult for you. Dolly. But it is essential that I get these facts, absolutely vital.

Can I ask you where you and your husband first met?"

Dolly sighed, then nodded reluctant agreement. "It was at the University of Kansas. Paddy came there from Ireland, as you know. He taught at the university. In the School of Education. So did I, family planning.

As I am sure you know, there is finally the growing awareness that all of our environment problems are basically caused by overpopulation, so the subject is no longer banned in the schools. Paddy was a mathematician, a very good one, overqualified for our college, really. That was because he had been recruited for the new university in Texas and was teaching in Kansas until they opened. That was part of the arrangement. They wanted him under contract and tied up. For their own sake-not his. He was a very lonely man, without any friends. I know he missed Dublin something fierce. That was what he used to say when he talked about it, something fierce. Not that he talked about himself that much. He was teaching undergraduates who were there just for the credits and didn't care at all about the subject. He really hated it. It was just about that time when we began going out together. He confided in me and I know that he found comfort in my companionship.

"I don't know why I'm telling you all this. Perhaps because you are a doctor. I've kept it inside, never talked about it to anyone before. Looking back now, now that he is dead, I can finally say it out loud. I don't. . . I don't think he ever loved me. I was just comfortable to have around. There is a lot of mathematics in demography, so I could follow him a bit when he talked about his work. He lost me rather quickly but he didn't seem to notice. I imagine that he saw me as a warming presence, to put it simply. This didn't matter to me, not at first. When he asked me to marry him I jumped at the chance. I was thirty-two then and not getting any younger. You know that they say that if a girl is not married by thirty that's the end of it. So I accepted his proposal. I tried to forget about all the schoolgirl ideas of romantic love. After all, people have made successes of arranged marriages. Thirty-two is a hard age for a single girl. As for him, if he loved anyone it was her. Dead, but that didn't matter."

"Then he did talk about this earlier relationship with the girl in Ireland?"

"Of course. Grown men aren't expected to be virgins. Even in Kansas. He was a very honest and forthright man. I knew he had been very, very close to this girl but the affair was long over. At first he didn't mention the boy. But before he proposed he told me what had happened in Ireland. Everything. I'm not saying I approved, but past is past and that's all there was to it."

"And how much did you know about Brian?"

"Just as much as Paddy did-which was precious little. Just his name, that he was living with his mother in some village in the country. She didn't want to hear from Paddy, not at all, and I knew that made him very upset. His letters were returned unopened. When he tried to send money, for the boy's sake, it was refused.

He even sent money to the priest there, for the boy, but that didn't work either. Paddy didn't want it back, he donated it to the church. The priest remembered that, so when the girl died he wrote Paddy about it. He took it badly, though he tried not to show it. In the end he worked hard to put it all from his mind. That's when he proposed to me. As I said, I knew a lot of his reasons for what he did. If I minded I kept it to myself. She was dead and we were married and that was that. We didn't even talk about it anymore.