"Right," the boy said and disappeared.
Jarvis eyed the girl, who was in turn watching him with a mixture of distaste and curiosity. "Is Ridge Harbor using girls as righthands now?" he asked.
Tirrell shook his head. "Lisa just came along to act as a guide."
The girl's face suddenly clicked. "You're the one who stopped me on my way here last June, aren't you?" Jarvis said, nodding. "What did you do, Detective, send my picture around to all the hives in the area?"
"As it happens, Lisa recognized your picture at the police station." Tirrell glanced around the room. "Where's your radiophone?"
"I'm afraid it's out of order," Jarvis said, almost too quickly.
Tirrell gave him a long look. "How very convenient. Show it to me; maybe I can fix it."
Jarvis glanced once at Colin's limp form, lying there beneath the seascape painting Miribel had given him so long ago. "All right," he said. "But I don't think it'll do any good."
He led the way into the study and pointed out the phone. "Thank you," Tirrell said. "Please sit over there against the wall. Lisa, watch him closely."
Jarvis did as he was told. "Tell me," he said as Tirrell got to work on the phone casing with a pocket screwdriver, "just how widespread is knowledge of my... involvement with Colin's kidnapping?"
Tirrell frowned up at him briefly. "Not very. Your poster identified you only as a material witness. Why?"
Jarvis shrugged. "The smaller the number of people who know what I'm doing out here, the better my chances of convincing everyone that it should be kept secret, at least for now."
"So you'd like to keep all this a secret, would you," Tirrell said. "We'd take Colin back to Ridge Harbor and you'd settle back in at the university, career and reputation intact, um?"
"My career and reputation are completely unimportant. Colin—and what may be happening inside him—is just the opposite. We might be on the brink of the most drastic change in Tigrin society since the teekay ability first appeared."
Tirrell snorted. "Impressive words—especially coming from a man who kidnapped his own son to do his experiments on. You'll forgive me if I remain unconvinced."
"His son?" Lisa looked startled. "Colin?"
"Yes," Jarvis nodded. "Detective Tirrell was just guessing, of course, but there's no reason now to deny it." He looked back at Tirrell. "Would you care to know just why I chose Colin?"
"Because you knew his birthday, I'd imagine."
"A minor point only. Mainly, it was because I knew he'd have a good chance of handling what I might be doing to him. I knew my own temperament and physical stamina and those of his mother Miribel, so his genetic background is good; and, more importantly, I knew the reputation of the Brimmers, who'd been given custody of him. I knew they would give him solid moral and ethical training. I don't know if that'll be enough. I hope so."
Tirrell looked up from the workings of the phone, where he'd been testing for loose wires. "What have you done to him?" he asked quietly.
Jarvis smiled tightly. "I've possibly made him the most important man on Tigris."
"How?"
This was it. The detective was listening; and if Jarvis could convince him of the need for secrecy there might still be a way to work out a deal. If not... "I'd be happy to. But perhaps Lisa should wait somewhere out of earshot for the rest of this discussion—outside the window there, for instance, where she could still watch me."
Tirrell held the scientist's eyes a moment longer before turning to look first at the window and then at Lisa. "I don't think that'll be necessary," he said. "She can stay and listen."
Jarvis hadn't expected that. "Detective, as I said before, the fewer that know anything about this, the better. Lisa is only a kid—"
"She's almost a teen," Tirrell interrupted. "And she's demonstrated an ability to keep secrets reasonably well. Besides, I don't especially trust your motives in wanting her outside."
Jarvis looked at Lisa, thoughts tangled with indecision. Even a single hint of this dropped into a hive would start rumors traveling like a firestorm, with effects potentially as devastating. But if he didn't talk now, his next chance would be at an official police interrogation... and more than rumors would spread from that. Lisa, he decided at last, was probably the lesser of the two risks. "All right," he sighed. "There is, I think, a reasonably good possibility that Colin will pass the first stages of puberty without undergoing Transition—and if he gets that far he'll have a fifty-fifty chance of keeping his teekay well into adulthood."
Lisa gasped. "You can stop Transition from coming?"
He shook his head. "Possibly... but not the way you're hoping. If the method works at all, the treatments will have to be started very young. There's nothing I can do for you; the metabolic changes that would be needed would be far too drastic to be safe. I'm sorry."
"What sort of changes are involved?" Tirrell asked.
Jarvis looked at him, glad for an excuse to turn away from Lisa's disappointment. "For the time being that has to remain my secret," he said.
"So you can make all the money from the process?"
"I'm not going to make a bill on this," Jarvis growled, annoyed at the other's attitude. "If you'd bother to think about it for ten seconds, you'd realize what a potential bombshell a discovery like this is. Handled wrong, it could literally drive Tigris into another Lost Generation situation."
"I realize what a mess this is a damn sight better than you might think," Tirrell retorted icily. "Why the hell do you think I kept your role as quiet as I could, otherwise?" He leveled a finger. "And if you're really worried about the effect on society, why'd you start the project in the first place? You could have thrown away your notes and that would've been the end of it."
Jarvis shook his head. "Because we need this, Detective—it's the only way to get back to a stable society. Besides, scientific knowledge can never be buried for very long. If I can find the right approach, sooner or later someone else will hit it, too... and that someone might not want to let all of Tigris in on it. He might keep it for his own use, or at least play politics with it."
Lisa inhaled sharply. Tirrell looked up at her, his own face rigid. "Yeah," he said to her. "He would, wouldn't he?" Looking back at the disassembled phone, he seemed to come to a decision. "All right, Doctor, you've made your point. You're getting out of here right now, along with all your notes and any of the chemicals you used. Lisa and Tonio will take you to Barona and send more police back to wait with me until Colin can travel."
A cold knot rose into Jarvis's throat. Was the discussion going to be closed, just like that? "Detective—to let more people know about this—certainly before the results are even in—will just cause panic and—"
"Doctor, I'd rather broadcast your story all over Tigris than let a certain person get at you—and that man is right now combing this area. There are police units standing by ready to move in, but if we can't call them the only other thing to do is risk flying you out of here ourselves."
"So why can't you and the kids handle him?" Jarvis frowned, his stomach tightening as the detective's sense of urgency began to seep into him. Tirrell clearly wasn't stupid—and he clearly understood the implications of hauling Jarvis and his notes into a police station, where any chance to keep this quiet would be gone forever. If Tirrell was that worried about this guy—