Killing Time by Caleb Carr Page A

encephalitis that had been popping
up in various parts of the world. In well-rehearsed, utterly convincing
statements that prompted widespread public sympathy, Tressalian and his equally
ambitious wife tearfully announced that Malcolm's case was so severe that he
might emerge from his hospital stay with permanent neurological damage: an
actual and distinct possibility, of course, given the experiments that were
about to be performed on his mind.
    I still shudder to think what
those weeks must have been like. At first the treatments seemed to go well, and
Malcolm exhibited a radically expanded mental capacity: a disorienting enough
experience for a three-year-old. But then, midway into the course of the
injections, his body seemed to rebel. Primitive functions—breathing, digestion,
balance—became impaired, and there were unexplained bouts of terrible systemic
pain and headache. The gene therapist had his own theory as to why—the human
brain was not possessed of infinite resources, he told Stephen Tressalian, and
with so much neuronal activity going to higher functions, there was the
distinct possibility that the autonomic systems were being starved. But he was
no physician, and Tressalian was too committed to his plan (as well as too
afraid of being found out) to bring in any specialized medical help. Then too,
despite all the terrible side effects, the boy's intellectual powers did continue
to grow at an exponential rate, producing results that eventually satisfied
even his father. After three months Stephen Tressalian called the project off,
telling himself, his wife, and anyone else who knew about the work that it had
been a gift for his son as well for genetic research and the future of
mankind. .
    Small matter that when Malcolm
emerged from the hospital—his arms gripping a pair of pathetic little crutches
that had to do the work of his suddenly disobedient legs, and his hair
mysteriously turned almost silver—he was faced by a crowd of reporters whose expressions
of horror he was now entirely wise enough to comprehend. What was important was
that the boy would be brilliant—no, was brilliant—and that the next time
Stephen Tressalian engaged in such an experiment he would be armed with enough
data to do a far better job.
    For there would be a next
time. Soon after Malcolm's release his mother became pregnant again, and this
time it was she who entered the private hospital, as Stephen Tressalian's gene
expert had determined that Malcolm's comparatively advanced stage of physical
development had had something to do with his adverse reaction to the therapy.
The fetus that would become Larissa received a refined course of injections in
utero, and the change seemed to do the trick: when she was born her body
exhibited none of her brother's physical disabilities, while the power of her
mind was quickly revealed to be astounding. In addition, her beauty from the
first looked to exceed even her mother's. In every way, Larissa seemed the
living vindication of all the risks her parents had taken.
    Of course, there was the strange
matter of that silver hair, with which Larissa too had been born; but Stephen
Tressalian refused to see this as anything other than a coincidence and
emphasized the differences between his two children rather than their
similarities.
    "He never even suspected the
most important thing that Malcolm and I had in common," Larissa said, as
we lay on my bed together.
    Yes, together: for her story had
quickly transformed my uneasiness about her work as an assassin into an emotion
that ran much deeper than the infatuation I'd felt to that point.
    "Which was?" I
murmured, touching her silvery locks and looking deep into her ebony eyes.
    She looked at the ceiling rather
blithely. "We were both a little mad. At least, I can't think of any other
way to describe it."
    It didn't seem an entirely
serious statement. "I'm sure you were," I said in a tone to match
hers. "And your parents never suspected?"
    "Oh,