The Ugly Little Boy

Ma

"That's correct," Miss Fellowes replied. "That's his bedroom and playroom back there. He takes his meals here, and that's his bathroom. I have my own living area over here, and these are the storage facilities."

"He never goes beyond this enclosed area?"

"No," Miss Fellowes said. "This is the Stasis bubble. He doesn't leave the bubble, not ever."

"A very confining sort of life, wouldn't you agree?"

Hoskins said quickly, too quickly, "It's an absolutely necessary confinement. There are technical reasons for it, having to do with the buildup of temporal potential involved in bringing the boy across time, that I could explain in detail if you wanted the full background. But what it comes down to is that the energy cost of allowing the boy to cross the Stasis boundary would be prohibitive."

"So to save a little money, you plan to keep him cooped up in these few small rooms indefinitely?" Levien asked.

"Not just a little money, Dr. Levien," Hoskins said, looking more harried than ever. "I said that the cost would be prohibitive. It goes even beyond cost. The available metropolitan energy supply would have to be diverted in a way that I think would cause insuperable problems for the entire utility district. There's no problem when you or I or Miss Fellowes cross the Stasis line, but for Timmie to do it would be, well, simply not possible. Simply not possible."

"If science can find a way to bring a child across forty thousand years of time," Maria

"I wish that were true, Dr. Levien," Hoskins said.

"So the child is permanendy restricted to these rooms," said Ma

"That's correct. As I've tried to explain, it can't be done, not within the real-world considerations that we have to put up with. We want the boy to be comfortable, but we simply can't divert our resources into trying to solve insoluble problems. -As I told you, I can provide you later on with the full technical analysis, if you want to check it over."

Ma

Levien said, "What sort of diet is the boy on?"

"Would you like to examine the pantry?" Miss Fellowes asked, in no very friendly way.

"Yes, as a matter of fact. Yes, I would."

Miss Fellowes made a sweeping gesture toward the refrigeration cabinets.

Take a good look, she thought. I think you'll be happy when you do.

Indeed Levien seemed pleased by what she found-a bunch of vials and ampoules and drip-globes and mixa-tion pods. The entire inhuman assortment of synthetic diets, so remote from anything that Miss Fellowes thought of as wholesome food, that Dr. Jacobs and his associates had insisted Timmie had to eat against Miss Fellowes* vehement objections. Levien prowled through the racks of high-tech foodstuffs with evident approval. It was just the kind of superfuturistic stuff she'd be likely to go for, Miss Fellowes thought angrily. She probably ate nothing but synthetics herself. If she ate anything at all.

"No complaints there," Levien said after a time. "Your nutrition people seem to know what they're doing."

"The boy does appear healthy," said Ma

"Yes," Maria

Ma

"Don't I count as companionship, Mr. Ma

"I was referring to die need for someone close to his own age. A playmate. This experiment is pla

"There's a great deal we hope to learn from Timmie about the era from which he comes. As his command of English improves-and Miss Fellowes assures me that he's becoming quite fluent, even though it's not easy for some of us to make out exactly what he's saying-"

"In other words, you intend to keep him here for a period of some years, Dr. Hoskins?" Maria

"That could be, yes."

Ma

Hoskins' eyes moved quickly from one to the other. He looked outnumbered and beleaguered.

He said, "Miss Fellowes has already brought up the issue of getting a playmate for Timmie. I assure you that we've got no desire whatever to cripple the boy's emotional development or any other aspect of his existence."

Miss Fellowes glanced at him in surprise. She had brought the issue up, yes. But nothing had come of it. Since that one inconclusive conversation in the company cafeteria, Hoskins hadn't said the slightest thing to her in response to her request that Timmie be given a child to keep him company. He had brushed the idea off then as unworkable, and he had seemed so taken aback by the whole notion, in fact, that Miss Fellowes had hesitated to bring it up with him a second time. For the moment Timmie had been getting along quite satisfactorily on his own. But lately she had begun to look ahead, thinking that Timmie's adaptation to modern life was proceeding so quickly that the moment to raise the point again with Hoskins was approaching.

And now Ma

Ma

Suddenly his tone was no longer so amiable.

Sounding flustered, Hoskins said, "So far as bringing a second Neanderthal back to the present rime to put in here with Timmie goes, which was Miss Fellowes' original suggestion, I have to tell you that we simply don't intend-"

"A second Neanderthal? Oh, no, Dr. Hoskins," said Ma

"It's a serious enough matter that there's one already incarcerated here," Maria

Hoskins shot her a venomous glare. Sweat was streaming down his face.

"I said that we don't intend to bring a second Neanderthal here," he replied, virtually between clenched teeth. "That's never been under consideration. Never! There are a dozen different reasons why. When Miss Fellowes brought it up the first time, I told her-"

Ma

Smoothly Ma

"A child who could visit Timmie on a regular basis," said Maria

"Just a minute," Hoskins snapped. "What assimilation? Are you imagining a pleasant future life in some cozy little suburb for Timmie? Applying for American citizenship, joining a church, settling down and getting married? May I remind you that what we have here is a prehistoric child from an era so remote that we can't even call it barbaric-a Stone Age child, a visitor from what you yourself, Dr. Levien, once described with some accuracy as an alien society. And you think he's going to become-"

Levien cut in coolly. "Timmie's hypothetical citizenship application and church membership aren't the issue, Dr. Hoskins, or any other such reductio ad absurdum. Timmie is still a child, and it's the quality of the childhood that he experiences that Mr. Ma

Acidly Hoskins said, "Which means in words of one syllable comprehensible by a mere physicist like myself,

Dr. Levien, that you think Timmie ought to have a playmate."

"Not merely 'ought to,' " Levien said. "Must."

"I'm afraid we're going to take the position that companionship for the child is essential," said Ma

"Essential," Hoskins repeated bleakly.

"A minimum first step," Levien said. "This is not to say that we are prepared to regard the boy's incarceration in our era for a prolonged period as acceptable or permissible. But for the moment, at least, we think we can waive our other outstanding objections and therefore the experiment can be permitted to continue-is that not so, Mr. Ma

"Permitted!" Hoskins cried.

"Provided," Maria