Richard next made a string of entries from the normal alphanumeric keys. “Now,” he said, turning back to face Nicole, “if I have done it correctly, we will have a cube, made from the same material as that ball, in about ten minutes.”

They ate some of the new melon while they waited. It tasted the same as the others. Steak and potatoes would be unbelievably good, Nicole was think­ing, when suddenly the end wall lifted up half a meter above the floor and a black cube appeared in the gap.

“Wait a minute, don’t touch it yet,” Richard said as Nicole went over to investigate. “Look here!” He shone his flashlight into the darkness behind the cube. “There are vast tunnels beyond these walls,” he said, “and they must lead to factories so advanced we couldn’t even recognize them. Imag­ine! They can even make objects on request.”

Nicole was beginning to understand why Richard was so ecstatic. “We now have the capability to control our own destiny in some small way,” he continued, “If I can break the code fast enough, we should be able to request food, maybe even what we need to build a boat.”

“Without loud motors, I hope,” quipped Nicole.

“No motors,” agreed Richard. He finished his melon and turned back to the keyboard.

Nicole was becoming worried. Richard had succeeded in making only one new breakthrough in a full Raman day. All he had to show for thirty-eight hours of work (he had only slept eight hours during the entire period) was one new material. He could make “light” black objects like the first ball, whose specific gravity was close to balsa wood, or he could make “heavy” black objects of density similar to oak or pine. He was wearing himself out with his work. And he could not, or would not, share any of the load with Nicole.

What if his first discovery was just blind luck? Nicole said to herself as she climbed the stairs for her dawn walk. Or what if the system cannot make anything but two kinds of black objects? She could not help worrying about wasted time. It was only sixteen more days until Rama would encounter the Earth. There was no sign of a rescue team. At the back of her mind was the thought that perhaps she and Richard had been abandoned altogether.

She had tried to talk to Richard about their plans the previous evening, but he had been exhausted. Richard hadn’t responded in any way when Nicole had mentioned to him that she was very concerned. Later, after she had carefully outlined all their options and asked his opinion about what they should do, she noticed that he had fallen asleep. When Nicole awakened after a brief nap herself, Richard was already working again at the keyboard and refused to be distracted by either breakfast or conversation. Nicole had stumbled over the growing array of black objects on the floor as she had exited the White Room for her early morning exercise.

Nicole was feeling very lonely. The last fifty hours, which she had spent mostly by herself, had passed very slowly. Her only escape had been the pleasure of reading. She had the text of five books stored in her computer. One was her medical encyclopedia, but the other four were all for recreation. ! bet all of Richard’s discretionary memory is filled with Shakespeare, she thought as she sat on the wall surrounding New York. She stared out at the Cylindrical Sea. In the far distance, barely visible in her binoculars through the mist and clouds, she could see the northern bowl where they had entered Rama the first time.

She had two of her father’s novels stored in the computer. Nicole’s per­sonal favorite was Queen for All Ages, the story of Eleanor of Aquitaine’s younger years, beginning with her adolescence at the ducal court in Poitiers, The story line followed Eleanor through her marriage to Louis Capet of France, their crusade to the Holy Land, and her extraordinary personal ap­peal for an annulment from Pope Eugenius. The novel culminated with Eleanor’s divorce from Louis and betrothal to the young and exciting Henry Plantagenet.

The other Pierre des Jardins novel in her computer’s memory was his universally acclaimed chef d’oeuvre, I Richard Coeur de Lion, a mixture of first-person diary and interior monologue, set during two winter weeks at the end of the twelfth century. In the novel Richard and his soldiers, embarked on another crusade, are quartered near Messina under the protection of the Norman king of Sicily, While there the famous warrior-king and homosexual son of Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry Plantagenet, in a burst of self-exami­nation, relives the major personal and historical events of his life.

Nicole remembered a long discussion with Genevieve after her daughter had read ! Richard the previous summer. The young teenager had been fascinated by the story, and had surprised her mother by asking extremely intelligent questions. Thoughts of Genevieve made Nicole wonder what her daughter might be doing at Beauvois at the very moment. They have told you that I have disappeared, Nicole surmised. What does the military call it? Missing in action?

In her mind’s eye Nicole could see her daughter riding home from school each day on her bicycle. “Any news?” Genevieve would probably say to her grandfather as she crossed the portal of the villa. Pierre would just shake his head sorrowfully.

It has been two weeks now since anyone has officially seen me. Do you still have hope, my darling daughter? The bereft Nicole was struck by an over­whelming desire to talk to Genevieve. For a moment, suspending reality, Nicole could not accept the fact that she was separated from her daughter by millions of kilometers and had no way to communicate with her. She rose to return to the White Room, thinking in her temporary confusion that she could phone Genevieve from there.

When her sanity returned several seconds later, Nicole was astonished at how easily her mind had tricked itself. She shook her head and sat down on the wall overlooking the Cylindrical Sea. She remained on the wall for al­most two hours, her thoughts roaming freely over a variety of subjects. To­ward the end of the time, when she was preparing to return to the White Room, her mind focused on Richard Wakefield. ! have tried, my British friend, Nicole said to herself. ! have been more open with you than with anyone since Henry. But it would be just my luck to be here with someone even less trusting than myself.

Nicole was feeling an undefined sadness as she trekked down the stairs to the second level and turned right at the horizontal tunnel. Her sadness changed to surprise when she entered the White Room. Richard jumped up from his small black chair and greeted her with a hug. He had shaved and brushed his hair. He had even cleaned his fingernails. Laid out on the black table in the middle of the room was a neatly sectioned manna melon. One piece sat on each of the two black plates in front of the chairs.

Richard pulled out her chair and indicated for Nicole to sit down. He went around the table and sat in his own seat. He reached across the table and took both of Nicole’s hands. “I want to apologize,” he said with great intensity, “for being such a boor. I have behaved very badly these last few days.

“I have thought of thousands of things to tell you during these hours I’ve been waiting,” he continued hesitantly, a strained smile playing across his lips, “but I can’t remember most of them… I know I wanted to explain to you how very important Prince Hal and Falstaff were to me. They were my closest friends… It has not been easy for me to deal with their deaths. My grief is still very intense…”

Richard took a drink of water and swallowed. “But most of all,” he said, “I’m sorry that I have not told you what a spectacular person you are. You are intelligent, attractive, witty, sensitive — everything I ever dreamed of finding in a woman. Despite our situation, I’ve been afraid to tell you how I felt. I guess my fear of rejection runs very deep.”