"Ah," Dr. Radhakrishnan said. "I thought I smelled perfume." "As you can see, Mr. Coover is a consummate host. My job does not come with such fringes, but I have more than enough to occupy myself." Mr. Salvador nodded in the direction of the communications rig on the bulkhead.

"You are a busy man," Dr. Radhakrishnan observed. "Great things are afoot," Mr. Salvador said with uncharacteristic gusto. "For certain people, this is a fascinating time to be alive."

Dr. Radhakrishnan certainly felt that way. "How long have you been working for Mr. Coover?"

Mr. Salvador paused before answering, his face alert, his eyes glittering. He was not thinking about how to answer so much as he was studying Radhakrishnan's face. He seemed, as usual, ever so slightly amused. "I wouldn't make unwarranted assumptions," he said.

Dr. Radhakrishnan wanted to pursue this line of questioning but he had realized that, by asking about Mr. Salvador's background, he had blundered into the realm of bad taste. And that was much worse than bad morals or bad manners for a certain kind of person. However, he sensed without having met her that Maria would be a much more accessible person on all levels. "I'm going to freshen up," he said, nodding toward the private cabin in the back. "Take your time and relax," Mr. Salvador said, "it's a long way to India."

In his usual style, Mr. Salvador had gone to great lengths to make Dr. Radhakrishnan feel at home in Delhi, even though Delhi was his home. A large suite had been rented out at the spectacular Imperial Hotel, an aptly named pile sitting at the end of a palm-tree-lined drive just off Janpath. It was just south of Connaught Circus and less than a mile from where the institute was being constructed. Mr. Salvador had rented out a couple of floors of the hotel. During the course of the long flight across the Pacific, Maria had developed quite an infatuation with Dr. Radhakrishnan and insisted that she be allowed to stay in Delhi for a while; Mr.

Salvador had grudgingly granted her a suite of her own, just down the hall from Dr. Radhakrishnan's. Mr. Salvador was staying at the other end of the hall in lesser but still opulent surroundings.

When Dr. Radhakrishnan arrived at the Imperial, a pleasant surprise awaited: his entire extended family. They all cheered and hugged and kissed him right there in the parlor of his suite and then moved downstairs to a banquet room for a lengthy dinner. Dr. Radhakrishnan felt like a conquering hero back from the wars, being welcomed home by the maharaja with a royal feast.

After that, Maria had to nurse him through a day or two of hangover, fatigue, and jet lag. When he finally felt ready, he called for a car and told the driver to take him southward down Janpath into the New Delhi South Extension, where, he had been assured, the temporary laboratories of the Radhakrishnan Institute were bustling away.

On his way out of the hotel, he met a young American fellow in the elevator. Dr. Radhakrishnan could have met this man in Antarctica and still recognized him immediately as an American high-tech entrepreneur. He was in his early thirties. He had long hair that had probably been cut in the mirror at home. He beard. He wore glasses. He was dressed in blue jeans, sneakers, a decent enough striped white shirt, and a crumpled wool blazer. He was carrying a briefcase in one hand and a rather formidable laptop computer in the other.

And one other key point: unlike everyone else he had met since the beginning of the flight to Delhi, he did not make any effort to brown-nose. "Hi, you must be Radhakrishnan," the man said. "I'm Peter Zeldovich. Most people I work with call me Zeldo. That's my handle on most e-mail systems. Nice to meet you." He put his laptop on the floor of the elevator and stuck out hand; Dr. Radhakrishnan shook it, limply and reluctantly.

"Gotten over your jet lag yet?" this man said as they took the elevator down to lobby level.

Dr. Radhakrishnan had already forgotten his proper name. He was terrible with names. Now he knew why everyone called this person Zeldo. His real names vanished instantly from memory; Zeldo lingered unremovably on the doorstep of the mind, like a steaming turd left behind by a stray dog. Hopefully they would not be working together very much.

Naturally they would not have to work together. It was Dr. Radhakrishnan's institute, he was in charge, he could send Zeldo back to his festering West Coast bachelor pad whenever he got to be too annoying. Which might not take very long, at this rate. "Heard you were on your way in to the Barracks, so I thought I'd hitch a ride with you," Zeldo said as they exited into the lobby. "The Barracks?"

"Yeah. That's what we've been calling the temporary institute. Guess you haven't seen it yet."

"Why would you call it by that name?" Of course it was superfluous even to ask questions like this; these breezy American chaps had to have nicknames for everything.

"Because that's what it is. It's down south, on the edge of this military zone-" "The Defence Colony?"

"Yeah." Zeldo reached for one of the doors, almost colliding with the turbaned doorman who opened it for him. Dr. Radhakrishnan had only been back in the civilized world for a couple of days, but now it felt as if he had never left, and as if the years in Elton were nothing more than a frigid nightmare, "Anyway, the temporary lab facilities are set up in these barracks-type buildings. Soviet concrete things, you know. It'll be okay for the time being, I guess."

Zeldo had the presence of mind to allow the driver to open the car door for him, and he slid into the seat ahead of Dr. Radhakrishnan. He folded up his long legs so that his knees were pressed against the back of the driver's seat and piled the briefcase and the computer on his lap. The driver pulled out on to Janpath, ignoring the painted lanes and creating his own, in the traditional local style.

"I'm the chiphead from Pacware," Zeldo said, as if Dr. Radhakrishnan were supposed to know what that meant. "What is Pacware?"

"Pacific Netware. I design logic devices - chips - for them." "Am I to gather that you are connected, in some way, with my institute?"

Zeldo gaped at him. "Sure," he said. "I'm doing the hardware design on the silicon portion of the new model biochips." "I was not aware that a new model was required."

Zeldo shrugged. "New models are always required," he said. "Hardware design is a fast-moving target. You don't update your designs every few months, you're working with Stone Age technology."

Dr. Radhakrishnan was finding it very difficult to keep his temper under control. Perhaps he was still just a bit irritable from his travels. For him to come home in triumph and finally to receive the recognition he deserved, and then to be stuck in an elevator, and a car, with this laid-back Yank who told him he was back in the Stone Age-

But he held his tongue, because he had an inkling that Zeldo might be half right. The chips they put into the baboons were off-the-shelf models with limited capabilities. It was a basic fact, with electronics, that if you designed a customized chip to do a particular job, it could work thousands of times faster than an off-the-shelf model.

If Zeldo could do this job properly and build a new, specialized chip for this purpose, it might vastly improve the capabilities of Dr. Radhakrishnan's implant.

Actually, bringing in a "chiphead" from a hot company like Pacific Netware was a brilliant idea. He wished he had thought of it himself. He wondered who had thought of it.

"Did they try to set you up with a babe?" Zeldo said. "I'm sorry? A babe?"

"Yeah. A chick. You know, a prostitute." Dr. Radhakrishnan wished that Zeldo had not used this word. "They did with me," Zeldo said. "Bought me a first class ticket on British Airways to get me over here from San Francisco. Soon as I get on, this incredible woman sits down next to me. She was playing footsy with me before we even pulled away from the gate. God, she was a hot lady."