Beggars in Spain Read Free Page A

glad you asked that, Mrs. Camden. Because there are side effects.” Susan paused; she was enjoying herself. “Compared to their age mates, the nonsleep children—who have not had IQ genetic manipulation—are more intelligent, better at problem-solving, and more joyous.”
    Camden took out a cigarette. The archaic, filthy habit surprised Susan. Then she saw that it was deliberate: Roger Camden was drawing attention to an ostentatious display to draw attention away from what he was feeling. His cigarette lighter was gold, monogrammed, innocently gaudy.
    “Let me explain,” Susan said. “REM sleep bombards the cerebral cortex with random neural firings from the brain stem; dreaming occurs because the poor besieged cortex tries so hard to make sense of the activated images and memories. It spends a lot of energy doing that. Without that energy expenditure, nonsleep cerebrums save the wear-and-tear and do better at coordinating real-life input. Thus, greater intelligence and problem-solving.
    “Also, doctors have known for sixty years that antidepressants, which lift the mood of depressed patients, also suppress REM sleep entirely. What they have proved in the past ten years is that the reverse is equally true: suppress REM sleep and people don’t get depressed. The nonsleep kids are cheerful, outgoing… joyous . There’s no other word for it.”
    “At what cost?” Mrs. Camden said. She held her neck rigid, but the corners of her jaw worked.
    “No cost. No negative side effects at all.”
    “So far,” Mrs. Camden shot back.
    Susan shrugged. “So far.”
    “They’re only four years old! At the most!”
    Ong and Krenshaw were studying her closely. Susan saw the moment the Camden woman realized it; she sank back into her chair, drawing her fur coat around her, her face blank.
    Camden did not look at his wife. He blew a cloud of cigarette smoke. “Everything has costs, Dr. Melling.”
    She liked the way he said her name. “Ordinarily, yes. Especially in genetic modification. But we honestly have not been able to find any here, despite looking.” She smiled directly into Camden’s eyes. “Is it too much to believe that just once the universe has given us something wholly good, wholly a step forward, wholly beneficial? Without hidden penalties?”
    “Not the universe. The intelligence of people like you,” Camden said, surprising Susan more than anything else that had gone before. His eyes held hers. She felt her chest tighten.
    “I think,” Dr. Ong said dryly, “that the philosophy of the universe may be beyond our concerns here. Mr. Camden, if you have no further medical questions, perhaps we can return to the legal points Ms. Sullivan and Mr. Jaworski have raised. Thank you, Dr. Melling.”
    Susan nodded. She didn’t look again at Camden. But she knew what he said, how he looked, that he was there.
     
    The house was about what she had expected, a huge mock Tudor on Lake Michigan north of Chicago. The land was heavily wooded between the gate and the house, open between the house and the surging water. Patches of snow dotted the dormant grass. Biotech had been working with the Camdens for four months, but this was the first time Susan had driven to their home.
    As she walked toward the house another car drove up behind her.
    No, a truck, continuing around the curved driveway to a service entry at the side of the house. One man rang the service bell; a second began to unload a plastic-wrapped playpen from the back of the truck. White, with pink and yellow bunnies. Susan briefly closed her eyes.
    Camden opened the door himself. She could see his effort not to look worried. “You didn’t have to drive out, Susan; I’d have come into the city!”
    “No, I didn’t want you to do that, Roger. Mrs. Camden is here?”
    “In the living room.” Camden led her into a large room with a stone fireplace. English country-house furniture, and prints of dogs or boats, all hung eighteen inches too high; Elizabeth