The Ugly Little Boy by Isaac Asimov, Robert Silverberg Page B
Authors: Isaac Asimov, Robert Silverberg
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to her new home, storing away the rest. That was done quickly enough. She had no houseplants to worry about, no cats, no pets of any kind. Her work had been the only thing that really mattered: the children, always the children, no need for plants or pets.
But in her prudent way she arranged to maintain her lease for an indefinite period of time. She was taking very seriously Gerald Hoskins' warning that she might be let go at any moment. Or might want to resign, for that matter: Miss Fellowes knew she should allow for the possibility that the operation at Stasis Technologies would be uncongenial to her, that her role in the project would be unsatisfying, that she might discover very swifdy that it had been a gigantic mistake to have taken the job. She hadn't burned her bridges, not at all: the hospital would be waiting for her return, the children, her apartment.
During those final two weeks, busy as she was, she made several trips across town to the headquarters of Stasis Technologies to help prepare for the arrival of the child from the past. They had given her a procurement staff of three, two young men and a woman, and she provided them with an extensive list of things she would need- medicines, nutritional supplements, even an incubator.
"An incubator?" Hoskins asked.
"An incubator," she said.
"We're not planning to bring back a premature child, Miss Fellowes."
"You don't know what you're bringing back, Dr. Hoskins. You told me so yourself, in just about that many words. You may be bringing a sick child; you may be bringing a weak one; you may be bringing a child who'll fall ill the moment it starts to get modern-day microbes into its system. I want an incubator, at least on a standby basis."
"An incubator. All right."
"And a sterile chamber big enough to contain an active and healthy child, if it turns out that it's too big to live in an incubator."
"Miss Fellowes, be reasonable, please. Our budget is-"
"A sterile chamber. Until we know that it's safe to let that child be contaminated by our air."
"Contamination is unavoidable, I'm afraid. It'll be breathing our microbe-ridden air from the moment it arrives. There's no way we can conduct the Stasis under the germ-free conditions you seem to want. No way, Miss Fellowes."
"I want there to be a way."
Hoskins gave her what she had already come to think of as his patented no-nonsense glare. "This is one that I'm going to win, Miss Fellowes. I appreciate your desire to protect the child from all imaginable risks. But you have no understanding of the physical layout of our equipment, and you've simply got to accept the fact that we can't deliver the child instantly into a perfectly pure isolation chamber. We can't."
"And if the child sickens and dies?"
"Our dinosaur is still in fine health."
"There's no reason to believe that reptiles, prehistoric or otherwise, would be subject to infection by the microorganisms that carry the diseases humans contract. But this is a human being you'll be bringing here, Dr. Hoskins, not a little dinosaur. A member of our own species."
"I appreciate that fact, Miss Fellowes."
"And therefore I ask you to-"
"And I tell you the answer is no. Some risks have to be shouldered here, and microbial infection is one of them. We'll be ready with all possible medical assistance if a problem develops. But we're not going to try to create a miraculous magical 100% safe environment. We're not," Then Hoskins' tone softened. -"Miss Fellowes, just let me say this much. I've got a child myself, a little boy, not even old enough for kindergarten yet. Yes, at my age, and he's the most wonderful thing that ever happened in my life, bar none. I want you to know, Miss Fellowes, that I'm as concerned about the safety of the child that'll be arriving here next week as I would be for my own son Jerry's. And as confident that all will go well as though my own son were involved in the experiment."
Miss Fellowes wasn't sure that the logic of his argument
But in her prudent way she arranged to maintain her lease for an indefinite period of time. She was taking very seriously Gerald Hoskins' warning that she might be let go at any moment. Or might want to resign, for that matter: Miss Fellowes knew she should allow for the possibility that the operation at Stasis Technologies would be uncongenial to her, that her role in the project would be unsatisfying, that she might discover very swifdy that it had been a gigantic mistake to have taken the job. She hadn't burned her bridges, not at all: the hospital would be waiting for her return, the children, her apartment.
During those final two weeks, busy as she was, she made several trips across town to the headquarters of Stasis Technologies to help prepare for the arrival of the child from the past. They had given her a procurement staff of three, two young men and a woman, and she provided them with an extensive list of things she would need- medicines, nutritional supplements, even an incubator.
"An incubator?" Hoskins asked.
"An incubator," she said.
"We're not planning to bring back a premature child, Miss Fellowes."
"You don't know what you're bringing back, Dr. Hoskins. You told me so yourself, in just about that many words. You may be bringing a sick child; you may be bringing a weak one; you may be bringing a child who'll fall ill the moment it starts to get modern-day microbes into its system. I want an incubator, at least on a standby basis."
"An incubator. All right."
"And a sterile chamber big enough to contain an active and healthy child, if it turns out that it's too big to live in an incubator."
"Miss Fellowes, be reasonable, please. Our budget is-"
"A sterile chamber. Until we know that it's safe to let that child be contaminated by our air."
"Contamination is unavoidable, I'm afraid. It'll be breathing our microbe-ridden air from the moment it arrives. There's no way we can conduct the Stasis under the germ-free conditions you seem to want. No way, Miss Fellowes."
"I want there to be a way."
Hoskins gave her what she had already come to think of as his patented no-nonsense glare. "This is one that I'm going to win, Miss Fellowes. I appreciate your desire to protect the child from all imaginable risks. But you have no understanding of the physical layout of our equipment, and you've simply got to accept the fact that we can't deliver the child instantly into a perfectly pure isolation chamber. We can't."
"And if the child sickens and dies?"
"Our dinosaur is still in fine health."
"There's no reason to believe that reptiles, prehistoric or otherwise, would be subject to infection by the microorganisms that carry the diseases humans contract. But this is a human being you'll be bringing here, Dr. Hoskins, not a little dinosaur. A member of our own species."
"I appreciate that fact, Miss Fellowes."
"And therefore I ask you to-"
"And I tell you the answer is no. Some risks have to be shouldered here, and microbial infection is one of them. We'll be ready with all possible medical assistance if a problem develops. But we're not going to try to create a miraculous magical 100% safe environment. We're not," Then Hoskins' tone softened. -"Miss Fellowes, just let me say this much. I've got a child myself, a little boy, not even old enough for kindergarten yet. Yes, at my age, and he's the most wonderful thing that ever happened in my life, bar none. I want you to know, Miss Fellowes, that I'm as concerned about the safety of the child that'll be arriving here next week as I would be for my own son Jerry's. And as confident that all will go well as though my own son were involved in the experiment."
Miss Fellowes wasn't sure that the logic of his argument
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