Straight to the point, Susan thought. “He suspected it.”

“Is he still working with prenatal growth regulators?”

“Not officially.”

“But on his own?”

“Some animal research.”

“Out of curiosity, I wonder, or guilt?”

Susan frowned. “I’m sorry?”

He waved his hand—never mind.

The waitress brought sashimi on wooden plates. “Thank you,” Susan said. The waitress bowed and returned a “Thank you.”

“It might be easier,” John said, “if you just told me what you know about me. We can begin there.”

But it was a tall order:What kind of monster do you think I am? Susan told him what Dr. Kyriakides had explained to her—that John was the product of a clandestine research project conducted in the fifties. Before his birth he had received an intrauterine cocktail of cortical growth regulators, human hormones Dr. Kyriakides had isolated under a classified government grant. The purpose of the research was to produce a superior human being, specifically in the neocortical functions—the most highly evolved functions, such as intelligence.

John’s smile was fixed. “ ‘Highly evolved’—sounds like Max. He told you all this?”

“At greater length. And with more breastbeating.”

“He does feel guilty.”

“I have the impression he always did.”

“Did he mention that his ‘government grant’ was by way of a client operation of the CIA? That his name came up twice in the Church Committee hearings?”

“Yes. He says they were funding everything in those days—LSD at McGill, exotic botany at Harvard. Postwar insanity.”

“Did he also mention that he was the closest thing to a father I had for the first several years of my life?”

“Something like that.”

“And that he farmed me out for adoption when the project was closed down?”