“There’s a reason. I’m a very private person.”
“And I can respect that. But people want to know about the man behind the discovery, wouldn’t you agree? The world is watching, Professor.”
“I’m really not very interesting, Miss Tripp. I think you’ll find me rather boring.”
“I hardly believe that. You’re just being modest.” She flips quickly through her notebook. “Now, from what I can gather, you were born in … Headly?”
A softball question, to get things started. “Yes, my parents raised horses.”
“And you were an only child.”
“That’s correct.”
“Sounds like you didn’t much care for it.”
His tone, evidently, has betrayed him. “It was a childhood like any other. There were some good points, some bad.”
“Too isolated?”
Logan shrugs. “When you’re my age, these sorts of feelings soften a great deal, though at the time I probably saw it that way. In the end, it wasn’t the life for me—that’s really all there is to say.”
“Still, Headly is a very traditional place. Some would even say backward.”
“I don’t think the people there would see it that way.”
A quick smile. “Perhaps I misspoke. What I mean is, it’s a long way from a horse farm in Headly to heading the chancellor’s task force on resettlement. Would that be fair to say?”
“I suppose. But I never had any doubts that I would go to university. My parents were country people, but they let me chart my own course.”
She looks at him warmly. “So, a bookish boy, then.”
“If you like.”
This is followed, once again, by a brief trip to her notes. “Now,” she says, “I have here that you’re married.”
“I’m afraid your information is a little out of date. I’m divorced.”
“Oh? When was that?”
The question makes him uncomfortable. Still, it is a matter of public record; he has no reason not to answer. “Six years ago. All very amicable. We’re still good friends.”
“And your ex-wife, she’s a judge, yes?”
“She was, with the Sixth Family Court. But she’s left that now.”
“And you have a son, Race. What does he do?”
“He’s a pilot in the air service.”
Her face brightens. “How marvelous.”
Logan nods. Obviously she knows all of this.
“And what does he have to say about your discoveries?”
“We haven’t really talked about it, not recently.”
“But he must be proud of you,” she says. “His own father, in charge of an entire continent.”
“I think that’s a bit of an overstatement, don’t you?”
“I’ll rephrase. Going back to North America—you’d have to concede it’s pretty controversial.”
Ah, thinks Logan. Here we go. “Not to most people. Not according to the polls.”
“But certainly to some. The church, for instance. What do you make of their opposition, Professor?”
“I don’t make anything.”
“But surely you’ve thought about it.”
“It’s not my place to hold one voice above any other. North America—not just the place but the idea of the place—has sat at the center of humankind’s sense of itself for a millennium. The story of Amy, whatever the truth is, belongs to everyone, not just the politicians or the clergy. My job is simply to take us there.”
“And what do you think the truth is?”
“It doesn’t matter what I think. People will have to judge the evidence for themselves.”
“That sounds very … dispassionate. Detached, even.”
“I wouldn’t say that. I care a great deal, Miss Tripp. But I don’t leap to conclusions. Take these names on the stone. Who were they? All I can tell you is that they were people, that they lived and died a very long time ago, and that somebody thought well enough of them to make a memorial. That’s what the evidence says. Maybe we’ll learn more, maybe we won’t. People can fill in the blanks however they like, but that’s faith, not science.”
For a moment she appears nonplussed; he is not being a cooperative subject. Then, reviewing her notes again: “I’d like to go back to your childhood a moment. Would you say you come from a religious family, professor?”
“Not especially.”
“But somewhat.” Her tone is leading.
“We went to church,” Logan concedes, “if that’s what you’re asking. It’s hardly unusual in that part of the world. My mother was Ammalite. My father wasn’t really anything.”
“So she was a follower of Amy,” Nessa says, nodding along. “Your mother.”
“It’s just the way she was raised. There are beliefs, and there are habits. In her case, I’d say it was mostly a habit.”
“What about you? Would you say you’re a religious man, Professor?”
So, the heart of the matter. He feels a growing caution. “I’m a historian. It seems like more than enough to occupy myself.”
“But history could be said to be a kind of faith. The past isn’t something you can actually know, after all.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”