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maze. It sniffed around the little space, squeaking.
    â€˜We have here a subject: the s , as we call it. In a moment I’ll open the entry door and it’ll attempt to find a way through this maze of transparent tubing. All the subjects – the experimentals and the controls – have already learned a path through the maze. The experimentals have received mild doses of the various preparations in their water, taken ad libitum. This particular subject is one of a group which has received a locally obtained psylocibe derivative. The mean time hitherto has been around seventy seconds—’
    â€˜For both the experimentals and the controls?’ the Pole asked.
    Janis released the entry lever and the mouse sauntered down the pipe. ‘Yes. I don’t wish to obscure the fact that, so far, the null hypothesis—’
    ping
    The s had pressed the switch at the end of the maze and was nibbling its reinforcer, a square centimetre of marmalade toast. The timer, wired to the exit lever and the reward switch, stood at 32 seconds.
    Silently, Janis removed the mouse and tried again with a control.
    She ran through a dozen variations: mice doped with betel-juice, opiates, coca, caffeine…
    It wasn’t a fluke, the psylocibe-heads were consistently twice as fast, way outside even experimenter effect.
    She stared at the men, puzzled.
    â€˜I must set up some double-blind protocols,’ she said. ‘Up to now, frankly, it hasn’t been worth it. At least, I assume you were interested in major effects.’
    â€˜We certainly are,’ said the German. ‘And this isn’t a new preparation?’
    â€˜Cumulative?’ said the Russian when Janis shook her head.
    â€˜It’s possible. Obviously, more…’
    â€˜Research is necessary, huh?’
    They all laughed.
    She worried that they’d think it was a set-up, lowering their expectations like that and then producing something so interesting; but no, they were sold on it. Her contract was renewed for six months; she was to take on a technician, check out all the possibilities.
    As she escorted them down the corridor the Russian sniffed. He nudged her.
    â€˜Is maybe not patriotic,’ he said, ‘but the Lebanese is better, no?’
    She smiled back at him blankly, then quickened her pace to hide her blush.
    Oh shit.
    Â 
    Fonthill Road, centre of the garment district. Great automatic factories spun and wove, cut and stitched in towers of glass and steel. The car-free street thronged with people who all, especially the women, seemed to Jordan to take up far too much space: jammed with bustles, he thought dourly as he skirted crinolines, ducked under parasols, manoeuvred around trains. Modesty’s own window displays – with their fractal chintzes, Mandelbrot paisleys and swathes of computer-generated lace applied as if with a spray-gun to every conceivable garment surface and trim – looked tasteful and restrained against the styles of the Bible-belts of Florida, Liberia and everywhere else that everybody’s daughter wanted to look like a televangelist’s wife.
    Four minutes after noon. Five people ahead of him in the queue for the Bundesbank cashpoint at the corner of Seven Sisters Road. Jordan shuffled and fumed, stared over their heads at the Fuller domes of the old Development Area. He keyed in the number at 12.13. The machine laboured and muttered to itself for forty finger-drumming seconds, then coughed and spat out a thick wad of crumpled currency. And another, and again.
    Jordan snatched them up and almost ran off while the screen was still offering a succession of financial services in what seemed increasingly desperate pleas to get the money back.
    Back at the office building he headed straight for the toilet and locked himself away in a lavatory stall. He knew he was safe there – say what you like about the Elders, they were genuine about certain kinds of privacy. It was understood