“Continue, please,” he invited, and his voice was so calm she felt almost flustered by its very lack of agitation. She paused a moment longer, then glanced down at her memo pad and scrolled through two or three pages of preliminary, hysteria-soothing notes it had just become obvious she wasn’t going to need.

“In addition to my purely laboratory research,” she said after a second or two, “I’ve been doing some extensive searches of your data bases.” Which was one hell of a lot more work than it would have been back home with proper library computer support. “In particular, I was searching for the earliest medical records—dating back to your Founding, if at all possible—which might have shed some corroborative light on my lab findings. Unfortunately, while there is a good bit of information, including case history notes on a surprising number of individual colonists, I was unable to find any data on the specific points which concerned me. Which,” she said, meeting his eyes with a frankness she had not intended to bring to this meeting before she got a feel for his personality, “was one reason for my concern.”

“You thought that perhaps those records had been suppressed?” Sullivan asked her, and chuckled at her expression. “My Lady, for all your frankness, you’ve been very cautious in your choice of words. Bearing that in mind, did you really think it would require a—what is the Manticoran slang phrase? a hyperphysicist, I believe?—to deduce the reason for your concern?” He shook his head at her. “I suppose it’s possible, even probable, that Father Church’s servants have suppressed… unpleasant information from time to time in our history, but if so, they did it without Father Church’s approval. Or the Tester’s.” Her eyebrows rose against her will, and he chuckled again. “My Lady, we believe God calls us to the Test of Life, which requires us to test both ourselves and our beliefs and our assumptions as we grow and mature in His love. How could we do that, and what validity would our Tests have, if Father Church itself distorted the data which forms the basis upon which we are to make them?”

“I… hadn’t thought of it that way, Your Grace,” Allison said slowly, and this time Sullivan laughed out loud.

“No, My Lady, but you’ve been rather more polite about it than some off-worlders have. We are a people of custom, and one which has traditionally embraced a highly consensual Faith and way of life, yet our Faith is also one of individual conscience in which no one—neither a man’s Steadholder, nor his Protector, nor even the Reverend or the Sacristy—may dictate to him on matters of the spirit. That is the central dynamic of our beliefs, and maintaining it has never been easy. Which is fair enough, for God never promised us the Test would be easy. But it means that, for all our consensuality, we have experienced many periods of intense, even bitter debate and doctrinal combat. I believe that has ultimately strengthened us, but memories of those periods make some of us uneasy about embracing changes in our Church and society. To be perfectly honest, I myself harbor some personal reservations about at least some of the changes—or, perhaps, about the rate of change—which I see around me. Yet not even the priests of Father Church, or perhaps especially not the priests of Father Church, may dictate to the consciences of our flock. Nor may we properly decide that this or that bit of knowledge, however unpleasant we may fear its consequences will be, should be restricted or concealed. So continue with your explanation, please. I may not fully understand it, and it may yet shock or concern me, but as a child of the Tester and of Father Church, it is my duty to hear and at least try to understand… and not to blame the bearer of the news for its content.”