“I didn’t,” she said frankly. “I just don’t know enough—and there are a lot of problems with the hypothesis that I don’t have a way to resolve. But it made me think about what mass is.”

“Mmh.” His eyes were closed, but his hand slid down her back and cupped her behind, warm and substantial. He jiggled it, gently. “There’s some. I’m pretty sure that’s mass.”

“Yes. So’s that.” She slid a hand down between them and cupped his testicles. Lightly, but it made him open his eyes.

“Point taken,” he said, and moved his hand to the small of her back. “So?”

“What do you think happens to us when we die?”

That woke him completely, though it took a moment to assemble words.

“When we die,” he said slowly. “If you mean in terms of our souls, the basic truth is that we don’t know, but we do have faith that we’ll go on existing, and we have a pretty good reason for having said faith. But that’s not what you mean, is it?”

“No. I mean bodies. Physically.”

He changed metaphysical gears, not without a small sense of clashing and grinding.

“You mean something other than just … er … decay?”

“Well, no, that is what I mean—but kind of … beyond rotting.”

He rolled onto his side and she followed, nestling under his chin, much like Adso, but with better-smelling hair.

“Beyond rotting … this is the kind of thing that keeps you up at night? God, what kind of dreams do you have? You’re the scientist here, but so far as I know, the process just goes on … what, dissolving?”

“Dissolution. Yes, exactly.”

“You know, normal people talk about sex in bed, don’t they?”

“Most of them probably talk about what horrible thing their child did during the day, the price of tobacco, or what to do about the sick cow. If they can stay awake. Anyway—I only had the required physics classes in college, so this is pretty basic and it may be completely wrong, and—”

“And nobody will ever be able to prove it one way or the other, so let’s not trouble about that part,” he suggested.

“Good thought. And speaking of smelling …” She turned her head and snuffled gently at his neck. “You smell like gunpowder. You haven’t been hunting, have you?” Her voice held a certain amount of incredulity. Not without reason, but he was slightly nettled.

“I have not. Your da asked me to show a’ chraobh àrd how to load his new musket and fire it without knocking his teeth out.”

“Cyrus Crombie?” she said. “Why? Da isn’t conscripting him into his gang, is he?”