“There. All right. Watch closely now,” Window said. The child saw the stone slabs, went over, sat down, and put his chubby hands flat on one of them. The camera came in closer, and Proteus could make out the symbols on the stone quite clearly. The baby seemed disappointed. He put his hands down flat on the symbols and scowled. Out of camera range, Bradwick chuckled encouragingly. Proteus almost snapped, “Be quiet.” He’d completely forgotten about Bradwick in his intentness.

The child turned, yelled, “Da!” and grinned, apparently at Bradwick.

“What does he do?” Proteus demanded; then he bit his lips, staring. While he’d turned to look at Window, the baby had returned to the stone tablet. Now the camera zoomed in. The small fingers were clumsily following the outlines of the symbols. Proteus noticed that the signs themselves were larger and more pronounced than the others he’d seen. At the same time the baby laughed with delight. When his fingers ran off the symbols he stopped, looking disappointed again and ready to cry. This happened twice. Then, whether his fingers just happened to return to the symbols or what, the baby seemed to be—

Proteus turned, startled, to Window. “What’s happening? He looks as if he’s … listening through his fingers? Or hears something through them?” But before Proteus finished speaking, the baby stood up unsteadily, and then went back to the floor, this time with his ear to the stone. Nothing happened. The child looked outraged. There was a rich, loud laugh—Bradwick’s. “Just exactly what he did earlier,” Bradwick said.

“Sssh,” Proteus said, and Window laughed.

The baby fingered the symbols again, and began jabbering excitedly as if he was trying to … repeat sounds he was hearing through his fingers from the stone? “Gibberish?” Proteus asked, not taking his eyes from the screen.

“That’s what Bradwick thought at first too, but watch now—”

Bradwick squatted down beside the child. “My nephew has given a beautiful demonstration of his earlier performance,” he said, with obvious pleasure. “I didn’t know what to make of it in the beginning. He’s often in here while I work. Curious, I examined the tablet and almost dismissed the whole thing, but something—his aura of discovery, maybe—wouldn’t let me. What did he find so fascinating? Then I thought of repeating his actual motions—”

Bradwick paused significantly, then looked directly at the camera. “When fingered a certain way, those symbols give off sounds that are carried through the fingertips. In this case, the symbols themselves give off the vibrations, but there are other variations, as we’ve already discovered in the last hour or so.”