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I would have kept you longer if Shelby Preparatory hadn’t been residential. Even so, I was always there to help you. I let you use my contacts for your studies. When you were on break, I took you to legislative briefings, agency hearings—not because I wanted to, but because you wanted to know how it all worked. I didn’t drag you into the GS track. You wanted it.”
    Thackery squirmed. It was true enough—for a long time he had taken the lead, had gladly applied himself toward making real what had seemed a sparkling vision. Until very recently he had not even realized that it was she who had planted that vision.
    Andra was not finished. “You made a commitment, and I supported you. We both worked very hard for a long time for this. You’re a thoroughbred, Merritt. I haven’t trained you, others have, but I know the course. You’re very close to a big hurdle, and I’m not going to allow you to refuse the jump. I expect you to go back. I will not let you quit.”
    Torn between incompatible yearnings, Thackery could not mount an effective defense. “All I want is your support,” he said pleadingly, his eyes wet. “Why can’t you give me that?”
    “Because if you stay here, you’re going to fail,” she said coldly. “Not just fail to live up to your potential. Did any of the track-jumpers who came into Georgetown last? No. You know what happened to them. It didn’t matter how bright they were. It didn’t matter how much they wanted it. They didn’t have the background, and they didn’t know how the system worked. They were outsiders, and they stayed outsiders until they gave up. And that’s what will happen to you if you don’t come back with me.”
    “I can’t,” he said helplessly. “I can’t.”
    She stood, and for a long moment searched his face with a hard gaze. “You mean you won’t. Which tells me not only what you think of me, but what you think of yourself. And I don’t like either part of that message.” Stopping at the door, she looked back. “I’m going to arrange a prepaid fare in your name for the transatlantic shuttle, one that’ll be good for the next three months. I hope you won’t be too proud or wait too long to use it.”
    For a long time, Thackery had cause to wonder if Andra had been right.
    He discovered quickly that the Tsiolkovsky students were no less intellectually able than those at Georgetown. Hobbled by his weak background in physical science, Thackery barely made an impression, much less a splash, in his classes and engineering project team—just as Andra had predicted. Nearly all of his previous training, save for the advanced mathematics, was useless. It took him a month to reach the point where he could follow conversations, and three months until he could contribute to them.
    But he did not go back. He viewed the expiration of the shuttle ticket to be a message to Andra, a message that said, You’re wrong, Andra. I can, loo, make it here .
    Yet by the end of the first year, Thackery had come to the sobering realization that he would in all likelihood never catch up to his new trackmates. He had started too far behind in a race in which there were no shortcuts. He took solace in knowing that he was stretching himself, was learning how to sustain a higher level of effort than he had ever needed before. And he held on to the hope that though he might never be the best again, he would be good enough.
    Toward the end of his second year, he sent Andra a letter that both took cognizance of and ignored the breach between them. He filled it with personal social details and his perceptions of London and environs, while avoiding mention of his studies or plans. A month later, he received a short reply from her in which she similarly avoided any mention of Tsiolkovsky. The fact that she responded at all he took to mean that she had come to at least a grudging understanding that he was not coming back to Georgetown; the way in which she responded suggested that they