The president watched the door close behind his science advisor, and sighed again. There were times when he wondered if all the fight he’d had to get to this office had been worth it; if he wouldn’t be happier back in Congress. He’d always liked politics, but the oval office was a pretty big job for an Iowa farm boy.
It would be pretty big for anybody, he thought. And the man who had wanted it, the man I defeated to get it—God, no. “Mary Lynn, who do we have next?”
“Secretary of the Interior, sir.”
“Very good. Send him in.”
FOURTEEN
Admiral Jardin looked with disgust at the document. He read it carefully, then again, before looking at Dr. Hasslein. “I don’t like it,” Snapper Jardin said.
“You are not asked to like it,” Hasslein told him. “It is a valid order from the Presidential Commission of Inquiry, and countersigned by General Brody for the president. I take it you are not satisfied, Admiral. Would you prefer to call General Brody yourself?”
“No. All right, I’ll deliver the chimpanzees to your National Security Agency interrogation team. I don’t seem to have much choice. But I will be damned if I’m going to cook up a press release about the apes needing rest and privacy and seclusion. I won’t cover for your damned wrecking crew, Hasslein. Leave the Navy out of your bloody intrigues.”
“All we are trying to do is to find what happened to Colonel Taylor, Admiral. Surely you want to cooperate in that?”
Jardin frowned. “Yeah. But I don’t think you’re going about it the right way. OK, what do you want for facilities?”
“Perhaps an empty hospital wing at Camp Pendleton?” Hasslein suggested. “Somewhere on a guarded post, and since one of the apes is pregnant, medical facilities wouldn’t be a bad idea. After all, Admiral, we don’t want to harm these animals. We only want to be sure they’ve told us everything we need to know.”
“I suppose. I still think my people could have handled the job. OK, you’ll get your hospital. We have a whole clinic not being used right now. It was part of the reception center for the Viet Nam POW’s coming home. Ought to have everything you need. We have tape recording setups and projection screens for debriefings of our troops—”
“Excellent,” Hasslein purred. “And you need not bother to arrange transportation. I’ll take care of that. You just alert the guards at Camp Pendleton that we’ll be there before noon tomorrow.” He reached across the desk to take the documents.
Admiral Jardin smoothly held them out of Hasslein’s reach. “I’ll keep this, if you don’t mind.”
Hasslein frowned. “Why?”
Jardin slammed his open palm against the desk. “Because I still don’t like any part of this, and if I didn’t have it in writing from the president I wouldn’t do it. I’ll keep these orders, Hasslein. I may need them some day.”
“Nonsense,” Hasslein said. He shrugged. “But if that’s the way you feel about it, there’s nothing I can do. Just be sure to have that interrogation suite ready for me, Admiral.” Hasslein smiled again, but there was no warmth in the look, and Admiral Jardin did not want to meet the scientist’s gaze.
“You still have not explained what they will do with us, Lewis,” Cornelius said. He watched the rolling brown hills of Orange County flicker past as the big limousine drove south on the San Diego freeway. Many of the hills were covered with imitation adobe houses, all crowded together inside small walled communities, while around them were empty brown hills again. “I gather we have no choice about coming with you.”
“I’m afraid you don’t,” Lewis said. He sat with Stevie; the two were facing the chimpanzees in the rear of the limousine. A glass partition separated the four from a Marine officer and his driver up front. Two Marine staff cars filled with armed men trailed behind them. “And I don’t know what to advise you. A number of the commissioners weren’t satisfied with your answers, so it wasn’t too difficult to get them to agree to a more, ah, professional, interrogation. I got the impression that if the Commission hadn’t agreed, this would happen anyway, so I went along with it . . .”
“Lewis!” Stevie said.
He shrugged. “As I told you, it wouldn’t have made any difference, darling. They’d have been subjected to interrogation anyway. At least this way the Presidential Commission has authority in the matter. They can’t do anything without consulting us. If we let it get out of the Commission’s hands . . .”
“But who’s behind all this?” Stephanie asked.
Lewis shook his head. “I don’t know. I suspect Hasslein.”
“Dr. Hasslein was very kind to me,” Zira said. “I wouldn’t think he’d do anything to hurt us.”
“Don’t bet on it,” Lewis said. He looked helplessly at the apes. “You understand, as a member of the Presidential Commission, I can’t advise you to lie or withhold information. But as your physician and friend—be careful.”
“These men are experts,” Stevie said. “They can make you say things you don’t mean, or—”
“Why would they do that?” Cornelius asked.
“I don’t know,” Stevie said. “But be careful, please.”
“And be polite,” Lewis warned.
Cornelius laughed. “You did hear that, did you not, Zira?”
“I heard. Lewis, have they—who are these men? How can they do this to us?”
“We did more to Colonel Taylor,” Cornelius reminded her. “They have as much right to treat us as animals as we did to treat their pilots . . .”
“But we didn’t know,” Zira protested.
“I wouldn’t mention Colonel Taylor at all, unless they ask,” Lewis warned. “And then I think you’d best stick to your original story—here we are.”
The car turned off the freeway and down a side road. It drove past the huge dome-shape of the San Onofre nuclear power plant, and Lewis and Stevie had to explain that to the apes.
“Atomic power?” Cornelius said wonderingly. “Would that have anything to do with atom bomb?”
“Not really,” Lewis said. “Same principles, but entirely different application. Atom bombs explode. This can’t.”
“But all these things really are human inventions,” Cornelius said. “I had always suspected so.”
The camp gates were just ahead. The car stopped and two Marine sentries peered inside, then waved them through with a salute. The car drove past barracks and administrative offices, and through the main part of the Marine camp. Then it climbed into more barren hills, until all the other buildings were lost from sight. The two staff cars followed.
They rounded another low hill and saw a complex of single-story wooden buildings with green roofs. The whole area had an abandoned look despite a number of cars parked in front of the central building. Two Marines stood guard out front, and they saw several others go into another building to their left.
Admiral Jardin came out to greet them. “Welcome to Camp Pendleton,” he said. “You should be comfortable here. We’ve arranged for our guests and the necessary scientific people to stay in the central wing here. Other personnel as needed will stay over there. We have everything you’ll need, I think.”
Lewis Dixon nodded. “Thank you, Admiral.”
Victor Hasslein came out of the central building. Four civilians accompanied him, but Hasslein did not introduce them. They stood around the limousine, and when the apes got out, stayed carefully behind them. “Very good, Admiral,” Hasslein said. “We’ll take custody of them now.”
Jardin nodded. “Yeah. You’ll remember this is a Navy facility, Dr. Hasslein.”
“Certainly. You needn’t be concerned, Admiral. We’ll take very good care of your guests. And of course, we now assume full responsibility . . .”
“Yeah,” Admiral Jardin said. He looked unhappily at Lewis and Stevie, then back at Hasslein. “Yeah. You sure do.”