As the buses pulled off, he was left alone with a field full of cars that would not start. Alone was the word for it. Failure nestled sorely inside his belly.
He couldn't move the cars. He wouldn't know where to begin. So he just left them and walked away. No one could trace them, he thought. But two worldwide networks had already zeroed in on the brief and dangerous puncture of the ozone shield. And no one in Moscow or Washington was calling it a window to prosperity.
The President had always known the world would end like this, with his looking on as a helpless bystander. The beam had been shot off; Russia had spotted it, too, and would not, under any circumstances, according to the best reports, accept the fact that America could not find a weapon being activated in its own land. But it was true.
The FBI reported that its search for something that produced a fluorocarbon stream had been fruitless. No one knew what to look for. Was it a gun? Was it a balloon? Did it look like a tank? Did it look like a giant can of hair spray?
But there was one good report as the world stumbled blindly toward its death. This from that most secret of organizations, the one he found out about on inauguration day, when the former president had brought him into the bedroom and showed him that red phone.
The President had used it more in the last week than all his predecessors had during their terms of office. The man on the other-end was named Smith, and his voice was sharp and lemony. It was a voice from which the President drew reassurance.
"We tracked down the source to one place, but it had been moved. It's in Hanoi."
"Are you sure?"
"We will only be sure when we get our hands on the damned thing. But our man tracked it to San Gauta and then that led to Hanoi."
"So the commies have it. Why are they being so mysterious?"
"I don't understand, sir."
"More than anything, I would like to get into the Kremlin and find out what the hell is going on. Could you use the older one for that? The Oriental?"
"He's on sort of a sabbatical."
"Now?" screamed the President.
"You don't order this one around like some officer. They have traditions a lot older than our country, or even Europe for that matter, sir."
"Well, what about the end of the world? What about that? Did you make that clear?"
"I think he has heard that before also, sir."
"Wonderful. Do you have any suggestions?"
"If I were you?" said Smith.
"Yes. "
"One of the problems, perhaps the main one, is that the Russians don't believe we are helpless about this fluorocarbon weapon, if it is a weapon."
"But if it's in Hanoi, they have it."
"Maybe they have it now and maybe they don't. If they do, I think they might step away from the brink. Let's hope they do. My man is only following the best lead we have, and frankly, Mr. President, I am glad we have that man doing it. There is no one better in the world we could have."
"I agree. I agree. Go on."
"I would suggest something I have been thinking about for a long time. Give them something to show that we want their trust in this matter. That we are just as interested in finding out about that fluorocarbon device as they are. We should give them some powerful secret of our own. That secret would be a proof of trust."
"Do you have one in mind?"
"Some device. We must have scores that they would be interested in. But make sure it is not one they think we think they already know about. The one thing we have to be in this matter is absolutely open. We have no choice, sir. I mean you'll have to open it all up."
"That is frightening, Smith."
"This is not a springtime of peace, sir."
"I wonder what my cabinet will think. What the Joint Chiefs will think."
"You don't have much of a choice, sir. You have to give orders."
"You know, Smith, the buck hasn't stopped here. The whole world has."
"Good luck, sir," said Smith.
"And good luck to you."
"Good luck to all of us, sir," said Smith.
The man chosen to bring the secret to Moscow was in his early sixties, a close friend of the President's, a billionaire, a fervent anticommunist, and the owner, of among other things, a technological corporation in the forefront of science.
When he saw what he was supposed to deliver, he almost accused the President of being a traitor. Laid out quite neatly, even to partial Russian translation, was the diagram of America's major missile defense system.
"I won't do it," said McDonald Pease, who possessed a crew cut, a Texas twang, and a doctorate in nuclear physics.
Then he heard about the new missile sites, and he softened a bit. Then he heard about a device that may have been the cause of the Russians' alarm, and he softened totally,
"Of course I'm going. We could all fry like biscuits in a desert. What sort of hound dog lunatic would play around with our little ozone shield? Sweet rib-snappin' muskrat. There won't even be a roach left on this planet. Give the Ruskies everything. Let's get this world back to being just generally dangerous. Holy cowdung. What is going on?"
"Your plane's waiting, Hal," said the President. That was McDonald Pease's nickname. With a first name like his, a nickname became mandatory.
With this one move the President was not only revealing a major American secret, but committing perhaps the shrewdest bargainer in the West. Pease would need it all, the President knew. What he did not know was that McDonald "Hal" Pease did not stand a chance, and was going to make matters even worse by being honest.
Chapter 12
McDonald Pease arrived in Moscow aboard a specially chartered jet given clearance to land in a vacant airstrip by the Soviet government.
He wore a Stetson hat and a four-thousand-dollar London suit. The chill wind of the autumn snows almost ripped the skin off his face. He didn't care. He hated these people. The only thing they ever did was steal technology and put poison into the minds of people better left to their own devices.
But more than that. He felt they were the most consistent liars the world had ever seen-and that was going some, considering his business partners and worldwide diplomacy, which he knew was a polite term for fraud.
The reason the Ruskies and other Marxists excelled at the blatant lie, Pease calculated, was the way they treated the word. In the tradition of the monotheistic religions, the word was supposed to carry the truth. Not that Christians, Jews, and Muslims always told the truth. But they were supposed to.
In Marxist-Leninist ideology, words were just tools to exhort. Agitprop. It had been that way since the beginning of Marxist-Leninist ideology and it was that way now. So even though the world was at the brink of destruction, it still turned the stomach of McDonald "Hal" Pease to be bringing plans for an American defense to the Russians themselves in an effort toward mutual trust.
Trust? Who knew what they meant by trust? The word probably had a special meaning, like their meaning for "peace." Namely, that lull in fighting between wars that would ultimately lead to their conquest of the world.
A Russian offered his own coat so that Mr. Pease would not freeze.
"No," said Pease. He let the wind tear at his skin.
Besides, they had brought cars right to the airplane. He counted all his people entering the cars and counted them again when they left. He'd started with twelve, and twelve got out of the cars inside the Kremlin walls.
The Premier had that typical Russian face: something that looked squashed. He had thick stubby hands. He expressed cautious optimism that America was willing to share her secrets.
They were in a large room. Behind the Premier were twelve Russian officers in wicker chairs. There were two translators and a large mirror on one of the walls. The fluorescent lights wouldn't have passed muster, thought Pease, in a Mexican junk heap.