Bard Lane took two steps to the curbing, sat down and held his face in his hands. Nearby, a wooden building crackled as the flames bit into it. The project fire engines screamed to a stop, sirens ridiculous in comparison to the memory of the scream of the dying Beatty One — a mosquito trying to outshout an eagle. Somebody rested a steady hand on Bard Lane’s shoulder. He looked up and saw the stolid, seamed face of Adamson. Tears had cut channels in the dust on his cheeks.
“Nick, I... I...”
Adamson’s voice was gruff. “I’ll take an emergency crew down and see what she did when she hit. If we’re lucky, she’ll be five miles from the village. Better go get on the radio, Bard, and give the word. Then I think you ought to make an announcement over the PA.” Adamson walked solidly away.
He walked to his office. The guard had voluntarily given up his assignment. The project personnel stood in the street. Not large groups. Two or three or four. Low voices. Long silences. They glanced quickly at him and then away. He went through the outer office. Bess Reilly sat at her desk. She sat with her forehead against the top of her typewriter. Her bony shoulders shook but she made no sound.
After he advised Sachson and Washington by coded radio, he obtained a clear circuit over the PA for every amplifier in the area.
He spoke slowly. “This is Lane. We don’t know what happened. We may never know who or what was responsible. You will be wondering about your jobs. I doubt very much whether we will be given a second chance. By the day after tomorrow we’ll have the checks ready for termination pay for most of you. Certain clerical, stock record, and lab employees will be retained for a time. A list of those who will be needed will be posted on the bulletin board tomorrow afternoon. One thing. Don’t ever feel that because of what just happened, all of what we have done is wasted. We learned things. If we’re not given a chance to use them, someone else will, sooner or later. They will learn from the mistakes we made. All employees will please proceed immediately to the time clocks and remove their time cards. Turn them in to Mr. Nolan. Mr. Nolan, after there has been time for all cards to be picked up, send someone to gather up the unclaimed ones. That’s the only way, I’m afraid, that we’ll ever learn who made the... first and last trip on the Beatty One. Dr. Inly, please report to my office. Benton, rope off the takeoff area, and advise me when the count is down to a one hour safety period. Those of you who lost personal possessions in the barracks fire, prepare the standard claim form. You can get forms and instructions from Miss Mees in the Accounting Office. Brainard, start your labor crews to work torch-cutting, for scrap, the tower that fell outside the radiation area. The club will be closed tonight. And... I don’t know how to say this properly, but I want to thank every single individual for... devotion and loyalty beyond anything I ever experienced before. Thank you.”
He released the switch and looked up. Sharan Inly was standing in the doorway. She walked to his desk. “You wanted to see me.”
He grinned in a very tired way. “Thanks, Sharan.”
“For what?”
“For being bright enough not to start commiserating with me, telling me how sorry you are and how it wasn’t my fault and all that.”
She sat down, hung one denimed leg over the arm of the chair. “There isn’t anything to say. Our good pal who calls himself Raul got to one of the group and fixed us. On the other side of the world somebody feels very, very good, I imagine.”
“What are you going to do, Sharan?”
“They’ll find another slot to put me in. Maybe I’ll be back in the Pentagon, testing the Oedipus complexes of quartermaster second lieutenants. Something frightfully thrilling along that line. But now I have a hobby.”
“Hobby?”
“Finding out how they worked that long-range hypnosis. There are a few people I can trust not to think I’ve lost my mind when I give them the story.”
“But you won’t be taking off immediately, I’m afraid. There’ll be an investigation. We’ll have the star parts. You and I and Adamson and Leeber and Kornal and a few of the others. Stick around, Dr. Inly. See the big three-ring circus. Hear the tigers howl for meat. Pay your money and see the seven wonders of the world.”
A storm front was moving in from the north. The day was unexpectedly and unusually muggy. Extra chairs had been brought into General Sachson’s conference room. Two bored girls sat at a small table near the windows, supplementing the recording devices with the aid of two stenotype machines. They had covered several yards of the white tape with the staggered letters. The door was closed against the reporters and photographers who waited in the corridor.
Bard Lane sat at the witness table. His armpits were sodden and he had a dry, stained taste in his mouth.
Senator Leedry was a dry wisp of a man, tiny and withered, but with a plump and arrogant little paunch. He smiled as he spoke. His baritone voice was alternately scalpel, cutting torch, and caress.
“I appreciate, Dr. Lane, your attempts to explain technical data in a manner that we poor laymen can understand. Believe me, we appreciate it. But I guess we’re not as bright as you imagine. At least, I’m not. Now, if it isn’t too much trouble, would you explain once again to us, your theory about the accident.”
“The A-six uses what they call, in Army slang, ‘soft’ radiation. The shielding also acts as an inhibitor. When actuated, the pellets are fed down to the CM chamber for combustion. The CM chamber utilizes the principles of the old shaped charge to achieve thrust. The controls had not been installed for the A-six drive. There is no possibility of an accidental transfer of pellets to the drive chamber.”
The Secretary of War, Logan Brightling, cleared his throat to interrupt. Cartoons depicted him perfectly as a hairless Kodiak bear wearing a wing collar. “Why was the Beatty One equipped with the hot stuff for the A-six drive before the controls were installed?”
“In spite of the inhibitors, the pellets generate appreciable heat. The Beatty One had an efficient method of utilizing this heat for self-contained power. To use that power for the necessary welding and structural work was more efficient than attempting to bring outside power to the ship. You could say that once we had the internal power source working, the Beatty One was helping to build herself. To continue, I have explained that I do not feel that it could have been an accident. The wall chart shows a schematic cross section.” Bard Lane walked over to the chart. “A man could enter here. It is the normal inspection procedure to check the shielding at regular intervals and take a careful count of all escaping radiation to determine whether or not it is well within safety limits. From this passage a man can work his way completely around the shielding and the drive chamber. At this point is a port that can only be used when the storage section contains no pellets. Beyond the port the radiation will kill a man in approximately twelve minutes. Once through that port it would take a person not more than three minutes to manually dislodge the pellets from their niches in the conveyor and drop them down onto the plate above the drive chamber. In a few minutes more the person could clamber down there, activate the motor on the plate and let the pellets drop into the drive chamber itself. Without the required inhibition, the CM would be instantaneously achieved and the ship would take off. Inspection of the area where the Beatty One stood has shown us that there is more residual radiation than would normally be expected. Thus we assume that the drive chamber was fed with more pellets than would normally have been carried there at one time by the conveyor, and thus we can assume that it was not an accidental actuation of the conveyor itself.”