XIV
The Reviewers Panned Hell Out of It
He woke with a guilty start and looked up at the clock on the ceiling; it was 09:45. Kicking himself free of the covers, he slid his feet to the floor and sprinted for the bathroom. While he was fussing to get the shower adjusted to the right temperature, he bludgeoned his conscience by telling himself that a wide-awake general is more good than a half-asleep general, that there was nothing he could do but hope that HargreavesтАЩs patrols would keep the bomb away from Konkrook until PickeringтАЩs brain-trust came up with one of their own, and that the fact that the commander-in-chief was making sack-time would be much better for morale than the spectacle of him running around in circles. He shaved carefully; a stubble of beard on his chin might betray the fact that he was worried. Then he dressed, put his monocle in his eye, and called the headquarters that had been set up in Sid HarringtonтАЩsтБатАФnow hisтБатАФoffice. A girl at the switchboard appeared on his screen, and gave place to Paula Quinton, who had been up for the past two hours.
тАЬThe Northern Lights got in about three hours ago, general,тАЭ she told him. тАЬShe had four of King YoorkerkтАЩs infantry regiments aboardтБатАФthe Seventh, Glorious-and-Terrible, the Fourth, Firm-in-Adversity, the Second, Strength-of-the-Throne, and the Twelfth, Forever-Admirable. TheyтАЩre the sorriest-looking rabble I ever saw, but Hideyoshi says theyтАЩre the best Yoorkerk has, and they all have Terran-style rifles. General MтАЩzangwe broke them into battalions, and put a battalion in with each of the Kragan regiments. I think theyтАЩre more afraid of the Kragans than they are of the rebels.тАЭ
He nodded. That was probably the best way to employ them, within the existing situation. The trouble was, Them MтАЩzangwe was incurably tactical-minded. Put those geeks of YoorkerkтАЩs in with the Kragans and theyтАЩd be most useful in conquering Konkrook, but the trouble was that, after associating with Kragans, they might develop into reasonably good troops themselves, to the undesired improvement of King YoorkerkтАЩs army. On the other hand maybe not. Keep them in Company service long enough, and they might want to forget about Yoorkerk and stay there.
тАЬHowтАЩs the situation over in town?тАЭ he asked.
тАЬWell, itтАЩs slowing up, since we began pulling contragravity out,тАЭ she told him, тАЬbut the geeks are breaking up rapidly.тБатАКтБатАж Oh, there was something funny about that hassle, last evening, when the Procyon came in. Two contragravity vehicles, an aircar and an air-lorry, that went out to meet the ship, are unaccounted for.тАЭ
тАЬYou mean two of our vehicles are missing?тАЭ
She shook her head, frowning in perplexity. тАЬWell, no. All the vehicles that answered that unidentified-aircraft alert returned, but there were these two that went out that we havenтАЩt any record of. Colonel Grinell is investigating, but he canтАЩt find out anything.тБатАКтБатАжтАЭ
тАЬTell him not to waste any more time,тАЭ he said. тАЬThose two were probably geeks from Konkrook. You know, thatтАЩs how the von Schlichten family got out of Germany, in the Year ThreeтБатАФflew a bomber to Spain. The Konkrook war-criminals are getting out before the Army of Occupation moves in.тАЭ
тАЬWell, the posts at the old Kragan castles report some contragravity, and parties riding тАЩsaurs, moving west from the city,тАЭ she told him. тАЬThere are a lot of refugees on the roads. And combat reports from Konkrook agree that resistance is getting weaker every hour.тБатАКтБатАж And the supra-atmosphere observation-craftтБатАФtheyтАЩre beginning to call her the Sky-SpyтБатАФis up a hundred and fifty miles over Keegark. We have radar and vision screens and telemetered radiation and other detectors here, tuned to her. TheyтАЩre installing a similar set on the Northern Lights at the shipyard. By the way, Air-Commodore Hargreaves wants to know if he can take a pair of 155┬аmm rifles from the Channel Battery and mount them on the Lights.тАЭ
тАЬYes, of course, he can have anything he wants, as long as it isnтАЩt urgently needed for the bomb project.тАЭ
тАЬSky-Spy reports normal contragravity traffic between Keegark and the farming-villages aroundтБатАФaircars, lorries, a few scowsтБатАФbut nothing suspicious. No trace of either of the Boer-class ships. KankadтАЩs people are building receiving sets to install on the Procyon and the Aldebaran, and another set for KankadтАЩs Town. Pickering and his people are still working, but they all look pretty frustrated. They have Major Thornton, at the ammunition plant, doing experimental work on chemical-explosive charges to bring the subcritical masses together and hold them together till an explosion can be produced; theyтАЩre using most of the skilled electrical and electronics people to work up a detonating device. ThatтАЩs why KankadтАЩs people are doing most of the detection-device work. Hargreaves is fitting a lot of small craftтБатАФcombat-cars and civilian aircarsтБатАФwith radar sets, to use for patrolling.тАЭ
тАЬThat sounds good,тАЭ von Schlichten said. тАЬIтАЩll be around and see how things are, after IтАЩve had some breakfast.тАЭ
He had breakfast at the main cafeteria, four floors down; there wasnтАЩt as much laughing and talking as usual, but the crowd there seemed in good spirits. He spent some time at headquarters, watching Keegark by TV and radar. So far, nothing had been done about direct reconnaissance over Keegark with radiation-detectors, but Hargreaves reported that a couple of privately owned aircars were being fitted for the job.
He made a flying inspection trip around the island, and visited the farms south of the city, on the mainland, and, finally, made a sweep in the command-car over the city itself. Reconnaissance in person was an archaic and unprogressive procedure, and it was a good way to get generals killed, but one could see a lot of things that would be missed on TV. He let down several times in areas that had already been taken, and talked to company and platoon officers. For one thing, King YoorkerkтАЩs flamboyantly named regiments werenтАЩt quite as bad as Paula had thought. SheтАЩd been spoiled by the Kragans in her appreciation of other native troops. They had good, standard-quality, Volund-made arms; they were brave and capable; and they had been just enough insulted by being integrated into Kragan regiments to try to make a good showing.
By noon, resistance in the city was beginning to cave in. Surrender flags were appearing on one after another of the Konkrookan rebel strong-points, and at 14:30, after he had returned to the Island, a delegation, headed by the Konkrookan equivalent of Lord Mayor and composed largely of prominent merchants, came across the channel under a flag of truce to surrender the cityтАЩs Spear of State, with abject apologies for not having GurgurkтАЩs head on the point of it. Gurgurk, they reported, had fled to Keegark by air the night before, which explained the incident of the unaccountable aircar and lorry. The Channel Battery stopped firing, and, with the exception of an occasional spatter of small-arms fire, the city fell silent.
At 16:00, von Schlichten visited the headquarters Pickering had set up in the office building at the power-plant. As he stepped off the lift on the third floor, a girl, running down the hall with her arms full of papers in folders, collided with him; the load of papers flew in all directions. He stooped to help her pick them up.
тАЬOh, general! IsnтАЩt it wonderful?тАЭ she cried. тАЬI just canтАЩt believe it!тАЭ
тАЬIsnтАЩt what wonderful?тАЭ he asked.
тАЬOh, donтАЩt you know? TheyтАЩve got it!тАЭ
тАЬHuh? They have?тАЭ He gathered up the last of the big envelopes and gave them to her. тАЬWhen?тАЭ
тАЬJust half an hour ago. And to think, those books were around here all the time, and.тБатАКтБатАж Oh, IтАЩve got to run!тАЭ She disappeared into the lift.
Inside the office, one of PickeringтАЩs engineers was sitting on the middle of his spinal column, a stenograph-phone in one hand and a book in the other. Once in a while, he would say something into the mouthpiece of the phone. Two other nuclear engineers had similar books spread out on a desk in front of them; they were making notes and looking up references in the Nuclear EngineersтАЩ Handbook, and making calculations with their sliderules. There was a huddle around the drafting-boards, where two more such books were in use.
тАЬWell, whatтАЩs happened?тАЭ he demanded, catching Pickering by the arm as he rushed from one group to another.
тАЬHa! We have it!тАЭ Pickering cried. тАЬEverything we need! Look!тАЭ
He had another of the books under his arm. He held it out to von Schlichten, and von Schlichten suddenly felt sicker than he had ever felt since, at the age of fourteen, he had gotten drunk for the first time. He had seen men crack up under intolerable strain before, but this was the first time he had seen a whole roomful of men blow their tops in the same manner.
The book was a novelтБатАФa jumbo-size historical novel, of some seven or eight hundred pages. Its dust-jacket bore a slightly-more-than-bust-length picture of a young lady with crimson hair and green eyes and jade earrings and a plungingтБатАФnot to say power-divingтБатАФneckline that left her affiliation with the class of Mammalia in no doubt whatever. In the background, a mushroom-topped smoke-column rose, and away from it something intended to be a four-motor propeller-driven bomber of the First Century was racing madly. The title, he saw, was Dire Dawn, and the author was one Hildegarde Hernandez.
тАЬWell, it has a picture of an A-bomb explosion on it,тАЭ he agreed.
тАЬIt has more than that; it has the whole business. Case specifications, tampers, charge design, detonating device, everything. Why, the end-papers even have diagrams, copies of the original Nagasaki-bomb drawings. Look.тАЭ
Von Schlichten looked. He had no more than the average intelligent laymanтАЩs knowledge of nuclear physicsтБатАФenough to recharge or repair a conversion-unitтБатАФbut the drawings looked authentic enough. They seemed to be copies of ancient blueprints, lettered in First Century English, with Lingua Terra translations added, and marked Top Secret and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Manhattan Engineering Distric.
тАЬAnd look at this!тАЭ Pickering opened at a marked page and showed it to him. тАЬAnd this!тАЭ He opened where another slip of paper had been inserted. тАЬEverything we want to know, practically.тАЭ
тАЬI donтАЩt get this.тАЭ He wasnтАЩt sick, anymore, just bewildered. тАЬI read some reviews of this thing. All the reviewers panned hell out of itтБатАФтАШWorld War II Through a Bedroom KeyholeтАЩ; тАШHenty in Black Lace PantiesтАЩтБатАФthat sort of thing.тАЭ
тАЬYeh, yeh, sure,тАЭ Pickering agreed. тАЬBut this Hernandez had illusions of being a great serious historical novelist, see. She wonтАЩt try to write a book till sheтАЩs put in years of researchтБатАФactually, about six monthsтАЩ research by a herd of librarians and college-juniors and other such literary cooliesтБатАФand she boasts that she never yet has been caught in an error of historical background detail.
тАЬWell, this opus is about the old Manhattan Project. The heroine is a sort of super-Mata-Hari, who is, alternately and sometimes simultaneously, in the pay of the Nazis, the Soviets, the Vatican, Chiang Kai-Shek, the Japanese Emperor, and the Jewish International Bankers, and she sleeps with everybody but Joe Stalin and Mao Tse-tung, and of course, she is in on every step of the A-bomb project. She even manages to stow away on the Enola Gay, with the help of a general sheтАЩs spent fifty incandescent pages seducing.
тАЬIn order to tool up for this production-job, La Hernandez did her researching just where Louren├зo Gomes probably did hisтБатАФUniversity of Montevideo Library. She even had access to the photostats of the old U.S. data that General Lanningham brought to South America after the debacle in the United States in AE 114. Those end-papers are part of the Lanningham stuff. As far as weтАЩve been able to check mathematically, everything is strictly authentic and practical. WeтАЩll have to run a few more tests on the chemical-explosive chargesтБатАФwe donтАЩt have any data on the exact strength of the explosives they used thenтБатАФand the tampers and detonating device will need to be tested a little. But in about half an hour, we ought to be able to start drawing plans for the case, and as soon as theyтАЩre finished, weтАЩll rush them to the shipyard foundries for casting.тАЭ
Von Schlichten handed the book back to Pickering, and sighed deeply. тАЬAnd I thought everybody here had gone off his rocker,тАЭ he said. тАЬWe will erect, on the ruins of Keegark, a hundred-foot statue of Se├▒orita Hildegarde Hernandez.тБатАКтБатАж How did you get onto this?тАЭ
Pickering pointed to a young man with dull brick colored hair, who was punching out some kind of a problem on a small computing machine.
тАЬPiet van Reenen, over there, he has a girlfriend whose taste runs to this sort of literary bubble-gum. She told him it was all in a book sheтАЩd just read, and showed him. We descended in force on the bookshop and grabbed every copy in stock. We are now running a sort of gaseous-diffusion process, to separate the nuclear physics from the pornography. I must say, Hildegarde has her biological data very well in hand, too.тАЭ
тАЬIтАЩll bet sheтАЩd have fun writing a novel about these geeks,тАЭ von Schlichten said. тАЬWell, how soon do you think you can have a bomb ready for us?тАЭ
тАЬCasting the cases is going to slow us down the most,тАЭ Pickering said. тАЬBut, even with that, we ought to have one ready in three days, at the most. By two weeks, weтАЩll be turning them out on an assembly-line.тАЭ
тАЬI hope we donтАЩt need more than one. But youтАЩd better produce at least half a dozen. And have some practice-bombs made up, out of concrete or anything, as long as theyтАЩre the right weight and airfoil and have some way of releasing smoke. Get them done as soon as you have your case designed. We want to be able to make a couple of practice drops.тАЭ
There was no use, he thought, of raising hopes which might prove premature. He told Paula Quinton, of course, and Themistocles MтАЩzangwe, and, by telecast on sealed beam, King Kankad and Air-Commodore Hargreaves. Beyond that, there was nothing to do but wait, and hope that Hargreaves could keep OrgzildтАЩs bombers away from Gongonk Island and KankadтАЩs Town and that Hildegarde Hernandez had been playing fair with her public. He visited the city, where a few pockets of diehard resistance were being liquidated, and where everybody who had not been too deeply and publicly involved in the znidd suddabit conspiracy was now coming forward and claiming to have been a lifelong friend of the Terrans and the Company. Von Schlichten returned to Gongonk Island, debating with himself whether to declare a general amnesty or to set up a dozen guillotines in the city and run them around the clock for a week. There were cogent arguments for and against either procedure.
By 21:00, the last organized resistance had been wiped out, and curfew had been imposed, and peace of a sort restored. There was still the threat from Keegark, but it was looking less ominous now than it had the evening before. Von Schlichten and Paula were having dinner in the Broadway Room, confident that there was nothing left to do that they could do anything about, when the extension phone that had been plugged in at their table rang.
тАЬColonel Quinton here,тАЭ Paula identified herself into it, and listened for a moment. тАЬThere has? When?тБатАКтБатАж Well, where did it come from?тБатАКтБатАж I see. And the direction?тБатАКтБатАж Anything else?тАЭ
Apparently there was nothing else. She hung up, and turned to von Schlichten.
тАЬThe Sky-Spy just detected a ship lifting out from Keegark, presumed one of the Boer-class freighters, either the Jan Smuts or the Oom Paul Kruger. It was first picked up on contragravity at about a hundred feet, rising vertically from near the Palace. The supposition is the geeks had her camouflaged since the time Commander Prinsloo first bombarded Keegark with the Aldebaran. That was about twenty minutes ago; at last report, sheтАЩs fifty miles north of Keegark, headed up the Hoork River.тАЭ
Von Schlichten started thinking aloud: тАЬThat could be a feint, to draw our ships north after her, and leave the approach to Konkrook or KankadтАЩs open, but that would be presuming that they know about the Sky-Spy, and I doubt that, though not enough to take chances on. They know we have ground and ship-radar, and they may think they can slip down the Konk Valley either undetected or mistaken for one of our ships from North Uller.тАЭ
He picked up the phone. тАЬGet me through on telecast to Air-Commodore Hargreaves, aboard the Procyon,тАЭ he said. тАЬIтАЩll take it in the office; IтАЩll be up directly.тАЭ He rose. тАЬFinish your dinner, and have the rest of mine sent up,тАЭ he told Paula.
Leaving the elevator, he rushed into the big headquarters room just as contact was established with the Procyon, on station over the northwestern corner of Takkad Sea, between KankadтАЩs Town and Keegark. The Aldebaran, he knew, was west of Keegark; the Northern Lights, now fitted with a pair of 155┬аmm guns, in addition to her 90тАЩs, had just arrived at KankadтАЩs. He had the Aldebaran sent north along the crest of the mountain-range between the Hoork and Konk river-valleys, where she could cover both with her own radar and other detection-devices and exchange information with the Sky-Spy, and the Gaucho sent in what looked like the right course to intercept the Boer-class freighter from Keegark. The Northern Lights, also with screens tuned to the Sky-Spy, was sent to take over the AldebaranтАЩs regular station. Finally, he called Skilk and had the Northern Star sent south down the Hoork Valley.
After that, there was nothing to do but wait, and watch the screens. Paula Quinton put in an appearance shortly after he had finished calling Skilk, pushing a cocktail-wagon on which their interrupted dinners had been placed. They finished eating, and drank coffee, and smoked. Most of the rest of his staff who were not busy on the bomb-project or at the shipyards or with the occupation of Konkrook drifted in; they all sat and stared from one to another of the screens, which told, in radar-patterns and direct vision and telescopic vision and heat and radiation detection, the story of what was going on to the northeast of them.
Keegark was dark, on the vision-screen; evidently King Orgzild had invented the blackout, too. Not that it did him any good; the radar-screen showed the city clearly, and it was just as clear on the radiation and heat-screens. The Keegarkan ship was completely blacked out, but the radiations from her engines and the distinctive radiation-pattern of her contragravity-field showed clearly, and there was a speck that marked her position on the radar-screen. The same position was marked with a pinpoint of light on the vision-screenтБатАФsome device on the Sky-Spy, synchronized with the detectors, kept it focused there. The Company ships and contragravity vehicles all were carrying topside lights, visible only from above, which flashed alternate red and blue to identify them.
Time crawled slowly around the clock-face on the wall, the sixty-five-second minutes of Uller dragging like hours. The spots that marked the enemy ship and her hunters crawled, too; seen from the hundred-and-fifty-mile altitude of the Sky-Spy, even the six-hundred-mile speed of the Gaucho was barely visible. They drank coffee till the stuff revolted them; they smoked until their throats and mouths were dry, they watched the screens until they thought that they would see them in their dreams forever. Then the Gaucho reported radar-contact with the Keegarkan ship, which had begun to turn in a hairpin-shaped course and was coming south down the Konk Valley.
After that, the Gaucho began reporting directly, and her topside identification-light went out.
тАЬтАж┬аdoused our lights; weтАЩre down in the valley, altitude about a thousand feet. WeтАЩre trying to get a glimpse of her against the sky,тАЭ a voice came in. тАЬWeтАЩre cutting in our forward TV-pickup.тАЭ The voice repeated, several times, the wavelength, and somebody got an auxiliary screen tuned in. There was nothing visible on it but the darkness of the valley, the star-jeweled sky, and the loom of the East Konk Mountains. тАЬWe still canтАЩt see her, but we ought to, any moment; radar shows her well above the mountains. Ah, there she is; she just obscured Beta Hydrae V; sheтАЩs moving toward that big constellation to the east of it, the one they call FinneganтАЩs Goat. Now sheтАЩll be right in the center of the screen; weтАЩre going straight for her. WeтАЩre going to try to slow her down till the Aldebaran can get here.тБатАКтБатАжтАЭ
The enemy ship was vaguely visible, now, becoming clearer in the starlight. She was a Boer-class freighter, all right. Probably the Jan Smuts; the Oom Paul Kruger had last been reported at Bwork, and there was little chance that she had slipped into Keegark since the uprising had started. For all anybody knew, she could have been destroyed in the fighting before the Bwork Residency fell.
тАЬAll right, we have her spotted; weтАЩre going to open up on her,тАЭ the voice from the Gaucho announced. тАЬShe has two 90тАЩs to our one; weтАЩll try to disable them, first.тАЭ The vision-screen lit with the indirect glare of the gun-flash, and the image in it jiggled violently as the ship shook to the recoil, then steadied again, with the enemy ship visible in the middle of it, growing larger and larger as the Gaucho rushed toward her. The gun fired again and again, flooding the screen with momentary yellow light and disturbing the image as the recoil shook the gun-cutter. The enemy ship began firing in reply, the shots were all wide misses. Apparently the geek guncrew didnтАЩt know how to synchronize the radar sights, and were ignorant of the correct setting for the proximity-fuses. The GauchoтАЩs searchlights came on, bathing her quarry in light. It was the Jan Smuts; the name and the figurehead-bust of the old soldier-philosopher were plainly visible. Her forward gun had been knocked out, and she was trying to swing about to get a field of fire for her stern-gun.
тАЬWeтАЩre going to give her a rocket-salvo,тАЭ the voice said. тАЬWatch this, now!тАЭ
The rockets leaped forward, from the topside racks, four and four and four and four, at half-second intervals. The first four hit the Smuts amidships and low, exploding with a flare that grew before it could die away as the second four landed. Nobody ever saw the third and fourth four land. The Jan Smuts vanished in a blaze of light that blinded everybody in the room; when they could see again, after some thirty seconds, the screen was dark.
In the direct-vision screen from the Sky-Spy, the whole countryside of the Konk Valley, five hundred miles north of Konkrook, was lighted. The heat and radiation detectors were going insane. And in the shifting confusion on the radar-screen, there was no trace either of the Jan Smuts or the Gaucho.
тАЬWell, the geeks did have an A-bomb,тАЭ Themistocles MтАЩzangwe said, at length. тАЬIтАЩd been trying to kid myself that we were just preparing against a million-to-one chance. I wonder how many more they have.тАЭ
тАЬPaula, find out who was in command of the Gaucho; heтАЩd be a junior-grade lieutenant. Fix up orders promoting him to navy captain, as of now. ItтАЩs probably the only thing we can do for him, anymore. And promotions of the same order for everybody else aboard that cutter. Authority Carlos von Schlichten, acting Governor-General.тАЭ He picked up a phone. тАЬGet me Commander Prinsloo, on Aldebaran.тБатАКтБатАжтАЭ
He ordered Prinsloo to launch airboats and make a search; cautioned him to be careful of radiation, but to take no chances on any of the GauchoтАЩs complement being still alive and in need of help. While that was going on, the Sky-Spy reported another ship coming over her horizon to the east, from the direction of Bwork. That would be the Oom Paul Kruger. Hargreaves had already learned of the advent of the second freighter. He was unwilling to take the Procyon off her station until the Aldebaran returned from the Konk Valley. In this, von Schlichten concurred.
Somebody suggested that a drink would be in order. They had just watched the all-but-certain death of three Terran officers, fifteen Terran airmen, and ten Kragans, but they had all been living in too close companionship with death in the past three daysтБатАФor was it three centuriesтБатАФto be too deeply affected. And they had also watched, at least for a day or so, the removal of the threat that had hung over their heads. And they had seen proof that they had a defense against King OrgzildтАЩs bombs.
They were still mixing cocktails when Pickering phoned in.
тАЬSome good news, general, from Operation тАШHildegarde.тАЩ We ought to have at least one bomb ready to drop by 15:00 tomorrow, four or five more by next midnight,тАЭ he said. тАЬWe donтАЩt need to have cases cast. We got our dimensions decided, and we find that there are a lot of big empty liquid-oxygen flasks, or tanks, rather, at the spaceport, thatтАЩll accommodate everythingтБатАФfissionables, explosive-charges, tampers, detonator, and all.тАЭ
тАЬWell, go ahead with it. Make up a few of them; as many as you can between now and 24:00 Sunday.тАЭ He thought for a moment. тАЬDonтАЩt waste time on those practice bombs I mentioned. WeтАЩll make a practice drop with a live bomb. And donтАЩt throw away the design for the cast case. We may need that, later on.тАЭ