Danielson manoeuvred her chair so she could see. Gantt pointed to the luminescent figures. 'You see the seismometers saturated when it got too close, so they stopped giving any useful information.' He played with the keys some more. 'The gravimeter here in camp also went off scale. They're meant to measure fluctuations of a part in a billion, and this one was at one per cent before it pooped out. The outer stations were fine, though; here's the mass they detected, a bit over ten million metric tons. That's just about what you guessed, wasn't it, Alex?'
'Pretty close,' admitted Runyan. He thought for a while and then asked, 'How long were the seismometers inactive?'
Gantt consulted the computer and then replied, 'Twenty— eight point — well, call it an even twenty-nine seconds, why?'
'Maybe we ought to go back to your tent where we can talk this over,' Runyan replied.
They left the equipment tent and walked towards Gantt's.
Wary glances followed them. All over the camp men stood in groups of three and four, discussing the strange event in muted and not so muted tones. Runyan and Danielson occupied the chairs they had first sat in upon their arrival, only a few hours ago. Gantt disappeared inside idle tent and returned with three styrofoam cups and a bottle of bourbon.
'A bit early in the day for normal circumstances,' he said, 'but I could use a little bracer. Will you join me?'
The other two nodded their acceptance and received their cups in turn. Runyan took a fairly healthy slug and looked on with mild surprise as Danielson drained hers in one quick motion and held it out to Gantt for a refill.
Danielson caught Runyan's look, grinned, and said in a voice hoarsened by the liquor, 'All us Virginians are bourbon drinkers, suh!'
Gantt smiled at the quip and raised his cup to gesture a toast, 'Well, here's to the future: may it not be entirely black.' He continued with a shake of his head, 'I must say that was the most god-awful feeling. I had the definite impression that you people had snuck up on either side of me and lifted my chair and then dropped it. All this instrumentation and electronics are well and good, but they're no substitute for being grabbed and shaken to let you know you're up against the real thing. The idea that that thing actually came up within, what, two or three yards of the tent? Jesus!' He drained his cup and poured another dollop.
'Did you feel a sideways pull?' inquired Danielson.
'That's what bowled me over. I had one foot in the air when someone raised the floor and then gave me a shove.'
'I guess maybe I did,' answered Gantt, 'but I was sitting down, so that took some of the edge off.'
'You're right. The thing must have come up just outside the tent,' Runyan joined in. 'Must have been one of those tunes when it got jarred off course somehow. Actually, in spite of the low probability, it's lucky no one was hit. I was thinking. Pat may have had a good idea: it might be of some interest to find the hole it made coming out and the other falling back in. Apparently that occurred just a bit further to the east, near the edge of camp. I think we may have learned something important here, in addition — to having the wits scared out of us.'
'What's that?' asked Gantt.
'Well, there are three things that come to mind. First, we've confirmed the fact that it comes down near where it went up. That's significant.'
'I thought of that. It's the same as Dallas ,' said Danielson, her eyes shining. 'It must be moving with the same tangential velocity as the surface of the earth as it comes up.'
Gantt looked puzzled, and Danielson explained to him, 'Remember that, because it rotates, the surface of the earth is actually moving at about a thousand miles an hour. If this thing were literally moving on a line pointed at a fixed direction in space, then as it reached the surface we would move out from under it at just that speed. How long did you say it was up? About a half of a minute? Let's see, the earth's surface rotates about twenty miles in a minute or about ten in the time the thing was up.'
'Closer to seven,' said Runyan with unconscious pedanticism, 'but clearly the relative motion could have been much greater than it actually was.'
'I guess I still don't quite see,' began Gantt.
'The point is,' explained Runyan, 'that when it comes to the surface of the earth it's virtually at rest with respect to the local terrain. That can't be an accident. It must have begun that way. We can rule out the idea that it's a naturally occurring black hole. To have it moving at precisely the earth's orbital velocity so that it could be trapped was asking a lot. To insist that it also move in consonance with the rotation of the earth is out of the question. I could never put any store in the idea anyway, but now I think we can really lay it to rest.
'Let me put it another way,' he continued, 'if you were to imagine taking a black hole and holding it in your hand so that both you and it were moving along with the surface of the earth, and then you were to drop it, and let it orbit freely, the result would be just what we have seen. It would drop down, pass to the far side of the earth and return. It must return to precisely the same altitude as that from which it was dropped, and at its highest point, when it momentarily has no velocity towards or away from the earth's centre, it must have precisely the same sideways motion as when it was released. To someone moving with the same motion, that is, with the velocity of the earth's surface, it would seem to come momentarily to an exact standstill.'
'But it didn't stand still,' objected Gantt, 'that is, it continued on up.'
'That's my second point,' replied Runyan. 'One we kicked around in La Jolla. We know how far up it went. It took about fifteen seconds to go up and an equal amount to return. At one gee, that's a distance of about three thousand four hundred feet. What's the altitude here?'
'About twenty-three hundred feet,' said Gantt.
'Then apogee is about five thousand seven hundred feet above sea level. A bit over a mile. That must be the altitude from which it was originally dropped.'
Before either Danielson or Gantt could comment, Runyan was on his feet. 'Let me get something out of my luggage.' He tossed off the remaining bourbon in his cup, set the cup on the chair arm, and strode purposefully over to the mess tent where their luggage had been placed. The cup blew off, and Gantt rescued it from the ground. Runyan rummaged for a moment and then returned with a stack of computer output. He regained his seat and balanced the paper on his knees so he could easily riffle the accordion— folded sheets.
'Another little project of mine,' he explained. 'Pat, you said that in Dallas your agents thought about forty seconds elapsed from the time you first heard the noise to when it returned. That gives an estimate of the altitude to which it rises. I figured they could be off by ten per cent either way. The Seamount event gave a more accurate estimate. I narrowed down the maximum altitude to within three hundred feet. What I've got here is a list of every point on earth which falls along the locus of the orbit and within three bins in altitude, each spanning a hundred feet. With this new precise data of yours, Ellison, we can throw out two-thirds of the possibilities. There are surprisingly few left. Few enough that they can all be checked in a finite time. There are a couple in California , a few in Arizona , a small batch in New Mexico and that's for the continental United States.' He looked on down the list, 'There's a couple of places in Morocco, one in Algeria, some in Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, none in Tibet, it's all too high, and finally, in the northern hemisphere, several places in China.' He flipped to another sheet. 'The southern hemisphere is even more sparse. A few places on either side of the Andes, in Chile and Argentina. That's about it. Everything else is lower, mostly ocean.'
Gantt's brows knitted in concentration.
'We're ahead of you there, Alex,' Danielson smiled slightly, her voice touched with pride. 'I made up a similar list of sites after we got back from La Jolla. Bob Isaacs had ordered up a photomontage along the trajectory several months ago. The problem was we didn't know what to look for, and there was too much area to cover. He just told me that we are collecting new satellite photos of the spots on my list; they'll be ready tomorrow morning.'
She craned her neck and looked down his list, flipping the pages back and forth.
'I think I've got everything you have here, and a few more. Here in Chile , for instance, north of Santiago. There's a shallow valley there and actually two points, not just one, a few kilometres apart.'
She looked up at Runyan, and he locked her eyes with a long, cool stare. Then he gave her a broad, friendly wink, and her heart jumped.
'You said you had three points?' Gantt prompted him to continue.
'This may be a bit more subtle, but just as important.' Runyan leaned forward and put his stack of computer printout on the ground. He retrieved his cup from Gantt rod poured himself a small bit of bourbon. Resting his upper forearms on both knees and rotating the cup between his palms, he looked up at Danielson from beneath his brows. 'Let me ask you, why is there such a small motion with respect to the surface?'
'But you just answered that!' objected Danielson. 'Its motion at its highest point is set by the initial conditions with which it's released. If it moved with the surface at first, it always will.'
'Always?'
Danielson stopped and stared at the bewhiskered scientist, her eyes shifting back and forth between his. Finally she said, 'You said earlier there must be perturbations, friction. The orbit can't be perfect, it must shift slowly with time.'
'Now I'm with you,' broke in Gantt. 'The orbit must shift slowly with time, but it hasn't shifted much.' He looked at both of them. 'So it hasn't had time.'
'That's just the sort of dung I've been trying to compute,' fold Runyan. 'My model isn't perfect yet, but I have some Feeling for the scale of dungs. I would have to say this thing couldn't have been around for more than ten years, and probably less.'
'What you're saying,' said Danielson, 'is that we only picked up a record of it recently because it's only been around recently.'
'Let me get this straight then,' Gantt said slowly. 'You're arguing that someone or something, somehow, made a black hole of about ten million tons not more than a few years ago, releasing it at rest from a point on the earth's surface about six thousand feet above sea level.' His forehead wrinkled in consternation.
'When we examine those places,' Danielson said, pointing at the computer paper at Runyan's feet, 'do you expect to see something definite?'
'Maybe not,' said Gantt, looking at Runyan. 'Granted that we're dealing with a small black hole, and that it was created artificially, which seems to follow.'
Runyan nodded assent.
'Then,' Gantt continued, 'we're also talking about something beyond our technological feasibility. Suppose the only thing remaining at the "launch site", if I may call it that, is a burned spot and the impression of three round pods — I believe that's the classical imprint of a UFO.'
'If we know where to look, we can find that too,' said Danielson, 'if not with satellites, then a direct fly-over.'
'I suppose we must keep an open mind,' said Runyan, 'but I have a feeling that the clues will be more definite.'
They lapsed into silence. Gantt broke it with a shake of his head. 'I'm sorry,' he said, 'but despite the evidence, I find the whole thing too incredible to believe. An artificial black hole planted here in the earth — I mean, my god!' He raised his hands and eyes in an imploring salute to the skies.
'Alex,' he continued, 'you said a while ago you were relieved the issue was now out in the open. I must say I don't feel that way at all. After all, proving that we are dealing with a black hole is only the tip of the iceberg. Until we know who and why, we've barely begun to plumb the mystery. The most stupendous, terrifying, and profound aspects of this situation would seem to be before us.'
He was silent for a moment and muttered, 'Christ,' and poured himself another jigger of bourbon and drank it off.
Runyan had slumped in his chair, chin on his chest. 'I suppose you could be right, Ellison,' he said. 'I have a hazy idea of what's going on that suggests to me that, conceptually anyway, we're over the hump.'
'How could we be? What in the world are you thinking?' Gantt demanded.
Runyan waved him off with a hand. 'It's too vague. I'm probably being naive or stupid or both.'
Gantt glared at him, uncomfortable with this dismissal. At last he said, 'Well, I don't know about you, but I'll go nuts if I just sit here and think about it. I've got to do something.' He stood up and looked around impatiently.
'Should we have another look for a hole in the ground?' asked Danielson. 'I really wasn't very thorough.'
'We could do that,' agreed Gantt. 'We don't really want to attract too much attention to what went on here. On the other hand, if we don't look now, any sign may get covered up by people shuffling around.'
The moment of tenseness forgotten, they discussed the problem of security for a while and finally decided they would stage a reenactment. This would show who was knocked down by the passage of the hole, thus showing where to look without giving away their object. Gantt would then order some rearrangement of equipment which would occupy most of the members of the entourage. This would give Runyan and Danielson a chance to search the ground for signs of penetration without drawing notice.
They put this plan into action with Runyan noting the vicinity where the hole had come up and Danielson several hundred feet away locating where it had descended.
Then Gantt gave orders to set up a fourth instrumentation site outside of camp and prepare accommodations for Runyan and Danielson, a legitimate task postponed earlier. Danielson joined Runyan. For the next few minutes they assiduously searched the several square yards just outside the main tent, Runyan erect and Danielson in a low crouch.
'Let's try something else,' Runyan finally said. He directed Danielson to stand against the tent wall.
'Now I'm going to jump and stamp — you look for some sign of settling dirt.'
He launched himself upward and came down with a satisfying thud. He looked at the ground as Danielson peered around. They looked up at one another and shrugged. Runyan repeated the faintly ludicrous operation, working systematically across the suspect area.
On the fifth try, Danielson pointed, 'There, just by your left foot.'
Two small stones were wedged in a depression, but as they looked a trickle of loose dirt sifted beneath the stones and disappeared.
Runyan crouched and carefully plucked away one of the stones in each hand. Beneath them was a hole in the sun— baked clay soil the size of a finger. Danielson jogged over to Gantt's tent and returned with a coat hanger under her arm and another she busily untwisted. When she straightened the hanger, she lowered it slowly into the hole. It met only minor resistance and sank to the hook which remained on the-edge, marking the spot.
They walked to the second location and after a brief search found another hole. Again, they straightened a coat hanger and embedded it to mark the spot. Runyan rummaged up a tape measure he had spotted in the main instrumentation tent, and they marked off the distance between the two holes, which Runyan recorded in a small notebook in his pocket.
'Alex,' Danielson asked as they headed back to Gantt's tent, 'is there a special significance to the fact that it came down a bit further to the east? Is that related to the earth's rotation from west to east?'
'That's one of many effects,' he replied as they settled into their chairs, 'but you have to be careful to treat all the irregularities, all the perturbations.'
'How does the rotation come in?' she asked.
'Well, here, I'll show you.' Runyan retrieved his computer output from the ground where he had left it and turned it over on his lap to write on the blank side. He pulled out a pen and carefully blocked out a set of equations. Danielson scooted her chair around close to his so she could see.
Gantt returned an hour later and found them in an animated discussion of orbit perturbations. He did not follow the details, but it was clear to him that Danielson was holding her own with Runyan, giving him pause with penetrating questions and occasionally adding a twist other own. Although the discussion was purely intellectual, Gantt could sense the electricity between the two. Alex is well into stage two, he thought, black hole or no. Then a question of the generation and propagation of seismic waves arose, and Gantt pitched into the discussion as well.
They were still at it when the dinner bell sounded. Runyan and Danielson lagged behind as they headed for the mess tent.
'Listen,' Runyan said quietly, leaning over towards her, 'there's not much to do here in the middle of god's country, but how about an evening stroll after things cool off. The desert can be quite beautiful then.'
Danielson turned her head to look up into his eyes, light flashing within the dark aura of his hair and beard. She wanted to be alone with him.
'That sounds very nice,' she said, holding his gaze for a moment. Then, with a new energy, they moved to catch up to Gantt.
After supper Runyan and Danielson joined Gantt at his tent in the fading evening light. Despite the lingering heat, they went inside the tent where Gantt switched on a generator-fed bulb. They discussed their current position and laid plans for the immediate future. Although the major point they had sought to check seemed well settled, they agreed that Gantt's station should remain in operation to compile a precise record of the behaviour of the object. Danielson would return and report to Isaacs and redouble the effort to discover the hypothesized point of origin. Runyan would report to Phillips and resume his orbital calculations. Gantt again profferred his bottle of bourbon, and they drank a nightcap to seal their arrangement. Danielson excused herself. Runyan followed a few minutes later.
Runyan pushed aside the tent flap and stepped out. The acrid aroma of tarpaulin mingled with the wafted delicate fragrance of greasewood. The clean dry air was warm and enveloping, as if you could shuck your clothes and drink it in through every pore. Runyan waited for his eyes to adjust, then turned towards Danielson's tent, a sense of anticipation beginning to tickle his loins. He peered through the darkness towards her tent, some forty paces away on the other side of the one erected for him, but could only make out the vaguest outlines. Then he saw her, waiting for him in the deepest shadow. The familiar feeling of sweet power flooded him, and his mind filled with images of her warm curves, putting flesh to the dim silhouette he could barely perceive as he approached.
Danielson watched the figure picking his sure way in the dark. She had the irrational feeling that the ground would open up and swallow him before he reached her. It didn't. He stopped a pace from her, his strong presence palpable even at the distance. She felt an urge to reach out and touch him, but he made no motion and neither did she.
He lingered a moment savouring the invisible aura between them, then whispered, 'Let's head out this way.'
He pointed to the rudimentary road that led to one of the outlying sites. They walked carefully out of the campsite and onto the road. The moon was nearly full, casting faint shadows. Danielson found that at their strolling pace she could walk easily, with only part of her attention on the rocky road-bed. She looked around and up. Away from the moon the pure desert sky was almost a solid blanket of stars.
'It's so lovely,' she whispered.
As she looked upward and outward the trauma of the afternoon receded and an overpowering expansiveness filled her. She reached for Runyan's arm and bugged it in both her hands, pulling him close to her. After several paces he freed his arm and encircled her waist. She slipped her arm across his back and leaned her head on his shoulder.
They walked on, speaking little, each lost in thought, awash in awareness of the other. Runyan estimated they had walked a half hour when he said, 'I think we better head back.'
'I suppose we should,' she replied, her voice hinting regret. She felt something slipping by, something she didn't want to lose. As they turned around in the darkness she tugged at his sleeve to halt him. He turned towards her, and she gripped his other sleeve as well, facing him, arms open, body exposed.
He raised his arms to encircle her shoulders, drawing her into a gentle embrace. She cradled her head against his chest, arms around his waist, and stared down at the earth beside them. She thought again of the shattering event of the earlier afternoon, of the miniscule horror hurtling beneath their feet. Somehow, she felt this man was her protector, the sole barrier between her and the ferocious void. She lifted her head to look into his eyes. The shadows on his face were portals to a vast emptiness which she had to keep at bay. She moved her face closer to his so his features were clear, the shadows muted. She opened herself to a feeling she knew had been growing. She wanted this man. The world seemed large and empty. She needed to be with him, to hold to his firmness and strength.
She stretched to kiss him, feeling the prickle of his moustache and beard as he responded. Their lips brushed. A cool current raced through their bodies at the touch of sensitive flesh on flesh. He cupped her jaw and neck, fingers lightly tangled in her hair, kissing her deeply, drawing a dormant passion up and out.
They walked as quickly as they could back to the camp, pausing for another prolonged kiss when the interval grew too long to bear. The camp was dark and quiet when they returned.
Outside her tent she embraced his neck and stood on tiptoe for one more lingering kiss before crossing the threshold. An image of the ludicrously narrow cot flashed in her mind. They could throw the thin mattress on the tent floor. She broke their kiss, found his hand, and brushed her lips across his palm. Then she pushed aside the tent flap and, still holding his hand, led him in. Runyan stooped to follow her, a small smile playing on his lips.
Chapter 15
'Pretty close,' admitted Runyan. He thought for a while and then asked, 'How long were the seismometers inactive?'
Gantt consulted the computer and then replied, 'Twenty— eight point — well, call it an even twenty-nine seconds, why?'
'Maybe we ought to go back to your tent where we can talk this over,' Runyan replied.
They left the equipment tent and walked towards Gantt's.
Wary glances followed them. All over the camp men stood in groups of three and four, discussing the strange event in muted and not so muted tones. Runyan and Danielson occupied the chairs they had first sat in upon their arrival, only a few hours ago. Gantt disappeared inside idle tent and returned with three styrofoam cups and a bottle of bourbon.
'A bit early in the day for normal circumstances,' he said, 'but I could use a little bracer. Will you join me?'
The other two nodded their acceptance and received their cups in turn. Runyan took a fairly healthy slug and looked on with mild surprise as Danielson drained hers in one quick motion and held it out to Gantt for a refill.
Danielson caught Runyan's look, grinned, and said in a voice hoarsened by the liquor, 'All us Virginians are bourbon drinkers, suh!'
Gantt smiled at the quip and raised his cup to gesture a toast, 'Well, here's to the future: may it not be entirely black.' He continued with a shake of his head, 'I must say that was the most god-awful feeling. I had the definite impression that you people had snuck up on either side of me and lifted my chair and then dropped it. All this instrumentation and electronics are well and good, but they're no substitute for being grabbed and shaken to let you know you're up against the real thing. The idea that that thing actually came up within, what, two or three yards of the tent? Jesus!' He drained his cup and poured another dollop.
'Did you feel a sideways pull?' inquired Danielson.
'That's what bowled me over. I had one foot in the air when someone raised the floor and then gave me a shove.'
'I guess maybe I did,' answered Gantt, 'but I was sitting down, so that took some of the edge off.'
'You're right. The thing must have come up just outside the tent,' Runyan joined in. 'Must have been one of those tunes when it got jarred off course somehow. Actually, in spite of the low probability, it's lucky no one was hit. I was thinking. Pat may have had a good idea: it might be of some interest to find the hole it made coming out and the other falling back in. Apparently that occurred just a bit further to the east, near the edge of camp. I think we may have learned something important here, in addition — to having the wits scared out of us.'
'What's that?' asked Gantt.
'Well, there are three things that come to mind. First, we've confirmed the fact that it comes down near where it went up. That's significant.'
'I thought of that. It's the same as Dallas ,' said Danielson, her eyes shining. 'It must be moving with the same tangential velocity as the surface of the earth as it comes up.'
Gantt looked puzzled, and Danielson explained to him, 'Remember that, because it rotates, the surface of the earth is actually moving at about a thousand miles an hour. If this thing were literally moving on a line pointed at a fixed direction in space, then as it reached the surface we would move out from under it at just that speed. How long did you say it was up? About a half of a minute? Let's see, the earth's surface rotates about twenty miles in a minute or about ten in the time the thing was up.'
'Closer to seven,' said Runyan with unconscious pedanticism, 'but clearly the relative motion could have been much greater than it actually was.'
'I guess I still don't quite see,' began Gantt.
'The point is,' explained Runyan, 'that when it comes to the surface of the earth it's virtually at rest with respect to the local terrain. That can't be an accident. It must have begun that way. We can rule out the idea that it's a naturally occurring black hole. To have it moving at precisely the earth's orbital velocity so that it could be trapped was asking a lot. To insist that it also move in consonance with the rotation of the earth is out of the question. I could never put any store in the idea anyway, but now I think we can really lay it to rest.
'Let me put it another way,' he continued, 'if you were to imagine taking a black hole and holding it in your hand so that both you and it were moving along with the surface of the earth, and then you were to drop it, and let it orbit freely, the result would be just what we have seen. It would drop down, pass to the far side of the earth and return. It must return to precisely the same altitude as that from which it was dropped, and at its highest point, when it momentarily has no velocity towards or away from the earth's centre, it must have precisely the same sideways motion as when it was released. To someone moving with the same motion, that is, with the velocity of the earth's surface, it would seem to come momentarily to an exact standstill.'
'But it didn't stand still,' objected Gantt, 'that is, it continued on up.'
'That's my second point,' replied Runyan. 'One we kicked around in La Jolla. We know how far up it went. It took about fifteen seconds to go up and an equal amount to return. At one gee, that's a distance of about three thousand four hundred feet. What's the altitude here?'
'About twenty-three hundred feet,' said Gantt.
'Then apogee is about five thousand seven hundred feet above sea level. A bit over a mile. That must be the altitude from which it was originally dropped.'
Before either Danielson or Gantt could comment, Runyan was on his feet. 'Let me get something out of my luggage.' He tossed off the remaining bourbon in his cup, set the cup on the chair arm, and strode purposefully over to the mess tent where their luggage had been placed. The cup blew off, and Gantt rescued it from the ground. Runyan rummaged for a moment and then returned with a stack of computer output. He regained his seat and balanced the paper on his knees so he could easily riffle the accordion— folded sheets.
'Another little project of mine,' he explained. 'Pat, you said that in Dallas your agents thought about forty seconds elapsed from the time you first heard the noise to when it returned. That gives an estimate of the altitude to which it rises. I figured they could be off by ten per cent either way. The Seamount event gave a more accurate estimate. I narrowed down the maximum altitude to within three hundred feet. What I've got here is a list of every point on earth which falls along the locus of the orbit and within three bins in altitude, each spanning a hundred feet. With this new precise data of yours, Ellison, we can throw out two-thirds of the possibilities. There are surprisingly few left. Few enough that they can all be checked in a finite time. There are a couple in California , a few in Arizona , a small batch in New Mexico and that's for the continental United States.' He looked on down the list, 'There's a couple of places in Morocco, one in Algeria, some in Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, none in Tibet, it's all too high, and finally, in the northern hemisphere, several places in China.' He flipped to another sheet. 'The southern hemisphere is even more sparse. A few places on either side of the Andes, in Chile and Argentina. That's about it. Everything else is lower, mostly ocean.'
Gantt's brows knitted in concentration.
'We're ahead of you there, Alex,' Danielson smiled slightly, her voice touched with pride. 'I made up a similar list of sites after we got back from La Jolla. Bob Isaacs had ordered up a photomontage along the trajectory several months ago. The problem was we didn't know what to look for, and there was too much area to cover. He just told me that we are collecting new satellite photos of the spots on my list; they'll be ready tomorrow morning.'
She craned her neck and looked down his list, flipping the pages back and forth.
'I think I've got everything you have here, and a few more. Here in Chile , for instance, north of Santiago. There's a shallow valley there and actually two points, not just one, a few kilometres apart.'
She looked up at Runyan, and he locked her eyes with a long, cool stare. Then he gave her a broad, friendly wink, and her heart jumped.
'You said you had three points?' Gantt prompted him to continue.
'This may be a bit more subtle, but just as important.' Runyan leaned forward and put his stack of computer printout on the ground. He retrieved his cup from Gantt rod poured himself a small bit of bourbon. Resting his upper forearms on both knees and rotating the cup between his palms, he looked up at Danielson from beneath his brows. 'Let me ask you, why is there such a small motion with respect to the surface?'
'But you just answered that!' objected Danielson. 'Its motion at its highest point is set by the initial conditions with which it's released. If it moved with the surface at first, it always will.'
'Always?'
Danielson stopped and stared at the bewhiskered scientist, her eyes shifting back and forth between his. Finally she said, 'You said earlier there must be perturbations, friction. The orbit can't be perfect, it must shift slowly with time.'
'Now I'm with you,' broke in Gantt. 'The orbit must shift slowly with time, but it hasn't shifted much.' He looked at both of them. 'So it hasn't had time.'
'That's just the sort of dung I've been trying to compute,' fold Runyan. 'My model isn't perfect yet, but I have some Feeling for the scale of dungs. I would have to say this thing couldn't have been around for more than ten years, and probably less.'
'What you're saying,' said Danielson, 'is that we only picked up a record of it recently because it's only been around recently.'
'Let me get this straight then,' Gantt said slowly. 'You're arguing that someone or something, somehow, made a black hole of about ten million tons not more than a few years ago, releasing it at rest from a point on the earth's surface about six thousand feet above sea level.' His forehead wrinkled in consternation.
'When we examine those places,' Danielson said, pointing at the computer paper at Runyan's feet, 'do you expect to see something definite?'
'Maybe not,' said Gantt, looking at Runyan. 'Granted that we're dealing with a small black hole, and that it was created artificially, which seems to follow.'
Runyan nodded assent.
'Then,' Gantt continued, 'we're also talking about something beyond our technological feasibility. Suppose the only thing remaining at the "launch site", if I may call it that, is a burned spot and the impression of three round pods — I believe that's the classical imprint of a UFO.'
'If we know where to look, we can find that too,' said Danielson, 'if not with satellites, then a direct fly-over.'
'I suppose we must keep an open mind,' said Runyan, 'but I have a feeling that the clues will be more definite.'
They lapsed into silence. Gantt broke it with a shake of his head. 'I'm sorry,' he said, 'but despite the evidence, I find the whole thing too incredible to believe. An artificial black hole planted here in the earth — I mean, my god!' He raised his hands and eyes in an imploring salute to the skies.
'Alex,' he continued, 'you said a while ago you were relieved the issue was now out in the open. I must say I don't feel that way at all. After all, proving that we are dealing with a black hole is only the tip of the iceberg. Until we know who and why, we've barely begun to plumb the mystery. The most stupendous, terrifying, and profound aspects of this situation would seem to be before us.'
He was silent for a moment and muttered, 'Christ,' and poured himself another jigger of bourbon and drank it off.
Runyan had slumped in his chair, chin on his chest. 'I suppose you could be right, Ellison,' he said. 'I have a hazy idea of what's going on that suggests to me that, conceptually anyway, we're over the hump.'
'How could we be? What in the world are you thinking?' Gantt demanded.
Runyan waved him off with a hand. 'It's too vague. I'm probably being naive or stupid or both.'
Gantt glared at him, uncomfortable with this dismissal. At last he said, 'Well, I don't know about you, but I'll go nuts if I just sit here and think about it. I've got to do something.' He stood up and looked around impatiently.
'Should we have another look for a hole in the ground?' asked Danielson. 'I really wasn't very thorough.'
'We could do that,' agreed Gantt. 'We don't really want to attract too much attention to what went on here. On the other hand, if we don't look now, any sign may get covered up by people shuffling around.'
The moment of tenseness forgotten, they discussed the problem of security for a while and finally decided they would stage a reenactment. This would show who was knocked down by the passage of the hole, thus showing where to look without giving away their object. Gantt would then order some rearrangement of equipment which would occupy most of the members of the entourage. This would give Runyan and Danielson a chance to search the ground for signs of penetration without drawing notice.
They put this plan into action with Runyan noting the vicinity where the hole had come up and Danielson several hundred feet away locating where it had descended.
Then Gantt gave orders to set up a fourth instrumentation site outside of camp and prepare accommodations for Runyan and Danielson, a legitimate task postponed earlier. Danielson joined Runyan. For the next few minutes they assiduously searched the several square yards just outside the main tent, Runyan erect and Danielson in a low crouch.
'Let's try something else,' Runyan finally said. He directed Danielson to stand against the tent wall.
'Now I'm going to jump and stamp — you look for some sign of settling dirt.'
He launched himself upward and came down with a satisfying thud. He looked at the ground as Danielson peered around. They looked up at one another and shrugged. Runyan repeated the faintly ludicrous operation, working systematically across the suspect area.
On the fifth try, Danielson pointed, 'There, just by your left foot.'
Two small stones were wedged in a depression, but as they looked a trickle of loose dirt sifted beneath the stones and disappeared.
Runyan crouched and carefully plucked away one of the stones in each hand. Beneath them was a hole in the sun— baked clay soil the size of a finger. Danielson jogged over to Gantt's tent and returned with a coat hanger under her arm and another she busily untwisted. When she straightened the hanger, she lowered it slowly into the hole. It met only minor resistance and sank to the hook which remained on the-edge, marking the spot.
They walked to the second location and after a brief search found another hole. Again, they straightened a coat hanger and embedded it to mark the spot. Runyan rummaged up a tape measure he had spotted in the main instrumentation tent, and they marked off the distance between the two holes, which Runyan recorded in a small notebook in his pocket.
'Alex,' Danielson asked as they headed back to Gantt's tent, 'is there a special significance to the fact that it came down a bit further to the east? Is that related to the earth's rotation from west to east?'
'That's one of many effects,' he replied as they settled into their chairs, 'but you have to be careful to treat all the irregularities, all the perturbations.'
'How does the rotation come in?' she asked.
'Well, here, I'll show you.' Runyan retrieved his computer output from the ground where he had left it and turned it over on his lap to write on the blank side. He pulled out a pen and carefully blocked out a set of equations. Danielson scooted her chair around close to his so she could see.
Gantt returned an hour later and found them in an animated discussion of orbit perturbations. He did not follow the details, but it was clear to him that Danielson was holding her own with Runyan, giving him pause with penetrating questions and occasionally adding a twist other own. Although the discussion was purely intellectual, Gantt could sense the electricity between the two. Alex is well into stage two, he thought, black hole or no. Then a question of the generation and propagation of seismic waves arose, and Gantt pitched into the discussion as well.
They were still at it when the dinner bell sounded. Runyan and Danielson lagged behind as they headed for the mess tent.
'Listen,' Runyan said quietly, leaning over towards her, 'there's not much to do here in the middle of god's country, but how about an evening stroll after things cool off. The desert can be quite beautiful then.'
Danielson turned her head to look up into his eyes, light flashing within the dark aura of his hair and beard. She wanted to be alone with him.
'That sounds very nice,' she said, holding his gaze for a moment. Then, with a new energy, they moved to catch up to Gantt.
After supper Runyan and Danielson joined Gantt at his tent in the fading evening light. Despite the lingering heat, they went inside the tent where Gantt switched on a generator-fed bulb. They discussed their current position and laid plans for the immediate future. Although the major point they had sought to check seemed well settled, they agreed that Gantt's station should remain in operation to compile a precise record of the behaviour of the object. Danielson would return and report to Isaacs and redouble the effort to discover the hypothesized point of origin. Runyan would report to Phillips and resume his orbital calculations. Gantt again profferred his bottle of bourbon, and they drank a nightcap to seal their arrangement. Danielson excused herself. Runyan followed a few minutes later.
Runyan pushed aside the tent flap and stepped out. The acrid aroma of tarpaulin mingled with the wafted delicate fragrance of greasewood. The clean dry air was warm and enveloping, as if you could shuck your clothes and drink it in through every pore. Runyan waited for his eyes to adjust, then turned towards Danielson's tent, a sense of anticipation beginning to tickle his loins. He peered through the darkness towards her tent, some forty paces away on the other side of the one erected for him, but could only make out the vaguest outlines. Then he saw her, waiting for him in the deepest shadow. The familiar feeling of sweet power flooded him, and his mind filled with images of her warm curves, putting flesh to the dim silhouette he could barely perceive as he approached.
Danielson watched the figure picking his sure way in the dark. She had the irrational feeling that the ground would open up and swallow him before he reached her. It didn't. He stopped a pace from her, his strong presence palpable even at the distance. She felt an urge to reach out and touch him, but he made no motion and neither did she.
He lingered a moment savouring the invisible aura between them, then whispered, 'Let's head out this way.'
He pointed to the rudimentary road that led to one of the outlying sites. They walked carefully out of the campsite and onto the road. The moon was nearly full, casting faint shadows. Danielson found that at their strolling pace she could walk easily, with only part of her attention on the rocky road-bed. She looked around and up. Away from the moon the pure desert sky was almost a solid blanket of stars.
'It's so lovely,' she whispered.
As she looked upward and outward the trauma of the afternoon receded and an overpowering expansiveness filled her. She reached for Runyan's arm and bugged it in both her hands, pulling him close to her. After several paces he freed his arm and encircled her waist. She slipped her arm across his back and leaned her head on his shoulder.
They walked on, speaking little, each lost in thought, awash in awareness of the other. Runyan estimated they had walked a half hour when he said, 'I think we better head back.'
'I suppose we should,' she replied, her voice hinting regret. She felt something slipping by, something she didn't want to lose. As they turned around in the darkness she tugged at his sleeve to halt him. He turned towards her, and she gripped his other sleeve as well, facing him, arms open, body exposed.
He raised his arms to encircle her shoulders, drawing her into a gentle embrace. She cradled her head against his chest, arms around his waist, and stared down at the earth beside them. She thought again of the shattering event of the earlier afternoon, of the miniscule horror hurtling beneath their feet. Somehow, she felt this man was her protector, the sole barrier between her and the ferocious void. She lifted her head to look into his eyes. The shadows on his face were portals to a vast emptiness which she had to keep at bay. She moved her face closer to his so his features were clear, the shadows muted. She opened herself to a feeling she knew had been growing. She wanted this man. The world seemed large and empty. She needed to be with him, to hold to his firmness and strength.
She stretched to kiss him, feeling the prickle of his moustache and beard as he responded. Their lips brushed. A cool current raced through their bodies at the touch of sensitive flesh on flesh. He cupped her jaw and neck, fingers lightly tangled in her hair, kissing her deeply, drawing a dormant passion up and out.
They walked as quickly as they could back to the camp, pausing for another prolonged kiss when the interval grew too long to bear. The camp was dark and quiet when they returned.
Outside her tent she embraced his neck and stood on tiptoe for one more lingering kiss before crossing the threshold. An image of the ludicrously narrow cot flashed in her mind. They could throw the thin mattress on the tent floor. She broke their kiss, found his hand, and brushed her lips across his palm. Then she pushed aside the tent flap and, still holding his hand, led him in. Runyan stooped to follow her, a small smile playing on his lips.
Chapter 15
Viktor Korolev forged down the sidewalk with long solid strides, his black mood radiating ahead, parting grumbling pedestrians like the bow wave of a ship. They had offered him a ride, but he needed to walk to work off his frustration.
So the Americans had done it! This inconceivable dung. He'd had to lay his proof before the generals. After that, none of his bellowing power could dissuade them from narrow thoughts of retribution. Granted the Americans were formally at fault, this thing was too different to be handled with old-fashioned polarized modes of behaviour. Good arguments, to no avail.
Korolev thought of his message to Zamyatin, a meagre return for gifts received. The American would rue the day he had proffered his insights, seeking help. Korolev sighed. Had this Robert Isaacs not catalyzed events, the day of reckoning would only have been postponed.
Korolev slowed his pace, frustration waning, pushed aside by the need to develop a constructive response. He began to mentally list others in the power structure to whom he could take his case for moderation, cooperation. Whatever the generals plotted now, he hoped it would involve no loss of life.
On Thursday morning, Isaacs studied each one of the photographs as Vincent Martinelli banded them over. He set one of them aside. All the others ended up in a neat stack of rejects. He picked up the special one and peered at it closely again.
'These are all the possible sites?'
'Every one Danielson gave us.'
'And this is the only one that shows anything but natural terrain and vegetation?' He flapped the photo in his hand.
'The only one.'
'Okay, so I'll bite. Where is it?'
' New Mexico.'
' New Mexico ! Good god! Then this thing may have begun in the United States ?'
'Looks like it. We took five shots of New Mexico. That one is in the Guadalupe Mountains to the east of the White Sands missile testing range.'
'Hmmm. Some connection there, you think?' Isaacs asked. 'What is the place?' He waved the photo again.
'Hey, don't ask me.' Martinelli protested. 'You're the smart guys that figure 'cm out.'
'No idea?'
'No, seriously. I came up here as soon as they came out of the print machine. All I've got is the coordinates. They're on the back.'
Isaacs turned the print over. The numbers meant nothing to him.
'I'll get Saris on this.'
'Anything else from my side?'
'Not until we know what we're dealing with here.'
'Okay, give a holier if you need something.'
'Right, thanks for the quick work, Voice.' Isaacs waved a salute as Martinelli let himself out.
Mid-morning was slow time. Esteban Ruiz sat in the guard house at the front gate of CIA headquarters trying to pick a rim of varnish from under his fingernail. A quiet smile reflected his thoughts. Tonight he would put the final coat on the new desk and shelves, and by tomorrow they could permanently set up the small computer he had scrimped and saved to buy his children. It was not the biggest, but it had been on sale, and when he lugged it in the door the children had shouted with surprise. Carlos, the oldest, had grumped a bit that it did not have enough memory, but Esteban's heart swelled with pleasure that his son even knew to question such a thing. Esteban did not know computers, was more than a little frightened of them, but he did know wood. The new shelves, the product of his hands, mind, labour, and love, looked good. He was proud of them and proud of his children who yearned to embrace a world he would never know. Ruiz was not aware of the black limousine until it slid to a quiet stop in front of him. Without quite focusing on detail, he knew what it was.
Holy Mary, Mother of God! he exclaimed to himself. Russians! He stepped quickly from the gate house, right palm on the butt of his service revolver, and tried to adopt his most gruff manner, but his voice shook, betraying his shock.
'Hold on there! Where do you think you're going?'
He addressed himself to the stolid-faced driver, but received no reply. Instead, the rear window whisked down in response to an inner button.
'We don't intend to go in, Sergeant,' Grigor Zamyatin used his most appealing tone. 'But I have an urgent message for Mr Isaacs, your Deputy Director of Scientific Intelligence.' He put a core of steel in the next words. 'I must see that he receives it.' Then he spoke smoothly again. 'Could he possibly come here to the gate and receive it directly?'
Ruiz could not help the edge of respect that crept into his voice. His hand slipped off his pistol butt. The driver of the limousine surreptitiously shifted his body and relaxed slightly as well.
'Sir, I can't comment on specific personnel. If you have a message, I'll take it.'
Zamyatin smiled slightly at this expected, but cumbersome subterfuge. No one knew who worked at the CIA except every spy in the world, and anyone else who cared to check. He reached into his jacket pocket and extracted the sealed envelope with Isaacs's name carefully handwritten across it. He extended it to the guard, but kept his grip as Ruiz reached for it. Zamyatin locked eyes with him.
'This is extremely urgent. It must be delivered to Mr Isaacs, and no one else.'
'I'll see that it is put into the proper channels,' Ruiz said noncommittally, but his voice rang with sincerity.
Zamyatin would have preferred to deliver the envelope personally to Isaacs, but this was the most he expected. He was confident Isaacs would have it within the hour. He released his grip on the envelope, and the window swished shut. Ruiz stepped back as the limousine backed up, performed a U-turn and accelerated out of the entry drive towards the Washington parkway. He stepped back into the gate house, placed the envelope gingerly on a shelf, and grabbed the phone.
'Ralph? This is Steve at the east gate. Damn car full of Russians, embassy types, just dropped off an envelope they say has to be delivered to Mr Isaacs. I think you'd better send somebody from the bomb squad down here. Right. You bet your ass I won't!' He punched the button disconnecting the phone and cradled the receiver on his shoulder while he flipped through the directory and ran his finger down the page until he came to the Office of the Deputy Director of Scientific Intelligence. Then he dialled again.
Bill Baris left the document section with as much material as he could conveniently carry in both hands. He walked rapidly down the corridor, intent on his destination. Earls was in his late forties, sharp-featured with thinning blond curls. He rarely stopped to ponder the fact that he was good at what he did. He just continued to do what felt right. This felt right, he thought of the material in his hands. Isaacs had nailed it.
He passed through Kathleen Huddleston's office giving a nod to her and barged into Isaacs's with a familiarity born of long comfortable association.
'Here you are, Bob.' He deposited the files on Isaacs's desk.
'What have you got?' Isaacs inquired.
'It's a private lab, about two years old. Strictly devoted to weapons research subcontracted from the Los Alamos National Laboratory.'
There was something very familiar about that description. Isaacs couldn't quite place it.
'Who runs it?' he asked.
'Guy name of Krone.'
'Paul Krone!' Isaacs slammed his fist on his desk, remembering Zicek talking about Krone in La Jolla , suggesting he be brought in. Looks like he was already in, Isaacs thought grimly.
'Sir?' Kathleen spoke over the intercom.
'Yes! What is it?' Isaacs was more abrupt than he intended.
'Sir, I just got a call from the guard at the front gate. Apparently a car from the Soviet embassy dropped off a note they insisted be delivered to you. It's being processed through security.'
Isaacs's mind raced through the possibilities.
'From the embassy, you say. Did the guard recognize anyone?'
'Not specifically. The car was an embassy limousine. There was a chauffeur and some official in the back seat who banded over the note and did all the talking.' Isaacs had a vivid mental image of looking out through his rear window and seeing nothing but the grill and long hood of Zamyatin's limousine.
'Ask security to have him check some mug shots of embassy personnel. Make sure one of Colonel Grigor Zamyatin is among them.'
'Yes, sir.' Kathleen rang off.
What could Zamyatin want? Isaacs asked himself. Why would anyone else in the Soviet embassy hand-deliver a note to him? He put these questions aside and picked up the pile of material Earls had brought in.
'Let me see some of that,' Earls requested. 'I only took time' to skim it.' He riffled through the pile of folders looking for some specific ones; then they settled down to read. Isaacs paused occasionally to make notes on a pad. Ten minutes passed in silence broken only by the shuffle of paper in the folders. Then the intercom buzzed again.
'Sir, Sergeant Ruiz, the guard, identified Colonel Zamyatin. He, Colonel Zamyatin that is, was very adamant that you get the note quickly and personally.'
'Where is it then?'
'Sergeant Ruiz said someone from the bomb squad picked it up.'
'The bomb squad!'
'Well, yes, I suppose they were concerned about letter bombs, that sort of thing.'
'Letter bombs are anonymous. Not likely that the Colonel would drop by in his official lime to deliver one. Tell them to get that note up here. On the double!'
'Yes, sir!'
Isaacs waved his arms at the ceiling in a gesture of desperation. 'What a world,' he exclaimed.
'So what kind of picture do we have here?' he asked rhetorically, addressing Saris. 'Krone Industries set up this lab to do research on contract to Los Alamos. They've done work on particle beams and lasers, particularly using them to implode material to high density and temperatures, just as Zicek said. That could be directly relevant.'
'It's not just Krone Industries,' said Earls. 'I've been reading quarterly reports the lab submitted to Los Alamos. Krone himself is chief man on the spot, devoting himself one hundred per cent to the effort.
'And not just his time,' Saris continued. 'Out of curiosity, I got a list of the companies in Krone Industries and looked up their financial reports.' He betted one of the folders he had selected. 'That lab is not just running on its consulting contract with Los Alamos. Every one of these companies under Krone's thumb has diverted significant portions of their resources to the lab. There's an immense effort going on there. Far more than required by the government contract.'
Isaacs leaned back in his chair to digest this information and looked up at a rap on the door. Kathleen opened it and ushered in an energetic young man with close-cropped hair. In his hand he clutched a mangled envelope.
'Mark Burley, sir. From counteractivity. This is the note delivered to you half an hour ago. We processed it as quickly as we could.' He banded over the envelope.
Isaacs took it and raised a sceptical eyebrow. The envelope was crudely ripped open and both the envelope and the portion of the enclosed note, which was exposed through the ragged flap, were wrinkled.
'You opened it?'
'Yes, sir,' Burley replied with deep sincerity. 'We deter— named it was not a letter bomb by certan physical tests, but we wanted to check the contents for contaminants. Contact poisons. If we'd had time we could've opened it so you'd never have noticed.' A small, proud smile came and went quickly. 'As it was, we did the most thorough job we could, in the shortest time.'
'I'm sure you did.' If Burley noticed Isaacs's facetious tone, he gave no sign.
'Thank you, Mr Burley. I appreciate the fast work.'
'Anytime, sir. That's our job.' The young man spun smartly on his heel and marched out. Isaacs exchanged an amused, wry smile with Bans.
'Boy Scout. Place is crawling with them,' said Bans.
Isaacs's smile faded as he extracted and read the hand— scrawled note. It was very brief.
I know. I have to tell them. You must hurry.
Isaacs had briefed Baris on his interchange with Korolev. He banded the piece of rough, light brown Russian paper to Earls.
'Know?' he asked. 'Know what?'
'I'm afraid damn near everything we do,' Isaacs replied. He thumbed the intercom.
'Yes?'
'Kathleen, get me Martinelli.'
Isaacs put a hand on the phone in anticipation and looked at Bans.
'At the very least Korolev knows everything we did when Pat and I first went to talk to Jason because of the synopsis I sent him. There's a very good chance he followed the same line of reasoning as Runyan. As wild an idea as a black hole is, it has a certain inevitability in hindsight. Korolev didn't have direct access to our physical evidence from Nagasaki and Dallas , but he had his own from the Novorossiisk.'
The phone buzzed and Isaacs jerked the receiver to his ear.
'Vince? I want to know about Soviet ship deployment. Particularly along thirty-two degrees forty-seven minutes, both north and south longitude.' He listened for a moment. 'Anytime in the last six weeks. I'd rather have that now and fresh stuff when you can get it.' He listened again. 'That's just the ticket. Thanks, Vince.'
He hung up and looked intently at Baris. 'We have to assume Korolev also guessed we were dealing with a black hole. I sent him my memo in late June. He's had six weeks to ponder it and move to do something about it. I also tipped off Zamyatin to watch Nagasaki. We can also assume they have at least a rough idea what went on there. If they have penetrated the Japanese with any efficiency, they probably have the full report. Korolev could pick up quickly on the parallels between the holes drilled in Nagasaki , and those in the Novorossiisk. For that matter, they may know about Dallas.
'In any case,' Isaacs continued, 'we lost three weeks sitting on our duffs waiting for Dallas to happen, three more before we got back to Jason, and Gantt got the real dope. That's six weeks when Korolev could have been pushing for some monitoring programme in Russia. The trajectory doesn't pass through Russia , so they'd have to mobilize somewhere else. It makes most sense to me to use their Navy. We would have moved faster if ours hadn't been so recalcitrant.
'I don't know what their response time would be, but I certainly got the idea from Zamyatin that Korolev has clout at high levels in the Kremlin. If they put properly instrumented ships on the trajectory, they could learn everything we have.'
'I see what you mean,' Baris said. 'If Korolev suspected a black hole, he'd have a gravimeter put on board to measure the mass.'
'Seems obvious enough,' Isaacs agreed. 'Gantt considered a shipboard experiment, but elected to put his apparatus on dry land to make it as stable as possible. We know now it wouldn't have made much difference. They'd have to be a bit careful, but an inertially mounted device, isolated from the worst pitching of the ship, would do the job.'
'Accurate timing would be easy,' Isaacs continued. 'With sonar monitors and some regular data acquisition they would know how long the thing hovered above sea level and could figure out the altitude to which it rose, just as we did.'
'So they'd look along the trajectory at that altitude, just as we did,' said Saris following the logic.
'And they would find this lab,' Isaacs slapped his palm on the stack of folders in front of them, 'just as we did. I think that must be what Korolev's note means. He's found Krone's lab, and, having raised a ruckus, he has to report his findings to the boys at the top.'
The phone rang and Isaacs jerked it up.
'Yes? Right.'
He reached for a pad and scribbled some numbers.
'Yes. Yes. Got that.' He listened, then spoke again. 'How far is that? Yes, dammit, no question. They're onto it. Sure, when they come in, but this is just what we needed. Thanks for the quick work. Great. Right.'
He hung up and relayed the message from Martinelli to Baris.
'There are five small flotillas in the Pacific, three along thirty-two degrees forty-seven minutes north, two south. Each has a research vessel, a tender, and a destroyer. They're spaced 1170 miles apart, sailing steadily westward, about 190 miles per day.'
'So they're tracking it,' Earls summarized.
'They're tracking it,' Isaacs confirmed.
'How long?' Saris inquired.
'Seven to ten days. Some got on station earlier.'
'That's plenty of time to collect a good timing record,' said Baris.
'I think there's no doubt now that Korolev has followed the same path that Runyan led us on,' Isaacs said. 'We've got to get to that lab and find out what's going on.'
'And damn quickly,' Saris said. 'If you've got this right and Korolev reports to the top brass in the Kremlin that a black hole was made and released at a secret US government lab, oh, boy.' Saris leaned back in his chair. 'Can you imagine what the chest-medal crowd will do with that? We'll be right back to square one when they thought we'd zapped their carrier. Damned if they weren't right!'
Isaacs stood up and moved to the window. He clasped his hands behind his back and stared out over the trees, rocking up on his toes. He could feel the mid-August heat which smothered the tree tops.
'We've got a powder keg already up there in orbit,' Isaacs mused. 'I don't know whether we can possibly move quickly enough to neutralize this situation. We've got to hope we can find an explanation that will satisfy the Soviets that this wasn't an intentional, government sanctioned plan.'
He spun suddenly.
'It wasn't, was it?'
'Whoa,' said Saris thoughtfully. 'There's no clue in any of the files here.' He pointed at the material on Isaacs's desk. 'But that's pretty clean stuff. I just pulled it out of our library. Our job's to know everything the bad guys are up to, not everything our team does, so maybe there's an outside chance. Still, if I read this guy Krone right, he's the kind who would tackle something like this on his own. Remember these were Krone Industries resources being squandered. Unless there was some heavy-duty laundering, there wasn't much government funding. I'll check more deeply, but I think we're clean.'
'We've got no choice but to get the whole story on Krone and that lab as fast as possible,' said Isaacs, regaining his seat. 'Bill, I want you to keep digging here. Track down everything you can going in and out of that lab that could be related to the manufacture of a black hole.
'Someone's got to go out to the site, though, and under the circumstances, I think I'd better take that one on myself.
'I'll call Pat and get her there too. And I might as well bring Runyan along. He knows Krone and is on top of the scientific aspects. I want you to get a team busy working up a reaction estimate. As things stand, how will the Soviets react if they're informed of Krone's lab? What will it take to keep them under control? Okay?'
'Right.'
'Any questions?'
'A procedural one. Before you go, have you told the Director yet?'
'I spent three hours with him last night. Trying to explain about the black hole. Left him numb. I'll have to see him now and report on Krone and the message from Korolev. I guess we'll see what kind of stuff he's really made of.'
'Is he going to want to go to the President? Or expect us to draw up a national intelligence estimate to circulate? The black hole is one thing, and perhaps an emergency in itself, but potential Russian reaction is a key issue now.'
'We're in a bind. We've been waiting to get all our facts straight before dumping something like a black hole in the President's lap. Of course, until this morning we didn't know that it was made here, nor that the Russians were on to us.
'There's no time now for a formality like an NIE,' Isaacs continued. 'We've got a real crisis. We must get the story from that lab and then pass it to the President directly. I think the Del will see it that way, but that's why I want you to get on that reaction estimate. We'll want that a part of the package.'
Isaacs looked at his watch. 'It's 10:45 now, 8:45 in New Mexico. I should be able to catch something at Andrews that will get us out there by mid-afternoon, local time. It'll take a few hours to check out the lab. I might make it back here by midnight.
'I'll suggest to the Del that he lay the groundwork for an emergency meeting of the National Security Council about then. And just hope the Russians don't push the button for twelve hours.'
.'All right,' said Earls, rising to leave. 'I'll get on it.' He strode quickly across the room and out the door.'
'Kate?' Isaacs called, and she appeared in the doorway, attuned to the emergency atmosphere.
'Tell the DCI I'm on my way to see him. Top priority. Order a helicopter to Andrews Air Force Base. Forty-five minutes from now, maximum. Half hour better. Arrange for a flight out of Andrews for me and two agents. Call Boswank and get him to assign me two of his people. Call Danielson and Runyan in Arizona and arrange for a flight for them. Destination for all of us is Holloman Air Force Base near White Sands, New Mexico. Arrange ground transportation there. We're headed for a laboratory about forty miles away, up in the mountains. Better yet, see if you can get another chopper to take us from Holloman to the lab. Here's the name of the lab and of the guy in charge.' He scribbled on a memo pad and banded it to her. 'I'll want to talk to him when I get back from seeing the DCI. And call Plumps in La Jolla and taut to Gantt while you're on the line to Arizona. I want Phillips here this evening prepared for an NSC meeting. They may want to get together in Pasadena to assemble the relevant information.'
So the Americans had done it! This inconceivable dung. He'd had to lay his proof before the generals. After that, none of his bellowing power could dissuade them from narrow thoughts of retribution. Granted the Americans were formally at fault, this thing was too different to be handled with old-fashioned polarized modes of behaviour. Good arguments, to no avail.
Korolev thought of his message to Zamyatin, a meagre return for gifts received. The American would rue the day he had proffered his insights, seeking help. Korolev sighed. Had this Robert Isaacs not catalyzed events, the day of reckoning would only have been postponed.
Korolev slowed his pace, frustration waning, pushed aside by the need to develop a constructive response. He began to mentally list others in the power structure to whom he could take his case for moderation, cooperation. Whatever the generals plotted now, he hoped it would involve no loss of life.
On Thursday morning, Isaacs studied each one of the photographs as Vincent Martinelli banded them over. He set one of them aside. All the others ended up in a neat stack of rejects. He picked up the special one and peered at it closely again.
'These are all the possible sites?'
'Every one Danielson gave us.'
'And this is the only one that shows anything but natural terrain and vegetation?' He flapped the photo in his hand.
'The only one.'
'Okay, so I'll bite. Where is it?'
' New Mexico.'
' New Mexico ! Good god! Then this thing may have begun in the United States ?'
'Looks like it. We took five shots of New Mexico. That one is in the Guadalupe Mountains to the east of the White Sands missile testing range.'
'Hmmm. Some connection there, you think?' Isaacs asked. 'What is the place?' He waved the photo again.
'Hey, don't ask me.' Martinelli protested. 'You're the smart guys that figure 'cm out.'
'No idea?'
'No, seriously. I came up here as soon as they came out of the print machine. All I've got is the coordinates. They're on the back.'
Isaacs turned the print over. The numbers meant nothing to him.
'I'll get Saris on this.'
'Anything else from my side?'
'Not until we know what we're dealing with here.'
'Okay, give a holier if you need something.'
'Right, thanks for the quick work, Voice.' Isaacs waved a salute as Martinelli let himself out.
Mid-morning was slow time. Esteban Ruiz sat in the guard house at the front gate of CIA headquarters trying to pick a rim of varnish from under his fingernail. A quiet smile reflected his thoughts. Tonight he would put the final coat on the new desk and shelves, and by tomorrow they could permanently set up the small computer he had scrimped and saved to buy his children. It was not the biggest, but it had been on sale, and when he lugged it in the door the children had shouted with surprise. Carlos, the oldest, had grumped a bit that it did not have enough memory, but Esteban's heart swelled with pleasure that his son even knew to question such a thing. Esteban did not know computers, was more than a little frightened of them, but he did know wood. The new shelves, the product of his hands, mind, labour, and love, looked good. He was proud of them and proud of his children who yearned to embrace a world he would never know. Ruiz was not aware of the black limousine until it slid to a quiet stop in front of him. Without quite focusing on detail, he knew what it was.
Holy Mary, Mother of God! he exclaimed to himself. Russians! He stepped quickly from the gate house, right palm on the butt of his service revolver, and tried to adopt his most gruff manner, but his voice shook, betraying his shock.
'Hold on there! Where do you think you're going?'
He addressed himself to the stolid-faced driver, but received no reply. Instead, the rear window whisked down in response to an inner button.
'We don't intend to go in, Sergeant,' Grigor Zamyatin used his most appealing tone. 'But I have an urgent message for Mr Isaacs, your Deputy Director of Scientific Intelligence.' He put a core of steel in the next words. 'I must see that he receives it.' Then he spoke smoothly again. 'Could he possibly come here to the gate and receive it directly?'
Ruiz could not help the edge of respect that crept into his voice. His hand slipped off his pistol butt. The driver of the limousine surreptitiously shifted his body and relaxed slightly as well.
'Sir, I can't comment on specific personnel. If you have a message, I'll take it.'
Zamyatin smiled slightly at this expected, but cumbersome subterfuge. No one knew who worked at the CIA except every spy in the world, and anyone else who cared to check. He reached into his jacket pocket and extracted the sealed envelope with Isaacs's name carefully handwritten across it. He extended it to the guard, but kept his grip as Ruiz reached for it. Zamyatin locked eyes with him.
'This is extremely urgent. It must be delivered to Mr Isaacs, and no one else.'
'I'll see that it is put into the proper channels,' Ruiz said noncommittally, but his voice rang with sincerity.
Zamyatin would have preferred to deliver the envelope personally to Isaacs, but this was the most he expected. He was confident Isaacs would have it within the hour. He released his grip on the envelope, and the window swished shut. Ruiz stepped back as the limousine backed up, performed a U-turn and accelerated out of the entry drive towards the Washington parkway. He stepped back into the gate house, placed the envelope gingerly on a shelf, and grabbed the phone.
'Ralph? This is Steve at the east gate. Damn car full of Russians, embassy types, just dropped off an envelope they say has to be delivered to Mr Isaacs. I think you'd better send somebody from the bomb squad down here. Right. You bet your ass I won't!' He punched the button disconnecting the phone and cradled the receiver on his shoulder while he flipped through the directory and ran his finger down the page until he came to the Office of the Deputy Director of Scientific Intelligence. Then he dialled again.
Bill Baris left the document section with as much material as he could conveniently carry in both hands. He walked rapidly down the corridor, intent on his destination. Earls was in his late forties, sharp-featured with thinning blond curls. He rarely stopped to ponder the fact that he was good at what he did. He just continued to do what felt right. This felt right, he thought of the material in his hands. Isaacs had nailed it.
He passed through Kathleen Huddleston's office giving a nod to her and barged into Isaacs's with a familiarity born of long comfortable association.
'Here you are, Bob.' He deposited the files on Isaacs's desk.
'What have you got?' Isaacs inquired.
'It's a private lab, about two years old. Strictly devoted to weapons research subcontracted from the Los Alamos National Laboratory.'
There was something very familiar about that description. Isaacs couldn't quite place it.
'Who runs it?' he asked.
'Guy name of Krone.'
'Paul Krone!' Isaacs slammed his fist on his desk, remembering Zicek talking about Krone in La Jolla , suggesting he be brought in. Looks like he was already in, Isaacs thought grimly.
'Sir?' Kathleen spoke over the intercom.
'Yes! What is it?' Isaacs was more abrupt than he intended.
'Sir, I just got a call from the guard at the front gate. Apparently a car from the Soviet embassy dropped off a note they insisted be delivered to you. It's being processed through security.'
Isaacs's mind raced through the possibilities.
'From the embassy, you say. Did the guard recognize anyone?'
'Not specifically. The car was an embassy limousine. There was a chauffeur and some official in the back seat who banded over the note and did all the talking.' Isaacs had a vivid mental image of looking out through his rear window and seeing nothing but the grill and long hood of Zamyatin's limousine.
'Ask security to have him check some mug shots of embassy personnel. Make sure one of Colonel Grigor Zamyatin is among them.'
'Yes, sir.' Kathleen rang off.
What could Zamyatin want? Isaacs asked himself. Why would anyone else in the Soviet embassy hand-deliver a note to him? He put these questions aside and picked up the pile of material Earls had brought in.
'Let me see some of that,' Earls requested. 'I only took time' to skim it.' He riffled through the pile of folders looking for some specific ones; then they settled down to read. Isaacs paused occasionally to make notes on a pad. Ten minutes passed in silence broken only by the shuffle of paper in the folders. Then the intercom buzzed again.
'Sir, Sergeant Ruiz, the guard, identified Colonel Zamyatin. He, Colonel Zamyatin that is, was very adamant that you get the note quickly and personally.'
'Where is it then?'
'Sergeant Ruiz said someone from the bomb squad picked it up.'
'The bomb squad!'
'Well, yes, I suppose they were concerned about letter bombs, that sort of thing.'
'Letter bombs are anonymous. Not likely that the Colonel would drop by in his official lime to deliver one. Tell them to get that note up here. On the double!'
'Yes, sir!'
Isaacs waved his arms at the ceiling in a gesture of desperation. 'What a world,' he exclaimed.
'So what kind of picture do we have here?' he asked rhetorically, addressing Saris. 'Krone Industries set up this lab to do research on contract to Los Alamos. They've done work on particle beams and lasers, particularly using them to implode material to high density and temperatures, just as Zicek said. That could be directly relevant.'
'It's not just Krone Industries,' said Earls. 'I've been reading quarterly reports the lab submitted to Los Alamos. Krone himself is chief man on the spot, devoting himself one hundred per cent to the effort.
'And not just his time,' Saris continued. 'Out of curiosity, I got a list of the companies in Krone Industries and looked up their financial reports.' He betted one of the folders he had selected. 'That lab is not just running on its consulting contract with Los Alamos. Every one of these companies under Krone's thumb has diverted significant portions of their resources to the lab. There's an immense effort going on there. Far more than required by the government contract.'
Isaacs leaned back in his chair to digest this information and looked up at a rap on the door. Kathleen opened it and ushered in an energetic young man with close-cropped hair. In his hand he clutched a mangled envelope.
'Mark Burley, sir. From counteractivity. This is the note delivered to you half an hour ago. We processed it as quickly as we could.' He banded over the envelope.
Isaacs took it and raised a sceptical eyebrow. The envelope was crudely ripped open and both the envelope and the portion of the enclosed note, which was exposed through the ragged flap, were wrinkled.
'You opened it?'
'Yes, sir,' Burley replied with deep sincerity. 'We deter— named it was not a letter bomb by certan physical tests, but we wanted to check the contents for contaminants. Contact poisons. If we'd had time we could've opened it so you'd never have noticed.' A small, proud smile came and went quickly. 'As it was, we did the most thorough job we could, in the shortest time.'
'I'm sure you did.' If Burley noticed Isaacs's facetious tone, he gave no sign.
'Thank you, Mr Burley. I appreciate the fast work.'
'Anytime, sir. That's our job.' The young man spun smartly on his heel and marched out. Isaacs exchanged an amused, wry smile with Bans.
'Boy Scout. Place is crawling with them,' said Bans.
Isaacs's smile faded as he extracted and read the hand— scrawled note. It was very brief.
I know. I have to tell them. You must hurry.
Isaacs had briefed Baris on his interchange with Korolev. He banded the piece of rough, light brown Russian paper to Earls.
'Know?' he asked. 'Know what?'
'I'm afraid damn near everything we do,' Isaacs replied. He thumbed the intercom.
'Yes?'
'Kathleen, get me Martinelli.'
Isaacs put a hand on the phone in anticipation and looked at Bans.
'At the very least Korolev knows everything we did when Pat and I first went to talk to Jason because of the synopsis I sent him. There's a very good chance he followed the same line of reasoning as Runyan. As wild an idea as a black hole is, it has a certain inevitability in hindsight. Korolev didn't have direct access to our physical evidence from Nagasaki and Dallas , but he had his own from the Novorossiisk.'
The phone buzzed and Isaacs jerked the receiver to his ear.
'Vince? I want to know about Soviet ship deployment. Particularly along thirty-two degrees forty-seven minutes, both north and south longitude.' He listened for a moment. 'Anytime in the last six weeks. I'd rather have that now and fresh stuff when you can get it.' He listened again. 'That's just the ticket. Thanks, Vince.'
He hung up and looked intently at Baris. 'We have to assume Korolev also guessed we were dealing with a black hole. I sent him my memo in late June. He's had six weeks to ponder it and move to do something about it. I also tipped off Zamyatin to watch Nagasaki. We can also assume they have at least a rough idea what went on there. If they have penetrated the Japanese with any efficiency, they probably have the full report. Korolev could pick up quickly on the parallels between the holes drilled in Nagasaki , and those in the Novorossiisk. For that matter, they may know about Dallas.
'In any case,' Isaacs continued, 'we lost three weeks sitting on our duffs waiting for Dallas to happen, three more before we got back to Jason, and Gantt got the real dope. That's six weeks when Korolev could have been pushing for some monitoring programme in Russia. The trajectory doesn't pass through Russia , so they'd have to mobilize somewhere else. It makes most sense to me to use their Navy. We would have moved faster if ours hadn't been so recalcitrant.
'I don't know what their response time would be, but I certainly got the idea from Zamyatin that Korolev has clout at high levels in the Kremlin. If they put properly instrumented ships on the trajectory, they could learn everything we have.'
'I see what you mean,' Baris said. 'If Korolev suspected a black hole, he'd have a gravimeter put on board to measure the mass.'
'Seems obvious enough,' Isaacs agreed. 'Gantt considered a shipboard experiment, but elected to put his apparatus on dry land to make it as stable as possible. We know now it wouldn't have made much difference. They'd have to be a bit careful, but an inertially mounted device, isolated from the worst pitching of the ship, would do the job.'
'Accurate timing would be easy,' Isaacs continued. 'With sonar monitors and some regular data acquisition they would know how long the thing hovered above sea level and could figure out the altitude to which it rose, just as we did.'
'So they'd look along the trajectory at that altitude, just as we did,' said Saris following the logic.
'And they would find this lab,' Isaacs slapped his palm on the stack of folders in front of them, 'just as we did. I think that must be what Korolev's note means. He's found Krone's lab, and, having raised a ruckus, he has to report his findings to the boys at the top.'
The phone rang and Isaacs jerked it up.
'Yes? Right.'
He reached for a pad and scribbled some numbers.
'Yes. Yes. Got that.' He listened, then spoke again. 'How far is that? Yes, dammit, no question. They're onto it. Sure, when they come in, but this is just what we needed. Thanks for the quick work. Great. Right.'
He hung up and relayed the message from Martinelli to Baris.
'There are five small flotillas in the Pacific, three along thirty-two degrees forty-seven minutes north, two south. Each has a research vessel, a tender, and a destroyer. They're spaced 1170 miles apart, sailing steadily westward, about 190 miles per day.'
'So they're tracking it,' Earls summarized.
'They're tracking it,' Isaacs confirmed.
'How long?' Saris inquired.
'Seven to ten days. Some got on station earlier.'
'That's plenty of time to collect a good timing record,' said Baris.
'I think there's no doubt now that Korolev has followed the same path that Runyan led us on,' Isaacs said. 'We've got to get to that lab and find out what's going on.'
'And damn quickly,' Saris said. 'If you've got this right and Korolev reports to the top brass in the Kremlin that a black hole was made and released at a secret US government lab, oh, boy.' Saris leaned back in his chair. 'Can you imagine what the chest-medal crowd will do with that? We'll be right back to square one when they thought we'd zapped their carrier. Damned if they weren't right!'
Isaacs stood up and moved to the window. He clasped his hands behind his back and stared out over the trees, rocking up on his toes. He could feel the mid-August heat which smothered the tree tops.
'We've got a powder keg already up there in orbit,' Isaacs mused. 'I don't know whether we can possibly move quickly enough to neutralize this situation. We've got to hope we can find an explanation that will satisfy the Soviets that this wasn't an intentional, government sanctioned plan.'
He spun suddenly.
'It wasn't, was it?'
'Whoa,' said Saris thoughtfully. 'There's no clue in any of the files here.' He pointed at the material on Isaacs's desk. 'But that's pretty clean stuff. I just pulled it out of our library. Our job's to know everything the bad guys are up to, not everything our team does, so maybe there's an outside chance. Still, if I read this guy Krone right, he's the kind who would tackle something like this on his own. Remember these were Krone Industries resources being squandered. Unless there was some heavy-duty laundering, there wasn't much government funding. I'll check more deeply, but I think we're clean.'
'We've got no choice but to get the whole story on Krone and that lab as fast as possible,' said Isaacs, regaining his seat. 'Bill, I want you to keep digging here. Track down everything you can going in and out of that lab that could be related to the manufacture of a black hole.
'Someone's got to go out to the site, though, and under the circumstances, I think I'd better take that one on myself.
'I'll call Pat and get her there too. And I might as well bring Runyan along. He knows Krone and is on top of the scientific aspects. I want you to get a team busy working up a reaction estimate. As things stand, how will the Soviets react if they're informed of Krone's lab? What will it take to keep them under control? Okay?'
'Right.'
'Any questions?'
'A procedural one. Before you go, have you told the Director yet?'
'I spent three hours with him last night. Trying to explain about the black hole. Left him numb. I'll have to see him now and report on Krone and the message from Korolev. I guess we'll see what kind of stuff he's really made of.'
'Is he going to want to go to the President? Or expect us to draw up a national intelligence estimate to circulate? The black hole is one thing, and perhaps an emergency in itself, but potential Russian reaction is a key issue now.'
'We're in a bind. We've been waiting to get all our facts straight before dumping something like a black hole in the President's lap. Of course, until this morning we didn't know that it was made here, nor that the Russians were on to us.
'There's no time now for a formality like an NIE,' Isaacs continued. 'We've got a real crisis. We must get the story from that lab and then pass it to the President directly. I think the Del will see it that way, but that's why I want you to get on that reaction estimate. We'll want that a part of the package.'
Isaacs looked at his watch. 'It's 10:45 now, 8:45 in New Mexico. I should be able to catch something at Andrews that will get us out there by mid-afternoon, local time. It'll take a few hours to check out the lab. I might make it back here by midnight.
'I'll suggest to the Del that he lay the groundwork for an emergency meeting of the National Security Council about then. And just hope the Russians don't push the button for twelve hours.'
.'All right,' said Earls, rising to leave. 'I'll get on it.' He strode quickly across the room and out the door.'
'Kate?' Isaacs called, and she appeared in the doorway, attuned to the emergency atmosphere.
'Tell the DCI I'm on my way to see him. Top priority. Order a helicopter to Andrews Air Force Base. Forty-five minutes from now, maximum. Half hour better. Arrange for a flight out of Andrews for me and two agents. Call Boswank and get him to assign me two of his people. Call Danielson and Runyan in Arizona and arrange for a flight for them. Destination for all of us is Holloman Air Force Base near White Sands, New Mexico. Arrange ground transportation there. We're headed for a laboratory about forty miles away, up in the mountains. Better yet, see if you can get another chopper to take us from Holloman to the lab. Here's the name of the lab and of the guy in charge.' He scribbled on a memo pad and banded it to her. 'I'll want to talk to him when I get back from seeing the DCI. And call Plumps in La Jolla and taut to Gantt while you're on the line to Arizona. I want Phillips here this evening prepared for an NSC meeting. They may want to get together in Pasadena to assemble the relevant information.'