Space: A Novel

by James A. Michener

  Some of the men gasped, but the effect Thompson sought was dissipated when the husky voice of Randy Claggett whispered, ‘Get that girl’s full name and address.’

  When the NASA high command learned through its grapevine of the threat posed by Cynthia Rhee, they gave Tucker Thompson a clear directive: ‘Get that Korean reporter straightened out,’ but Tucker, remembering his first encounter with her, knew that he was not the man for that job. Calling Mrs. Mott to his room at the Bali Hai, he said, ‘Ride herd on our Miss Kimchi.’

  ‘Who’s that?’

  Impatiently Thompson explained: ‘Kimchi is the smell-ingest coleslaw in the world, and the bitingest. It’s Korean, loaded with garlic. And that Rhee dame is twice as obnoxious. You’re to tell her what’s what. She’s to lay off our astronauts.’

  Rachel laughed. ‘What an unfortunate use of words, Tucker. Lay off.’

  ‘It’s your paycheck if she gets out of line.’

  So Rachel went to the Dagger Bar, where Miss Rhee was sitting alone at her customary table in the rear. Walking up to her, Rachel said, ‘May I join you?’

  ‘Has Mr. Thompson ordered you to check on me?’ the Korean woman asked with transparent insolence.

  ‘He did just that,’ Rachel snapped, grabbing at a chair and pulling herself up to the table. ‘I’ve been informed that men at the bar heard you boast that you were going to sleep with each of our astronauts. What a vile thing to have said.’

  To her surprise, the Korean woman lost all belligerence. Like an autumn sunrise a warm smile spread over her beautiful face and she placed her small, well-tended hands over Rachel’s. ‘Surely you must know that men always spread such rumors when they feel challenged by women who are brighter than they are.’

  ‘Do you challenge them?’

  ‘I certainly do. Men like your Mr. Thompson have been getting away with murder … the bullshit they write about the astronauts.’

  ‘Do you have to use such words?’

  ‘That word is the only one which describes what the men writers around here have been throwing into the wind.’

  ‘And you intend to correct that?’

  ‘I surely do.’ She leaned back against the wall to study Mrs. Mott. ‘You know, of course, that I’m extremely pleased to have you here at my table. I’ve been wondering how I might meet you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You’re just as much a part of my story as Randy Claggett.’

  ‘I’m surprised,’ Rachel said.

  ‘Don’t be. Your husband is a prime part of NASA, and to understand him, I must understand you.’

  ‘And to keep you from wrecking things,’ Rachel said, ‘I must understand what motivates you.’

  ‘I’m relatively simple. Fiercely oriented. Self-controlled. But never complex.’

  ‘Tell me,’ Rachel said, and the sincerity in her voice encouraged the Asian woman to confide:

  ‘Because I was born at the right time, in 1936, I profited from the groundwork done by the great women journalists who preceded me. Simone de Beauvoir, Dorothy Thompson, and especially the three younger Americans of the postwar period. I have no illusions that I’m as good as they were, but I am their inheritor and I intend to send my profession forward, as they did.’

  When Rachel said, ‘Tell me about the three Americans,’ Cynthia replied, ‘A woman like you ought to know about them,’ and Rachel said, ‘There’s a great deal I don’t know.’

  ‘The significant fact is, they’re all dead. Each one killed herself at the extremes of her profession, and I suppose I’ll do the same. Maggie Higgins worked herself to death in Korea. Dickie Chapelle proved herself braver than most men, parachuting behind enemy lines, submarining in dangerous waters, leading a patrol of Marines with flame-throwers, and finally blowing herself to fragments on a land mine in Vietnam. Nell Nevler, as you know, plunged to a shattering death when the Russian transport in which she and her Russian colonel were escaping plunged into the Kiev airport.

  ‘They were brave women, brilliant women, who established new freedoms, who redefined how women could be employed. That they performed well in the 1950s enabled me to try my hand in the 1970s, and I assure you that I do not intend to be a lesser woman than they were.’

  When Rachel probed as to what her intentions were with the Solid Six, Cynthia laughed. ‘Who knows? When NASA launches a satellite, who can certify where it will head? Many have gone their own ways, to the consternation of your bright boys in Houston. Same thing happens when you launch a person with ideas at a target with emotional content. Who can anticipate?’

  The two women reflected on this for some time, then Cynthia added what was perhaps the most relevant in all that she had revealed:

  ‘In comparison with the women I’ve mentioned, I consider myself rather limited, but I do have one thing none of them did. I’m driven by a compulsive force you would not believe. You see, I’m a Korean brought up in Japan, where Koreans are treated like dirt. And that’s a furnace which forges a special kind of steel—flexible … keen … indestructible. I’m like a sword of the Japanese samurai, whom I detest but also admire. Their swords cut to the quick of things, and I do the same.’

  When Rachel looked up she saw Tucker Thompson approaching the table. ‘And how are you two girls getting along?’ And Rachel thought: What an unequal battle this is going to be! The Korean karate champ versus the Madison Avenue hack, but later, when she had watched how adroitly Tucker protected himself in the dirty infighting, she concluded that perhaps the duel would not be as uneven as she had thought.

  John Pope’s blunt defense of the right of his fellow astronauts to behave without supervision by NASA and Folks had several repercussions. The five other astronauts, knowing him to be a rather stuffy straight arrow who never dallied with the groupies, were impressed by his willingness to defend them on a matter of principle, and they appreciated this. They had already elevated Randy Claggett to the position of master pilot, and now they conferred on Pope the unannounced title of political leader. This gave him no added perquisites, only additional responsibilities, but when difficult problems arose, or confrontations with the high command, they expected him to make the first statements and then to defend them. It was not a position he sought, nor one that gained him ease; observed behavior among one’s peers accounted for it, and a herd of cattle in a meadow or a flight of geese at sunset will make the same kind of election for the same kind of reason.

  It was perplexing that the men accorded Pope this honor, for they did not especially like him; he was too rigid, too much an overage Cub Scout, far too much a loner. He did not drink or smoke; he quarantined himself from the groupies; and while the other astronauts lounged in the Dagger Bar, he was apt to be on the beach, running six or seven miles to keep the fat down. This separation of Pope from the rest did not mean that the latter conformed to the pattern of Randy Claggett, with his wild and sometimes crazy Texas ways. The normative astronaut was Hickory Lee: quiet, fearfully efficient, solid drinker off duty, quick to anger if his rights were trespassed, and average in almost every other human reaction. Pope and Claggett stood at the extremes; Hickory commanded the middle.

  For two reasons the NASA brass were not happy with Pope’s outspoken defiance of Stanley Mott and Tucker Thompson: they had carefully cultivated the myth that the astronauts were almost heavenly creatures—’a cross between Jesus Christ, Ulysses and Joe DiMaggio,’ one writer had said—and they had profited enormously from it; they must preserve this myth unsullied; and they had entered into a contract with Folks whereby it and Thompson enjoyed special privileges, and to have him rebuffed so harshly was distasteful. So for some weeks, until it became clear that the Twins were not going to continue any rebellion which might endanger the great project of ultimately placing a man on the Moon, Pope and Claggett were looked upon with suspicion.

  The astronauts maintained a careful balance between rigorous attention to detail and rowdy relaxation, and one afternoon, following an informal meeting with th
e press, five of them huddled around a corner table in the Dagger Bar, conducting a noisy debate concerning where, during a journey to the Moon, Earth’s gravity ceased to exercise dominance and Moon’s took over. Preposterous guesses circulated, after which Hickory Lee banged his beer glass and cried, Tope, you studied astronomy. Where is the break-even point?’

  John did not know, but across the room he spotted Stanley Mott and invited him over to settle the debate, and after the answer was given—220,000 miles from Earth, 19,000 miles from the Moon—Mott lingered to check on how his young men were doing, and he was pleased. But as he talked with the five he noticed that they were looking over his shoulder at someone who had just entered.

  It was Tim Bell, the civilian, fresh from the barber, who had given him an especially sharp haircut. It made Bell, always studiously neat, seem even more handsome than usual, a fact which the young man was approving as he looked at himself in the mirror. Mott was perplexed when Claggett whispered, ‘Let’s give him the haircut routine.’

  The five young men rose and walked casually across the room toward where Bell was admiring himself, and as Mott watched them go he felt pride in being associated with them. Slim of hip, broad of shoulder and slightly underweight, they created a trim appearance, and because of the press meeting, each was still dressed in a dark suit and crisp white shirt, with a sober tie knotted in a severe V that nestled neatly within the collar. What differentiated them were their shoes, each having chosen a style which best reflected his way of life. Claggett wore Texas boots, tall and limber. Harry Jensen had chosen French-style pumps with extremely thin soles. Pope, of course, preferred the 1920 wingtip decorated with little holes punched in the leather to make artistic patterns. And each of the others had his own unique wear, always highly polished.

  What made them appear the same, like five clones of the one ideal astronaut, were their watches, each man wearing on his left wrist a chronograph, immensely big, heavy and expensive. It told local time, Greenwich Mean Time on the twenty-four-hour system, the day of the week, the month, the phase of the Moon, and served also as a stopwatch, lap timer and alarm clock. Hickory Lee said of his, ‘I had more trouble learning how to work this monster than I did with advanced calculus at MIT.’

  For one brief moment, as they passed from the shadowy darkness of the barroom into an aureole of sunlight coming through a western window, they looked as if nature itself were applauding their excellence, and Mott wondered if anywhere else in America there was assembled a more attractive group. But when he looked again they had passed on, and surrounded Bell as if they intended to beat him up.

  ‘Bell!’ Claggett said with a rush of emotion. ‘We’ve decided to stand with you, no matter what.’

  Ed Cater took him by the arm and said confidentially, ‘At first we thought you might be a jerk, but you’ve shown us you can fly with the best. I’m going to back you all the way.’

  Jensen said brightly, ‘Call on me, Tim, whenever you need help. As for right now, you say the word and we’ll move out.’

  ‘What’s this all about?’ Bell asked nervously.

  ‘That haircut,’ Claggett said. ‘We’re ready right now to go in town and beat hell out of the man who gave you that haircut.’

  Bell smiled weakly, suspecting correctly that the horseplay had something to do with his not belonging to the military.

  Mott, watching the nonsense, experienced an intense desire to see his own son, who had elected a course so different from that chosen by these young gods, and that night he confessed to his wife: ‘I’ve been doing a great deal of thinking, Rachel. About Millard and us. And the fact that we’d allowed his life style to drive a wedge between us.’ His voice quavered and tears threatened.

  What is it, dear?’

  ‘Working with these young men, day after day … It’s made me hungry to see our boy. I don’t give a damn how he’s living or what other people think. He’s our son, and I see now that we’re obligated to stay with him, hell or high water.’

  Rachel bowed her head to hide her own tears, then muttered, ‘You may be right. What do you intend doing?’

  ‘I’ve asked headquarters for permission, next time I’m in California. Three-day leave to visit with Millard.’

  ‘To what purpose?’

  ‘No purpose. No purpose in God’s world. I just want to see him and let him know we love him.’

  Stifled sobs prevented Rachel from speaking, but after a long interval during which she blew her nose twice, she laughed nervously, then said softly, ‘It’s strange, you know, speaking about how your work with the six men has affected you. I see their wives day after day, and I suppose I know everything that’s wrong with every one of them. But do you know what? I’d be overjoyed to have any one of them as a daughter-in-law. I wish to God that Millard would marry someone like them.’

  ‘Apparently that’s not going to be, and frankly, I no longer give a damn. As Pope said the other morning, “We do not seek counsel from you.” Millard’s made a life decision and now we’re the ones who have to adjust.’

  ‘Even though we despise the decision?’

  ‘Yes. We must keep in contact with our son. No matter what he does.’

  During the next visit of the astronauts to check on progress at Allied Aviation, Mott slipped away, rented a car and drove to Malibu Beach, where with the help of a girl in a bikini he found the cottage occupied by Millard and a young man from Indiana named Roger. Millard, taller than his father, no glasses, very slim, very tanned, appeared to be in excellent health. He wore his hair much longer than did the astronauts and apparently he owned no socks, for during their entire visit together his father never saw him in any.

  The son, supposing that his father had come to lecture him, was decidedly cool at first, while Roger was openly defensive, but as the afternoon passed with no lectures, the atmosphere eased, and by the time Stanley invited the young men to have dinner with him, they were almost eager to accept because they wanted to hear what had brought him to their cottage. At first the talk centered on the astronauts.

  ‘Are they really as …’ Young Mott did not know how to finish his question without insulting his father, and there was an awkward pause.

  ‘As square as they seem?’ Stanley suggested, and when the young men laughed, he raised three fingers and said, ‘Eagle Scouts, word of honor. Millard, you would not believe how square these fellows are.’

  ‘To what purpose?’

  ‘Every time they go aloft they lay their lives on the line. One slip and they’re dead. They need discipline.’

  ‘They’ve had no accidents yet. Aren’t you overplaying it?’

  ‘The accidents will come. But they’ll forge ahead. And one of these days they’ll stand on the Moon.’

  ‘As I said, to what purpose?’

  Stanley Mott spoke very carefully. ‘Because that’s the job they’ve given themselves. That’s their scene, as you say.’ When neither of the young men spoke, he added, trying to sound casual, ‘The way you men have worked out your own scene.’

  Silence. So he added, offhandedly, ‘I respect the astronauts’ choice. I respect yours.’ And before either young man could respond, he launched hurriedly into a recitation of what the astronauts had to know before they could participate in a space flight: ‘Math, vector analysis, orbital mechanics, computers, rocket engines, the characteristics of three hypergolic fuels, digital systems, radio, television and another ten or eleven really tough fields.’

  ‘You make them sound like geniuses,’ Roger said. He had been unable to master algebra.

  ‘Let me tell you a funny thing, Roger. What I’ve just recited are the basic fields. When they get through them, then they begin the hard work. Tracing out the particular systems of their particular spacecraft. The manuals, eight and a half by eleven, typewriter size, stand this high.’ And with his hands he indicated a pile nearly two feet high, waiting for his listeners to absorb that staggering fact.

  ‘The other day I saw two of
the men running to a class, and they were on a slanting surface so that their heads were tilted to the left, and I had this crazy feeling: They better stop that or the knowledge will spill out their ear. They must have, right now, as much information in their heads as the human brain can accommodate. They must be among the brightest men on Earth.’ He paused, then concluded: ‘Maybe only squares would be solid enough to absorb so much without going nuts. Maybe they have to be square.’

  The young men nodded, and Roger smoothed the expensive cashmere sweater he was wearing. ‘Another round?’ Mott asked, but no one wanted any further drinks, so the waitress brought the food, a delicious seafood salad with Italian garlic bread and iced tea.

  As they ate, Millard said cautiously, ‘Back there you said something about life styles.’

  ‘Yes. I said I respected life styles.’

  ‘I have a job, you know.’

  ‘I didn’t know.’ He took off his glasses, wiped his tired eyes, and said, ‘I’m delighted, Millard. What’s it deal with?’

  ‘Now that’s odd,’ Millard replied. ‘You ask “What’s it deal with?” as if the job itself was more important than the man doing the job.’

  ‘Habit of speech, I guess.’

  But Millard would not let his father off the hook so easily. ‘If I told you that I had a job which sounded important. Computers. Plastic forms. Damned near anything mechanical. You’d be proud, and you could say offhandedly at the country club, “My boy Millard’s into computers.” Well, your boy Millard’s into nurses’ helper in a children’s hospital. And so is Roger.’

  ‘Damned good public service,’ Mott said.

  ‘We think so,’ his son said defiantly.

  ‘In the normal swing of events, what will it …’

  ‘Lead to? Nothing, so far as I can see. It’s a way of life for the present, and where anything leads to I haven’t a clue.’

  ‘Go with the flow?’ Mott asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  This required no further comment, so after a while Mott said brightly, as if opening a completely new subject, ‘Your mother and I are eager to maintain contact, Millard. If your work ever brings you back East … or vacations … you must stay with us. You, too, Roger.’