by Isaac Asimov
“One thing only is left over since those days of half a century ago. That one thing is the respect of humanity for science. We have prohibition; smoking for women is outlawed; cosmetics are forbidden; low dresses and short skirts are unheard of; divorce is frowned upon. But science has not been confined-as yet.
“It behoves science, then, to be circumspect, to refrain from arousing the people. It will be very easy to make them believe-and Otis Eldredge has come perilously close to doing it in some of his speeches-that it was science that brought about the horrors of the Second World War. Science outstripped culture, they will say, technology outstripped sociology, and it was that unbalance that came so near to destroying the world. Somehow, I am inclined to believe they are not so far wrong, at that.
“But do you know what would happen, if it ever did come to that? Scientific research may be forbidden; or, if they don’t go that far, it will certainly be so strictly regulated as to stifle in its own decay. It will be a calamity from which humanity would not recover for a millennium.
“And it is your trial flight that may precipitate all this. You are arousing the public to a stage where it will be difficult to calm them. I warn you, John. The consequences will be on your head.”
There was absolute silence for a moment and then Harman forced a smile. “Come, Howard, you’re letting yourself be frightened by shadows on the wall. Are you trying to tell me that it is your serious belief that the world as a whole is ready to plunge into a second Dark Ages? After all, the intelligent men are on the side of science, aren’t they?”
“If they are, there aren’t many of them left from what I see.” Winstead drew a pipe from his pocket and filled it slowly with tobacco as he continued: “Eldredge formed a League of the Righteous two months ago-they call it the L. R.-and it has grown unbelievably. Twenty million is its membership in the United States alone . Eldredge boasts that after the next election Congress will be his; and there seems to be more truth than bluff in that. Already there has been strenuous lobbying in favour of a bill outlawing rocket experiments, and laws of that type have been enacted in Poland, Portugal and Rumania. Yes, John, we are perilously close to open persecution of science.” He was smoking now in rapid, nervous puffs.
“But if I succeed, Howard, if I succeed! What then?”
“Bah! You know the chances for that. Your own estimate gives you only one chance in ten of coming out alive.”
“What does that signify? The next experimenter will learn by my mistakes, and the odds will improve. That’s the scientific method.”
“The mob doesn’t know anything about the scientific method; and they don’t want to know. Well, what do you say? Will you call it off?”
Harman sprang to his feet, his chair tumbling over with a crash. “Do you know what you ask? Do you want me to give up my life’s work, my dream, just like that? Do you think I’m going to sit back and wait for your dear public to become benevolent? Do you think they’ll change in my lifetime?
“Here’s my answer: I have an inalienable right to pursue knowledge. Science has an inalienable right to progress and develop without interference. The world, in interfering with me, is wrong; I am right. And it shall go hard; but I -will not abandon my rights.”
Winstead shook his head sorrowfully. “You’re wrong, John, when you speak of ‘inalienable’ rights. What you call a ‘right’ is merely a privilege, generally agreed upon . What society accepts, is right; what it does not, is wrong.”
“Would your friend, Eldredge, agree to such a definition of his ‘righteousness’?” questioned Harman bitterly.
“No, he would not, but that’s irrelevant. Take the case of those African tribes who used to be cannibals. They were brought up as cannibals, have the long tradition of cannibalism, and their society accepts the practice. To them , cannibalism is right , and why shouldn’t it be? So you see how relative the whole notion is, and how inane your conception of ‘inalienable’ rights to perform experiments is.”
“You know, Howard, you missed your calling when you didn’t become a lawyer.” Harman was really growing angry. “You’ve been bringing out every moth-eaten argument you can think of. For God’s sake, man, are you trying to pretend that it is a crime to refuse to run with the crowd? Do you stand for absolute uniformity, ordinariness, orthodoxy, commonplaceness? Science would die far sooner under the programme you outline than under governmental prohibition.”
Harman stood up and pointed an accusing finger at the other. “You’re betraying science and the tradition of those glorious rebels: Galileo, Darwin, Einstein and their kind. My rocket leaves tomorrow on schedule in spite of you and every other stuffed shirt in the United States. That’s that, and I refuse to listen to you any longer. So you can just get out.”
The head of the Institute, red in the face, turned to me. “You’re my witness, young man, that I warned this obstinate nitwit, this… this hare-brained fanatic.” He spluttered a bit, and then strode out, the picture of fiery indignation.
Harman turned to me when he had” gone: “Well, what do you think? I suppose you agree with him.”
There was only one possible answer and I made it: “You’re not paying me to do anything else but follow orders, boss. I’m sticking with you.”
Just then Shelton came in and Harman packed us both off to go over the calculations of the orbit of flight for the umpteenth time, while he himself went off to bed.
The next day, July 15th, dawned in matchless splendour, and Harman, Shelton, and myself were in an almost gay mood as we crossed the Hudson to where the Prometheus -surrounded by an adequate police guard-lay in gleaming grandeur.
Around it, roped off at an apparently safe distance, rolled a crowd of gigantic proportions. Most of them were hostile, raucously so. In fact, for one fleeting moment, as our motorcycle police escort parted the crowds for us, the shouts and imprecations that reached our ears almost convinced me that we should have listened to Winstead.
But Harman paid no attention to them at all, after one supercilious sneer at a shout of: “There goes John Harman, son of Belial.” Calmly, he directed us about our task of inspection. I tested the foot-thick outer walls and the air locks for leaks, then made sure the air purifier worked. Shelton checked up on the repellent screen and the fuel tanks. Finally, Hal-man tried on the clumsy spacesuit, found it suitable, and announced himself ready.
The crowd stirred. Upon a hastily erected platform of wooden planks piled in confusion by some in the mob, there rose up a striking figure. Tall and lean; with thin, ascetic countenance; deep-set, burning eyes, peering and half closed; a thick, white mane crowning all-it was Otis Eldredge. The crowd recognized him at once and many cheered. Enthusiasm waxed and soon the entire turbulent mass of people shouted themselves hoarse over him.
He raised a hand for silence, turned to Harman, who regarded him with surprise and distaste, and pointed a long, bony finger at him:
“John, Harman, son of the devil, spawn of Satan, you are here for an evil purpose. You are about to set out upon a blasphemous attempt to pierce the veil beyond which man is forbidden to go. You are tasting of the forbidden fruit of Eden and beware that you taste not of the fruits of sin.”
The crowd cheered him to the echo and he continued: “The finger of God is upon you, John Harman. He shall not allow His works to be defiled. You die today, John Harman.” His voice rose in intensity and his last words were uttered in truly prophetlike fervour.
Harman turned away in disdain. In a loud, clear voice, he addressed the police sergeant: “Is there any way, officer, of removing these spectators. The trial flight may be attended by some destruction because of the rocket blasts, and they’re crowding too close.”
The policeman answered in a crisp, unfriendly tone: “If you’re afraid of being mobbed, say so, Mr. Harman. You don’t have to worry, though, we’ll hold them back. And as for danger-from that contraption-” He sniffed loudly in the direction of the Prometheus , evoking a torrent of jeers and yells.
“Leave the sinner to his sins,” he shouted. “ ‘Vengeance is mine,’ saith the Lord.”
As the moment approached, Shelton nudged me. “Let’s get out of here,” he whispered in a strained voice. “Those rocket blasts are poison.” Saying this, he broke into a run, beckoning anxiously for me to follow.
We had not yet reached the fringes of the crowd when there was a terrific roar behind me. A wave of heated air swept over me. There was the frightening hiss of some speeding object past my ear, and I was thrown violently to the ground. For a few moments I lay dazed, my ears ringing and my head reeling.
When I staggered drunkenly to my feet again, it was to view a dreadful sight. Evidently, the entire fuel supply of the Prometheus had exploded at once, and where it had lain a moment ago there was now only a yawning hole. The ground was strewn with wreckage. The cries of the hurt were heartrending, and the mangled bodies-but I won’t try to describe those.
A weak groan at my feet attracted my attention. One look, and I gasped in horror, for it was Shelton, the back of his head a bloody mass.
“I did it.” His voice was hoarse and triumphant but withal so low that I could scarcely hear it. “I did it. I broke open the liquid-oxygen compartments and when the spark went through the acetylide mixture the whole cursed thing exploded.” He gasped a bit and tried to move but failed. “A piece of wreckage must have hit me, but I don’t care. I’ll die knowing that-”
His voice was nothing more than a rasping rattle, and on his face was the ecstatic look of martyr. He died then, and I could not find it in my heart to condemn him.
It was then I first thought of Harman. Ambulances from Manhattan and from Jersey City were on the scene, and one had sped to a wooden patch some five hundred yards distant, where, caught in the treetops, lay a splintered fragment of the Prometheus’ forward compartment. I limped there as fast as I could, but they had dragged out Harman and clanged away long before I could reach them.
After that, I didn’t stay. The disorganized crowd had no thought but for the dead and wounded now , but when they recovered, and bent their thoughts to revenge, my life would not be worth a straw. I followed the dictates of the better part of valour and quietly disappeared.
The next week was a hectic one for me. During that time, I lay in hiding at the home of a friend, for it would have been more than my life was worth to allow myself to be seen and recognized. Harman, himself, lay in a Jersey City hospital, with nothing more than superficial cuts and bruises-thanks to the backward force of the explosion and the saving clump of trees which cushioned the fall of the Prometheus . It was on him that the brunt of the world’s wrath fell.
New York, and the rest of the world also, just about went crazy. Every last paper in the city came out with gigantic headlines, “28 Killed, 73 Wounded-the Price of Sin,” printed in blood-red letters. The editorials howled for Harman’s life, demanding he be arrested and tried for first-degree murder.
The dreaded cry of “Lynch him!” was raised throughout the five boroughs, and milling thousands crossed the river and converged on Jersey City. At their head was Otis Eldredge, both legs in splints, addressing the crowd from an open automobile as they marched. It was a veritable army.
Mayor Carson of Jersey City called out every available policeman and phoned frantically to Trenton for the State militia. New York clamped down on every bridge and tunnel leaving the city-but not till after many thousands had left.
There were pitched battles on the Jersey coast that sixteenth of July. The vastly outnumbered police clubbed indiscriminately but were gradually pushed back and back. Mounties rode down upon the mob relentlessly but were swallowed up and pulled down by sheer force of numbers. Not until tear gas was used, did the crowd halt-and even then they did not retreat.
The next day, martial law was declared, and the State militia entered Jersey City. That was the end for the lynchers. Eldredge was called to confer with the mayor, and after the conferences ordered his followers to disperse.
In a statement to the newspapers. Mayor Carson said: “John Harman must needs suffer for his crime, but it is essential that he do so legally. Justice must take its course, and the State of New Jersey will take all necessary measures.”
By the end of the week, normality of a sort had returned and Harman slipped out of the public spotlight. Two more weeks and there was scarcely a word about him in the newspapers, excepting such casual references to him in the discussion of the new Zittman antirocketry bill that had just passed both houses of Congress by unanimous votes.
Yet he remained in the hospital still. No legal action had been taken against him, but it began to appear that a sort of indefinite imprisonment “for his own protection” might be his eventual fate. Therefore, I bestirred myself to action.
Temple Hospital is situated in a lonely and outlying district of Jersey City, and on a dark, moonless night I experienced no difficulty at all in invading the grounds unobserved. With a facility that surprised me, I sneaked in through a basement window, slugged a sleepy interne into insensibility and proceeded to Room 15E, which was listed in the books as Harman’s.
“Who’s there?” Harman’s surprised shout was music in my ears.
“Sh! Quiet! It’s I, Cliff McKenny.”
“You! What are you doing here?”
“Trying to get you out. If I don’t, you’re liable to stay here the rest of your life. Come on, let’s go.”
I was hustling him into his clothes while we were speaking, and in no time at all we were sneaking down the corridor. We were out safely and into my waiting car before Harman collected his scattered wits sufficiently to begin asking questions.
“What’s happened since that day?” was the first question. “I don’t remember a thing after starting the rocket blasts until I woke up in the hospital.”
“Didn’t they tell you anything?”
“Not a damn thing,” he swore. “I asked until I was hoarse.”
So I told him the whole story from the explosion on. His eyes were wide with shocked surprise when I told of the dead and wounded, and filled with wild rage when he heard of Shelton’s treachery. The story of the riots and attempted lynching evoked a muffled curse from between set lips.
“Of course, the papers howled ‘murder,’ “ I concluded, “but they couldn’t pin that on you. They tried manslaughter, but there were too many eye-witnesses that had heard your request for the removal of the crowd and the police sergeant’s absolute refusal to do so. That, of course, absolved you from all blame. The police sergeant himself died in the explosion, and they couldn’t make him the goat.
“Still, with Eldredge yelling for your hide, you’re never safe. It would be best to leave while able.”
Harman nodded his head in agreement “Eldredge survived the explosion, did he?”
“Yes, worse luck. He broke both legs, but it takes more than that to shut his mouth.”
Another week had passed before I reached our future haven-my uncle’s farm in Minnesota. There, in a lonely and out-of-the-way rural community, we stayed while the hullabaloo over Harman’s disappearance gradually died down and the perfunctory search for us faded away. The search, by the way, was short indeed, for the authorities seemed more relieved than concerned over the disappearance.
Peace and quiet did wonders with Harman. In six months he seemed a new man-quite ready to consider a second attempt at space travel. Not all the misfortunes in the world could stop him, it seemed, once he had his heart set on something.
“My mistake the first time,” he told me one winter’s day, “lay in announcing the experiment. I should have taken the temper of the people into account, as Winstead said. This time, however”-he rubbed his hand
s and gazed thoughtfully into the distance-”I’ll steal a march on them. The experiment will he performed in secrecy-absolute secrecy.”
I laughed grimly, “It would have to be. Do you know that all future experiment in rocketry, even entirely theoretical research is a crime punishable by death?”
“Are you afraid, then?”
“Of course not, boss. I’m merely stating a fact. And here’s another plain fact. We two can’t build a ship all by ourselves, you know.”
“I’ve thought of that and figured a way out, Cliff. What’s more, I can take care of the money angle, too. You’ll have to do some traveling, though.
“First, you’ll have to go to Chicago and look up the firm of Roberts amp; Scranton and withdraw everything that’s left of my father’s inheritance, which,” he added in a rueful aside, “is more than half gone on the first ship. Then, locate as many of the old crowd as you can: Harry Jenkins, Joe O’Brien, Neil Stanton-all of them. And get back as quickly as you can. I am tired of delay.”
Two days later, I left for Chicago. Obtaining my uncle’s consent to the entire business was a simple affair. “Might as well be strung up for a herd of sheep as for a lamb,” he grunted, “so go ahead. I’m in enough of a mess now and can afford a bit more, I guess.”
It took quite a bit of travelling and even more smooth talk and persuasion before I managed to get four men to come: the three mentioned by Harman and one other, a Saul Simonoff. With that skeleton force and with the half million’ still left Harman out of the reputed millions left him by his father, we began work.
The building of the New Prometheus is a story in itself-a long story of five years of discouragement and insecurity. Little by little, buying girders in Chicago, beryl-steel plates in New York, a vanadium cell in San Francisco, miscellaneous items in scattered comers of the nation, we constructed the sister ship to the ill-fated Prometheus .
