I ought to close it down, Pethel said to himself. It’s my ‘scuttler. And I’ve decided I don’t want it used for this, not now, not after my trip over there, that ‘hopper ride back across the Atlantic with Bill Smith.
He wondered where Bill Smith, the Peking man, was now. Perhaps at Yale Psychiatric Institute or some such august place, being put through aptitude and profile tests, one after another. And of course being subjected to relentless questioning regarding the ingredients of his culture.
Some of Bill Smith’s testimony had leaked to the homeopapes. The Pekes had not, for instance, discovered glass. Rubber, too, was unknown to them, as were electricity, gun-powder, and, of course, atomic energy. But, more mysteriously, both clocks and the steam engine had never been stumbled onto or developed by the Pekes, and Dar Pethel could make no sense out of that. In fact, their entire society was an enigma to him.
However, one thing was certain: there had been no Thomas Edison on alter-Earth. Phonographs, light bulbs, and, for that matter, the telephone and even the ancient telegraph, were absent. What inventions they did have—for example the technique of laying crushed rock roads—had been developed over enormously long periods, microscopically elaborated by each generation mosaic-style. Except for the odd, complex compressor and turbine system, nothing seemed to have come to the Pekes in a single creative leap.
The device by which the QB satellite had been knocked off remained a mystery; Bill Smith knew nothing about it, according to the homeopapes, and knew nothing even of the satellite. The linguistics machine appeared to be unable to clarify the situation.
Jim Briskin, as he also watched, found himself dwelling on the gloomier aspects of the situation.
Where we made our mistake, he decided, was in not coming to some kind of rapprochement with the Pitecanthropi. It should have been done before a single emigrant crossed over . . . now, of course, it’s too late. But of course President Schwarz had to proceed swiftly if this was to become a way of stealing Jim Briskin’s thunder. Both men knew this. In his situation, Jim mulled, I probably would have done the same.
But that doesn’t make it any less lethal.
Standing beside him, Sal Heim murmured, ‘When do you think they’ll be streaming back? Or will they be able to get back?’
‘Cally Vale stood it. Alone. Possibly they can adapt; it’s certainly more viable an environment than Mars.’ In fact, there was no comparison. Mars was utterly impossible and everyone knew it. ‘It all depends on the reaction of the Peking people.’ And, he reflected, since the Schwarz administration couldn’t wait to find that out, we’ll have to learn it the hard way. In terms of the loss of human life.
‘What I’m trying to figure out,’ Sal murmured, ‘is whether the public still identifies you with this or whether Schwarz has succeeded in . . ..’
‘Even if you knew that,’ Jim said, ‘you wouldn’t know anything. Because we don’t know yet what the upshot of this mass migration is going to be, and I have a feeling that when we find out it won’t matter who gets the credit for it; we’ll all be in the pot together.’
Sal said, ‘I heard an interesting rumor on my way here. You’re aware that George Walt have been missing since they shut down the Golden Door. According to this rumor . . .’ Sal chuckled. ‘They emigrated.’
Feeling a pervasive, shocked chill, Jim said, ‘They what? To alter-Earth, you mean?’
‘Right through this ‘scuttler, here, that we’re looking at.’
‘But that ought to be easy to check on. If George Walt had passed through, TD’s engineers would certainly remember; they could hardly mistake George Walt for anybody else.’ He was now deeply disturbed. ‘I’ll see what Leon Turpin has to say about it.’
‘Don’t be so sure George Walt would be noticed,’ Sal said. ‘He, the actual living brother, may have carried his synthetic twin over in dissembled form, identified as maintenance and colonizing equipment; everyone who goes across carries something, some of them a couple tons.’
‘Why would George Walt emigrate?’ In facet, why had they shut the satellite down? Nobody had been able to explain that to his satisfaction, although a number of theories had been floating around, the central one being that George Walt anicipated Jim’s election and realized that their day had virtually arrived.
‘Maybe the Pekes will take care of them,’ Sal offered. ‘They would be rather a disheartening apparition, appearing in their midst; the Pekes might take it as a bad omen and cast the two of them back here in pieces.’
‘Who would be able to find this out?’ Jim said.
‘You mean what George Walt are up to on the other side—assuming they’re there? Perhaps Tito Cravelli.’
‘How would Tito know? He doesn’t have any contacts among the Peking people.’
Sal said, ‘Tito keeps tabs on everything.’
‘Not on this,’ Jim disagreed. ‘George Walt, if they’ve crossed over, have gone where we can’t scrutinize them; that’s the cold, hard truth and we might as well face it.’ Broodingly he said, ‘If I was positive they’d crossed over, I think I’d seriously plead with TD to shut the ‘scuttler down. To keep them bottled up over there, for the rest of eternity.’
‘Are you that much afraid of George Walt?’
‘Sometimes I am. Especially very late at night. I am right now, hearing about this.’ He moved a little away from Sal Heim, feeling depressed. ‘I thought we were through with George Walt,’ he said.
‘Through with them? Without killing them?’ Sal laughed.
I guess in the final analysis I’m not very bright, Jim Briskin said to himself glumly. We should have finished it, up there at the satellite, when we almost had them. Instead we chose to shuffle naively back to Terra, for what seemed a good idea at the time: a cup of hot syntho-coffee.
Now, it did not seem very brilliant. The passage of even a little time was a great edifier.
Sal said sardonically, ‘Hell, Jim, maybe you won their respect by being so charitable.’ He obviously did not think so. Far from it.
‘You’re a great second-guesser,’ Jim said, with bitterness. ‘Where were you with your advice then?’
Sal said quietly, ‘Nobody expected them to do something so radical as close the Golden Door. What happened up there on the satellite that day must really have shaken them.’
Coming up beside him, ancient Leon Turpin leered happily and cackled, ‘Well, Briskin, or whatever you call yourself, that’s the first batch of bibs. Historic, isn’t it? Makes you feel young again, doesn’t it? Say something. At least, smile.’ To Sal he said, ‘Is he always this solemn?’
‘Jim runs deep, Mr Turpin,’ Sal said. ‘You have to get accustomed to it.’
‘Just wait until we get that rent enlarged,’ Turpin wheezed. ‘My boys have been on it all week and tonight they’re going to hook up an entirely different power source; it’s all plotted out, rechecked dozens of times. By tomorrow morning, we should have a hole two to three times bigger. And then we can really hustle them through. Zip.’ He made a quick gesture.
‘Have you made thorough provision,’ Jim said, ‘to receive them back in the event something goes wrong on the other side?’
‘Well,’ Leon Turpin conceded, ‘the ‘scuttler will be turned off most of the night as the boys work it over. Nobody can pass through then, of course. But we weren’t expecting any trouble. At least not so soon.’
Sal and Jim glanced at each other.
‘President Schwarz said it would be agreeable,’ Turpin added. ‘After all, our contract is with the Dept of SPW. We’re acting well within the law. There’s nothing that compels us to keep the ‘scuttler running at all times.’
God pity those colonists, Jim Briskin said to himself, if anything does go wrong tonight.
‘They know about the Pekes,’ Turpin protested. ‘It’s been in the papes constantly; nothing’s been concealed from them: as soon as they were revived the situation was explained to them in detail. Nobody forced them to go.
J
im said, ‘They were given the choice of going across or being put back to sleep.’ He knew that for a fact; Tito had informed him.
‘As far as I’m concerned,’ Leon Turpin said sulkily, ‘those people are over there voluntarily. And any risk they’re taking—’
You skunk, Jim Briskin thought.
It was going to be a long night. At least for him.
At eleven p.m. Tito Cravelli received from one of his almost infinite number of paid contacts a piece of news which did not resemble anything he had ever picked up before. Frankly, he did not know whether to laugh or rush to the tocsin; it was simply too goddam peculiar.
He mixed himself a whiskey sour in the kitchen of his conap and pondered. The datum had reached him by a circuitous route; initially it had been piped from a TD exploration team on the other side of the ‘scuttler nexus, prior to the shutting-down of the ‘scuttler, and from there to Bohegian, whereupon Earl had of course relayed it to him. Was it possibly a gag? If he could regard it that way, it would be a distinct relief. But he could not afford to; it might be bona fide. And in that case . . .
Back in the living room, he dialed Jim Briskin’s number. ‘Listen to this,’ Cravelli said, when he had Jim on the vidscreen. He did not bother to apologize for waking Jim up; that hardly mattered. ‘See what you can make out of this. George Walt is with the Pekes, at their population center in northern Europe. TD’s field corps believes they made contact with the Pekes somewhere in North America, and the Pekes then transported them across the Atlantic.’
‘So quickly?’ Jim said. ‘I thought they had nothing better than slow surface ships.’
‘Here’s the substance of it. The Pekes have installed George Walt at their capital and are worshipping them as a god.’
There was silence.
Finally Jim said, ‘How—did the TD field corps find this out?’
‘From parleys with North American Pekes. They’ve been palavering continually; you know that. Those linguistics machines have been droning on night and day. The Pekes are—dazzled. Well, weren’t we a little in awe of George Walt ourselves? It’s not so odd when you think of it. I’d make book that George Walt went there anticipating some such reaction as that; they probably did some groundwork in advance.’
Jim said cyptically, ‘Another one of Sal’s predictions bites the dust.’ He looked weary. ‘Cravelli, you know we’re over our head. Schwarz is over his head. If someone suggested shutting—’
‘And strand those people over there?’
‘They can be brought back tomorrow morning. And then it could be shut down.’
‘There’s too much momentum behind it now,’ Cravelli pointed out. You can’t turn off a mass movement like that. In Dept of SPW warehouses all over the United States, they’re rousing the sleepers right and left. Assembling equipment, arranging transportation to Washington, D.C.—’
‘I’ll call Schwarz,’ Jim said.
‘He won’t listen to you. He’ll think you’re just trying to regain a primary relationship to the project, a relationship which he inherited by moving so quickly. Schwarz has the initiative now, Jim, not you. His whole political life depends on pushing those bibs across as fast as possible. Fix yourself a great big stiff type drink. That’s what I did. And then go back to bed. I’ll talk to you again in the morning. Maybe in the light of day we can hatch something out.’ But he didn’t think so.
Jim said, ‘I’ll talk to Leon Turpin, then.’
‘Ha! Turpin and Schwarz are interlaced through that lush contract let to TD through Rosenfeld; it’s a masterpiece. You can’t offer TD that kind of money—I hear it involves billions of dollars, and all TD has to do is keep the ‘scuttler going, just stand there and pump power to it.’ Cravelli added, ‘And enlarge the aperture, I understand. But that ought to be easy enough; they’ve been studying it for the last week.’ In fact they had probably already accomplished it. ‘I’m going back to my drink, now. And then I’m going to fix another and then . . .’
‘There’s one man who can stop this. The owner of the ‘scuttler. I met him on that trip across the Atlantic. Darius Pethel, in Kansas City.’
‘Yes, he claims it as part of his inventory. But dammit, Jim, are you really sure you want to shut down the ‘scuttler and stop emigration? It would be the end of you politically. Sal must have told you that already.’
Woodenly, Jim nodded. ‘Yes. Sal told me.’
‘Don’t do anything tonight.’
‘We’re in the grip of fate,’ Jim said. ‘We can’t do anything; we’ve started something bigger than all of us put together. We may be seeing the end of the human race.’
‘Humanum est errare,’ Cravelli said, assuming he was joking. But was he? ‘You don’t mean that,’ Cravelli said, stricken. ‘I hate that kind of talk; it’s morbid and defeatist and ten other things, all of them bad. That acceptance speech you gave at the nominating convention; it was cut out of the same lousy cloth. Sal ought to give you a good swift kick.’
‘I believe what I believe,’ Jim said.
At four a.m. the augmented power supply had been coupled to the Jiffi-scuttler; supervising the work, Don Stanley gave the go-ahead signal to start the ‘scuttler back up. It had been off now for six and a half hours. His fingers crossed, Stanley tensely smoked his cigarette and waited as the entrance hoop gradually flared into unusual, pale-yellow brilliance, at least four times as bright as before.
Beside him, Bascolm Howard, who had strolled in to watch, said, ‘It certainly caught right away. No hesitation there.’
‘It really shines,’ Stanley murmured. God, suppose we’re overloading it he thought. Suppose it heats up too much and bums out. But the engineers who had done the work had assured him that the load was within the safe tolerance. And he had to go by what they said.
‘Tired?’ Howard asked him.
‘Dam right.’ Stanley felt irritable. ‘I ought to be home in bed.’ We all should be, he said to himself. I’ll be glad when they’ve run the final tests on this and it’s ready to go back into operation.
A senior engineer hopped into the tube of the ‘scuttler and disappeared from sight. Stanley dropped his cigarette to the lab floor and savagely ground it out. Now we learn the truth, he realized. We get the poop, whether we’ve failed or been successful.
Minutes passed.
Reappearing, the engineer called to him. ‘Mr Stanley, would you come here, please?’
Stanley, on rubber legs, made his way to the tube. ‘How is it inside there?’
‘The rent’s big, now. Three and a half, maybe four times greater.’
Feeling limp as tension throughout his body lessened, Stanley said, ‘Fine. Now we can go home where we belong.’
‘I want you to look through the rent,’ the engineer said.
‘Why?’ He did not see the point.
The engineer said, ‘Just look, okay? For chrissake, will you please look, Mr Stanley?’
He looked.
Through the rent in the tube wall he saw, not a grassy meadow and ultramarine sky, no white flowers with buzzing, lazy bees tackling them. And he saw no sign of people. None of the tons of equipment which had been passed through the rent. No tents. No temporary septic tanks. No improvised food kitchens or overhead lighting. Instead he saw—and could not at first accept that he saw—a marsh like expanse, gray with mist and the hollow croakings of some distant birds. He saw reeds poking through the gummy, yellow water which lay in pools. A snake moved suddenly, twisting its path through the stagnant debris. And over to the right, some small living creature with a naked tail dropped to safety in the dense shadows beneath a cracked, hairy mass of roots.
The air smelled of decay and silent, utter death.
Pulling back into the ‘scuttler tube, Stanley said hoarsely, ‘It’s not the same place.’
His chief engineer nodded mutely.
‘It’s a swamp,’ Stanley said. ‘My god, what kind of catastrophe is this? Can you make any sense out of it? We better get the origin
al power supply right back on; you evidently can’t increase the load and get the same results only more so, instead you get this, whatever it is.’ He took one more look. All his determination was required merely to see it, let alone venture through the rent and actually into it. ‘I think I understand,’ he said, muttering to himself. ‘There’s not just one alter-Earth, parallel universe or whatever you call it; there’s several, and why we didn’t deal that factor into our planning I’ll never know. We’ll never make that mistake again.’
‘I agree,’ his engineer said, beside him, also looking.
‘You think we can restore the original power supply and make contact again with where we dumped those people?’
‘We can try.’
‘We’ve got to,’ Stanley said. ‘You know who’ll get the rap; it’ll be us. Start work immediately; we’ll work the rest of the night.’ God, he thought. What’ll I tell old man Turpin? Nothing. If we can get this patched up again we’ll see it’s forgotten forever. Like it never happened.
‘I’m not thinking about us getting the blame,’ the senior engineer said to him. ‘I’m thinking about those people, especially those women, stranded there.’
‘They’ll be okay! They’ve got supplies; they went there to colonize, so let them colonize. It was their idea to go across, they knew they were taking a risk. It was their responsibility. So tough tubes.’ He drew himself back into the ‘scuttler, shaking. ‘Wow, what a hell of a sight. I can’t see colonizing there. You think you’d like to live there, Hal?’
‘No, Mr Stanley,’ the engineer said. He rose to his feet stiffly, waved to the team standing before the entrance hoop. ‘Shut it off!’
The power died. Stanley walked back out of the tube and over to Howard. ‘Now we have to take apart the whole damn thing again and fix it back up the way it was,’ he said bitterly. ‘What lousy luck. And it’s going to take twenty years to get those millions of bibs through; President Schwarz’ll never buy that. That’s the end of that contract. That voids it automatically.’ And to think we worked six and a half hours for this, he said to himself.
The Crack in Space Page 15
