Arthur C Clarke - Light Of Other Days

by Light Of Other Days (lit)

  HalliweU thought this rooftop garden was secure. And she was right. Well, almost right. The roof is covered by a one-way mirror—it allows in the sun's soothing rays, but keeps out prying eyes. That is, everyone's eyes but ours!

  Let's go on down through the roof now—yes, through the roof—and there she is, certainly a sight for sore eyes as she enjoys the filtered Caribbean sunlight au naturel. Despite the mirrored roof Hal- liweU is cautious—you can see here she is covering up as a light plane passes overhead—but she should have known she can't hide from OurWorid!

  As you can see Mr. Gravity has been kind to our SecGen; Halliwell is as much a knockout as when she shimmied across the stages of the world all of forty years ago. But the question is—is she still all the original Hatliwell, or has she accepted a little help?...

  THE AGENT

  When the FBI caught up with Hiram, Kate felt a rush of relief.

  She had been happy enough to be scooping the world—but she had been doing that anyhow, with or without WormCams. And she'd become increasingly un- comfortable with the idea mat such a powerful technol- ogy should be exclusively in the hands of a sleazy megalomaniac capitalist like Hiram Patterson.

  As it happened, she was in Hiram's office the day it all came to a head. But it didn't turn out the way she expected.

  Kate paced back and forth. She was arguing with Hiram, as usual.

  "For God's sake, Hiram. How trivial do you want to get?"

  Hiram leaned back in his fake-leather chair and gazed out of the window at downtown Seattle, considering his reply.

  Once, Kate knew, this had been the presidential suite of one of the city's better hotels. Though the big picture window remained, Hiram had retained none of the grand trimmings of this room; whatever his faults, Hiram Pat- terson was not pretentious. The room was now a regular working office, the only furniture the big conference ta- ble and its set of upright chairs, a coffee spigot and a water fountain. There was a rumor that Hiram kept a bed here, rolled up in a compartment built into the walls. And yet there was a lack of a human touch, Kate thought. There wasn't even a single image of a family member—his two sons, for instance.

  But maybe he doesn't need images, Kate thought ^ sourly. Maybe his sons themselves are trophy enough.

  "So," Hiram said slowly, "now you're appointing yourself my bloody conscience, Ms. Manzoni."

  "Oh, come on, Hiram. It's not a question of conscience. Look, you have a technological monopoly which is the envy of every other news-gathering organization on the planet. Can't you see how you're wasting it? Gossip about Russian royalty and candid-camera shows and on- the-field shots of soccer games... I didn't come into mis business to photograph the tits of the UN Secretary- General."

  "Those tits, as you put it," he said dryly, "attracted a billion people. My prime concern is beating the com- ,. petition. And I'm doing that." ^

  T "But you're turning yourself into the ultimate papa- razzo. Is that the limit of your vision? You have such— power—to do good."

  He smiled. " 'Good'? What does good have to do with it? I have to give people what they want, Manzoni. If I don't, some other bastard will. Anyway I don't see what you're complaining about. I ran your piece on England invading Scotland. That was genuine hard-core news."

  "But you trivialized it by wrapping it up in tabloid gar- bage! Just as you trivialize the whole water-war issue. Look, the UN hydrology convention has been a joke—" tt! don't need another lecture on the issues of the day, Manzoni. You know, you're so pompous- But you un- derstand so little. Don't you get it? People don't want to know about the issues. Because of you and your damn Wormwood, people understand that the issues just don't matter. It doesn't matter how we pump water around the planet, or any of the rest of it, because the Wormwood is going to scrape it all away anyhow. All people want is entertainment. Distraction."

  "And that's the limit of your ambition?"

  He shrugged. "What else is there to do?"

  She snorted her disgust. "You know, your monopoly won't last forever. There's a lot of speculation in the industry and the media about how you're achieving all your scoops. It can't be long before somebody figures it out and repeats your research."

  "I have patents—"

  "Oh, sure, that will protect you. If you keep this up you'll have nothing left to hand on to Bobby."

  His eyes narrowed. "Don't you talk about my son. You know, every day I regret bringing you in here, Man- zoni. You've brought in some good stories. But you have no sense of balance, no sense at all."

  "Balance?. Is that what you call it? Using the WormCam for nothing more than celebrity beaver shots?—"

  A soft bell tone sounded. Hiram lifted his head to the air. "I said I wasn't to be interrupted."

  The Search Engine's inoffensive tones sounded from the air. "I'm afraid I have an override, Mr. Patterson."

  "What kind of override?"

  "There's a Michael Mavens here to see you. You too, Ms. Manzoni."

  "Mavens? I don't know any—"

  "He's from the FBI, Mr. Patterson. The Federal Bu- reau of—"

  "I know what the FBI is." Hiram thumped his desk, frustrated. "One bloody thing after another."

  At last, Kate thought.

  Hiram glared at her. "Just watch what you say to this arsehole."

  She frowned. "This government-appointed law- enforcement arsehole from the FBI, you mean? Even you answer to the law, Hiram. I'll say what I think best."

  THE UGHT OF OTHER DAYS 97

  He clenched a fist, seemed ready to say more, then just shook his head. He stalked to his picture window, and the blue light of the sky, filtered through the tinted glass, evoked highlights from his bald pate. "Bloody hell," he said. "Bloody, bloody hell."

  Michael Mavens, FBI Special Agent, wore the standard- issue charcoal-gray suit, collarless shirt and shoelace tie. He was blond, whiplash thin, and he looked as if he had played a lot of squash, no doubt at some ultracompetitive FBI academy.

  He seemed remarkably young to Kate: no more than mid- to late twenties. And he was nervous, dragging awkwardly at the chair Hiram offered him, rumbling with his briefcase as he opened it and dug out a Soft- Screen.

  Kate glanced at Hiram. She saw calculation in his broad, dark face; Hiram had spotted this agent's surpris- ing discomfort too.

  After showing them his badge,*Alavens said, "I'm glad to find you both here, Mr. Patterson, Ms- Manzoni. I'm investigating an apparent security breach—"

  Hiram went on the attack. "What authorization do you nave?"

  Mavens hesitated. "Mr. Patterson, I'm hoping we can all be a little more constructive than that"

  " 'Constructive'?" Hiram snapped. "What kind of an- swer is (hat? Are you acting without authorization?" He reached for a telephone icon in his desktop.

  Mavens said calmly, "I know your secret."

  Hiram's hand hovered over the glowing symbol, then withdrew.

  Mavens smiled. "Search Engine. Security cover FBI level three four, authorization Mavens M. K. Confirm please."

  After a few seconds, me Search Engine reported back, "Cover in place. Special Agent Mavens."

  Mavens nodded. "We can speak openly."

  Kate sat down opposite Mavens, intrigued, puzzled, nervous.

  Mavens spread his SoftScreen flat on the desktop. It showed a picture of a big white-capped military heli- copter. Mavens said, "Do you recognize this?"

  Hiram leaned closer. "It's a Sikorsky, I think."

  "Actually a VH-3D," said Mavens.

  "It's Marine One," said Kate. 'The President's heli- copter."

  Mavens eyed her. "That's right. As I'm sure you both know, the President and her husband have spent the last couple of days in Cuba at the UN hydrology conference. They've been using Marine One out there. Yesterday, during a short flight, a brief and private conversation took place between President Juarez and English Prime Minister Huxtable." He tapped the 'Screen, and it re- vealed a blocky schematic of the helicopter's interior. "Th
e Sikorsky is a big bird for such an antique, but it is packed with communication gear. It has only ten seats. Five are taken up by Secret Service agents, a doctor, and military and personal aides to the President."

  Hiram seemed intrigued. "I guess one of those aides has the football."

  Mavens looked pained. "We don't use a 'football' anymore, Mr. Patterson. On this occasion the other pas- sengers, in addition to President Juarez herself, were Mr. Juarez, the chief of staff, Prime Minister Huxtable and an English security agent.

  "All of these people—and the pilots—have the high- est possible security clearances, which in the case of the agents and other staff are checked daily. Mr. Huxtable, of course, despite his old-style title, holds an office equivalent to a state governor. Marine One itself is swept several times a day. Despite your virtual melodramas about spies and double agents, Mr. Patterson, modem antisurveillance measures are pretty foolproof. And be- sides, the President and Mr. Huxtable were isolated in- side a security curtain even within the Sikorsky. We don't know of any way those various levels of security can be breached." He turned his pale brown eyes on Kate. "And yet, apparently, they were.

  "Your news report was accurate, Ms. Manzoni. Juarez and Huxtable did hold a conversation about the possi- bility of a military solution to England's dispute with Scotland over water supplies,

  "But we have testimony from Mr. Huxtable that his speculation about invading Scotland is—was—private and personal. The notion is his, he hadn't committed it to paper or electronic store, or discussed it with any- body—not his Cabinet, not even his partner. His con- versation with President Juarez was actually the first time he'd articulated the idea out loud, to gauge the ex- tent of the President's support for such a proposal, if formulated.

  "And at the time you broke the story, neither the Prime Minister nor the President had discussed this with anybody else." He glared at Kate, "Ms, Manzoni, you see the situation. The only possible source for your story is the Juarez-Huxtabte conversation-itself."

  Hiram stood beside Kate. "She's not going to reveal her sources to a goon like you."

  Mavens rubbed his face and sat back. "I have to tell you, sir, that bugging the Prez is going to land you with a list of federal charges as long as your arm. An inter- agency team is investigating this matter. And the Presi- dent is pretty angry herself. OurWorid could be shut down. And you, Ms. Manzoni, will be lucky to evade jail."

  "You'll have to prove it first," Hiram blustered. "I can testify that no OurWorid operative has been anywhere near Marine One, to plant a bug or to do anything else. This interagency investigation team you run—"

  Mavens coughed. "I don't run it. I'm part of it. In fact the Bureau chief himself—"

  Hiram's mouth dropped open. "And does he know you're here? No? Then what are you trying to do here, Mavens? Set me up? Or—blackmail? Is that it?"

  Mavens looked increasingly uncomfortable, but he sat still.

  Kate touched Hiram's arm. "I think we'd better hear him out, Hiram."

  Hiram shook her away. He turned to the window, hands caged behind his back, his shoulders working with anger.

  Kate leaned toward Mavens. "You said you knew Hiram's secret. What did you mean?"

  And Michael Mavens started talking about worm- holes.

  The map he produced from his briefcase and spread over the table was hand-drawn on unheaded paper. Ev- idently, Kate thought, Mavens was straying into specu- lations he hadn't wanted to share with his FBI colleagues, or-even commit to the dubious security of a SoftScreen.

  He said, "This is a map of the route Marine One took yesterday, over the suburbs of Havana. I've marked time points with these crosses. You can see that when the key Juarez-Huxtable onboard conversation took place—it only lasted a couple of minutes—the chopper was here.'1''

  Hiram frowned, and tapped a hatched box highlighted on the map, right under the Sikorsky's position at the start of the conversation. "And what's this?"

  Mavens grinned. "It's yours, Mr. Patterson. That is an OurWorld DataPipe terminal. A wormhole mouth, link- ing to your centra! facility here in Seattle. I believe the DataPipe terminal under Marine One is the mechanism you used to get your information from the story."

  Hiram's eyes narrowed.

  Kate listened, but with growing abstraction, as Ma- vens speculated—a little wildly—about directional mi- crophones and the amplifying effects of the gravitational fields of wormhole mouths. His theory, as it emerged,

  THE LtGHT OF OTHER DAYS 101 was that Hiram must be using the fixed DataPipe anchors to perform his bugging.

  It was obvious that Mavens had stumbled on some aspects of the truth, but didn't yet have it ail.

  "Bull," said Hiram evenly. "There are holes in your theory I could fly a 7A7 through."

  "Such as," Kate said gently, "OurWorld's ability to get cameras to places where there is no DataPipe worm- hole terminal. Like those hurricane-struck Philippine is- lands. Or Secretary-General Halliwell's cleavage."

  Hiram glared at Kate wamingly. Shut up.

  Mavens looked confused, but dogged. "Mr. Patterson, I'm no physicist. I haven't yet figured out all the details. But I'm convinced that just as your wormhole technol- ogy is your competitive advantage in data transmission, so it must be in your news-gathering operations."

  "Oh, come on, Hiram," she said. "He has most of it."

  Hiram growled, "Damn it, Manzoni. I told you I wanted plausible deniability at every stage."

  Mavens looked inquiringly at Kate.

  She said, "He means, cover for the existence of the WormCams."

  Mavens smiled. "WormCams. I can guess what that means. I knew it."

  Kate went on, "But deniability wasn't always possi- ble. And not in this case. You knew it, Hiram, before you approved the story. It was just too good a lead to pass on ... I think you should tell him what he wants to know."

  Hiram glared at her. "Why the hell should I?"

  "Because," said Mavens, "1 think I can help you."

  Mavens stared wide-eyed at David's first wormhole mouth, already a museum piece, the spacetime pearl still embedded in its glass block. "And you don't need an- chors. You can plant a WormCam eye anywhere, watch anything.... And you can pick up sound too?"

  "Not yet," Hiram said. "But the Search Engine is a pretty good lipreader. And we have human experts to back it up. Now, Special Agent. Tell me how you can help me."

  Reluctantly, Mavens set the glass block down on the table. "As Ms. Manzoni deduced, the rest of my team is only a couple of steps behind me. There will probably be a raid on your facilities tomorrow."

  Kate frowned. "Then surely you shouldn't be here, tipping us off."

  "No, I shouldn't," Mavens said seriously. "Look, Mr. Patterson, Ms. Manzoni, I'll be frank. I'm arrogant enough to believe that on this issue I can see a little more clearly than my superiors, which is why I'm step- ping over the mark. Your WormCam technology—even what I was able to deduce about it for myself—is fan- tastically powerful. And it could do an immense amount of good: bringing criminals to justice, counterespionage, surveillance—"

  "If it was in the right hands," Hiram said heavily.

  "If it was in the right hands."

  "And that means yours. The Bureau's."

  "Not just us. But in the public domain, yes. I can't agree with your reporting of the Juarez-Huxtable con- versation- But your exposure of the fraudulent science behind the Galveston desalination project, for example, was a masterful piece of journalism. By uncovering that particular scam alone you saved the public purse billions of dollars. I'd like to see responsible news-gathering of that kind continue. But I am a servant of the people. And the people—we—need the technology too, Mr- Pat- terson."

  'To invade citizens' privacy?" Kate asked.

  Mavens shook his head. "Any technology is open to abuse. There would have to be controls. But—you may not believe it, Ms. Manzoni—on the whole we civil ser- vants are pretty clean.

  "And we need all the help we
can get. These are in- creasingly difficult times—as you must know, Ms. Man- zoni."

  "The Wormwood."

  "Yes." He frowned, looking troubled. "People seem reluctant to take responsibility for themselves, let alone for others, their community. A rise in crime is being | matched by a rise in apathy about it. Presumably this H will only grow worse as the years go by, as the Worm-

  -^ wood grows closer."

  Hiram seemed intrigued. "But what difference does it

  ,;- make if the Wormwood is going to cream us all any-