"I knew it was more money," he told them. He thought for a few seconds. "Tell you what I'll do. You get your heads together and produce a preliminary cost breakdown of what you think you'll need. After that, if you convince me, I'll talk to ISF headquarters in Geneva about it. Fair enough?"
Morelli opened the folder that he had been resting on his knees, extracted a wad of typewritten sheets of columns and figures, turned them around, and slid them on to Hughes's desk.
"Funny you should mention that, Pete," he said, keeping an absolutely straight face. Hughes stared disbelievingly down at the papers and then back up at the two earnest faces confronting him from the other side of his desk.
"Okay," he sighed, resigned. "Let's go through it now."
A week later, Hughes and Morelli flew to Geneva. The week after that, three directors from ISF headquarters came to Sudbury to obtain firsthand background information on what had been going on and what the possibilities for the future were. A few days after the matter had been discussed in Geneva, Peter Hughes called Morelli and gave him the good news. "I've just had Maurice on the line from Geneva. You'd better tell the team right away—we're going ahead with Mark II."
The first thing to do was place orders for a long list of equipment needed for the construction of Mark II. Hughes and Morelli had decided that, however gifted with talents for the unorthodox Aub might be, the new instrument would be designed and built according to accepted practices. That way it would be easy to expand, modify, and trouble-shoot; parts would be readily replaceable; and regular maintenance by suppliers would be feasible, enabling Aub and the other scientists at Sudbury to concentrate on the jobs they were there to do. It would take longer to get off the ground that way, but thereafter progress would be faster. Besides that, they had Mark I to occupy them in the meantime; without doubt it still had enormous potential for improvement that they were only beginning to appreciate.
But at about that time the first signs started to appear that on other fronts things were not running normally.
* * *
"Yes, Professor Morelli?" The face of the official from the State Department local office in Boston stared impassively out of the screen.
"I want to know about this inquiry you've sent us," Morelli replied from his Sudbury office. "And the questionnaire that you've attached to the back of it. What's it all about?"
"Purely a routine formality, Professor," the official replied smoothly. "A matter of keeping records up-to-date, you understand."
Morelli waved the paper in front of him. "But what is the purpose of all these questions?" he demanded. "Personnel working here and a list of the projects they're working on . . . declaration of capital equipment and the use that's being made of it . . . major research projects funded during the last two years . . . What in hell's going on? I've never seen anything like this before."
"Perhaps we have been a little more lax in the past than we should have been," the face replied. "I assure you that such information is pertinent to our duties and that we are empowered to request it."
"Empowered by whom?" Morelli asked angrily. The man's manner was beginning to irritate him.
"That I can't disclose, I'm sorry. I can only give you my assurance."
"Damn your assurance! It's either hogwash or you don't know what you're talking about. Let me talk to your boss."
"Really . . . I can hardly accept the necessity of . . ."
"Put me through to your boss," Morelli stormed.
"I'm afraid that Mr. Carson is unavailable at the moment. However, I . . ."
"Then tell him to call me," Morelli said and flipped off the screen.
Morelli glowered at the blank display screen for a long time while he tried in his mind to fit some kind of pattern to it. That had been the third such probing inquiry in two weeks. All kinds of obscure officials in obscure places were, it seemed, suddenly taking a lot of interest in Sudbury and what was going on there. He didn't like it.
* * *
"Okay, Alice, this guy in a gray suit and wearing a collar and tie started talking to you in the club," Morelli said. They were with a group relaxing and enjoying the sun during the lunch break by the shore of the lake outside the Institute. "What happened?"
"Well, at first I thought it was a pickup," she told him. "You know, some guy out on the town . . . He looked a bit out of place there, but you get all kinds, I guess."
"Uh huh . . .go on."
"But it turned out he really wasn't interested in me at all," she said. "Only in the place I worked at. He wanted to know if I worked for a Professor Morelli, who used to specialize in gravitational physics and who had discovered how to force particle annihilations some years back. It was a funny kind of conversation for a place like that. . . . He seemed to be trying to make it sound casual, but it came across all artificial, you know?"
"So what did you tell him?" Morelli asked.
"Well, I said, yes I did, but then he started asking if you were still working on the same thing and how much further you'd gone with it. That was when I got suspicious—really suspicious—and got out. Later on, Larry—he's a bartender there—said the guy had been asking around all night trying to get ISF people pointed out. I thought you should know."
"You did the right thing," Morelli told her. "Don't worry about it; just forget the whole thing. But if anything similar happens again, you let me know right away. Okay?"
Later that afternoon, Morelli went to find Peter Hughes. "Me being pestered is bad enough, but now they're starting on the juniors. What in hell is going on?"
* * *
"Sorry, Mr. Hughes, I'm afraid I can't help you." The man from the Technical Coordination Bureau in Washington looked dutifully concerned, but somehow the sincerity didn't come through. "I really don't know anything about anything like that."
Hughes stared back at the screen dubiously. "I'm not saying your department is actually doing it," he said. "I'm simply asking what you know about it."
"As I said, Mr. Hughes, I know nothing about anything like that," the Bureau man replied. "I will make inquiries though, I assure you. I'm sure you appreciate that there are many departments that require inputs for statistical purposes and so forth . . . nothing sinister. If any of their people have been a little, shall we say, overzealous, I apologize, and if I can find out who it is and bring some restraining influence to bear, I certainly will. Thank you for calling. If you'll excuse me, I think I have another call holding."
Meanwhile, down in the basement room that housed the central node of the Institute's computer complex, the operations manager was frowning over the weekly activity analysis that had just been dropped on his desk. The numbers on the sheet told him that the surveillance programs running in the preprocessor that interfaced the system to the outside world via the Infonet lines had trapped and aborted no fewer than fifty-seven illegal attempts to gain access to the Sudbury database from anonymous places elsewhere. It had been the same the week before, too, and nearly as bad the week before that. Somebody was trying very hard to find out what information and records were stored in that database.
But all this interference proved nothing more than a distraction—an irritation that didn't really affect the work on Mark II. Then things took a more serious turn. The first intimation that the project was in trouble came when Mike and Phil drew up a detailed list of required equipment and components and began contacting suppliers for technical information, prices, and delivery estimates.
"I'm sorry," the secretary to the sales manager of Micromatic Devices, Inc., advised. "But Mr. Williams isn't in right now. Can I take a message?"
"You've taken about a hundred messages already," Mike told her irritably. "I've been trying to talk to him for two days. When will he be back?"
"I really can't say," she replied. "He really is busy these days."
"Damn it, so am I," Mike protested. "What's the matter with everybody these days—don't they want to do any business? Look, you find him, please, and tell him to give m
e a call, urgent . . . day or night, I don't care. Got that?"
"Well, I'll see what I can do." The secretary didn't sound very optimistic. "Leave it with me, okay?"
"Okay," Mike sighed as he cut the call.
"I want to try something," Clifford growled from where he had been watching at the back of the room. "Key the same number again, will you." As he spoke he moved forward and pivoted the Infonet terminal around so that the view from it would show a different background. Mike rekeyed and, as Clifford slipped into the chair, another female face appeared.
"Micromatic, hello," she announced.
"Ron Williams, please," Clifford answered.
"Putting you through to Sales," she said. A second later the same secretary that had spoken to Mike was staring out at Clifford. He repeated the name.
"Who's calling Mr. Williams?" she inquired.
"Walter Massey of ACRE, New Mexico."
"One moment."
The screen blurred for a moment, then stabilized to reveal the smiling features of a man probably in his late thirties.
"Walt . . ." he began, then his face fell abruptly. "Oh . . . Bradley Clifford . . . It's been a long time . . . I thought you'd left ACRE a long time ago."
"I did," Clifford said curtly. "I'm at ISF, Sudbury. What the hell are you playing at?"
"I'm not sure I know . . ."
"Sure you're damn well sure. We've been calling for two days and getting the bum's rush. All the time you're sitting on your ass there. What are you playing at?"
Williams looked confused and tried to smile weakly. "We've been having a bit of a communications problem here," he said. "Sorry if it's been a pain. What did you want?"
"Model 1137-C pulse resonators," Clifford said. "How much and how long to deliver?"
"Oh, gee . . . well . . . ah . . . that might be a problem. I don't think that model is available anymore. They're on engineering hold at Manufacturing pending design mods. Could be a while before they're released."
"How long is a while?" Clifford demanded. "And what do you have in the way of alternatives?"
Williams was looking uncomfortable. "I really can't say how long," he pleaded. "It all depends on our engineering people. We've withdrawn all the other models from the list." Without waiting for further comments he went on hastily. "It looks as if we can't really help you this time. Some time in the future though, maybe."
After he had cleared down the call, Clifford scowled at Mike. "Something very strange is going on. I've never known that outfit to play hard to get before; usually they're very helpful. If it's not because they don't want to do business, then somebody somewhere is getting at them and warning them off for some reason. I'm beginning to get a good idea who."
* * *
"They were advertising them less than a month ago, and now they're saying it'll take twelve months at least." Clifford slapped the paper down on Morelli's desk and turned angrily away to face the window. "It's the same thing everywhere we go, Al. Everything is unavailable or reserved for government priority or out of stock. The only way we'll get those modulators is from that company in France that Aub mentioned. Have you had any luck with that approach yet?"
"Forget it," Morelli said gloomily.
"Why? What's happened now?"
"We need an importation license and we can't get one. It's been refused."
"Why, for Christ's sake? Aub says all the ones they used at Berkeley came from France, no problem."
"No reason offered," Morelli said. "It's just been refused outright. Anyhow, the matter's academic now since the French outfit won't play ball."
"What d'you mean—won't play?" Clifford asked. "I thought they said they'd be happy to oblige."
"A week ago they said they would be," Morelli agreed. "But when I talked to them yesterday, it'd all changed. Jacques muttered something about having to reserve a stock for spares and said they couldn't let any go. He said they'd been misled by an incorrect stock count."
"Bullshit!" Clifford raged. "They've been got at too. Isn't anywhere in the world safe from those bastards and their grubby fingers? All we wanted to do was be left alone!"
* * *
"But it looks as if somebody doesn't want to leave you alone," Sarah commented when Clifford brought her up-to-date that evening. "You always said we'd be famous one day."
"The whole thing's childish and stupid," Clifford declared moodily. "Presumably the idea is to show to the world that you can't beat the system. If you look like you're doing a good job of getting along without them, they make it their business to screw it up for you. That way the world gets the message. It's typical of the way their minds work. Jesus, no wonder the world's in such a mess!"
"I suppose it's a gentle reminder to ISF to stay in line too," Sarah added. "If the system pronounces you undesirable, then that's the way you're supposed to stay. In other words, taking in the outcasts isn't the way to keep friends."
"Yeah, that too, I guess," Clifford agreed. "Al's pretty fed up with the whole business too. I've never seen him low before. It's ridiculous."
"Do you think they might reconsider your employment contracts then?" Sarah asked hesitantly. "I mean it must be affecting the work of the whole place."
"If they've thought about that they haven't mentioned it," Clifford said. "But I can't say I'd blame 'em." He thought deeply for a long time and then said suddenly in a brighter voice:
"Oh, I forgot to tell you, there is a piece of good news as well."
"I don't believe it. What?"
"Professor Zimmermann is due to take a couple of weeks vacation down on Earth sometime in the near future. Al said so today. Apparently Zimmermann wants to come to Sudbury for a day or two to see for himself what we're doing at the Institute. You always said you wanted to meet him. It looks like maybe now you'll get the chance."
Chapter 14
The screen and its associated electronics had been salvaged from a basement room of the Institute that had become the final resting place for a bewildering assortment of dust-covered hardware left over from one-time projects whose purpose was long forgotten. The minicomputer that provided local control for the screen and in addition linked it into the Institute's main computing complex had originally formed part of a body scanner at Marlboro General Hospital; it had been scheduled for the scrap heap when the hospital made a decision to replace the scanner with a more up-to-date system, but had found its way to Sudbury on the back seat of Aub's car. The control console had been built mainly from panels of roughly cut aluminum sheeting, and included in its list of unlikely component parts: pieces of domestic Infonet terminals, microprocessors from household environmental-control units, Army-reject bubble memory modules, a frequency synthesizer from a sale of surplus stocks by a marine radar manufacturer in Boston, and a selection of items from various do-it-yourself hobby kits. The whole assemblage was housed in a small room adjoining the GRASER and connected by a multitude of cables to the clutter of cabinets and racks that formed the main body of the detector situated out on the large floor, in a space cleared immediately beside the reactor sphere itself.
Professor Heinrich Zimmermann stood back a few paces from the screen, a faint smile of amusement playing on his lips as he contemplated the image being displayed, and accepted good-naturedly the challenge that it implied. Most of the screen's area was taken up by a plain circular disk of dull orange, showing no internal detail or pattern but lightening slightly to become just a shade more yellow toward the center. The background to the disk was at first sight completely dark, but closer inspection revealed the merest hint of a blood-red mist to relieve the blackness. At length Zimmermann shook his head and looked back at Aub, who was sitting on a metal-frame stool in front of the console and watching him with twinkling eyes that failed to conceal his suppressed mirth.
"I thought that you had shown me everything. Now it appears that you have saved some sort of mystery until the very end. I am afraid I shall have to acknowledge defeat. What is it?"
Aub's
face split into a grin. From behind the professor, Clifford and Morelli stepped forward to complete the semicircle around the display.
"Well, since you're an astronomer, we thought we'd better lay on something that would have the right kind of appeal," Clifford replied. "As we said earlier, Aub's been spending quite a lot of time modifying the detector to give an improved response to cosmic hi-radiation. Okay?" Zimmermann nodded. Clifford continued, "The most intense sources of naturally occurring hi-waves are the concentrated annihilations produced in large masses. Now, what's the biggest mass you can think of very near where we're all standing?"
Zimmermann frowned to himself for a moment.
"Near here . . . ? I suppose it would have to be the foundation and base supporting the reactor sphere out there . . ." He caught the look on Clifford's face. "No . . . ?"
"Much bigger 'n that. Try again."
"Bigger by lots of orders of magnitude," Morelli hinted, joining in the game.
"You don't mean . . ." Zimmermann pointed down at the floor while the others nodded encouragingly. "Not Earth?" He looked from one to another, astonished.
"That's what you're looking at, all right," Clifford confirmed. "That image is produced from data processed out of hi-radiation being generated right through this whole planet."
Zimmermann stared again at the screen while his mind raced to comprehend fully the thing he was seeing. He knew that the hi-waves received by the detector did not arrive through normal space and could not be associated with any property of direction. He also knew that the everyday notion of distance had no direct counterpart in hi-space and that the information arriving at the detector was a summation of hi-waves originating from every part of the cosmos. How, then, could a representation of Earth be extracted from all that, and just what viewpoint did the image on the screen signify?
As if he could read the questions forming in the professor's mind, Clifford picked up his explanation. "Distance does play a part in the k-equations, but not in the sense of determining any propagation time. It comes in as an amplitude-modulating coefficient."
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