Critical Mass

by Frederik Pohl

  Rocked by the sudden vision of himself as a man of influence, Denzer hardly heard the rest of what the research man was saying. Maggie Frome pushed herself away from him and stared thoughtfully at Valendora.

  “We’re all in the same boat, friend,” she said kindly.

  Valendora scowled at the floor.

  “But what’s this about an attack?”

  With bitter sarcasm Valendora said, “Nothing at all, Miss Frome. Merely what I have spent eleven months of my tune on. And twenty-two computer hours.”

  “I’m impressed, friend. You said something about an attack?”

  Valendora said, “You would not understand single-event prediction, Miss Frome. It is a statistical assessment of probabilities. Oh, nothing in itself that has not previously been studied, true; but it is in the establishing of quantitative values for subjective data that I have, I do know, made a contribution.” He shrugged moodily. “And by tomorrow? The event, you see. If I have not published before the event it is only a mathematical statement. The test of a theory is the predictions that can be made from it; I have made my prediction. During the All-Star Game, you see-“

  “There you are!” cried a new voice.

  It was the plump youth who had been quarreling with Valendora at the booking desk. He was still angry. “Baseball,” he snapped, “that’s all I hear. Can’t I make anyone understand that I am a special investigator on Senator Horton’s personal staff? The senator is waiting to interview me right now! And this man has stolen my thesis!” He put a hand out and briskly pumped Denzer’s. “Walter Chase, sir. M.A., C.E., and all the rest of that nonsense,” he twinkled, for he had made a quick estimate of Denzer’s well-cut clothes and hangdog look and pigeonholded him at once as second-string executive, subject to flattery.

  “Denzer. Nature’s Way,” he mumbled, trying to let go of the hand, but Chase hung on.

  “I’m in cement, Mr. Denzer,” he said. “Did a bit of research-my dissertation, actually-just received another degree-and Senator Horton is most taken by it. Most taken, Mr. Denzer. Unfortunately I’ve just the one copy, as it happens and it’s, well, rather important that it not be lost. It concerns cement, as it affects

  our shelter program-and, after all, what is a shelter but cement? Eh? Probably should’ve been classified at the start, but-” He shrugged with the faint amused distaste of the man of science for the bureaucrat. “Anyway, I must have it; the senator must see it with his own eyes before he’ll give me the j-before making final arrangements. And this man has stolen it.”

  “Stolen!” screamed Valendora. “Man! It is your fault, man! I was only-“

  “Be careful!” commanded Chase furiously. “Don’t blame me! I was merely-“

  Denzer felt a tug on his arm. Maggie Frome winked and led him away, near the group of singing drunks. They sat down again. “Quieter here!” she shouted in his ear. “Put your shoulder back, Denzer! I want to go back to sleep!”

  “All right!” he yelled, and helped her settle her head against him; but in a moment she raised it again.

  ““Denzer!” she asked over the singing of the group, “did you hear what your friend from the Institute was saying? Something about an attack? I had the funny idea he meant missile attack-a real one, I mean.”

  “No,” he shouted back, “it was only baseball! All-Star Game, you know.”

  And he hardly heard the raucous bellowing of the drunks for the next half hour, inhaling the fragrance of her hair.

  They were released at last, Denzer making bail; the bail corresponded to the amount of their fines for A.R.P. violation, and small print at the bottom of their summons pointed out that they could forfeit it if they chose, thus paying their fines, simply by failing to appear at the magistrate’s trial. They got out just in time to get the bulldog edition of Nature’s Way from a sidewalk scriber.

  They looked at once on the spread, pages 34 and 35, expecting anything, even blank pages.

  Tragically, the pages were not blank at all.

  Pages 34 and 35 had nothing to do with Aztec Wine of Coca. It was a straight news story, headlined:

  U. S. MISSILE VULNERABILITY TOTAL IN

  ALL-STAR GAME, SAYS GOVERNMENT

  STATISTICS EXPERT

  From there it got worse. Maggie screamed faintly over Denzer’s shoulder as she read parts of it aloud: ” ‘The obsessive preoccupation of the American public with baseball stems from a bread-and-circuses analogy with ancient Rome. Now, as then, it may lead to our destruction.’ Denzer! Does this maniac want us to get lynched?”

  “Read on,” moaned Denzer, already several laps ahead of her. Neatly boxed on the second page was a digested, sexed-up version of something Denzer recognized faintly as the study of cement in the shelter program Chase had mentioned. What the Nature’s Way semantic-digester had made of it was:

  SHELTERS DEATH TRAPS

  Study of the approved construction codes of all American shelter projects indicates that they will not withstand even large chemical explosives.

  “I think,” sobbed Arturo Denzer, “that I’ll cut my throat.”

  “Not here, Mac,” snapped the news-scribing machine. “Move on, will you? Hey! Late! Whaddya read?”

  Shaking, the couple moved on. “Denzer,” Maggie gasped, “where do you think Joe got this stuff?”

  “Why, from us, Maggie,” Denzer tried to swallow, but his throat was dry. “Didn’t you hear Chase before? That was the mix-up at the desk; we must have got his papers, and I suppose what’s his-name’s, Venezuela’s, and bundled them off to Joe. Nice job of rush typography, though,” he added absently, staring into

  I

  space. “Say, Maggie. What Venezuela was talking about. You think there’s any truth to it?”

  “To what, Denzer?”

  “What it says here. Optimum time for the Other Side to strike-during the All-Star Game, it says. You think-?”

  Maggie shook her head. “I don’t think, Denzer,” she said, and they walked on for a moment.

  They heard their names called, turned, and were overtaken rapidly by Valendora and the cement engineer. “You!” cried Chase. “You have my thesis!”

  “And you have my study!” cried Valendora.

  “Not I but humanity,” said Denzer sadly, holding out the damp faxed edition of Nature’s Way.

  Valendora, after one white-faced oath in Spanish, took it calmly. He glanced up at the sky for a second, then shrugged. “Someone will not like this. I should estimate,” he said thoughtfully, “that within five minutes we will all be back in the calabozo.”

  But he was wrong.

  It was actually less than three.

  v

  It was the third inning, and Craffany had just benched Little Joe Fliederwick. In spite of the sudden ban on air travel the stadium was full. Every television screen in the country followed Little Joe’s trudging walk to the dugout.

  In the White House, President Braden, shoes off, sipping a can of beer, ignored the insistent buzzing hi , his ear as long as he could. He wanted to watch the game, “-and the crowd is roaring,” roared the announcer, “just a-boiling, folks! What’s Craffany up to? What will he do next? Man, don’t we have one going here today? Folks, was that the all-important turning point in today’s all-im-in today’s record-breaking All-Star Game, folks? Well, we’ll see. In sixty seconds we’ll return to the field, but meanwhile-“

  The President allowed his attention to slip away from the commercial and took another pull at his beer. Baseball, now. That was something he could get his teeth into. He’d been a fan since the age of five. All his life. Even during the Century of the Common Woman, when that madman Danton had listened to the Female Lobby and put girls on every second base in the nation. But it had never been this good. This Fliederwick, now, he was good.

  Diverted, he glanced at the screen. The camera was on Little Joe again, standing at the steps to the dugout, looking up. So were his teammates; and the announcer was saying: “Looks like some more of those a
ir-to-air missile-busters, folks. A huge flight of them. Way up. Well, it’s good to know our country’s defense is being looked after and, say, speaking of defense, what do you suppose Craffany’s going to do now that-“

  The buzzing returned. The President sighed and spoke to his invisible microphones. “What? Oh. Well, damn it… all right.”

  With a resentful heart he put down the beer can and snapped off the television set. He debated putting his shoes back on. He decided against it, and pulled Ms chair close to the desk to hide his socks.

  The door opened and Senator Horton came in.

  “Mr. President,” cried Horton, “I want to thank you. There’s no doubt your prompt action has saved your country, sir. I imagine you’ve been filled in on the, ah, incident.”

  Well, he had been, the President thought, but by Senator Harkness, and maybe the time had come when Jim Harkness’ view of world affairs needed a little broadening. “Suppose you tell me about it,” he said.

  Horton looked faintly perplexed, but said promptly: “It was basically an accident. Two men, working independently, came up with reports, strictly unofficial, but important. One was a graduate student’s thesis on shelter construction; happens the boy was looking for

  a job, the Cement Research and Development Institute recommended him to me, he was on his way to see me when the thing happened. That’s how I became involved in it. The other fellow’s a lab worker, at least as far as earning a living’s concerned, but he’s a mathematician something-or-other and was working out a problem with his lab’s computers. The problem: If the Reds are going to sneak-punch us, when will they do it? The answer: today. While we’re all off base, with the All-Star Game. In the old days they’d maybe pick a presidential election to put one over, just like Hitler used to pick the long weekends. Now all they need is a couple of hours when everybody’s looking the other way, you see. All-Star Game’s a natural.”

  The President said mildly, “I can see that without using a computer, Senator.”

  “Certainly, sir. But this boy proved it. Like to meet him, by the way? I’ve got the lot of them, right outside.”

  In for a penny, in for a pound, thought the President, motioning them in. There were three men and a girl, rather young, rather excited. Senator Horton rattled off introductions. The President gathered the other two had been involved in the security leak that had occurred on the reports.

  “But I’ve talked to them,” cried Senator Horton, “and I can’t believe there’s a grain of malice in all of them. And what they say, Mr. President, requires immediate action.”

  “I was under the impression I’d taken immediate action,” said the President. “You asked me to ground all civilian air traffic so the missile-watchers could have a clear field; I did. You asked me to put all our defense aircraft airborne; I did. You asked for a Condition Red defense posture and you got it, all but the official announcement.”

  “Yes, Mr. President. The immediate danger may have been averted, yes. But what about the future?”

  “I see,” said the President, and paused for a second. Oddly, there was no voice from the prompter in his ear to suggest his next words. He frowned.

  “I see,” he said again, louder. The tiny voice in Ms ear said at last:

  “Well, sir, uh-” It cleared its throat. “Sir, there seems to be some confusion here. Perhaps you could ask the Senator to continue to brief you.”

  “Well-” said the President.

  “David,” whispered the prompter.

  “-David, let’s get our thinking organized. Why don’t you continue to fill me hi?”

  “Gladly, sir! As you know, I’m Shelters all the way. Always have been. But what this young man here says has shaken me to the core. Mr. Venezuela says-” Valendora grinned sullenly at the rug-“that at this very moment we would be in atoms if it hadn’t been for his timely publication of the statistical breakdown of our vulnerability. He’s even a little sore about it, Mr. President.”

  “Sore?”

  The senator grinned. “We spoiled his prediction,” he explained. “Of course, we saved our own lives … The Other Side has computers too; they must have assessed our national preoccupation with baseball. Beyond doubt they intended to strike. Only the commotion his article caused-not only in our own country but, through their embassies, on the Other Side-plus of course your immediate reaction when I telephoned you asking for a Red Alert, kept the missiles from coming down today, sir. I’m certain of it. And this other young fellow, Mr. Chase-” Walter Chase bowed his head modestly-“brought out a lot of data in his term paper, or whatever it was. Seemed like nonsense, sir, so we checked it. Everything he said is not only fact but old stuff; it’s been published hundreds of times. Not a word of new material hi it.” Chase glared. “That’s why we’ve never built deep shelters. They simply won’t stand up against massive attack-and cannot be made to stand up. It’s too late for shelters. In building them we’re falling into the oldest strategic trap of human warfare; We’re fighting yesterday’s war today.”

  President Braden experienced a sinking feeling when the earprompter said only, and doubtfully, “Ask him to go on, sir.”

  “Go on, si-Go on, David.”

  “Why,” said the senator, astonished, “that’s all there is, Mr. President. The rest is up to you.”

  President Braden remembered vaguely, as a youth, stories about the administration of President -who was it? Truman, or somebody around then. They said Truman had a sign on his desk that read: The buck stops here.

  His own desk, the President noticed for the first time, was mirror-smooth. It held no such sign. Apart from the framed picture of his late wife there was nothing.

  Yet the principle still held, remorselessly, no matter how long he had been able to postpone its application. He was the last man in the chain. There was no one to whom the President could pass the buck. If it was time for the nation to pick itself up, turn itself around and head off in a new direction, he was the only one who could order it to march.

  He thought about the alternatives. Say these fellows were right. Say the shelters couldn’t keep the nation going in the event of all-out attack. Say the present alert, so incredibly costly hi money and men, could not be maintained around the clock for any length of time, which it surely could not. Say the sneak-punchers were right…

  But no, thought the President somberly, that avenue had been explored and the end was disaster. You could never get all the opposing missile bases, not while some were under the sea and some were touring the highways of the Siberian tundra on trucks and some

  were orbital and some were airborne. And it only took a handful of survivors-to kill you.

  So what was left?

  Here and now, everybody was waiting for him to speak-even the little voice in his ear.

  The President pushed his chair back and put his feet up on the desk. “You know,” he said, wiggling his toes in their Argyle socks, “I once went to school’too. True,” he said, not apologizing, “it was West Point. That’s a good school too, you know. I remember writing a term paper in one of the sociology courses … or was it history? No matter. I still recall what I said in that paper. I said wasn’t it astonishing that things always got worse before they got better. Take monarchy, I said. It built up and up, grew more complex, more useless, more removed from government, in any real sense, until we come to things like England’s Wars of the Roses and France’s Sun King and the Czar and the Mikado-until most of the business of the government was in the person of the king, instead of the other way around. Then-bang! No more monarchy.”

  “Mr. President,” whispered the voice in his ear, “you have an appointment with the Mongolian Legate.”

  “Oh, shut up, you,” said the President amiably, shocking his prompter and confusing his guests. “Sorry, not you,” he apologized. “My, uh, secretary. Tells me that the Chinese representatives want to talk about our ‘unprecedented and unpeace-loving acts’-more likely, to see what they can find out.” H
e picked the plug out of his ear and dropped it hi a desk drawer. “They’ll wait. Now, take slavery,” he went on. “It too became more institutionalized-and ritualized-until the horse was riding the man; until the South here was existing on slaves, it was even existing for slaves. The biggest single item of wealth in the thirteen Confederate states was slaves. The biggest single line of business, other than agriculture, was slavery, dealing and breeding. Things get big and formal, you see,

  just before they pop and blow away. Well, I wrote all this up. I turned it in, real proud, expecting, I don’t know, maybe an honorary LL.D. At least a compliment, certainly … It came back and the instructor had scrawled one word across the top of it: Toynbee. So I read up on Toynbee’s books. After, of course, I got over being oppressed at the instructor’s injustice to me. He was right. Toynbee described the whole thing long before I did.

  “But, you know, I didn’t know that at the time. I thought it up myself, as if Toynbee had never lived,” said the President with some pride. He beamed at them.

  Senator Hort6n was standing with open mouth. He glanced quickly at the others in the room, but they had nothing but puzzlement to return to him. He said, “Mr. President, I don’t understand. You mean-“

  “Mean? I mean what’s happened to us,” said the President testily. “We’ve had our obsessive period. Now we move on to something else. And, Senator, Congress is going to have to help move; and, I’m warning you, you’re going to help me move it.”

  When they left the White House it was late afternoon. The lilacs that bordered the wall were in full, fragrant bloom. Denzer inhaled deeply and squeezed the hand of Maggie Frome.

  Passing the sentry box at the end of the drive, they heard a voice from a portable radio inside. It was screaming: