‘I guess so,’ Gram said. ‘But we’ve used laser beams on his ship out there in space and they’ve done nothing.’
‘Mobile laser systems, such as are found on warships,’ Ild said, ‘put out an insignificant beam compared with a large stationary system such as Baltimore has. Will you please use your fone and make arrangements immediately? Thirty-two hours is not long.’
It sounded like a good idea; Willis Gram picked up his line-4 fone and got a trunk call through to Baltimore, to the technicians in charge of the laser system.
Across from him, as he made the arrangements, sat Amos Ild, massaging his great head, his attention focused on everything that Gram said.
‘Fine,’ Ild said, when Gram hung up the fone. ‘I have been calculating the probabilities of Provoni finding a scientific race superior enough to our own that they could impose their political will on us. So far, inter-stellar flights have located only two civilizations more advanced than our own… and they were not very greatly advanced: perhaps a hundred years or so. Now, notice that Provoni has returned in the Gray Dinosaur; that is important, because had he actually encountered such a superior race they most certainly would have come here in one or more of their ships. Look at him; look at his fatigue. He is virtually blind and dead. No, neutrologics says to decide that he is bluffing; he could so easily have proved he was not, merely by returning in an alien vessel. And’ – Amos Ild grinned – ‘there would have been a flotilla of them, to impress us. No, the same ship he left in, the way he looked on TV—’ His head wobbled with intensity; on the bald scalp veins stood out, throbbing.
‘Are you all right?’ Gram inquired.
‘Yes. I am solving problems; please be quiet for a moment.’ The lidless eyes stared, and Willis Gram felt uneasy. He momentarily dipped into Ild’s mind but, as was so often the case with New Men, he found thought-processes he could not follow. But this – it wasn’t even a language; it took the form of what appeared to be arbitrary symbols, transmuting, shifting… hell, he thought, and gave up.
All at once Amos Ild spoke. ‘I have reduced the probability to zero, through neutrologics. He does not have any alien with him, and the only threat he poses is the technological hardware which some highly evolved race has provided him.’
‘You’re sure?’
“According to neutrologics it is an absolute, not a relative certainty.’
‘You can do that with your neutrologics?’ Gram asked, impressed. ‘I mean, instead of it being like 30–70 or 20–80 you express it in the terms a precog can’t; all he can give is probabilities because they’re a bunch of alternate futures. But you say “absolute zero”. Then all we need to get is’ – he saw the reason, now, for having the Baltimore laser system set up – ‘just Provoni. The man himself.’
‘He’ll be armed,’ Amos Ild said. ‘With very powerful weapons, both mounted on his ship and hand weapons besides. And he’ll be within a shield of some kind, a protective area that moves with him. We will keep the Baltimore laser gun pointed on him until it penetrates his shield; he will die; the mobs of Old Men will see him die; Cordon is already dead; we are not far from the finish. In thirty-two hours it may all be over.’
‘And then my appetite will come back,’ Gram said.
Amos Ild said, smiling slightly, ‘It looks to me as if it never went away.’
You know, Gram thought to himself, I don’t trust this ‘absolute zero’ business; I don’t trust their neutrologics – maybe because I don’t understand it. But how can they maintain that an event in the future must happen? Every precog I’ve ever talked to has said that hundreds of possibilities lie at every point in time… but they don’t understand neutrologics either, not being New Men.
He picked up one of his fones. ‘Miss Knight,’ he said, ‘I want a convocation of as many precogs as I can get within, say, the next twenty-four hours. I want them patched into a network by telepaths and, myself being a telepath, I’ll contact all the precogs and see, if working in unison, they can come up with a good probability. Get on this right away – it has to be done today.’ He rang off.
‘You’ve violated our arrangement,’ Amos Ild said.
‘I just wanted to integrate the precogs via the telepaths,’ Gram said. ‘And get their’ – he paused – ‘opinion.’
‘Call your secretary back and cancel your request.’
‘Do I have to?’
‘No,’ Amos Ild said. ‘But if you go ahead, I’m going back to Great Ear and continue my work there. It’s up to you.’
Gram picked up the fone again and said, ‘Miss Knight, cancel that about the precogs, what I just said.’ He hung up, feeling gloomy and morose. Extracting information from the minds of others was his chief modus operandi in life; it was hard to give up.
‘If you go to them,’ Ild said, ‘you’re back with probabilities; you’ll be back with 20th century logic, a tremendous step back; well over two hundred years.’
‘But if I got ten thousand precogs patched in by ‘paths—’
‘You would not know,’ Amos Ild said, ‘as much as I have already told you.’
I’ll let it go,” Gram agreed. He had elected Amos Ild as his source of information and opinion, and it was probably the right thing to do. But ten thousand precogs… aw hell, he thought. There really isn’t enough time anyhow. Twenty-four hours – that’s nothing. They’d all have to assemble in one spot, and twenty-four hours wouldn’t do it, modern subsurface transportation notwithstanding.
‘You’re really not going to sit here in my office,’ he said to Amos Ild, ‘continually, without a break, all the way through this?’
Ild said, ‘I want the bio material on Provoni; I want everything I enumerated.’ He sounded impatient.
With a sigh, Willis Gram pressed a switch on his desk; it opened the circuits to all the major computers throughout the world. He rarely – if ever – used this mechanism. ‘Provoni comma Thors,’ he said. ‘All material, and then an abstract in terms of relevance. At ultimate high-speed run, if possible.’ He remembered to add, ‘And this takes priority over everything else.’ He released the switch, turned away from the mike. ‘Five minutes,’ he said.
Four and one half minutes later, a stack of paper oozed from a slot in his desk. That was a rundown of all information. Then, coded in red, the summation: one or two pages.
He handed it all over to Ild without looking at it, Reading anything more about Provoni did not appeal to him; he had read, seen, heard endlessly about the man, it seemed, during the last few days.
Ild read the summation first, at great speed.
‘Well?’ Willis Gram asked. ‘You made your zero prognosis without the material; now does having seen the material alter your neutrologics in any way?’
“The man’s a showman,’ Ild said. ‘Like many Old Men who are intelligent, but not intelligent enough to enter the Civil Service. He’s a con man.’ He tossed the summary down and began to look over the great volume of material; as before, he read at fantastic speed. Then, all at once, he scowled. Once more the great egg-like head bobbed unsteadily; Amos Ild reached up reflectively to stop its near gyrations.
‘What is it?’ Gram asked.
‘One small datum. Small?’ Ild laughed. ‘Provoni refused public testing. There’s no record of him ever having taken a Civil Service examination.’
‘So what?’ Gram asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Ild said. ‘Perhaps he knew he’d fail. Or perhaps’ – he fiddled with the papers, moodily – ‘or perhaps he knew he would pass. Perhaps’ – he fixed his unwinkable eyes on Gram – ‘perhaps he’s a New Man. But we can’t tell.’ He held up the mass of material angrily. ‘It’s not here either way. The datum is simply missing; no records of any aptitude testing of Provoni are here – and never were here.’
‘But mandatory testing,’ Gram said.
‘What?’ Ild stared at him.
‘In school. They give mandatory tests, IQ and aptitude tests to see which channel of education the st
udents should receive. He would have taken one every four years or so, from three years of age on.’
‘They’re not here,’ Ild said.
Gram said, ‘If they’re not here, Provoni or somebody working in the school-system for him, got them out.’
‘I see,’ Amos said presently.
‘You care to withdraw your “absolute zero” prediction?’ Gram asked acidly.
After a pause, in a low, controlled voice, Amos Ild said, ‘Yes’
TWENTY-TWO
Charlotte Boyer said, ‘Scrup the authorities. I’m going to be at Times Square when he lands.’ She inspected her wrist-watch. ‘Two hours from now.’
Nick said, ‘You can’t. The military and the PSS—’
‘I heard the newscaster,’ Charley said. ‘Same as you. “A dense, enormous mass of Old Men, numbering perhaps in the millions, has converged on Times Square and—” Let’s see; how did he put it? “And for their own protection they’re being removed by balloon ‘copters to safer places.” Such as Idaho. Did you know you can’t get a Chinese dinner in Boise, Idaho?’ She rose, paced the room. ‘Sorry,’ she said to Ed Woodman, the owner of the apartment in which she and Nick were staying, ‘What do you say?’
Ed Woodman said, ‘Look at the TV screen. They’re hustling everyone anywhere near Times Square into those goddam huge 4-D transports and flying them out of the city.’
‘But more people are arriving,’ his wife Elka said. ‘They’re falling behind; more people are coming in than are being gotten out.’
‘I want to go,’ Charley said.
‘Watch on TV,’ Ed said. He was an older man, in his early forties, heavyset, good-natured, but keenly alert. Nick had found his advice worth listening to.
On TV, the announcer was saying, ‘Rumors that the largest laser gun in the eastern United States has been moved from Baltimore and set up near Times Square seem to have a basis in fact. At about ten this morning, New York time, a large object, which observers said looked like a complete laser system, was landed by air on the roof of the Shafter Building, which overlooks Times Square. If – and I repeat if – the authorities intend to use a very powerful laser beam on Provoni or Provoni’s ship, this would be the spot where the laser gun would most likely be placed.’
‘They can’t keep me from going there’ Charley said.
Ed Woodman, swiveling his chair to turn toward her, said, ‘Yes, they certainly can. They’re using tranquilizing gas; they’re knocking everyone out and then shoveling them aboard those big 4-D transports like so many sides of beef.’
‘Clearly,’ the TV newscaster said, ‘the moment of confrontation will come when, having landed his ship, and assuming he does so, Thors Provoni exits from the ship and displays himself for what he undoubtedly expects to be an adoring public. His distress will be, shall we say, acute? To find no one there, just police and army barricades.’ The newscaster smiled amiably. ‘Over to you, Bob?’
‘Yes,’ Bob Grizwald, another of the endless gnat-army of TV newscasters said, ‘Provoni is in for a disappointment. No one, repeat: no one, will be allowed near his ship.’
‘That laser cannon mounted on the roof of the Shafter Building may give him a welcome,’ the first newscaster said; Nick had not picked up his name, but it didn’t matter – they were interchangeable men, all smooth, all buttoned down, unable to lose their poise no matter what calamity occurred. The only emotion which they allowed themselves to express was an occasional wry smile. They were doing this now.
Charley said, ‘I hope Provoni wipes out New York.’
‘And seventy million Old Men?’ Nick asked.
Ed Woodman said, ‘You’re too savage, Charlotte. If the aliens have come to destroy the cities, they’ll destroy the Old Men rather than the New Men out there in the country on those floating sky-rafts. That would hardly coincide with Provoni’s wishes. No, it’s not cities they want – it’s the apparatus. The thing that governs.’
Nick said to him, ‘If you were a New Man, Ed, would you be nervous right now?’
‘I’d be nervous’ Ed said, ‘if that laser cannon doesn’t hurt him. In fact I’d be nervous anyhow. But not nervous like a New Man, no, indeed not. If I were a New Man or an Unusual, and I saw that laser beam bounce off Provoni, I’d find a ditch to hide in; I wouldn’t be able to get away fast enough. They probably don’t feel that way: they’ve ruled for so long, held power for so long, that heading for a ditch, literally and physically, wouldn’t enter their minds.’
‘If they gave all the news,’ Elka said severely, ‘they’d mention how many New Men and Unusuals have been leaving New York during the last eight or nine hours. You can see, look.’ She pointed out the window. The skyscraper was blackened by a sea of dots. Airborne squibs radiating out from the downtown section of the city: their old and familiar stamping grounds.
‘Turning now to other news,’ the newscaster said, ‘it has been officially reported that the noted New Man theoretician and builder of the Great Ear, the first electronic telepathic entity, Amos Ild, has been appointed by Council Chairman Gram to a special post. “Advisor to the Council Chairman”, it is designated. Word from the enormous Federal Building in Washington—’
Ed Woodman shut the set off.
‘Why did you do that?’ Elka asked, slender and tall in her inflated balloon trousers and fishnet drawstring blouse, her tawny red hair tumbling down the back of her neck. In some ways, Nick had noted, she resembled Charley. They had been friends, he was informed, back into school years; back to something like the As level, which was virtually infancy.
‘Amos Ild,’ Woodman said. ‘There is a really strange one. I’ve been interested in him for years; Christ, he’s considered one of the three or four brightest men in the whole Sol System. Nobody understands his thinking, except perhaps the one or two in the same class – near the same class, I mean – with him. He’s’ – he gestured – ‘a screwball.’
‘But we can’t tell,’ Elka said. ‘We can’t follow their neutrologics.’
‘But if other New Men can’t understand him—’
‘Einstein was the same way with his Unified Field Theory,’ Nick said.
‘Einstein’s Unified Field Theory was understood theoretically, but it took twenty years to prove it.’
‘Well, when Great Ear comes on, we’ll know about Ild,’ Elka said.
‘We’ll know about him before that,’ Ed said. ‘We’ll know as we watch the government make decisions in this Provoni crisis.’
‘You never were an Under Man,’ Nick said to Ed.
‘Afraid not. Too gutless.’
‘Does it make you want to fight?’ Charley asked, coming over to infuse herself into their conversation.
‘Fight? Against the government? Against the PSS and the military?’
‘With help on our side,’ Nick said. ‘The help of the non-terrestrials. Such as Provoni is bringing – or so he claims.’
‘He probably is,’ Ed Woodman said. ‘There’s no point in returning to Earth empty-handed.’
‘Get your coat,’ Charley said to Nick. ‘We’re flying to Times Square. Either that or we’re through with each other.’ She got her own coat, her rawhide leather jacket, marched to the apartment door, opened it, stood.
Ed Woodman said, ‘Well, you can fly into the area, and a PSS or army ‘copter will grapple you and drag you down. And they’ll run Nick’s name through their computers and come up with the fact that the black pissers have him on their snuff-list. So they’ll shoot him, and you can come on back here.’
Rotating, as if on an axis, Charley reentered the apartment, hung up her coat. Her full lips protruded in a grim pout, but she yielded to the logic. After all, this was why they were hiding out here, staying with friends of hers she hadn’t seen in two years.
‘I don’t understand,’ Charley said. ‘Why did they want to kill Nick? If it had been me – and we thought it was, all of us – I could understand that, because that old goat was trying to get me into one of tho
se “infirmary” beds for convalescing girls… but Nick – he let you go when he had you earlier. He didn’t feel the need of killing you then; you just walked out of the building, as free as the air we breathe.’
‘I think I know,’ Elka Woodman said. ‘He could stand her leaving him per se, but he knew where she was going: back to you. And he was right; you were.’
‘I saw her and Denny,’ Nick said. ‘If Denny—’ He decided not to finish the sentence. If Denny were alive, she’d be with him, not me, he thought. And that did not please him, in a sense. But anyhow the opportunity for him was there, and many a man before, in such situations, had moved to take advantage of it. It was part of the expertly waged battle of sexual possessiveness, the ‘look who I get to lay’ syndrome, carried to its logical conclusion: the opposition is snuffed. Poor Denny, he thought. Denny was so sure that if they once got into the Purple Sea Cow he could get away, get all three of them away. Maybe he could have. They would never know because they had decided not to be lured back by the Cow; as far as he and Charley knew, it remained on the roof field of the apartment building, where Denny had left it.
It was too dangerous to go back. They had fled on foot, lost themselves in the crowds of Old Men and releasees from the camps; New York, in the last couple of days, had become a mass of humanity which rolled, tide-like, toward Times Square, broke on the rocks which were the PSS and army barricades, and then fell back.
Or were flown off, God knew where. After all, Willis Gram had only promised to open the old camps – he hadn’t promised not to build new ones.
Charley asked aggressively, ‘We are going to watch on TV, aren’t we?’
‘Sure,’ Ed Woodman said, leaning forward and clasping his hands together between his knees. ‘Missing it is out of the question; they’ve got TV cameras on every roof in that region. Let’s upon this occasion hope Provoni doesn’t decide to grab the airways again.’