additional expense, no doubt." The senator could also be crisp."Surprises me that the military should think of that, however."
The closing of the heavy doors behind him punctuated his remark andcaused him to step to the center of the bunker. Where there had seemedadequate room before, now the feeling was one of oppressiveovercrowding.
Unconsciously, Major Eddy squared his elbows as if to clear the spacearound him for the manipulation of his controls. Professor Stein sat athis radar screen, quiet, immobile, a part of the mechanisms. He wasaccustomed to overbearing authority whatever political tag it might wearat the moment.
"Beep. Eleven minutes," the signal sounded.
"Perhaps you'll be good enough to brief me on just what you're doinghere?" the senator asked, and implied by the tone of his voice that itcouldn't be very much. "In layman's language, Colonel. Don't try to makeit impressive with technical obscurities. I want my progress report onthis project to be understandable to everyone."
Jennings looked at him in dismay. Was the man kidding him? Explain thezenith of science, the culmination of the dreams of man in twenty simplewords or less! And about ten minutes to win over a man which thePentagon had failed to win.
"Perhaps you'd like to sit here, Senator," he said courteously. "When welearned you were coming, we felt yours should be the honor. At zerotime, you press this key--here. It will be your hand which sends thetest ship out into space."
Apparently they were safe. The senator knew so little, he did notrealize the automatic switch would close with the zero time signal, thatno hand could be trusted to press the key at precisely the right time,that the senator's key was a dummy.
"Beep, ten," the signal came through.
Jennings went back over to the periscope and peered through the slit. Hefelt strangely surprised to see the silver column of the ship stillthere. The calm, the scientific detachment, the warm thrill ofco-ordinated effort, all were gone. He felt as if the test flightitself was secondary to what the senator thought about it, what he wouldsay in his progress report.
He wondered if the senator's progress report would compare in anyparticular with the one on the ship. That was a chart, representing asfar as they could tell, the minimum and maximum tolerances of humanlife. If the multiple needles, tracing their continuous lines, went overthe black boundaries of tolerances, human beings would die at thatpoint. Such a progress report, showing the life-sustaining conditions ateach point throughout the ship's flight, would have some meaning. Hewondered what meaning the senator's progress report would have.
He felt himself being pushed aside from the periscope. There was noungentleness in the push, simply the determined pressure of an arrogantman who was accustomed to being in the center of things, and thinkingnothing of shoving to get there. The senator gave him the briefest ofexplanatory looks, and placed his own eye at the periscope slit.
"Beep, nine," the signal sounded.
"So that's what represents two billion dollars," the senator saidcontemptuously. "That little sliver of metal."
"The two billion dollar atomic bomb was even smaller," Jennings saidquietly.
* * * * *
The senator took his eye away from the periscope briefly and looked atJennings speculatively.
"The story of where all that money went still hasn't been told," he saidpointedly. "But the story of who got away with this two billion will bedifferent."
Colonel Jennings said nothing. The white hot rage mounting within himmade it impossible for him to speak.
The senator straightened up and walked back over to his chair. He waveda hand in the direction of Major Eddy.
"What does that man do?" he asked, as if the major were not present, orwas unable to comprehend.
"Major Eddy," Jennings found control of his voice, "operates remotecontrol." He was trying to reduce the vast complexity of the operationto the simplest possible language.
"Beep, eight," the signal interrupted him.
"He will guide the ship throughout its entire flight, just as if he weresitting in it."
"Why isn't he sitting in it?" the senator asked.
"That's what the test is for, Senator." Jennings felt his voice becomingicy. "We don't know if space will permit human life. We don't knowwhat's out there."
"Best way to find out is for a man to go out there and see," the senatorcommented shortly. "I want to find out something, I go look at itmyself. I don't depend on charts and graphs, and folderol."
The major did not even hunch his broad shoulders, a characteristicgesture, to show that he had heard, to show that he wished the senatorwas out there in untested space.
"What about him? He's not even in uniform!"
"Professor Stein maintains sight contact on the scope and transmits theIFF pulse."
The senator's eyes flashed again beneath heavy brows. His lips indicatedwhat he thought of professors and projects who used them.
"What's IFF?" he asked.
The colonel looked at him incredulously. It was on the tip of his tongueto ask where the man had been during the war. He decided he'd better notask it. He might learn.
"It stands for Identification--Friend or Foe, Senator. It's armyjargon."
"Beep, seven."
_Seven minutes_, Jennings thought, _and here I am trying to explain theculmination of the entire science of all mankind to a lardbrain insimple kindergarten words_. Well, he'd wished there was something tobreak the tension of the last half hour, keep him occupied. He had it.
"You mean the army wouldn't know, after the ship got up, whether it wasours or the enemy's?" the senator asked incredulously.
"There are meteors in space, Senator," Jennings said carefully. "Radarcontact is all we'll have out there. The IFF mechanism reconverts ourbeam to a predetermined pulse, and it bounces back to us in a differentpattern. That's the only way we'd know if we were still on the ship, orhave by chance fastened on to a meteor."
"What has that got to do with the enemy?" O'Noonan askeduncomprehendingly.
Jennings sighed, almost audibly.
"The mechanism was developed during the war, when we didn't know whichplanes were ours and which the enemy's. We've simply adapted it to thisuse--to save money, Senator."
"Humph!" the senator expressed his disbelief. "Too complicated. Theworld has grown too complicated."
"Beep, six."
The senator glanced irritably at the time speaker. It had interruptedhis speech. But he chose to ignore the interruption, that was the way tohandle heckling.
"I am a simple man. I come from simple parentage. I represent the simplepeople, the common people, the people with their feet on the ground. Andthe whole world needs to get back to the simple truths andhonesties...."
Jennings headed off the campaign speech which might appeal to themountaineers of the senator's home state, where a man's accomplishmentswere judged by how far he could spit tobacco juice; it had littleapplication in this bunker where the final test before the flight of manto the stars was being tried.
"To us, Senator," he said gently, "this ship represents simple truthsand honesties. We are, at this moment, testing the truths of all thatmankind has ever thought of, theorized about, believed of the spacewhich surrounds the Earth. A farmer may hear about new methods ofgrowing crops, but the only way he knows whether they're practical ornot is to try them on his own land."
The senator looked at him impassively. Jennings didn't know whether hewas going over or not. But he was trying.
"All that ship, and all the instruments it contains; those represent theutmost honesties of the men who worked on them. Nobody tried to bluff,to get by with shoddy workmanship, cover up ignorance. A farmer does nottry to bluff his land, for the crops he gets tells the final story.Scientists, too, have simple honesty. They have to have, Senator, forthe results will show them up if they don't."
* * * * *
The senator looked at him speculatively, and with a growing respect. Nota bad speech, tha
t. Not a bad speech at all. If this tomfoolery actuallyworked, and it might, that could be the approach in selling it to hisconstituents. By implication, he could take full credit, put over theimpression that it was he who had stood over the scientists making surethey were as honest and simple as the mountain farmers. Many a man hasgone into the White House with less.
"Beep, five."
Five more minutes. The sudden thought occurred to O'Noonan: what if herefused to press the dummy key? Refused to take part in this project hecalled tomfoolery? Perhaps they thought they were being clever in havinghim take part in the ship's launching, and were by that act