CHAPTER V
The spider ships towered above the surrounding aircraft. Their construction was utilitarian; their living quarters were cramped; entrance was achieved from the ground by means of a retractable ladder from the base platform.
The underbelly dome contained the cutting ray. It could strike deep into the Earth, burning through shale and granite with equal efficiency. The portable casing could be sunk almost simultaneously; it would seem to contain the ray as a hose contains water. While like a giant rig, the ship would poise on its triple legs above the operation. As rapidly as the crew could section the casing, the drilling would proceed.
The three ships would form a triangle. Like insects sending down stingers they would, when the time came, lance three deep shafts into the Earth. Then down the casings would plunge the identical charges. Technicians could compute the point where the three shock waves would meet. A fourth ray would enter the Earth to the proper depth; and at that point would be buried the deadly atomic seed. At the proper time, the charges would be detonated. And where their waves met, under incredible heat and pressure, there the chain reaction would begin, to explode, in an instant, the whole of the Earth.
The Oligarch summoned Herb. "You may sit at my table," he said.
Sleep ladened, Herb sank down across from the Oligarch.
"The necessity for rushing them into a hasty decision is unfortunate," the Oligarch said.
Herb sat hating. The words scarcely penetrated into his confused being. The turmoil was worse than ever.
"... I have been studying the reports. Three members of the Committee, as it stands now, oppose us. And listen...."
"Yes."
"They will be sure to try to end the hearings tomorrow."
"Yes," Herb repeated dully.
"It will go to the full Senate. We have requested a decision within a week. That may not be sufficient time for the popular sentiment of the country to crystallize in our favor. A few determined men may be able to defeat us."
Herb felt a little shudder crawl along his mind. Then his thoughts whirled away.
"It will be infinitely more difficult to win the crucial support of Senators Klein, Stilson and Council after the Committee hearings end. We must bring them to our side. They have become the focal point of the opposition. We must prolong the Committee hearings until we have convinced them. If we can convince them, the full Senate will go along. We'll have ripped the heart out of the opposition."
Herb tried to concentrate on the reasoning. "Yes," he said.
"They will press for an immediate vote. They have known, even if they don't realize it consciously, that the longer they delay, the surer they are of being defeated."
"If we don't ... can't...."
I don't know, the Oligarch thought. I don't know. Threats? Try to plant the charges secretly? "We'll have to convince them. And we've got to do it within a week—maybe a little more, a day or two more."
"What do we do? How? I mean, what do we tell them?" Herb's thoughts were like fog. He wished he could go back to sleep.
The Oligarch knew he was wasting his time explaining to Herb. He wished that he could go before the Committee, himself, but he dared not. Automatic reactions were far more consistent and convincing than his calculating deceit would be. He could conceivably be caught in a lie. Not Herb.
"I'll ... I'll try...."
The Oligarch analyzed Herb's potential. Ten days. Ten days. If he becomes unreliable, where shall I find another?
"We have almost three weeks," Herb said. "We could give them fifteen or sixteen days.... We could plant the charges in one day...."
"You may as well go back to sleep, Herb."
"Yes."
Herb stood up and stumbled away.
The Oligarch returned to his cabin, washed his hands, and went to his desk.
He fumbled at the newspapers. He saw an editorial: "Council Makes Starmen Hearing Political Football." The people were slowly coming to the starmen's support, but how long, how long...? He saw another headline: STARMEN POSSIBLE MENACE TO EARTH SOCIETY.
The first thing Herb did upon arising the morning of the third hearing was to fill in his dream form. He had filled in thousands of them during his life, and yet it was always a frightening experience.
A chill of the Unknown confronted him.
Watchful eyes were, in a way, reassuring; planted microphones could be circumvented; spies could be recognized. But the dream form could not be cheated.
What awful secrets did it reveal? Life and death hung in the balance. Somehow they could tell from the fantasy fiction of a dream how you felt about the reality around you: about the Oligarchy, about your job, about your family.
And they could tell when you lied.
And if you said you didn't dream.
Everyone on Brionimar dreamed.
If they didn't like your dreams, they shot you....
Even into his numb and information filled mind, terror crept as his pencil moved across the dream form.
He breakfasted in the messhall and then left for the hearing. As usual, there was a group of humans standing outside the guard lines, marveling at the three starships, standing upon spider legs, looking ready to whirl skyward at any sign of hostility. Far above, the interstellar ship waited in the coldness of space for the shuttle ships to complete their mission and return.
There was an unexpected buzz in the Committee Room when Herb and his two companions arrived.
An ugly television camera squatted across from the Chairman's desk.
Bud had changed his vote on televising the hearings.
Herb watched Bud cross to Senator Stilson. Until this morning the two had seemed very friendly.
"Let's get together later," Bud was saying. "I'll explain my position. I'm sure you'll understand."
Senator Stilson refused to acknowledge that Bud was there.
"Look, Eddy, boy, don't act like that. Listen, I was thinking this over last night, and I think it's only right...."
"The Socialists have gotten to you, Bud. That's all there is to say."
Bud swallowed in shocked disbelief. "Oh, now...." More than anything else in the world Bud wanted to refute this slander. Desperation gripped him: the socialists have gotten to you! No! God damn you! Take that back, you son of a bitch! His hands clenched.
He swallowed again, stiffly, with difficulty. Relax. For the love of God, relax. "Oh, now...."
Senator Stilson walked away.
Bud sat down weakly. I'll show him, he thought. I'll.... I'll.... It was frightening to have Senator Stilson call you a Socialist.
Bud tried not to think about Frank's face ... Frank's threats had nothing to do with him changing his mind. A man can change his mind. That he had changed his mind seemed to Bud a measure of his honesty and fairness. It was nothing less than that.
One of the other starmen whispered to Herb: "That one's changed sides."
Herb nodded. The Senators were beginning to respond to pressure from their constituents. But even as the tension was sinking, even as elation rose, a second emotion swept through him. It was not enough to deceive those in this room. Now he must also lie to innocent watching millions all over the planet. His fists clenched. He hated Bud.
Early in his testimony he noticed a girl in the audience. There was something in her face that made his eyes return to it time after time. Gradually he came to concentrate exclusively on her and try to explain everything to her alone. He smiled uncertainly, and she smiled back encouragement.
And Norma—this situation suddenly became immediate and personal to her. She watched Herb, listening intently, wanting desperately to communicate her encouragement to him and her belief in him.
Bud caught a taxi to attend the executive session of the hearings that had been set for eight o'clock that evening. The starmen would not be present.
Bud was ill at ease. "Hurry up, damn it!" he snapped at his driver.
Telegrams from all over the country had been pouring into his office. They had awakened him to certain possibilities. His changed vote on television had brought him unprecedented publicity, even from normally hostile newspapers. He realized that the longer the hearings continued the more familiar his name would become.
He was convinced by now that the majority of the people (even as himself) were inclined to approve an agreement with the starmen.
Surely they weren't thinking of ending the hearings and taking the matter to the full Senate? They wouldn't dare flush headlines down the drain like that.
Would they?
He grumbled to himself. Of course they wouldn't. Here was a fulcrum, a lever.... Look at the publicity.... After all, another Missourian had made it from a Congressional Committee. Perhaps the starmen hearings had really seized the imagination of the American people ... Harry S. Truman had made it....
He experienced a moral awakening, a sharp clear call to duty that transcended morality. All things changed. The world was suddenly portentious and thrilling, and secret enemies lurked and unseen disasters hovered.
His mind was humming with the exultation. He thought of himself dying at the end of his ... sixth ... eighth ... tenth ... term of office. He pictured the universal sorrow. He wanted to cry. They would mourn for a year: for two years. They would build huge monuments to his memory. Monuments bigger than any monuments ever built.
The taxi stopped.
Perhaps after forty years in office, he would be assassinated. The public wrath....
"Here we are," the driver said.
Getting out, he knew that he would fight to see the hearings continued.
He was late. Already the other four Senators were seated. Bud nodded to them and took his place. He put his brief case (it gave him a sense of importance to carry one) on the table before him and unzipped it as if to be ready to delve into its contents to document his every statement.
The atmosphere was tense. Bud looked from face to face. Senator Stilson was granite hostility. Senator Gutenleigh avoided his eyes. Senator Klein glared at him truculently.
"It was called for eight," Senator Stilson said icily.
"Good evening, gentlemen," he said. "Sorry I'm late."
"Good evening," Senator Rawlins said. "These gentlemen here," he included everyone but Bud in his gesture, "intend to dispense with a report and merely issue the Committee's recommendation. They've already decided to close the hearings and present the matter to the Senate tomorrow."
Bud was stunned. This was unbelievable. That meant ... that.... The friends! Somehow they had gotten to Gutenleigh, the Senator from Hawaii. Bud had counted on him—on the basis of his television vote—to oppose Klein and Stilson. What outrageous, Un-American pressure had been exerted to cause him to surrender?
"But ... but ... Senator Guten—"
"Has," Senator Stilson said in his thin, peevish tenor, "reconsidered."
Enmity and hostility flared silently from the Chairman. An almost baffled look crossed his face as if the implications had finally arrived in his consciousness: here was a Senator, Senator Council, a member of—as he thought of it—his team, who had had the temerity to transgress his leadership. One would expect opposition from a radical like Rawlins. But from a Council...! He had always felt that Bud was one of his. The insult was compounded by heresy.
"I feel," Senator Rawlins said, "that two questions require further exploration: how is it that the starmen are so ignorant of basic scientific principles; and for what reason do they insist that we reach such a momentous decision in such a limited time? To ask the Senate to vote now would force an honest man to perhaps a hasty decision. For myself, until these points are clarified, I would be very reluctant to reach any sort of an agreement with them. I want to ask this Committee to reconsider its decision, and I hope the Honorable Senator from Missouri will join with me, and that between us we can prevail upon the other gentlemen."
A sincere democrat, he spoke with quiet desperation, "In order to expect the people to choose wisely, we must be sure that they are given an opportunity to receive all the pertinent facts."
Bud was howling inwardly with the fury of a thwarted child. Headlines were flying away from him. His stand in the full Senate would command only one one-hundredth of the attention it would receive here. He arose, trembling with rage.
Shaking a quivering finger at Senator Stilson he cried, "You have bribed Gutenleigh!"
Gutenleigh looked uncomfortable.
"What did they promise you, Sam?" he thundered, wondering wildly what counter promises he could make.
Even Senator Stilson was shocked by Bud's violent outburst. Bud was famous for his rabid thundering against subversives, but no one had expected him to have the courage to open such hysterical fire on his Senate colleagues. Senator Stilson said, "I resent your attitude, sir!"
"Gentlemen, Gentlemen," Senator Rawlins said. "A little moderation, please."
"I'm for them, damn you!" Bud cried. "You're all in a conspiracy—a filthy conspiracy—against me!"
"If you don't sit down, I will summon an officer and have you removed bodily from this Chamber," Senator Stilson said.
They were all looking at Bud. With a great display of reluctance, he sank to his seat. He refused to look at Senator Stilson. He sulked and plotted revenge. And remembered Frank and hated everybody.
The vote proceeded routinely. Three members voted to recommend that the Senate reject the starmen's offer. Senator Rawlins abstained, and Bud voted that the Senate accept it.
The committee meeting broke up. Senators Klein and Stilson went out to gather up opposition Senators. They lobbied far into the night.
Nor was Bud to be outdone.