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I chuckled.
It sounds like a big job. Who is your client?
A U.S. Senator, he said, who shall remain nameless.
With that I can guess, I said, but I won't.
You'll do it?
Yes. I could use the money.
It will be dangerous.
They all are.
We regarded the crosses, with the packs of cigarettes and other various goodies tied to them in the way of religious offerings.
Good, he said. When will you start?
Before the month is out.
Okay. When will you report to me?
I shrugged, under starlight.
When I've got something to say.
That's not good enough, this time. September 15 is the target date.
... If it goes off without a hitch?
Fifty grand.
If it gets tricky, and I have to dispose of a corpus or three?
Like I said.
Okay. You're on. Before September 15.
No reports?
... Unless I need help, or have something important to say.
You may, this time.
I extended my hand.
You've got yourself a deal, Don.
He bowed his head, nodding to the crosses.
Give me this one, he finally said. I want this one. The men I lost were very good men.
I'll try. I'll give you as much as I can.
I don't understand you, mister. I wish I knew how you ...
Good. I'd be crushed if you ever knew how!
And we walked back down the hill, and I left him off at the place where he was staying that night.
Let me buy you a drink, said Martin, as I passed him on the foredeck on my way out of Carol Deith's cabin.
All right, and we walked to the ship's lounge and had one.
I've got to thank you for what you did while Demmy and I were down there. It ...
It was nothing, I said. You could have fixed it yourself in a minute if somebody else had been down and you'd been up here.
It didn't work out that way, though, and we're happy you were handy.
I consider myself thanked, I said, raising the plastic beer stein, they're all plastic these days. Damn it!
What kind of shape was that shaft in? I asked him.
Excellent, he said, furrowing his wide, ruddy forehead and putting lots of wrinkles around his bluish eyes.
You don't look as confident as you sound.
He chuckled then, took a small sip.
Well, it's never been done before. Naturally, we're all a little scared ...
I took that as a mild appraisal of the situation.
But, top to bottom, the shaft was in good shape? I asked.
He looked around him, probably wondering whether the place was bugged. It was, but he wasn't saying anything that could hurt him, or me. If he had been, I'd have shut him up.
Yes, he agreed.
Good, and I thought back on the sayings of the short man with the wide shoulders. Very good.
That's a strange attitude, he said. You're just a paid technician.
I take a certain pride in my work.
He gave me a look I did not understand, then, That sounds strangely like a twentieth-century attitude.
I shrugged.
I'm old-fashioned. Can't get away from it.
I like that, he said. I wish more people were that way, these days.
What's Demmy up to, now?
He's sleeping.
Good.
They ought to promote you.
I hope not.
Why not?
I don't like responsibilities.
But you take them on yourself, and you handle them well.
I was lucky, once. Who knows what will happen, next time ... ?
He gave me a furtive look.
What do you mean, 'next time'?
I mean, if it happens again, I said. I just happened to be in the control room ...
I knew then that he was trying to find out what I knew, so neither of us knew much, though we both knew that something was wrong.
He stared at me, sipped his beer, kept staring at me, then nodded. You're trying to say that you're lazy?
That's right.
Crap.
I shrugged and sipped mine.
Back around 1957, fifty years ago, there was a thing called AMSOC, and it was a joke. It was a takeoff on the fu
It is true that the Mohole Project died stillborn, but that which eventually came of the notion was even grander and more creative.
Most people know that the crust of the Earth is twenty-five or more miles thick under the continents, and that it would be rough drilling there. Many also know that under the oceans the crust is much thi
Another one? Martin asked me.
Yeah. Thanks.
If you study the International Union of Geology and Geophysics publication, Active Volcanoes of the World, and if you map out all those which are no longer active, you will note certain volcanic and seismic belts. There is the Ring of Fire surrounding the Pacific Ocean. Start along the Pacific coast of South America, and you can follow it up north through Chile, Ecuador, Colombia, Central America, Mexico, the western United States, Canada, and Alaska, then around and down through Kamchatka, the Kuriles, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, and New Zealand. Forgetting about the Mediterranean, there is also an area in the Atlantic, near Iceland.
We sat there.
I raised mine and took a sip.
There are over six hundred volcanoes in the world which could be classified as active, though actually they don't do much most of the time.
We were going to add one more.
We were going to create a volcano in the Atlantic Ocean. More specifically, a volcanic island, like Surtsey. This was Project RUMOKO.
I'm going down again, said Martin. Sometime during the next few hours, I guess. I'd appreciate it if you would do me the favor of keeping an eye on that goddam machine next time around. I'd make it up to you, some way.
Okay, I said. Let me know when the next time is, as soon as you know it, and I'll try to hang around the control room. In case something does go wrong. I'll try to do what I did earlier, if there's no one around who can do any better.
He slapped me on the shoulder.
That's good enough for me. Thanks.
You're scared.
Yeah.
Why?
This damned thing seems jinxed. You've been my good-luck charm. I'll buy you beers from here to hell and back again, just to hang around. I don't know what's wrong. Just bad luck, I guess.
Maybe, I said.
I stared at him for a second, then turned my attention to my drink.
The isothermic maps show that this is the right place, the right part of the Atlantic, I said. The only thing I'm sacred about is none of my business.