Страница 17 из 134
“People were disgusted with the ‘Mad Decades.” They had had enough of it, and feared, beyond all else, a return to it To remove that possibility, they put the ways of those decades behind them. Their motives, you see, were understandable and laudable. All the freedom, all the sophistication, all the lack of convention were gone-swept away clean. We are living now in a second Victorian age; and naturally so, because human history goes by swings of the pendulum and this is the swing toward religion and convention.
“One thing only is left over since those days of half a century ago. That one thing is the respect of humanity for science. We have prohibition; smoking for women is outlawed; cosmetics are forbidden; low dresses and short skirts are unheard of; divorce is frowned upon. But science has not been confined-as yet.
“It behoves science, then, to be circumspect, to refrain from arousing the people. It will be very easy to make them believe-and Otis Eldredge has come perilously close to doing it in some of his speeches-that it was science that brought about the horrors of the Second World War. Science outstripped culture, they will say, technology outstripped sociology, and it was that unbalance that came so near to destroying the world. Somehow, I am inclined to believe they are not so far wrong, at that.
“But do you know what would happen, if it ever did come to that? Scientific research may be forbidden; or, if they don’t go that far, it will certainly be so strictly regulated as to stifle in its own decay. It will be a calamity from which humanity would not recover for a mille
“And it is your trial flight that may precipitate all this. You are arousing the public to a stage where it will be difficult to calm them. I warn you, John. The consequences will be on your head.”
There was absolute silence for a moment and then Harman forced a smile. “Come, Howard, you’re letting yourself be frightened by shadows on the wall. Are you trying to tell me that it is your serious belief that the world as a whole is ready to plunge into a second Dark Ages? After all, the intelligent men are on the side of science, aren’t they?”
“If they are, there aren’t many of them left from what I see.” Winstead drew a pipe from his pocket and filled it slowly with tobacco as he continued: “Eldredge formed a League of the Righteous two months ago-they call it the L. R.-and it has grown unbelievably. Twenty million is its membership in the United States alone . Eldredge boasts that after the next election Congress will be his; and there seems to be more truth than bluff in that. Already there has been strenuous lobbying in favour of a bill outlawing rocket experiments, and laws of that type have been enacted in Poland, Portugal and Rumania. Yes, John, we are perilously close to open persecution of science.” He was smoking now in rapid, nervous puffs.
“But if I succeed, Howard, if I succeed! What then?”
“Bah! You know the chances for that. Your own estimate gives you only one chance in ten of coming out alive.”
“What does that signify? The next experimenter will learn by my mistakes, and the odds will improve. That’s the scientific method.”
“The mob doesn’t know anything about the scientific method; and they don’t want to know. Well, what do you say? Will you call it off?”
Harman sprang to his feet, his chair tumbling over with a crash. “Do you know what you ask? Do you want me to give up my life’s work, my dream, just like that? Do you think I’m going to sit back and wait for your dear public to become benevolent? Do you think they’ll change in my lifetime?
“Here’s my answer: I have an inalienable right to pursue knowledge. Science has an inalienable right to progress and develop without interference. The world, in interfering with me, is wrong; I am right. And it shall go hard; but I -will not abandon my rights.”
Winstead shook his head sorrowfully. “You’re wrong, John, when you speak of ‘inalienable’ rights. What you call a ‘right’ is merely a privilege, generally agreed upon . What society accepts, is right; what it does not, is wrong.”
“Would your friend, Eldredge, agree to such a definition of his ‘righteousness’?” questioned Harman bitterly.
“No, he would not, but that’s irrelevant. Take the case of those African tribes who used to be ca
“You know, Howard, you missed your calling when you didn’t become a lawyer.” Harman was really growing angry. “You’ve been bringing out every moth-eaten argument you can think of. For God’s sake, man, are you trying to pretend that it is a crime to refuse to run with the crowd? Do you stand for absolute uniformity, ordinariness, orthodoxy, commonplaceness? Science would die far sooner under the programme you outline than under governmental prohibition.”
Harman stood up and pointed an accusing finger at the other. “You’re betraying science and the tradition of those glorious rebels: Galileo, Darwin, Einstein and their kind. My rocket leaves tomorrow on schedule in spite of you and every other stuffed shirt in the United States. That’s that, and I refuse to listen to you any longer. So you can just get out.”
The head of the Institute, red in the face, turned to me. “You’re my witness, young man, that I warned this obstinate nitwit, this… this hare-brained fanatic.” He spluttered a bit, and then strode out, the picture of fiery indignation.
Harman turned to me when he had” gone: “Well, what do you think? I suppose you agree with him.”
There was only one possible answer and I made it: “You’re not paying me to do anything else but follow orders, boss. I’m sticking with you.”
Just then Shelton came in and Harman packed us both off to go over the calculations of the orbit of flight for the umpteenth time, while he himself went off to bed.
The next day, July 15th, dawned in matchless splendour, and Harman, Shelton, and myself were in an almost gay mood as we crossed the Hudson to where the Prometheus -surrounded by an adequate police guard-lay in gleaming grandeur.
Around it, roped off at an apparently safe distance, rolled a crowd of gigantic proportions. Most of them were hostile, raucously so. In fact, for one fleeting moment, as our motorcycle police escort parted the crowds for us, the shouts and imprecations that reached our ears almost convinced me that we should have listened to Winstead.
But Harman paid no attention to them at all, after one supercilious sneer at a shout of: “There goes John Harman, son of Belial.” Calmly, he directed us about our task of inspection. I tested the foot-thick outer walls and the air locks for leaks, then made sure the air purifier worked. Shelton checked up on the repellent screen and the fuel tanks. Finally, Hal-man tried on the clumsy spacesuit, found it suitable, and a
The crowd stirred. Upon a hastily erected platform of wooden planks piled in confusion by some in the mob, there rose up a striking figure. Tall and lean; with thin, ascetic countenance; deep-set, burning eyes, peering and half closed; a thick, white mane crowning all-it was Otis Eldredge. The crowd recognized him at once and many cheered. Enthusiasm waxed and soon the entire turbulent mass of people shouted themselves hoarse over him.
He raised a hand for silence, turned to Harman, who regarded him with surprise and distaste, and pointed a long, bony finger at him:
“John, Harman, son of the devil, spawn of Satan, you are here for an evil purpose. You are about to set out upon a blasphemous attempt to pierce the veil beyond which man is forbidden to go. You are tasting of the forbidden fruit of Eden and beware that you taste not of the fruits of sin.”
The crowd cheered him to the echo and he continued: “The finger of God is upon you, John Harman. He shall not allow His works to be defiled. You die today, John Harman.” His voice rose in intensity and his last words were uttered in truly prophetlike fervour.
Harman turned away in disdain. In a loud, clear voice, he addressed the police sergeant: “Is there any way, officer, of removing these spectators. The trial flight may be attended by some destruction because of the rocket blasts, and they’re crowding too close.”
The policeman answered in a crisp, unfriendly tone: “If you’re afraid of being mobbed, say so, Mr. Harman. You don’t have to worry, though, we’ll hold them back. And as for danger-from that contraption-” He sniffed loudly in the direction of the Prometheus , evoking a torrent of jeers and yells.
Harman said nothing further, but climbed into the ship in silence. And when he did so, a queer sort of stillness fell over the mob; a palpable tension. There was no attempt at rushing the ship, an attempt I had thought inevitable. On the contrary, Otis Eldredge himself shouted to everyone to move back.
“Leave the si
As the moment approached, Shelton nudged me. “Let’s get out of here,” he whispered in a strained voice. “Those rocket blasts are poison.” Saying this, he broke into a run, beckoning anxiously for me to follow.
We had not yet reached the fringes of the crowd when there was a terrific roar behind me. A wave of heated air swept over me. There was the frightening hiss of some speeding object past my ear, and I was thrown violently to the ground. For a few moments I lay dazed, my ears ringing and my head reeling.
When I staggered drunkenly to my feet again, it was to view a dreadful sight. Evidently, the entire fuel supply of the Prometheus had exploded at once, and where it had lain a moment ago there was now only a yawning hole. The ground was strewn with wreckage. The cries of the hurt were heartrending, and the mangled bodies-but I won’t try to describe those.
A weak groan at my feet attracted my attention. One look, and I gasped in horror, for it was Shelton, the back of his head a bloody mass.
“I did it.” His voice was hoarse and triumphant but withal so low that I could scarcely hear it. “I did it. I broke open the liquid-oxygen compartments and when the spark went through the acetylide mixture the whole cursed thing exploded.” He gasped a bit and tried to move but failed. “A piece of wreckage must have hit me, but I don’t care. I’ll die knowing that-”