Odyssey

On-screen, the committee had finished with Asquith, were filing out, or standing around talking to each other while the commissioner disconsolately made his way out of the room.

THE NATIONAL WAS devoted to commentary on science, politics, and the world at large. It ran book reviews, a letters section, three editorials, political cartoons, a logic puzzle, and a section on the state of the language. MacAllister had never lost his affection for a well-composed sentence, and nothing drew his disgust quite as effectively as overwritten pieces, prose that wandered about without ever getting to the point. He didn’t think well of adjectives, despised adverbs, and insisted his correspondents rely on nouns and verbs. They do the heavy lifting, he’d said numerous times while handing back copy with large chunks carved out of it.

The staff meeting for each issue was held Monday afternoon after the current issue had been put to bed. So what was on the horizon for next week that we want to cover?

All eleven correspondents were present, two physically, the others via hookup. The lead story, they decided, would be on the danger posed by the possibility of the southern ice cap giving way. How serious is it? he asked the reporter who’d been assigned to do the background work.

“Worse than the Council’s letting on,” she said. “It could let go with virtually no warning. If the whole thing goes down, as they expect it will, there’ll be hundreds of thousands dead along the coastlines.”

“What are the odds?” asked Chao-Pang, in Madagascar. “We’ve been talking about it for two centuries.”

“They’re still doing computations. But they look scared.”

Okay. That would be the cover. Let’s take a serious look at this thing. How likely is it to occur in, say, the next year? How prepared are we? Has the administration taken serious steps, or are they hoping nothing will happen until they’re out of office? (He already knew the answer to that one.)

Next up was a developing political scandal, a prominent House leader taking money and other benefits from lobbyists.

“Guilty?” asked MacAllister.

“Absolutely.”

“Will he step down?”

“Not voluntarily. But it looks as if he’ll wind up in jail.”

Then there was the artificial sperm issue, which would make it possible to dispense with males in the reproductive process. Not desirable, of course, but possible. And that was enough to bring out the legions who feared for the moral fabric and claimed we were playing God.

Who’s your daddy? The phrase would take on a whole new meaning.

“How’s it going to go?” asked MacAllister.

The response came from Hugh Jankiewicz, who covered the House. “There’ll be a fight, the ban will fail, then there’ll be a reaction and a bigger fight. Eventually everybody will get used to it. I suspect nobody will be able to show any harm done, and we’ll move on to something else.”

“Where’s the advantage?” asked MacAllister.

“Purely political,” said Jankiewicz. “It will enable some women to claim men have become irrelevant.”

WHEN THE LINE cleared, a call was waiting.

“Mr. MacAllister? My name’s Charles Dryden.” MacAllister immediately decided he didn’t like the speaker. He smiled too easily. It was okay for young women, but in men, especially older men, it was a giveaway. He was dressed in the kind of clothes one wore in the executive suite.

“Yes, Mr. Dryden,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

“Mr. MacAllister — May I call you Gregory?”

“If you like.”

“Gregory, I represent Orion Tours. We’re putting together a major advertising campaign. We’ve been looking at the reading audience of The National. By and large, they fit the profile of the sort of people who use our service. They are intelligent, well educated, and they do not lack for resources.”

MacAllister roundly disliked people who couldn’t flatter and sound as if they meant it. “Thank you for the compliment.”

“We’d like to make your publication one of the core engines of the campaign.”

He wasn’t certain what a core engine was, but he wasn’t going to quibble. “Excellent, Mr. Dryden,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll find The National a profitable investment.”

“Yes, indeed. I have no doubt it would be advantageous to both our organizations. By the way, please call me Charlie.”

“Okay, Charlie. It’s a pleasure to meet you. How about if I transfer you to our marketing director and you can let him know precisely what you want.” The marketing director, of course, was Tilly.

“Before you do, Gregory, there is one thing we’d need to clarify. You, personally, are on record as being opposed to the effort to promote starflight.”

“Well, that’s not quite accurate. I think interstellar exploration is fine. I’m just not sure it should be a high priority for taxpayer funds at the moment.”

“Yes.” He glanced at something far away. The smile looked a bit pained. “I understand the distinction, of course. Unfortunately, we have some people on our board who perceive you, you, not the magazine, as an active opponent to the effort to take humanity to the stars.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, Charlie.”

“What we’d like you to do is soften your stand somewhat.”

“What would you suggest?”

“Oh. Nothing major. Just maybe an editorial pointing out that you do favor the expansion of the human spirit into deep space. Something to that effect.”

“You know, Charlie, you’re right. That’s exactly how I feel. I’m not entirely sure what it means, but I’m for it.”

There was a moment of confusion while Dryden considered what MacAllister was saying. Then the smile came back. “Excellent. Then there’s no problem.”

“ — But I won’t write the editorial.”

“Well, a simple statement on one of the interview shows would probably be sufficient.”

“I’m sorry, Charlie. It’s not on my list of priorities at the moment. Orion is welcome to take advertising space with The National, or not, as it pleases. But you don’t get to dictate editorial policy. I enjoyed talking with you.”

HE SPENT THE evening reading a new novel by Judah Winslow, a young man who had a magnificent career in front of him. He’d just finished the book and was about to call it a night when Tilly let another caller through. “Anthony DiLorenzo,” the caller said. “I’m a physicist. University of Cairo.”

“What can I do for you, Dr. DiLorenzo?”

He looked like the Ancient of Days. Lined face, white whiskers, full jowls, watery eyes. “I saw the show you did last week. Up Front.”

“Okay.”

“I’m in full agreement. But you’ve missed the real boondoggle.”

“Which is what?”

“The Origins Project. It costs tens of billions.”

“I’m aware of what it costs, Doctor. At the moment we’re fighting one battle at a time. Anyhow, the bulk of the funding for it comes from the Europeans.”

“It doesn’t matter. I suggest you fight this one and forget the Academy.”

“Why?”

“How much do you know about Origins?”

“Just that it’s expensive.”

“Did you know there’s a chance it could blow up?”

“Sure. That’s why they moved it out to 36 Ophiuchi.”

“Mr. MacAllister, actually it’s located several light-years the other side of 36 Ophiuchi.”

“What are you trying to tell me, Doctor?”

“It might not be far enough.”

That got his attention. “What do you mean? What kind of explosion are they expecting?”

“They aren’t expecting one, but they are concerned about the possibility.”

“Could you explain, please?”

“Several kinds of miscarriages are possible. But, since they are where they are, we need only concern ourselves with one.”

“Okay.”

“Worst-case scenario: It’s possible an event at Origins could destroy the Earth.”

“Doctor, they are light-years away.”

“The Origins Project is a hypercollider, Mr. MacAllister. Nothing remotely like it has ever been built before. And it’s probably perfectly safe.”

“Probably.”

“There’s an outside chance that the thing could tear a hole in the fabric of space.”

“A hole in space? What does that mean, exactly?”

“If it happens, the end of everything.” He began trying to explain, citing equations and theorems that meant nothing to MacAllister.

“Wait a minute,” MacAllister said, finally. “What’s everything? You mean the entire project might blow up?”

“The entire universe, sir. Everything.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“The chance that it would happen is remote. But there is a chance.”

“Give me a number.”

“Maybe one in a million. It’s hard to say.”

“One in a million they could blow up the universe.”

“That’s not precisely what would happen. But the effect would be the same.”

“Do the people in charge agree with your assessment?”

“Some think the odds are longer. Some that there is no chance at all. It’s possible the odds are very low. We simply do not know.”

“What’s the point of the research?”

“To learn how the Big Bang was generated.” His eyes bored into MacAllister. “You have influence in high places. Get it stopped.”

“Give me the children until they are seven and anyone may have them afterward.” Francis Xavier’s comment. A child’s mind is open to learn, and it is a cruel and heartless thing to fill it with myth disguised as history, to impose upon it a bogus lifelong perspective, and close it up again, leaving it proof against common sense and all argument. Surely, if there is a hell, people who do this are the ones who will get their tickets punched.

A judgment by the God who devised the quantum system should be considerably different from the one the Reverend Koestler envisions. I gave you a sky full of stars, and you never raised your eyes. I gave you a brain, and you never used it.

— Monday, February 23

MOTHER APOLOGIZES FOR SON’S ATTACK ON PREACHER

“Always a Difficult Child”

chapter 13

An optimist is somebody who thinks our various political and social systems, schools and churches, support groups and Boy Scout troops, jury trials and congressional committees, are on the up-and-up. That they are intended for the benefit of the members. The reality is that they are designed to keep everyone in line.

— Gregory MacAllister, “Red Flags”