Goodbye California (17 page)

‘What happened?’

‘The hotels fell down. Commercial interests, commercial interests. Say Dr Whitcomb predicted a ‘quake on the Newport-Inglewood Fault. One certain result would be the temporary closing of the Hollywood Park Race Track – it’s almost smack on the fault, and you can’t have tens of thousands of people jammed into a potential death-trap. A week goes by, two weeks, and nothing happens. Loss of profits might run into millions. Can you imagine how much Dr Whitcomb would be sued for?

‘And the Jaws Syndrome is just first cousin to the Ostrich Syndrome. Put your head in the sand, pretend it’s not there and it’ll go away. But fewer and fewer people are indulging in that, with the result that fear, in many areas, is reaching a state dangerously close to hysteria. Let me tell you a story, not my story, but a very prophetic short story written some five years ago by a writer called R. L. Stevens.

‘If I recall correctly it was called
The Forbidden Word.
There was a California Enabling Act which prohibited all reference to earthquakes in print or public. Penalty of five years. The State, apparently, has lost, by death or flight, fifty per cent of its population because of earthquakes. Roadblocks at State lines and people forbidden to leave. A man and girl are arrested for mentioning the word “earthquake” in a public place. I wonder when we’re going to have a real life Enabling Act, when a mounting hysteria will drive us into a nineteen-eighty-four Orwellian situation?’

‘What happened?’ Barrow said. ‘In the story?’

‘It’s not relevant, but they got to New York which was crowded by the millions of Californians who’d fled east and were arrested by the Population Control Board for mentioning the word “love” in public. You can’t win. The same as we can’t win in this situation. To warn, to cry doom, the end of the world is nigh? Or not to warn, not to frighten them into a state of near-panic? For me, there is one crucial factor. How can you evacuate three million people, as in Los Angeles, on a mere prediction? This is a free society. How in God’s name can you close down coastal California, ten millions, maybe more, and hang around for an indeterminate time while you wait for your predictions to come true? Where are you going to go, where are you going to put them? How can you
make
them leave when they know there is no place to go? This is
where their homes are, their jobs are, their friends are. There are no homes anywhere else, no jobs anywhere else, no friends anywhere else. This is where they live, this is where they’ll have to live, and, even though it’s sooner rather than later, this is where they’ve going to have to die.

‘And while they’re waiting to die, I think they should be allowed to live with as much peace of mind, relative though that may be, as is possible. You’re a Christian in the dungeons in Rome and you know it’s only a matter of time before you’re driven into the arena where the lions are waiting. It doesn’t help a great deal if you are reminded of the prospect every minute. Hope, however irrational, springs eternal.

‘Well, that’s my attitude and that’s my answer. I have lied in my teeth and I intend to go on doing so. Any suggestions that we were wrong will be vehemently denied. I am not, gentlemen, committed to a lie: I am committed to a belief. I have, I think, made my position very clear. Do you accept it?’

Barrow and Crichton looked briefly at each other, then turned to Benson and nodded in unison.

‘Thank you, gentlemen. As for this maniac Morro, I can be of no help there. He’s all yours, I’m afraid.’ He paused. ‘Threatening to explode an atomic bomb, or suchlike. I must say that, as a concerned citizen, I’d dearly love to know what he’s up to. Do you believe him?’

Crichton said: ‘We have no idea.’

‘No inkling what he’s up to?’

‘None.’

‘Suspense, war of nerves, tension. Creating fear, hoping to panic you into precipitate and misguided action?’

‘Very likely,’ Barrow said. ‘Only, we haven’t got anything to act against yet.’

‘Well, just as long as he doesn’t let it off under my seat or in any other inhabited area. If you learn the time and place of this proposed – ah – demonstration, may I request a grandstand seat?’

‘Your request has already been granted,’ Barrow said. ‘We were going to ask you anyway. Would there be anything else, gentlemen?’

‘Yes,’ Ryder said. ‘Would it be possible to borrow some reading material on earthquakes, especially recent ones?’

Everyone looked at him in perplexity. Everyone, that is, except Benson. ‘My pleasure, Sergeant. Just give this card to the librarian.’

Dunne said: ‘A question, Professor. This Earthquake Preventitive Slip Programme of yours. Shouldn’t that delay or minimize the great ‘quake that everyone seems to think is coming?’

‘Had it been started five years ago, perhaps. But we’re only just beginning. Three, maybe four years before we get results. I know in my bones that the monster will strike first. It’s out there, crouched on the doorstep, waiting.’

At half past ten that morning Morro re-entered his study. Dubois was no longer at the observation window but was sitting at Morro’s desk, two revolving tape-recorders in front of him. He switched them off and looked up.

Morro said: ‘Deliberations over?’

‘Twenty minutes ago. They’re deliberating something else now.’

‘How to stop us, no doubt.’

‘What else? I gave up listening some time ago: they couldn’t stop a retarded five-year-old. Besides, they can’t even speak coherently, far less think rationally.’

Morro crossed to the observation window and switched on the speaker above his head. All four scientists were sitting – more accurately sprawling – round the table, bottles in front of them to save them the labour of having to rise and walk to the drinks trolley. Burnett was speaking, his face
suffused with alcohol or anger or both and every other word was slurred.

‘Damn it to hell. All the way to hell. Back again, too. There’s the four of us. Look at us. Best brains in the country, that’s what we are supposed to be. Best
nuclear
brains. Is it beyond our capacity, gentlemen, beyond our intelligence, to devise a means whereby to circument – I mean circumvent – the devilish machinations of this monster Morro? What I maintain is –’

Bramwell said: ‘Oh, shut up. That makes the fourth time we’ve heard this speech.’ He poured himself some vodka, leaned back and closed his eyes. Healey had his elbows on the table and his hands covering his eyes. Schmidt was gazing into infinity, riding high on a cloud of gin. Morro switched off the speaker and turned away.

‘I don’t know either Burnett and Schmidt but I should imagine they are about par for their own particular courses. I’m surprised at Healey and Bramwell, though. They’re relatively sober but you can tell they’re not their usual selves. In the seven weeks they’ve been here – well, they’ve been very moderate.’

‘In their seven weeks here they haven’t had such a shock to their nervous system. They’ve probably never had a shock like this.’

‘They know? A superfluous question, perhaps.’

‘They suspected right away. They knew for certain in fifteen minutes. The rest of the time they’ve been trying to find a fault, any fault, in the
designs. They can’t. And all four of them know
how
to make a hydrogen bomb.’

‘You’re editing, I take it. How much longer?’

‘Say twenty minutes.’

‘If I give a hand?’

‘Ten.’

‘Then in fifteen minutes we’ll give them another shock, and one that should have the effect of sobering them up considerably if not completely.’

And in fifteen minutes the four men were escorted into the study. Morro showed them personally to their deep armchairs, a glass on a table beside each armchair. There were two other berobed acolytes in the room. Morro wasn’t sure precisely what kind of reaction the physicists might display. The acolytes could have their Ingram sub-machine guns out from under their robes before any of the scientists could get half-way out of their chairs.

Morro said: ‘Well, now. Glenfiddich for Professor Burnett, gin for Dr Schmidt, vodka for Dr Bramwell, bourbon for Dr Healey.’ Morro was a great believer in the undermining of confidence. When they had entered Burnett and Schmidt had had expressions of scowling anger, Bramwell of thoughtfulness, Healey of something approaching apprehension. Now they all wore looks of suspicion compounded by surprise.

Burnett was predictably truculent. ‘How the hell did you know what we were drinking?’

‘We’re observant. We try to please. We’re also thoughtful. We thought your favourite restorative
might help you over what may come as a shock to you. To business. What did you make of those blueprints?’

‘How would you like to go to hell?’ Burnett said.

‘We may all meet there some day. I repeat the question.’

‘And I repeat the answer.’

‘You will tell me, you know.’

‘And how do you propose to set about making us talk? Torture?’ Burnett’s truculence had given way to contempt. ‘We can’t tell you anything we don’t know about.’

‘Torture. Oh, dear me, no. I might – in fact, I shall be needing you later on. But torture? Hmm. Hadn’t occurred to me. You, Abraham?’

‘No, Mr Morro.’ Dubois considered. ‘It is a thought.’ He came to Morro and whispered something in his ear.

Morro looked shocked. ‘Abraham, you know me, you know I don’t wage war on innocents.’

‘You damned hypocrite!’ Burnett’s voice was a hoarse shout. ‘Of course that’s why you brought the women here.’

‘My dear fellow –’

Bramwell said in a weary voice: ‘It’s a bomb of some sorts. That’s obvious. It might well be a blueprint for a nuclear bomb, a thought that immediately occurred to us because of your propensity for stealing nuclear fuel. Whether it’s viable, whether it will work, we have just no idea. There
are hundreds of nuclear scientists in this country. But the number of those who can make, actually
make
, a nuclear bomb is severely restricted. We are not among the chosen few. As for those who can actually
design
a hydrogen bomb – well I, personally, have never met one. Our science is devoted to exclusively peaceful nuclear pursuits. Healey and I were kidnapped while working in a laboratory where they produced nothing but electricity. Burnett and Schmidt, as we are well aware, were taken in the San Ruffino nuclear reactor station. God’s sake, man, you don’t build hydrogen bombs in reactor stations.’

‘Very clever.’ Morro was almost approving. ‘You do think fast on your feet. In your armchair, rather. Enough. Abraham, that particular excerpt we selected. How long will it take?’

‘Thirty seconds.’

Dubois put a tape-recorder on a fast rewind, his eye on the counter, slowed and finally stopped it. He pressed a switch, saying: ‘Healey first.’

Healey’s voice: ‘So we are in no doubt then?’

Schmidt’s voice: ‘None. I haven’t been since the first time I clapped eyes on those hellish blueprints.’

Bramwell’s voice: ‘Circuitry, materials, sheathing, triggering, design. All there. Your final confirmation, Burnett?’

There was a pause here then came Burnett’s voice, strangely flat and dead. ‘Sorry, gentlemen, I need that drink. It’s the Aunt Sally, all right.
Estimated three-and-a-half megatons – about four hundred times the power of the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki. God, to think that Willi Aachen and I had a champagne party the night we completed the design!’

Dubois switched off. Morro said: I’m sure you could even reproduce those plans from your head, Professor Burnett, if the need arose. A useful man to have around.’

The four physicists sat like men in a dream. They didn’t look stunned: they just weren’t registering anything. Morro said: ‘Come here, gentlemen.’

He led the way to the window, pressed an overhead switch and illuminated the room in which the scientists had examined the blueprints. He looked at the scientists but without satisfaction, gratification or triumph. Morro did not seem to specialize very much in the way of feelings.

‘The expressions on your faces were more than enough to tell us all we wanted to know.’ If the four men had not been overcome by the enormity of the situation in which they found themselves, the ludicrous ease with which they had been tricked, they would have appreciated that Morro, who clearly had further use for them, was doing no more than establishing a moral ascendancy, inducing in them a feeling of helplessness and hopelessness. ‘But the recordings helped. That’s the first thing I would have expected. Alas, outside your own arcane specialities, men with abnormally gifted minds are no better than little
children. Abraham, how long does the entire edited version take?’

‘Seven and a half minutes, Mr Morro.’

‘Let them savour it to the full. I’ll see about the helicopter. Back shortly.’

He was back in ten minutes. Three of the scientists were sitting in their chairs, bitter, dejected and defeated. Burnett, not unexpectedly, was helping himself to some more of the endless supply of Glenfiddich.

‘One further small task, gentlemen. I want each of you to make a brief recording stating that I have in my possession the complete blueprints for the making of a hydrogen bomb in the megaton range. You will make no mention whatsoever of the dimensions, no mention of its code name “Aunt Sally” – what puerile names you scientists give those toys, just another sign of how limited your imagination is outside your own field – and, above all, you will make no reference to the fact that Professor Burnett was the co-designer, along with Professor Aachen, of this bomb.’

Schmidt said: ‘Why should those damn things be kept so secret when you’ll let the world know everything else?’

‘You will understand well enough inside the next two days or so.’

‘You’ve trapped us, fooled us, humiliated us and above all used us as pawns.’ Burnett said all this with his teeth clenched, no mean feat in itself. ‘But you can push a man too far, Morro. We’re still men.’

Morro sighed, made a small gesture of weariness, opened the door and beckoned. Susan and Julie came in and looked curiously around them. There was no apprehension or fear on their faces, just puzzlement.

‘Give me that damned microphone.’ Without permission Burnett snatched it from the table and glared at Dubois. ‘Ready?’

‘Ready.’

Burnett’s voice, though charged with emotion – pure, black rage – was remarkably clear and steady, without a trace of the fact that he had, since his non-existent breakfast, consumed the better part of a bottle of Glenfiddich, which said a great deal either for Professor Burnett or Glenfiddich.

‘This is Professor Andrew Burnett of San Diego. It’s not someone trying to imitate me – my voice-prints are in security in the University. The blackhearted bastard Morro has in his possession a complete set of plans for the construction of a hydrogen bomb in the megaton range. You had better believe me. Also you had better believe Dr Schmidt and Drs Healey and Bramwell – Drs Healey and Bramwell have been held captive in this damned place for seven weeks. I repeat, for God’s sake believe me. This is a step-by-step, fully composited, fully integrated plan ready to build now.’ There was a pause. ‘For all I know, the bastard may already have built one.’

Morro nodded to Dubois who switched off. Dubois said: ‘The first and last sentences, Mr Morro –’

‘Leave them in.’ Morro smiled. ‘Leave them. Eliminates the need for checking on voice-prints. They carry with them the normal characteristic flavour of the Professor’s colourful speech. You can cope, Abraham? Ridiculous question. Come, ladies.’

He ushered them out and closed the door. Susan said: ‘Do you mind enlightening us? I mean, what
is
going on?’

‘Certainly not, my dears. Our learned nuclear physicists have been doing a chore for me this morning. Not that they were aware of that fact: unknown to them I had their conversation recorded.

‘I showed them a set of plans. I proved to them that I am indeed in possession of the secrets of the manufacture of hydrogen bombs. Now they are proving that to the world. Simple.’

‘Is that why you brought the scientists here?’

‘I still have a further important use for them but, primarily, yes.’

‘Why did you bring us into that room, your study?’

‘See? You are an inquisitive person. I was just satisfying your curiosity.’

‘Julie here is not an inquisitive person.’

Julie nodded vigorously. For some reason she seemed close to tears. ‘I just want out of here.’

Susan shook her arm. ‘What is it?’

‘You know very well what it is. You know why he brought us in there. The men were turning balky. That’s why
we
were brought up here.’

‘The thought hadn’t escaped me,’ Susan said. ‘Would you – or that dreadful giant – have twisted our arms until we screamed? Or do you have dungeons – castles always have dungeons, don’t they? You know, thumb-screws and racks and iron maidens? Do you break people on the wheel, Mr Morro?’

‘A dreadful giant! Abraham would be hurt. A kind and gentle giant. As for the rest? Dear me. Direct intimidation, Mrs Ryder, is less effective than indirect. If people can bring themselves to believe something it’s always more effective than having to prove it to them.’

‘Would you have proved it?’ Morro was silent. ‘Would you have had us tortured?’

‘I wouldn’t even contemplate it.’

‘Don’t believe him, don’t believe him!’ Julie’s voice shook. ‘He’s a monster and a liar.’

‘He’s a monster all right.’ Susan was very calm, even thoughtful. ‘He may even be a liar. But in this case I believe him. Odd.’

In a kind of despair, Julie said: ‘You don’t know what you’re saying!’

‘I think I do. I think Mr Morro will have no further use for us.’

‘How can you
say
that?’

Morro looked at Julie. ‘Some day you may be as wise and understanding as Mrs Ryder. But first
you will have to meet a great number of people and read a great number of characters. You see, Mrs Ryder
knows
that the person who laid a finger on either of you would have to answer to me. She knows that I never would. She will, of course, convince those disbelieving gentlemen we’ve just left and they will know I couldn’t use this threat again. I do not have to. You are of no more use to me.’ Morro smiled. ‘Oh, dear, that does sound vaguely threatening. Let us rather say that no harm will come to you.’

Julie looked at him briefly, the fear and suspicion in her eyes undimmed, then looked abruptly away.

‘Well, I tried, young lady. I cannot blame you. You cannot have heard what I said at the breakfast table this morning. “We do not wage war on women.” Even monsters have to live with their monstrous selves.’ He turned and walked away.

Susan watched him go and murmured: ‘And therein lies the seeds of his own destruction.’

Julie looked at her. ‘I – I didn’t catch that. What did you say?’

‘Nothing. I’m just rambling. I think this place is getting to me also.’ But she knew it wasn’t.

‘A complete waste of time.’ Jeff was in a black mood and didn’t care who knew it. He had almost to raise his voice to a shout to make himself heard above the clamorous racket of the helicopter engine. ‘Nothing, just nothing. A lot of academic
waffle about earthquakes and a useless hour in Sassoon’s office. Nothing, just nothing. We didn’t learn a thing.’