Timescape (16 page)

Peterson judged the "rather" was the usual American attempt at speaking English-English, the effect in any case spoiled by the grammatical error in the sentence before it.

The door opened and Kiefer's secretary came in with an ashtray which she set before Peterson. Peterson thanked her, abstractedly tabulating her physical characteristics and giving her a good 8 out of 10. He realized with relish that only his status as a member of the Council had overridden Kiefer's ban on smoking in his office.

Kiefer perched on the edge of the chair facing him. "So.... tell me how you found the situation in South America." He rubbed his hands together eagerly.

Peterson exhaled luxuriously. "It's bad. Not desperate yet but very serious. Brazil has become more dependent on fishing lately thanks to their shortsighted slash-and-burn policy of a decade or two ago–and of course this bloom seriously affects fishing."

Kiefer leaned forward even more, as eager for details as any gossiping housewife, and at this point Peterson put himself on automatic. He revealed what he had to and extracted from Kiefer a few technical points worth remembering. He knew more biology than physics, so he did a better job than with Renfrew and Markham. Kiefer went into their funding situation–bleak, of course; one never heard any other tune–and Peterson guided him back onto useful stuff.

"We believe the whole food chain may be threatened," Kiefer said. "The phytoplankton are succumbing to the chlorinated hydrocarbons–the kind used in fertilizer." Kiefer leafed through the reports. "Manodrin, specifically."

"Manodrin?"

"Manodrin is a chlorinated hydrocarbon used in insecticides. It has opened a new life niche among the microscopic algae. A new variety of diatom has evolved. It uses an enzyme which breaks down manodrin. The diatom silica also excrete a breakdown product which interrupts transmission of nerve impulses in animals. Dendritic connections fail. But they must have gone into all this at the conference."

"It was mostly at the political level, what steps to be taken to meet the immediate crisis and so on."

"What is going to be done about it?"

"They're going to try to shift resources from the Indian Ocean experiments to contain the bloom, but I don't know if it'll work. They haven't completed their tests yet."

Kiefer drummed his fingers on the ceramic tiles. He asked abruptly,

"Did you see the bloom yourself?"

"I flew over it," Peterson answered. "It's ugly as sin. The color terrifies the fishing villages."

"I think I'll go down there myself," Kiefer muttered, more to himself than to Peterson. He got up and began to pace the room. "Still, y'know, I keep feeling there's something else ..."

"Yes?"

"One of my lab types thinks there's something special going on here, a way the process can kinda alter itself." Kiefer waved a hand in dismissal.

"All hypothetical, though. I'll keep you informed if any of it pans out."

"Pans out?"

"Works, I mean."

"Oh. Do."

Peterson got away from Scripps later than he'd planned. He accepted an invitation to dinner at Kiefer's to keep things going on the good-fellow front, always a wise idea. It was harder for a sod to cross you when he's drunk some and told a joke and devoured a casserole in your company, however boring the conversation had been.

Peterson's limo and tag-along security detail took him into La Jolla center for the appointment at San Diego First Federal Savings. It was a bulky squarish building, set dead among a brace of tedious stores of the shoppe variety. He thought of getting something as a traveler-home-from-the-wars gift, something he'd done more often when younger, but dismissed the idea after three seconds of deliberation. The shops were of the semi-infinite markup species and despite the rickety dollar, the pound was worse. All that would be quite to the side if the shops had been interesting, but instead they sported knickknacks and ornate lamps and gaudy ashtrays. He grimaced and went into the bank.

The bank manager met them at the door, primed by the sight of the security force. Yes, he had been advised of Mr. Peterson's arrival, yes, they had searched the bank records. Once inside the manager's office Peterson asked brusquely, "Well, then?"

"Ah, sir, it was a surprise to us, let me tell you," the thin man said seriously. "A safety deposit box with the fees arranged for decades ago.

Not your typical situation."

"Quite so."

"I ... I was told you would not have the key?" The man obviously hoped Peterson would have it, though, and save him a lot of explaining to his superiors afterward.

"Right, I don't. But didn't you find the box was registered in my name?"

"Yes, we did. I don't understand ..."

"Let us simply say this is a matter of, ah, national security. "

"Still, without a key, the owner–"

"National security. Time is important here. I believe you take my meaning?" Peterson gave the man his best distant smile.

"Well, the undersecretary did explain part of it on the phone, and I have checked with my immediate superior, but–"

"Well, then, I'm happy to see things have worked out so quickly. I congratulate you on your speed. Always good to see an efficient operation."

"Well, we do–"

"I would like to have a quick look at it now," Peterson said with a certain undertone of firmness.

"Well, ah, this, this way ..."

They went through a pointless ritual of signing in and stamping the precise time and passing through the buzzing gate. The huge steel doors were opened to reveal a gleaming wall array of boxes. The manager nervously fished appropriate keys from his vest pocket. He found the right box and slid it out. There was a moment's hesitation before he surrendered it. "Thanks, yes," Peterson murmured politely, and went directly to the small room nearby for privacy.

He'd had this idea on his own and rather liked it. If what Markham said was right, it was possible to reach someone in the past and change the present. But precisely how this action affected the present wasn't clear.

Since the past viewed now might well be the one Renfrew had created, how could they tell it from some other past that never happened, but might have? This whole way of looking at it was a mistake, Markham said, since once you passed a tachyon beam between two times they were forever linked, a closed loop. But to Peterson it seemed essential to know if you had in fact got through. In Markham's idealized experiments, with flipping light switches and toggles moving back and forth between pegs and all, the whole question was confused. So Peterson had proposed a check, of sorts. True enough, you had to send back the preliminary ocean data and so on. But you could also ask the past to set aside some kind of road marker. One clear sign that the signals had been received–that would be enough to convince Peterson that these ideas weren't drivel. So two days before leaving London he'd called Renfrew and given him a specific message to send. Markham had a list of the experimental groups who could conceivably receive a tachyon message on their nuclear magnetic resonance devices. A message was addressed to each site. New York, La Jolla, Moscow. Each was requested to establish a clearly labeled safety deposit box in Peterson's name with a note inside. That should be enough.

Peterson couldn't reach Moscow without explaining to Sir Martin why he wanted to go. New York was out of the question, temporarily, because of the terrorists. That left La Jolla.

Peterson felt his pulse quicken as the catch on the safety deposit box came free with a click. When the lid of the box tilted back he saw only a sheet of yellow paper folded in thirds. He picked it Up and carefully flattened the creases. It crackled with age.

MESSAGE RECEIVED LA JOLLA

That was all. It was quite enough. Instantly Peterson felt two conflicting emotions: elation, and a sudden disappointment that he had not asked for more. Who had written the note? What else did they receive? He realized ruefully that he had assumed the sod getting the signal would obey the instruction and then go on and tell how he got it, what he thought it meant, or at least who he buggering well was.

But no, no, he thought, sitting back. This was enough. This proved the whole colossal business was right. Incredible, but right. The implications beyond that were unclear, granted, but this much was certain.

And as well, he thought with a touch of pride, he had done it all himself.

He wondered for a moment if this was what it was like to be a scientist, to make a discovery, to see the world unlocked if only for an instant.

Then the bank manager knocked hesitantly on the door, the mood was lost, and Peterson pocketed the sheet of yellow.

He stayed at the Valencia Hotel in a suite overlooking the cove. The park below was part gnawed away by the encroaching surf, as evidenced by the sudden termination of some walkways. All along the coast the waves had undercut the conglomerate soil. Shelves stuck out above the surf, ready to topple. No one seemed to notice.

He told his security men and limo to clear off for the night. They made him conspicuous and he had been under the limelight quite enough for one day. His mind was churning with the success at the bank. He dissipated some of the energy with thirty laps in the hotel pool, and then with unsuccessful forays into the shops near the hotel. The clothing stores interested him most, but they were the sort which could not simply display their wares and stand aside, but set them in scenes of English manor houses or French chateaux. There was still money here, though most of it seemed misdirected. The people were bright and clean and glossy. At least being prosperous set one apart in England; here it guaranteed nothing, not even taste.

The sidewalks thronged with old people, some quite rude if you didn't step aside for them. The younger men, though, were bright and athletic.

The women interested him more, crisply fashionable, immaculately groomed. There was a certain blandness to them, though, an indefinable stamp of prosperous neutrality. Part of him envied this life. He knew that these people striding so confidently along Girard were hemmed in by as many restrictions as the English–Southern California was a mass of limits on immigration, buying houses, water use, changing jobs, automobiles, everything–but they looked free. There was still not much of the worldweariness here which Europeans often equated with maturity. He had always missed a certain complexity among the women, as well. They seemed interchangeable, their faces carefully smooth and open. Sex with them was healthy, competent, and matter-of-fact. If one propositioned them, they were never surprised or shocked. Their no meant no and their yes meant yes. He missed the challenge of the no that meant maybe, the elegant game of seduction. These Americans didn't play games; they were energetic and skillful but never devious or secret or subtle. They preferred direct questions, gave direct answers. They liked to be on top.

At this point in his musings, he stopped before a wine store, and decided to see if he could get a few cases of good California wine flown back to England. One never knew when the chance would come again.

He was waiting in the bar for Kiefer when the thought struck him.

What if he'd simply sent a letter to Renfrew, with the message inside?

Given the post these days, it might not have even reached him by now, never mind being acted upon. In that case, after he'd got the yellow paper today, he could've rung up Renfrew and ordered him not to send the message. What would Markham make of that?

He finished his gin and then remembered the business about the loops.

Yes, the scheme he'd just devised would have thrown everything into an indeterminate state. That was the answer. But what kind of answer was that?

"Damn streets," Kiefer complained. "Getting' like a slum." He wrenched the steering wheel around a sharp curve. Tires howled.

For Peterson this change of topic was a decided improvement. Kiefer had been reciting the virtues and benefits of eating fresh vegetables brought in at something approximating the speed of light from "the valley," a cornucopia needing no further name.

To encourage this new line of discussion Peterson ventured mildly, "It all looks very prosperous to me."

"Yes, well, of course, you don't see it if you keep to the avenues. But it's getting harder to maintain standards. Look around you here, for instance.

Notice anything?"

They were high in the hills now, on winding narrow roads that afforded glimpses of the ocean between Spanish ranches and miniature French chateaux.

"See how they're walled in? When we first came here, oh, almost twenty years ago now, they were all open. Great views from every house. Now you can't even call on your neighbor without standing out in the street pushing buttons and talking into an intercom. And frap, you should see the antiburglar networks! Electronics worth a hundred German shepherds.

Backup batteries for brownouts, too."

"The crime rate is bad, then?" Peterson asked.

"Terrible. Illegal aliens, too many people, not enough jobs. Everybody feels he has a right to a life of luxury–or at least comfort–so there's a lot of frustration and resentment when the dream craps out."

Peterson began to replan his schedule. He would leave time to find the best electronic security system he could. Stupid of him, not to think of it before. That sort of thing was precisely where the Americans excelled. He would have use for a good system, adaptable and rugged. If possible, he would carry it back with him on the plane. Again he wished for a private jet.

"The town is getting carved up into sealed-off enclaves," Kiefer went on.

"Oldsters, mostly."

Peterson nodded as Kiefer cited statistics for California, which was second only to Florida in percentage of old people. Since the foldup of the Social Security system, the Senior Movement lobby had been pressuring even harder for special privileges, tax breaks, and extra favors. Peterson was sure he knew more of the demographics than Kiefer; the Council had got a worldwide picture on them two years ago, including some confidential projections. Attaining the zero-population-growth birth rate had left the US and Europe with a bulge in the population curve, now hitting retirement age. They expected hefty monthly checks, which had to come from the reduced ranks of younger people through taxes. It led to an