Voyagers I (5 page)

Stoner looked up from his frozen dinner and saw Jo standing in the kitchen doorway, a thick manila folder clutched in her mittened hands.

For a moment he didn’t know what to say. Dark anger rushed through him; he could feel its heat in his face.

“What are you doing here?”

She stood her ground. “I brought the latest packet of photographs from Goddard Space Center.” Her voice was low but steady.

“Brought me my homework. Thanks a lot.”

Taking a step into the kitchen, Jo said, “Professor McDermott needed somebody to carry things from the observatory to you. He told me to do it.”

Stoner said nothing.

“I had to get special clearance from the Navy.”

“I’ll bet.”

“Look—I didn’t think they’d do this to you.” Jo’s voice didn’t tremble, but he could sense the tension in it. And there was something in her face, something in those dark eyes of hers: guilt, or fear, or…what?

“What did you think they’d do?” he asked.

She shrugged inside her heavy wool coat. “I don’t know. I tried to warn you…to tell you that McDermott was uptight about you going to Washington…”

“How’d he find out, Jo?”

Her face fell. In a voice so low he could barely hear it, she answered, “I told him.”

“Yeah. I know.”

“He pressured me. I’ve been cutting a lot of classes to be out at the observatory. He said he’d flunk me out if I didn’t tell him what you were up to.”

He studied her. If she’s lying, she’s good at it. Anger was seething inside him. Or was it something else, something more? Anger usually left Stoner cold, his mind became as unemotional and unfeeling as an electronic computer. But now his hands wanted to grab and tear, his insides were jumping, blood pounding. Jesus, Stoner realized, it’s been months since I’ve gotten laid.

“Come on in,” he said, trying to make it sound calm. “Take your coat off. Sit down. Have some coffee.”

Hesitantly Jo entered the kitchen. She put the thick manila folder on the Formica-topped counter, pulled off her mittens, slipped out of the coat. Stoner went to the range, where the glass coffeepot sat, half empty.

“No coffee for me, thanks.” She took the stool across the counter from his and watched him pour himself a cup. “Are they treating you all right here? Is there anything I can bring you?”

“My car and the keys to it.”

“They won’t let me.”

He carried the steaming mug back to the counter and sat down facing her. “That old car’s the only thing I’ve got to show for sixteen years of marriage.”

“Oh.”

“I’ve become kind of attached to it.”

“But they’re treating you okay? They’re not giving you any hassles?”

“Sure. Everything’s fine—once I signed the security agreement. Now I’ve got the run of the house. Eight rooms. Or is it nine? I’ve lost count. Plenty of food. I have to cook it for myself, though. I’m a lousy cook.”

“I could cook for you, sometimes.”

He ignored it. Reaching for the manila folder, Stoner pulled out the latest stack of photographs. They showed the fat, flattened, gaudily striped beach ball that was the planet Jupiter. He could see exquisite details of the streaming bands of clouds that flowed across the planet: eddies and whirlpools the size of Earth, in burnt orange, brick red, dazzling white.

“Where are the background field pictures I asked for?”

“In the next batch,” Jo replied. “They’re still being processed.”

“I need them,” he said. “And a computer terminal.”

She nodded. “Anything else?”

“Books. Every book on extraterrestrial life you can find. Empty the libraries. I want
everything
on the subject.”

Another nod. “Anything else?”

He looked into her deep, lustrous eyes. “Why did you come here tonight, Jo?”

“Professor McDermott told me to. I’m a courier now.”

“Why did you accept the job? You didn’t have to.”

For a moment she didn’t answer. Then, “I wanted to see you. To tell you I’m sorry. If I’d stood up to Big Mac…maybe…” She looked away from him. “I’m sorry it turned out this way. Truly I am.”

He reached across the table and grasped her wrist. “Prove it.”

Without another word he led her out of the kitchen, through the tiny, close rooms of the old part of the house, up the narrow stairway to his bedroom.

He closed the door firmly. No need to turn on a lamp: cold moonlight filtered through the gauzy curtains of the window.

For a moment Jo stood in front of the bed. Then she turned toward him. Stoner leaned his back against the heavy wooden panels of the door. Neither of them spoke.

He could see her face etched by the moonlight. She wasn’t smiling. Her expression was strangely placid, tranquil. She began unbuttoning her blouse. Stoner watched. She unhooked her bra and tossed it aside. Reaching down, she pulled off her shoes, then slithered the jeans down her long legs. And finally the skimpy flowered bikini panties.

“Is this what you want?” she whispered.

His throat was dry. “Yes,” he said, with an effort.

She stepped to him and started to unbutton his shirt. He stood there and let her do the work. Finally she was on her knees in front of him and he was naked. She kissed his erect penis.

“Is this what you want?” she asked again. But she didn’t wait for an answer.

Just before he thought he would explode, Stoner dug his fingers into her thick black hair and pulled her away from him. Bending down, he scooped her into his arms and carried her the four strides to the bed. He put her on the coverlet and tented his body over hers.

Jo twined her arms around his neck and pulled him down onto her. He kissed her as he entered her and she was warm and ready and moving in rhythm with him.

It was like being in space again, floating weightlessly, drifting, drifting through the dark eternities while the stars solemnly, silently gazed down.

She clung to him as they convulsed together and then gasped out a single word: “Keith!”

For long moments they lay locked together, hearts racing, breath gasping. He lifted his face from the tufted coverlet and looked into her eyes again.

She smiled up at him. “That’s the first time you’ve kissed me,” she said.

“It’s the first time you called me by my first name.”

They laughed together.

He sat on the edge of the bed. His insides still felt fluttery. Jo traced a fingernail along the length of his spine.

“Is there anything else I can do for you, Dr. Stoner?” she teased.

Turning back toward her, “Stay the night.”

“I have a class tomorrow morning.”

“Oh.” He frowned in the shadows. “Where in hell are we, anyway? Where is this house?”

“In New Hampshire…not far from White River Junction.”

“White River Junction? Then how in hell can you drive to campus in time for a morning class?”

“So I’ll miss the class,” Jo said easily. “It won’t be the first time.”

“That’s what got you under McDermott’s thumb, isn’t it?”

“I can handle Professor McDermott. He’s just a big bully.”

“White River Junction,” Stoner mused. “Maybe you ought to bring up a pair of skis the next time you come.”

“We won’t be here for the ski season, from what Professor McDermott says.”

“What do you mean?”

“He said the whole observatory staff will be heading south in a few weeks.”

“Including me?”

She nodded. “And me. I’m going too.”

“Where?”

“He wouldn’t say. Just that the climate wouldn’t be so cold.”

“Green Bank?” Stoner wondered. “No, it’s just as cold in those West Virginia hills as it is here. It can’t be Arecibo. Not even Big Mac could swing Drake and Sagan out of there.”

“What’s it like to be an astronaut?” Jo asked.

He blinked at the sudden shift in subject. “Huh? I wasn’t really an astronaut…not like the real rocket jocks. They used me as a construction engineer. I just rode up into orbit and helped put Big Eye together.”

“But you spent months in space, didn’t you?”

Shrugging, “Sure. And once they got the telescope working, NASA figured they didn’t need an expensive astrophysicist who did construction work anymore. So I got RIFfed.”

“What does that mean?”

“Reduction In Force. Laid off. Bounced. Fired.”

“And that’s when you came to the observatory?”

“Yes.”

“And your family…where are they?”

So she’s pumping me, Stoner told himself, knowing that sooner or later she would have asked him about his wife and children.

“My wife took the kids back to her parents in Palo Alto,” he said flatly. “The day I got the RIF notice, as a matter of fact. Strictly coincidence; poetic timing. We hadn’t gotten along in years.”

“How old…?”

“Fifteen and twelve,” he answered automatically. “The boy’s the oldest. I don’t see them at all. Last time I flew out to Palo Alto they wouldn’t even come to the front door to say hello to me. Let’s change the subject.”

Jo reached over and pulled him down to her and kissed him. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “It must hurt a lot.”

“It should, I guess. But mostly it just feels kind of numb.”

“You’re covering it over.”

“With work. Right. My work comes first. Doris always said that it did, and she was right.”

“And now?”

“Now I’m onto the biggest goddamned discovery in history. Nothing else matters. I’m going to
prove
that we’ve found extraterrestrial intelligence. No matter what Big Mac or the Navy or anybody else does—I’m going to prove it to the world.”

Jo leaned her head against his shoulder and made long, soothing, soft strokes of her fingertips down his chest.

“So fierce,” she said in a whisper. “Do you know, you’re just like me? We’re two of a kind.”

“You? You’re kidding.”

“I want them to notice me, too, Keith. I want to
be
somebody. I want to make the whole world know who I am.”

He found himself grinning. “Well, you’re on the right project for that.”

But Jo said, “Who’s going to notice a little technical assistant, next to the famous Dr. Keith Stoner or Professor McDermott. No. I’m going to become an astronaut. A real one.”

“NASA isn’t hiring.”

“They will be, sooner or later. And women will get special preference, you’ll see.”

“It’s not a romantic life. It’s more like being a bus driver. Just a lot of hard donkey work. And risk.”

“But you went into space. You became famous.”

“And unemployed.”

“Imagine making love in zero gravity!”

“Waterbeds are almost as good. Besides, astronauts don’t make love in orbit. They’re too damned busy. And scared. And exhausted.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“It’s a dull life, I tell you.”

“No duller than being a computer programmer.”

“Is that what you’re studying?”

He could sense her smiling in the darkness, cradled next to his body. “That’s what my parents think I’m studying. They want me to go to school and learn a nice, sensible trade until I meet a nice, sensible guy and get married and start having babies.”

“And they’re paying your way…”

“The hell they are! I got myself a partial scholarship. And I work weekends and summers. How do you think I got into the observatory? I get paid for helping out.”

He grinned at the determination in her voice. “So now you’ve joined Big Mac’s supersecret ETI project. I hope he’s paying you well.”

“I get a full technician’s salary.”

“Not bad.”

“And I’m transferring to the Astronautics Department,” Jo added. “I’m going to be an astronaut and nothing’s going to stop me.”

“Fine,” Stoner said, fighting back a yawn. “But in the meantime let’s not freeze to death.” He peeled back the covers on his side of the bed.

“Don’t worry,” Jo answered. “We’re going to be nice and warm this winter. We’re going to Arecibo. I’m sure of it.”

“McDermott can’t swing that much weight,” Stoner said, sliding into the bed. The sheets were already warm from the press of their bodies.

But Jo was on her feet, searching through the moonlit room for her scattered clothes.

“What’re you doing?”

“I brought an overnight bag with me,” she said, yanking on the jeans without bothering about the panties. “It’s in my car. I’ll be back in a minute.”

She was still buttoning her blouse as she went out into the hall, heading for the stairs.

Stoner yawned and wondered briefly how she knew so much about McDermott’s plans. Then he thought about the overnight bag. The cocky little bitch! He didn’t know whether to laugh or be angry. Yawning, he decided to do neither. He turned over on his side and drifted to sleep.

A cocktail party in official Washington has an inbred hierarchical cast to it. Senators usually outweigh congressmen, of course, but there are all sorts of gradations among both senators and congressmen. A committee chairman is obviously more important than a subcommittee chairman—most of the time. But what about a junior Republican who happens to be an attractive woman? What about a congressman’s aide who happens to be related to the governor of the congressman’s home state?

Lieutenant Commander Tuttle was sensitive to the subtlest nuances of these parties. He knew that lieutenant commanders were slightly lower, in cocktail party echelons, than the average bartender. Still, much good work could be done at the right party if the lieutenant commander properly briefed his commanding officer. Besides, this party had a special extra dimension to it: the guest of honor was Willie Wilson, the Urban Evangelist who was the brand new “catch” of the young social season.

The party was taking place in the old Sheraton-Park Hotel, still desperately trying to cling to its former elegance. The gilt decorations of the function room were worn thin, the old draperies dusty and frayed. But the rumor was that Wilson had arranged the party for himself and gotten a special low price from the hotel. The ostensible hostess had been dragooned into fronting for the Urban Evangelist.

Tuttle’s post for the evening was in a corner of the ornate, gilded function room, dutifully chatting with the wife of his commanding admiral.

“These parties are such a bore, don’t you think?” bellowed Mrs. Admiral O’Kelly. She held a heavy Bourbon on the rocks in one beringed hand and was fingering her rope of artificial pearls with the other.

Tuttle nodded. He was in dress uniform and felt slightly stiff and foolish standing next to this old matron with her bluish hair piled high atop her wrinkled, sagging face. But the admiral’s orders had been firm: “Let me do the talking; you keep my wife supplied with drinks but don’t let her get drunk.”

Not an easy task, thought Tuttle.

The big room was only half filled with guests in tuxedos and evening gowns. Willie Wilson was the newest “in” subject of Washington society, but the Sheraton-Park was not an “in” hotel anymore.

Still, the noise level was climbing to the point where you had to shout to make yourself heard by the person standing next to you. The admiral’s wife had no trouble with that: she had the voice of a Marine drill instructor.

“Who is this Wilson, anyway?” she roared, leaning slightly toward Tuttle so she could yell directly into his ear. “Some preacher, isn’t he?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Tuttle answered, wincing. “He’s called the Urban Evangelist. His mission is to reach the people in the inner cities—the poor and disadvantaged.”

“I saw him on television last week. He’s a good-looking rascal!”

Across the room, Admiral O’Kelly was locked in earnest conversation with one of the President’s Whiz Kids.

“My people over at Justice have picked up something that smells funny,” said the earnest young man from the White House. He wore a three-piece beige suit with an open-necked pastel green shirt. “Have you guys been pulling any fast ones up in New England?”

Admiral O’Kelly let his impressive eyebrows rise. “Why, what on earth are you talking about, boy?”

The Whiz Kid’s face went stiff with suppressed anger. “Don’t play games with me, Admiral. And I don’t have to be a hundred years old to know that something fishy is happening up there.”

“It would help,” O’Kelly said, lowering his voice a notch and putting some iron into it, “if you told me what you’re referring to.”

“Forcible abduction of a NASA scientist, that’s what I’m talking about! Ring a bell?”

The admiral grinned at him, his face a leathery network of creases. “Can’t say that it does. Sure you’re not confusing my boys with CIA?”

“There haven’t been any complaints,” the White House aide admitted, “so you’re in the clear—so far. But if I were you…”

“Let’s put it this way, son.” O’Kelly laid a heavy hand on the young man’s shoulder. “If
I
were
you
, I’d pay attention to what’s in my In-basket. I’ve been trying to get the attention of you West Wing boys for the past ten days.”

“You have?”

“If you search diligently through your incoming memos, you’ll find three of ’em from me. Last one’s stamped Urgent and Top Secret. Dated three days ago. I thought sure you’d look at that one.”

The Whiz Kid frowned. “I should have seen it…”

“I suppose you get so many Urgent and Top Secret memos that they just pile up on your desk,” the admiral said, straight-faced.

“Yeah. Well, okay…let’s get together, then. Tomorrow. I’ll phone you first thing in the morning.”

The admiral nodded cheerfully. “Good. I think you’ll find what I have to tell you quite interesting. And important enough to bring to the President’s attention—without any further delays.”

The young man from the White House nodded. Admiral O’Kelly turned his back on him and let the natural tides of the party pull them in opposite directions.

That takes care of that target, O’Kelly told himself. One down and one to go.

He glanced across the noisy room and saw that Tuttle, stubby and loyal as a bullterrier, was still standing resolutely beside his wife. Alma didn’t look too drunk. Still time to find Target Number Two.

And there he was, gliding toward the bar like a well-oiled smiling insurance salesman. O’Kelly headed for the bar.

Todd Nickerson had the bulbous red nose of a drunk. His eyes were always glazed over, even at important committee hearings and during vital votes on the floor of the House of Representatives. At parties he was loud, laughing, often lewd.

But Nickerson was the key man on the House subcommittee that examined ONR’s budget every year. Not the subcommittee chairman. The chairman was an ancient party warhorse from Missouri whose only real interests were pork barrels and buxom black women.

Despite being half drunk most of the time, Nickerson was the real power of the subcommittee. And O’Kelly had to make certain that the subcommittee would not rise up to haunt him once he had put Tuttle’s plan into action. The admiral elbowed his way through the crowd, stalking Nickerson like a submarine trailing an oil tanker.

They made a funny pair, once they started talking to each other in the middle of the party. O’Kelly, all steel gray with his bushy brows and piercing eyes, his uniform immaculate and pressed so well that the creases on his trousers could cut glass; Nickerson, weaving blearily, a tall, lank, alcoholic Ichabod Crane leaning over to hear what the stockier admiral had to say.

“The National Radio Astronomy Observatory?” the congressman yelled. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Partygoers turned to stare, saw that it was Nickerson, and politely returned to their own conversations.

O’Kelly, feeling the collar of his uniform rasp against his neck, took the civilian by the arm. “Now, don’t get crazy on me, Congressman. This is important. Very important. I’m not even certain that we can bring it up before the subcommittee; I’m afraid of leaks.”

Nickerson focused his eyes on the admiral with an obvious effort. “Arecibo?” he asked, his voice lower. “That’s what you want? D’you know what kind of headlines it’d make if the Navy takes over a peaceful research facility?”

“We already fund a large part of its operation,” O’Kelly reminded the congressman. “We only need it full time for a short while.”

Nickerson waved his glass in the air, miraculously without spilling a drop or hitting any of the people standing nearby.

“And what will the National Science Foundation do?” he demanded with a lopsided smile. “They’ll go running to the media, tha’s what they’ll do. They’ll start screaming that the good ol’ Navy’s screwing them outta the world’s biggest radio telescope.”

“That’s why we need your support, Congressman. All of this must be done in utmost secrecy…”

“Secrecy my ass! The media’ll make Golgotha look like a rehearsal. They’ll crucify the Navy in general and you in particular. Ready to hang on a cross? In public?”

Suddenly O’Kelly looked as if he were on the bridge of a destroyer, charging into the enemy’s guns. “If I have to,” he answered firmly.

Nickerson blinked, then stared at him, mouth hanging open stupidly. The party babbled around them: raucous laughter, shrill voices, smoke, a blur of colorful women’s gowns and men’s somber formal suits.

“You’re serious,” Nickerson said at last.

“You bet I am.”

The glaze left Nickerson’s eyes. He was cold sober and alert. “Maybe you’d better tell me about it. In detail.”

The admiral shook his head. “Not here.”

“Outside then,” Nickerson said. “I doubt that the grounds are bugged.”

By the time the admiral came to reclaim his wife, the party had wound down considerably. The room was emptying, the noise level was down to a subdued buzz of conversations.

“Time for us to go, my dear,” Admiral O’Kelly said to his wife, taking the glass from her hand and putting it on the table next to him.

“It’s been a dull party,” she said, slurring the words slightly.

“I’m awfully sorry, sweetheart, but it was important for us to be here.” Turning toward Tuttle, “I was able to accomplish a couple of things that might have taken weeks, otherwise. Months, perhaps.”

Tuttle beamed happily.

“I shouldn’t have to go to boring parties,” Mrs. Admiral O’Kelly said as her husband led her by the hand. “I didn’t even get to meet the guest of honor.”

“Some other time, dear. Some other time. Tuttle,” he said over his shoulder, “thanks for taking such good care of the missus.”

“My pleasure, sir.”

“I’ll see you in the office at oh-eight-thirty,” the admiral said, by way of good night.

“Yes,
sir
!” Tuttle knew the admiral’s tone meant: mission accomplished.

He felt exalted. He had won over the admiral to his plan and the admiral had taken on the White House and Congressman Nickerson. And won. The project was definitely
go
.

Scanning the dwindling crowd, excitement bubbling within him, Tuttle saw Willie Wilson. The Urban Evangelist was shaking hands, wishing people well as they filed past him on their way out. He pumped the admiral’s hand, and then Mrs. O’Kelly’s. She smiled girlishly at him.

“Thank you kindly, Admiral. The people of the inner city will appreciate your help and understanding.” Wilson turned to the next couple in the impromptu line, as an aide whispered behind him. “God bless you, Senator. Hope you win by a landslide next year…. Thanks for coming…. Good to see you….”

Tuttle hung on the fringes of the dwindling crowd, practically bursting to tell somebody his Good News. It was Top Secret, of course, but he couldn’t keep all this excitement bottled up inside himself. Some of it
had
to come out.

Finally Wilson noticed him. “Freddie, is that you in that fancy uniform?”

“Hello, Will,” said Tuttle.

The evangelist was in his trademark blue denim suit, with a white shirt and flowery bandana knotted at his throat. He was scarcely taller than Tuttle, and whippet thin. His face was bony, all angles. His hair was angelic golden blond; his eyes the cold gray of an Atlantic storm.

“I haven’t laid eyes on you since—when was it, Freddie? Atlanta?”

“New Orleans,” Tuttle corrected. “After the cops tried to break up your street meeting.”

“Yes, I remember now. Two years ago. The Catholics were getting nervous in the service about me.”

He’s had his teeth capped, Tuttle saw. I guess you have to when you do so much work on television.

“I saw you over in Georgetown,” Tuttle said. “You pulled a good crowd.”

“A high school gym,” Wilson replied. “That’s not much. Next time I come back to this town we’ll fill RFK Stadium.”

“I hope you do.”

“We’re getting bigger all the time.”

“I know. People are starting to notice. Especially the TV spots. You put on a good show.”

A small crowd was piling up at the doorway behind Tuttle, waiting to have their final word with the guest of honor. His aides fidgeted nervously and looked at their wristwatches.

“Well, we’re trying,” Wilson said. “It’s a long, hard road.”

“Yes, I guess it is.”

“So why’s the Navy at my party? Who was that admiral just went by?”

Tuttle laughed and heard himself say, “Maybe the Navy’s getting religion.”

Wilson grinned back at him.

“Something big is happening, Willie,” Tuttle whispered suddenly, uncontrollably. “Something so big that it’s going to blow everybody’s mind.”

“What do you mean, Freddie?”

Gesturing halfheartedly at the others milling around them, Tuttle whispered, “It’s too soon to say. But it’s big. Enormously big. As soon as we can verify that it’s really true, I’ll get word to you.”

Wilson put on his best smile. “That’s fine, Freddie. But what’s it all about?”

Shaking his head, Tuttle said, “You’ll know when I tell you. Nothing like it’s ever been seen before. All I can say is—watch the skies.”

“Lord, you make it sound like the Second Coming.”

“Maybe it is,” Tuttle answered, completely serious. “Maybe it is.”