III

 

 

Turpin was plainly ill at ease and could not make up his mind how to open a conversation. For the time being that suited Sheklov. He wanted to get the feel of America, hammering home on the automatic level what he had learned on the conscious. Already he had noticed a contradiction. From the radio that Turpin had switched on, as though by reflex, music was emanating of a kind that he himself had barely encountered since his teens, when his generation still thought it “progressive” and “liberal” to imitate the example of Western rock-groups. The sound was imbued with curious nostalgia. Then, between items, an announcer resolved the paradox by saying that the programme was aimed at the eternally youthful and proceeding to advertise a skin-food.

For men, as well as women. He sniffed. Yes, he wasn’t mistaken; Turpin was heavily perfumed with something that hadn’t been detectable in the open air, but had built up in the closed metal box of the car, despite the conditioning, until it was overpowering. He thought of asking for a window to be opened, but changed his mind. He was going to have to adjust.

To things like this superway, for instance. Back home, the roads he knew were typically two or at most three lanes wide, laid with geometrical exactitude across the landscape, carrying far more trucks and hundred-passenger buses than private cars, and had control cables laid under the surface so that no mere human being should be called on to avert an accident at 200 k.p.h.

But roads weren’t really important. You could use less land and shift more people with a hovertrain riding concrete pylons, or for long distances you would fly.

When this road, with its opulent curves, came to a rise in the ground, its builders had contrived to give the impression that it eased itself up to let the hill pass beneath. Elegant, certainly. Yet so wasteful! Eight lanes in each direction, not because there was so much traffic, only because that much margin must be allowed for human error!

Thinking of speed. … He repressed a start as he looked at the speedometer. Oh, yes. Not k.p.h., but m.p.h; the Americans had resolutely clung to their antiquated feet, yards, and miles, just as they had clung to Fahrenheit when the rest of the world abandoned it. Even so, he hoped that Turpin was a reasonably competent driver. He himself had never attempted to guide a land-vehicle at such velocity.

Now, finally, Turpin was addressing him: “Cigarette?”

“Please.” It would be interesting to try American tobacco. But he found it hot, dry, and lacking in aroma.

Ahead, a lighted beacon warned traffic to merge into the left lanes, and shortly, as the car slowed, he saw something that confirmed his worst fears: a wreck involving two trucks and a private car around which a gang of black men were busy with chains, jacks, and cutting-torches. On the centre divide an ambulance-crew waited anxiously to be offered a cargo.

When was someone last killed on the roads, Back There?

He watched Turpin covertly as they passed the spot, and read no emotion whatever on his face.

Well, to sustain his pretense for so long, obviously he must have had to repress his natural reactions …

Yet Sheklov found the explanation too glib to be convincing.

 

Then, a little farther on, they encountered another gang of workmen, also black, being issued with tools from a truck on the hard shoulder. Some of them were setting up more beacons. That was a phenomenon Sheklov had been briefed about: a “working welfare” project. Obviously they were here to repair the road; equally obviously, the road didn’t need repairing. But it conformed to the American ideal: You don’t work, you don’t eat.

He felt a surge of pride as he reflected on the superior efficiency of a planned economy. Then, sternly, he dismissed the thought. The system must work, otherwise human beings could not tolerate it. It was not for him to say that it oughtn’t to work. Enclosed, isolated, offensively conceited, the Americans were still human, and what they did among themselves was ipso facto to be respected as part of the vast repertoire of human potential.

Drawing a deep breath, he closed his eyes for a moment. Words formed in memory; they said, “O Dhananjaya, abandoning attachment and regarding success and failure alike, be steadfast in Yoga and perform thy duties.”

And his duty at present was to be Donald Paton Holtzer, who had never heard of the Blessed Lord’s Song.

 

There was considerable traffic on the move. He saw hundreds of cars, mostly as they were left behind, because Turpin had clearance for the fastest lanes, but two or three times howling monsters tore past them illegally on the inside, and once they were overtaken by a patrolman on a racer with his siren howling like a soul in torment.

The roads, while still in usable condition, were being torn up and re-made. So too the cars were destined for a short, short life. Everything about this silent limousine of Turpin’s was ultra-modern, including its schedule of obsolescence. Approximately six months old, it was already as close to the scrapyard as to the factory.

And from the scrapyard its elements would go to the factory again.

Talk about taking in each other’s washing. … But he slapped that down in his mind, too.

Now and then they passed in sight of enormous housing developments, and Sheklov also studied these carefully. Apartments stacked in towering blocks. Gardens around them, or parks. Trees in neat lines, force-grown with para-gibberellins. He found them attractive, but somehow flawed—perhaps by the way they resembled one another, as though they had been mass-produced complete with occupants. They were becoming shabby. His briefings had included a thorough conspectus of the cycle of American fads and fashions, and he was able to date them as having been built about twenty-five years ago—just about the time, indeed, that Turpin was planted in the States.

Reminded of his companion, he turned his head. Turpin’s eyes were on him.

“You’re very quiet,” Sheklov said.

Turpin gave a plump-jowled grin. “I figured you’d start talking in your own good time. Make the most of this ride, though. I do have a bug-free room at home, of course, but this car is even safer. And we’re coming pretty close to Lakonia now.”

He seemed to have recovered completely from his earlier nervousness.

“Frankly,” Sheklov said, “I was expecting you to ask what brought me here. I gather you weren’t informed of the details.” He spoke easily in the language he had practised non-stop during his briefing period.

“I didn’t question the decision,” Turpin said stiffly. “After all, I’ve been thoroughly absorbed by now, and your people—” He bit something back.

“Go on,” Sheklov encouraged.

“All right, I’ll have to get around to it sooner or later. Your people don’t seem to set much store by me nowadays.”

Sheklov displayed genuine surprise. “I don’t know where you got that impression! I’ve always heard that your complete assimilation has made you the most valuable single agent we’ve ever had here. Why else would they have called on you to cushion my arrival?”

Turpin didn’t answer, but pressed his lips together in a thin line. Sheklov could gloss that expression easily enough. Because you’d have been told I was good, to bolster your own confidence; or because I’m to be eliminated and you’re to replace me; or because you’re expendable yourself, and meant to bring about our joint downfall; or because I’m suspect and you’ve been assigned to investigate me …

Turpin sighed. “Oh, what’s the point of worrying? I do as I’m told, that’s all. I laid on exactly the cover for you that was requested—you’re Canadian, timber-salesman, been down here sounding out a new pulp contract, recommended to Energetics General by your parent firm, looking for a supplier of plastic glue for bonding chipboard, staying with me at Lakonia because we’re very eager to close that deal. Which is true; we’re short of foreign currency, as you know. There’s a bag in the trunk for you, with clothes, ticket-stubs, hotel bills, a raft of genuine material. Anyway, the fact that I speak for you will protect you from security.”

That sounded too pat. Sheklov was about to voice a question, when Turpin added, “And for extra insurance I’ll have you photographed with Prexy.”

He tossed that off casually also, but if it was a promise he could keep, Sheklov felt, he was entitled to be proud of his record. They had told him over and over how well-established Turpin was, and though he reserved the right to doubt it until he saw it happen he was prepared to believe that Turpin could indeed invoke the President to reinforce his cover.

“You brought up the purpose of your visit,” Turpin went on. “I imagine it’s to check me out. Don’t think I’ll be offended if you tell me.”

There was overt bitterness in his tone. Sheklov saw in that a reason why the people Back There might have downgraded this man in their minds. But if they had, none of them had let slip the slighest suggestion of the fact.

“It’s nothing to do with you at all,” he grunted. “We’ve run into a problem we can’t solve. We’re at our wits’ end. And since we’ve looked everywhere else for ideas, we’re finally being driven to look for some over here.”

He wondered if his own scepticism showed in his voice. He was thinking: Pluto! Hell! Half the people in this country probably never heard of it, and the rest must be old enough to remember Disney’s dog!

Turpin took a fresh cigarette. “Hah! It must be quite a problem, then. Explain! I want to know what’s so important that I have to risk everything I’ve built up in twenty-five years.”

Sheklov marshalled his words carefully. He’d rehearsed this introductory exposition many times, of course. He said, “As a senior vice-president of Energetics General, you must know as much as any one man about the defence system of this continent. Right?”

“Why not? We designed most of it. We still contract for its servicing. And have I ever failed to notify your people of our newest developments?”

“No, you haven’t,” Sheklov said fervently, and felt a shiver go down his spine. In a sense, the fact that Earth had not long ago dissolved into a nuclear holocaust was due to this man at his side. It was awe-inspiring to reflect on that.

“So tell me,” he continued when he had recovered from his brief access of wonder, “what would happen if—say—New York were wiped off the map by a total-conversion reaction?”

“A—what?” Turpin jerked in his seat. Ash fell from his cigarette to his thigh. He brushed at it, and missed.

“Total-conversion, I said. Well?”

“Well! Uh …” Turpin licked his lips. “Well, it would depend on whether anything had been detected coming down from orbit.”

“Something would have.”

“Well, then! Uh. … Well, everything in the sky not accounted for by the flight-plan at Aerospace HQ would be taken out by ground missiles. That’s automatic. Then the orbital hardware would be activated, and you’d lose the tovs.”

“Tobs?”

“Tovs. Didn’t they give you that? Careless! Short for tovarich. That’s what we call your manned satellites.”

You: we. Force of habit, probably. Camouflage. But Sheklov found himself wondering how deep the camouflage went in Turpin’s mind after a quarter of a century.

“Is there a lot of orbital hardware?”

“Enough,” Turpin said, and gave a thin smile. “Sorry, but you might let slip something you’re not supposed to know.”

Sheklov allowed him the petty victory. He said, “And then …?”

“Within about two minutes, the Nightsticks would be homing on their targets. They’re solid-fuelled inertial-guided missiles with—”

“Yes, we know about those. Thanks to you.”

He said it deliberately, to determine how much the reminder would affect Turpin. The answer was—severely. He stuttered for several seconds.

“Anyway!” he pursued. “Within eight minutes and thirty seconds, twelve thousand megatons would go down on East Bloc territory. And if there were another—”

Sheklov held up his hand. “The world’s most perfect defensive system. Yes. We’ve taken great care for many years to avoid tripping this country’s deadly burglar alarms, but they still exist, which means that people must think they’re still necessary.”

“We’re doing our best to cure that!” Turpin said with a hint of anxiety. “Though naturally in my position I daren’t—”

“Daren’t do anything that might cast suspicion on your cover,” Sheklov cut in. “Sure, we understand just how tough security can be over here. But what’s your response to the news that some American city may well be converted into raw energy in the near future?”

A haunted expression came and went on Turpin’s face, as though for the first time in years he was reviewing the implications of setting off twelve thousand megatons of nuclear explosive. He said, “You mean the Chinese have—”

“Chinese, hell. The Chinese don’t have a total-conversion reaction! Nobody has it, down here.”

Understanding began to turn Turpin’s cheeks to grey.

“Yes,” Sheklov said with a nod. “Out near Pluto we’ve met—someone else.”