Los Alamos (39 page)

“I don’t know what you’d do anymore. You’re different.”

“No, still marvelous,” she said, her voice bitter. “But I tell you what. If you have second thoughts, just chuck it in the bin and no one’s the wiser. But I’d have someone give it a look, I really would. Who knows? There might be a promotion in it for you. Just keep my name out of the thank-you speech. Come to think of it, you don’t know my name now, do you? Maybe that’s best.”

“You never used to be like this,” he said, not really answering her. “How do I contact you?”

“You don’t. I’m finished with it now. Steven’s address is inside. A box number. They read the post, by the way, so tell whoever it is to be careful—well, that sounds silly, doesn’t it? Of course they would. Just tell them to give him a time and a place and he’ll know. Somewhere in Santa Fe—he’s not allowed to travel. If he doesn’t hear, well, then he’ll assume the comrades aren’t interested and we’ll have to think of something else.”

“Emma,” he said, his voice low. “In Berlin, when I—I was under orders.”

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“No, don’t go. You have to know what happened when I left. I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t tell anybody. They said lives might depend on it.”

“Lives did,” she said sharply.

Connolly heard her get up. Flustered, he turned and looked up to see her standing there, her padded shoulders pulled back, rigid with anger. He wanted to signal her, but her eyes were fixed on Matthew, oblivious to the room around them.

“I don’t mean ours,” Lawson was saying. “We were just kids. The others—they had a list, the whole network. I had to disappear. I couldn’t tell anybody. They
ordered
me not to, do you understand? It was important. There were people involved. It wasn’t my decision.”

“Wasn’t it?”

“No. Do you think I’d run away? Just like that? They had something for me to do. I couldn’t say no. It’s the discipline—every link. I had to do what they told me. Then, after—”

“Why are you telling me this?” she said, her voice cold. Connolly had dropped the wire and was staring at her.

“I don’t want you to think—I couldn’t help it, do you see?”

“Do you want me to forgive you? What a bastard you are.”

“I just wanted you to know what happened,” he said, hesitant now under her glare.

“That’s not all that happened in Berlin, Matthew,” she said, her voice so low and intense that the noise of the room seemed to step away from it, afraid. “You left a child. I cut it out.”

Connolly stared, helpless, as her eyes filled with tears.

She leaned in. “I saw it in a pan. Like a blood clot. But they cut out all my children. Didn’t mean to, but they did. You think I’m hard? I’m barren, Matthew. That’s what happened in Berlin. Here,” she said, picking up the envelope and throwing it at his chest. “Go save the world. Save it for your children.”

For a minute, no one moved. Then Emma picked up her bag and walked quickly out of the restaurant, her shoes clacking hard on the wood floor. Connolly watched her go, expecting Lawson to follow her, but there wasn’t a sound in the booth. He waited another minute, catching his own breath, then got up to go.

When he looked over the partition, he saw Lawson sitting, his face as red as if it had been slapped, staring at the brown envelope. Then suddenly he got up, bumping into Connolly.

For a split second Connolly met his eyes, wide and frantic. “Sorry,” he said automatically, but Lawson was already running out of the room.

Connolly followed through the noisy bar and pushed the door out into the hot air. Lawson was halfway down the block, walking quickly. He stopped and shouted something—her name?—but it was lost in the roar of the overhead train. At the corner, he had to stop for a light, and Connolly could see Emma across Third, already far along the side street, her white dress darting in and out of the crowd. They crossed together, Connolly hanging back a little, waiting for him to sprint, but there were too many people now and he couldn’t break through. Instead he sidestepped them, jumping into the street, then back again, trying to keep her in sight. When she turned right on Lexington, he quickened his pace, pushing against the crowd.

Emma hadn’t noticed any of it. When she reached the hotel she went straight in, not looking around. Lawson followed her to the door, dodging a car against the light, and then, finally there, stopped unexpectedly. Connolly turned at the window of a deli, watching to his left. Lawson stood for a second, rooted in indecision, then took a step toward the entrance and stopped again. A soldier and a girl came out of the hotel, carrying suitcases. Lawson took a handkerchief to wipe his face, then, his whole body slumping in some final resignation, turned and started walking slowly away. When he passed Connolly in the deli window he was looking at the sidewalk, glum and confused, as if he had just missed a train. Then Connolly lost him in the crowd.

Emma was sitting on the bed, breathing deliberately to calm herself. She glanced up when he came in, then looked away again, obviously not wanting to talk. He touched her shoulder, then went into the bathroom and started putting things in his Dopp Kit.

“Did you hear?” she said finally from the bedroom. “I’m afraid I muffed it.”

“No,” he said, coming out, “it was fine. Perfect.” His voice went low. “Emma, I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”

“No, you didn’t.” She shrugged, shaking the hair off her neck. “Now what?”

“Now we wait.”

“Like a message in a bottle.” She stood up and went over to the window. “Anyway, it’s done now. Good luck to him.”

“You all right?”

She nodded. “Funny how voices don’t change. Everything else, but not voices. It gave me quite a turn at first. ‘We respect that.’ My God.” She lit a cigarette, still looking out the window. “Promise me something, will you? When this is over, all this Karl business, no more, all right? You see what it’s done to him. Always some war to fight, whether there is one or not. He’s stuck in the trenches for good now.”

“It’s a promise. You can count on this one.”

She turned, smiling a little. “He couldn’t help himself, could he? What are you doing?” she said, noticing the Dopp Kit. “Going somewhere?”

“I thought we might change hotels. Our last night. Change of scene.”

She smiled. “You don’t have to do that. I’m all right, really.”

“Actually, I think we’d better,” he said. “He followed you.”

“Followed me?”

“Not like that. I think he probably wanted to make up.”

“But he didn’t come in,” she said quietly.

“No,” he said, closing the kit. “But he knows you’re here. Which means they’ll know I’m here too, if anyone’s interested. And they might be, once they get a look at his mail. We can’t afford to take that chance.”

She folded her arms, holding herself. “You think he’d have us watched?”

“It wouldn’t be up to him.”

She took that in. “I thought this was over.”

“Almost. It’s just a precaution.”

“Still on the job,” she said, putting out her cigarette. “Right. And here I thought you were being romantic.”

“I can still be that.”

“Where now?” she said brightly. “Do you think you could manage something a bit grander? The Waldorf?”

He grinned. “No. I was thinking of the Pennsylvania. It’s the one place we’re sure to be alone.”

“Unless that man’s still there.”

“He won’t be. Anywhere but there.”

He was there, however. After dinner, a little tight, they went to the Café Rouge to hear the music, and it was Emma who spotted him, sitting not far from the band.

“It’s him,” she said. “He must be off duty—he’s checked his hat.”

“And picked up a girl,” Connolly said. “What do you know.”

“I don’t think he’s seen us.”

“Come on, let’s dance.”

Emma giggled as Connolly maneuvered her toward the other table. “You’re torturing him,” she said, watching the man pretend not to recognize them. The girl, all bright lipstick, was drinking a highball.

“Just a little.”

“He’ll be furious.”

“Because we ruined his little night on the town? I doubt he’ll want to go into that. Looks bad on the report.”

She giggled again. “But what will he
think?”

“That we’ve been here all along and he should have kept his mouth shut. Now he’s going to have to explain it.”

“Who do you think she is?”

He grinned. “There’s a question.”

She leaned her head against his shoulder. “Now he’ll be on the train.”

“Paying very close attention this time. Just think of him as your personal bodyguard. Look, he’s getting up to dance. I didn’t think there was anybody in G-2 who could do that.”

“Stop. He’ll see you laughing. We shouldn’t be doing this, you know. It’s not supposed to be funny. Why is it?”

“He doesn’t think he’s funny. And he’s going to write a report and it’s going to sit in a file until it’s useful to someone who isn’t funny either. And there won’t be a thing in it about his pumping his way across a dance floor and trying to get some girl into bed. That’s the way it works.”

“Not funny at all.”

“No. How do you feel?”

“I don’t know. From one minute to the next. Today—”

“Don’t think about it.”

“I did something I never thought I’d do. Deliberately harm someone.”

“That depends on how you look at it.”

“I’m not even sure it was wrong. How is that possible? Not to know what’s wrong. And I didn’t mind. I
wanted
it to work. And now we’re laughing at that man and dancing, as if nothing had happened. What sort of person does that make me?”

He looked at her. “I don’t care. Like the rest of us, I suppose. Everybody has his reasons.”

“Even Matthew.”

“I don’t know the answer to that, Emma. Some are better than others, maybe.”

“So maybe you can be wrong for the right reasons.”

“I don’t know that one either. We’re not going to solve it here, you know. Let’s take a little time out. You’re still all keyed up.”

She smiled weakly at him. “The wine, no doubt. At least you didn’t say that. I have to sort it out sometime, though.” She looked up at him, studying his face. “What about you? What were you thinking about today?”

“In the restaurant? That I wasn’t helping you at all.”

“But you did. You made it easy.”

His eyes asked a question.

“I didn’t know how I would feel. And then it was easy—I knew I could do it. It’s easy when you don’t love somebody anymore.”

“He was a fool to let you go.”

“We let each other go. Anyway, he’s gone.”

“Pretty quick divorce, by the way.”

She smiled. “I couldn’t resist. I wanted to hear what he’d say. I must say, he might have protested a little,” she said lightly. “Anyway, there’s our answer. Free. Aren’t you pleased?”

He looked at her. “He’s not the one I’m worried about.”

17

O
PPENHEIMER’S VOICE CAME
through the half-open door, as angry as Connolly had ever heard it. “You picked one hell of a time, Jeff,” he was saying, his tone almost witheringly sharp.

“It’s the right time,” a voice answered, so young it seemed adolescent. “There’ll never be a better one.”

Connolly could see Oppenheimer standing behind his desk, holding a bulletin board notice. “ ‘The Gadget and the Future,’ ” he read disdainfully. “And just what the hell do you expect to accomplish with this little town meeting? Where do you think we are, Palo Alto?”

“We can’t just ignore it, Oppie,” the young man said, holding his ground. “There are issues. The scientific community has a right to a voice in this. While there’s still time.”

“There isn’t any time. We’ve got people working twenty-four hours a day. We don’t have time for seminars on civilization and its discontents.”

“We should.”

Oppenheimer, at any rate, must be working around the clock, Connolly thought. His frame, always frail, was now alarmingly thin, the eyes set deeply in their sockets, the bony fingers clutching the cigarette nearly skeletal. His voice, dry and scratchy, seemed to cry out for rest, but instead his body was in constant motion, pacing edgily, his arms jerking involuntarily to relieve the tension of being awake.

“Is Leo behind this?” he said suddenly.

“Leo?”

“Szilard. In Chicago. You know very well what Leo. Don’t fence with me, Jeff.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Oppie.”

Oppenheimer looked up, suddenly embarrassed. “You don’t? Sorry. I thought he might be, that’s all. He’s circulating a petition. No doubt you’ll want to sign it. Meanwhile, I’d appreciate it if you’d cancel this damn-fool meeting.”

“Why?”

“Security wouldn’t like it.”

“So what?”

“It upsets them. This is a sensitive time, Jeff, you know that as well as anyone. Let’s not make it more complicated than it is.”

“Oppie, we’re talking about scientists getting together to discuss the implications of what we’re doing. That’s all.”

“I know what we’re talking about,” Oppenheimer snapped, taking a puff on his cigarette. “I’m talking about a test scheduled for
today
that’s now two weeks late. I’m counting hours. Kisty’s down at S Site fixing the explosive lenses himself. You know that. In fact, why aren’t you down there helping, instead of—instead of—” His voice sputtered, caught by the look on the man’s face.

“What?”

“Scheduled for today? The glorious Fourth? What was the idea—the biggest fireworks ever?”

“Don’t be a jerk. Not precisely the Fourth. This week. Nobody thought about
fireworks.”
He stopped and smiled to himself. “In fact, nobody
did
think about that. Odd. Anyway, what’s the difference? We didn’t make it.”

“Oppie, are you ordering me not to have this meeting?” the man said calmly.

Oppenheimer lit a fresh cigarette from the end of the other, his body visibly backing down. “No,” he said finally, “I wouldn’t order you to do that.”

“You were the one who started the open meetings.”

“Yes.”

“And to hell with the security bozos, remember?”

“All right, Jeff, if the men want it—”

“So what happened? We haven’t had a meeting in quite a while.”

Oppenheimer looked at him, his eyes flaring in anger again. “I got busy, Jeff. I’m busy now, in fact.”

“You’re welcome to attend, by the way. In fact, people would really like that—to hear what you have to say. We’re not trying to hurt the project.”

“I know,” Oppenheimer said gently.

Connolly knocked on the open door.

“Speak of the devil,” Oppenheimer said. “One of your security bozos, in the flesh.”

Jeff, a young scientist in horn-rimmed glasses, flushed.

“I didn’t hear anything,” Connolly said breezily. “We don’t listen at keyholes.”

“Yet,” Oppenheimer said quickly.

“Sunday,” Jeff said, turning to leave. “If you can make it.”

Oppenheimer watched him go, then looked back. “Mr. Connolly,” he said wearily. “Pleasant trip?”

“What was that all about?”

“It’s beginning to dawn on them that the gadget has implications,” he said, his voice still taut.

“What hath God wrought?”

“I haven’t been called that yet. No, they think we might be in league with the other one. Implications. Where has everyone been? The implications were there from the start. Now the hand-wringing. The Chicago lab wants to talk to the President—the President, if you please—about a
demonstration
for the Japanese. Blow up some little island somewhere and the emperor and the rest of the samurai will fall to their knees, begging for terms. And no one gets hurt.”

“It’s an idea.”

“Don’t be a fool. It’s already decided.” The answer, quick as whiplash, stung Connolly, as if he had been sent to the children’s table. Sometime during the technical crises and the drought regulations and the personal tantrums, Oppenheimer had been to Washington and watched while someone drew a target circle around a city. Already decided.

“You don’t think it would work,” Connolly said tentatively.

“They’re fanatics,” Oppenheimer said flatly. “If it’s a dud, we’d actually end up prolonging the war.”

“You don’t believe that—that it’s a dud.”

“I don’t know. Nobody does. Right now all we’ve got are numbers on paper. Numbers on paper. Yes?” he said to his secretary, who’d appeared in the door.

“General Groves on the line for you.”

Connolly made a sign question—
Do you want me to go?
—but Oppenheimer waved his hand dismissively and pointed to the chair.

“One minute,” he mumbled and picked up the phone, turning his body halfway to the left, creating the privacy of an imaginary booth. “General. Yes, thanks. It’s the lens castings—hairline cracks, even a few bubbles. I don’t know what the hell they thought they were doing. We’ve got accuracy to one thirtieth and we need one three-hundredth just to be safe. We’re going to need a few more days.” A burst of talk from the other end. “No, it’s not just a snag,” Oppenheimer said waspishly. “It’s a problem. I’ve got Kisty working on it now. He’s down there himself. He might make it, he might not.” Another burst. “I don’t think you understand. He’s working with dentist drills and tweezers and anything he can lay his hands on. Filling in the bubbles. Just to get one decent set of explosive lenses. Two more days.” His face, already drawn, seemed to grow even tighter as he listened to Groves’s reply. A dressing-down, Connolly guessed, or at least a frustrated sputtering. “I know we’ve moved it once already.” And then he didn’t speak again, staring out the window at the Tech Area as Groves went on. He’d clearly not expected an argument or he wouldn’t have asked Connolly to stay, and now he was stuck with an audience.

Connolly stood up and walked over to study the photos on the wall. With Lawrence at the Berkeley cyclotron. A group shot of the Tech Area division heads. Eisler looked straight at the camera, his eyes dreamy and benign.

Finally Oppenheimer was giving in. “Well, that’s that, then. We’ll do what we can. No, I understand. It’s a risk—you should know that. Yes, the sixteenth. You’ll be here, I assume.” And then he was putting down the receiver, still looking out the window.

“The President wants to tell the Russians at the meeting in Germany,” he said, partly to himself.

“But they already know.”

“They don’t know that we know they know,” he said, toying with it, a word game. “For that matter, what
do
they know? Only that we’re trying. He wants to tell them we’ve done it. At the meeting. Ready or not. So we’ll be ready.”

“Why at the meeting?”

Oppenheimer shrugged. “To give him some height at the table, I suppose.”

“But if they already know—”

Oppenheimer turned to face him. “The President doesn’t know that, remember? Nobody does.
You
know it, if you can prove it. Can you do that before they sit down at Potsdam?”

Connolly said nothing.

Oppenheimer smiled. “But they’re sitting down anyway. So there’s your deadline too.”

“It’s out of my hands at this point, you know.”

Oppenheimer nodded. “Mine too.” He turned to the papers on his desk. “And I still have a picnic to get to. They’ll want a speech. What is it now, a hundred and sixty-nine years? What do you do with a number like that? We were supposed to be having the test today, not eating watermelon and making speeches. History will have to wait a little. Today we deal with cookouts. That was the good general’s thought for today—no cookouts. The whole mesa’s dry as dust. A spark would do it. I suppose he’s got visions of the whole project going up in flames because of one Fourth of July hot dog. I have to say, the man thinks of everything. One minute international conferences, the next lemonade and egg salad. So. Now we’ve got campfire patrol.” He looked up, as if he’d noticed Connolly for the first time. “Anyway, what was it you wanted?”

“You wanted to see me.”

Oppenheimer looked puzzled for a moment, then, remembering, frowned. “Yes, right.” He lit another cigarette. “About this trip.”

“Thanks for the Pullman.”

Oppenheimer frowned again. “I know this is none of my business.”

“You want a report? I thought we agreed to keep you in the dark till we had something.”

“I don’t mean that,” Oppenheimer said quickly. “I thought this trip was work.”

“It was.”

“You didn’t tell me you were taking a lady. I hear you’re quite a dancer.”

“You’re right,” Connolly said evenly, “it’s none of your business.”

“It is when you’re carrying on with one of the scientists’ wives. That’s all we need right now—a jealous husband. I’m surprised at you.”

“The trip was work. She was part of it.”

Oppenheimer raised his eyebrows. “Is that the truth?”

“Yes.”

“Are you trying to tell me there’s nothing going on?”

“No,” Connolly said, meeting his stare. “I didn’t say that.”

“I see.” Oppenheimer put down the paper in his hand. “It wouldn’t be the first time, you know. Put people together and there’s always a certain amount of interest generated. You have to expect that. You have to expect trouble, too. He’s a good man.”

“I’ve met him.”

“And that didn’t deter you in the slightest.” Connolly paused. “No.”

Oppenheimer smiled. “At least you’re honest. I guess. May I ask what she’s got to do with all this?”

“If you ask, I’ll tell you, but I’d rather you didn’t ask. Not yet.”

Oppenheimer put out his cigarette. “I used to know everything that went on here. Looks like I wasn’t as well informed as I thought. Murder. Adultery. A vipers’ nest, it turns out. Cookouts.”

“You’re forgetting espionage.”

“Yes,” Oppenheimer said, looking at him, “how could I forget that?” He picked up the paper again. “Now what do I do with this? ‘Dereliction of duty. Misuse of government funds. Authorized travel for personal purposes. Sexual’—what do they call it?” He referred to the paper. “ ‘Sexual indiscretions with project personnel.’ Indiscretions.”

“Ignore it. You’re a busy man.”

“Not half as busy as you, it seems. I can’t ignore a security request. They want you out of here.”

“They’re just blowing smoke. Ignore them.”

“They won’t let up, you know.”

“You take your friends in security too seriously,” Connolly said, thinking of the young scientist and his meeting.

“My friends,” Oppenheimer said. “You seem to think they’re a joke. Did you know they refused to give me a clearance until Groves personally vouched for me? Me. Did you know they still investigate my old associates, my family? They’ve put my brother through hell.” He saw the look in Connolly’s eyes. “But you knew that. He was a member of the party at Stanford. Given that, we both must be disloyal. They keep my file active—they never close it. So I’ve learned to be a little sensitive about our friends. I try not to annoy them.”

Connolly got up. “The lady in question helped me make contact with someone I hope will lead to Karl’s killer. The money was mine. She shared my hotel room, but I was sleeping there anyway. Our friends in security think we were off on a toot and it’s just what I want them to think. You’re not buying any favors with them, you know. You’ll always scare them. You’re everything they’re not.”

Oppenheimer was quiet for a minute, then smiled faintly, a tic. “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

“A small one.”

“You want me to vouch for you, then.”

“Groves vouched for you.”

“You forget I have a certain amount of responsibility to keep this project secure.”

“So did Groves.”

Oppenheimer paused. “So he did,” he said, taking the paper and letting it flutter to the wastebasket. “Now will you do something for me? Keep your indiscretions discreet, will you? This particular husband is too valuable right now to be worrying about his wife.”

“I don’t think he knows. He’s at Trinity most of the time.”

Oppenheimer started and then jotted something down. “Thank you for reminding me. I almost forgot about the cables.”

“Cables?”

“Coaxial cables. The rats are chewing the wires at the site. We have to patrol the whole damn desert floor now, night and day. Miles of wire. It’s got everybody jumpy.” He caught Connolly’s look. “Sorry, what were we saying?”

“Nothing. I was going to be more discreet.”

“Yes, that’s right.” Oppenheimer paused. “Be careful. They usually do know.”

“Who?”

“Kitty was married when we met. We thought her husband didn’t know, but he did.”

Connolly looked up at him, surprised, then let it go. “You ought to get some sleep,” he said.

“Everybody says that, but nobody tells me how.”

The whole mesa seemed on edge, like some extension of Oppenheimer’s nervous system. Connolly had come back west with a sense of relief—the high, dry air was the air he breathed now—but the Hill had changed. It was curiously deserted, with hundreds gone to the test site and the usual traffic at the gates slowed by travel restrictions. Los Alamos was left to bake in the arid July air. The grass had long since dried up, the little patch gardens scraggly and cracked. Children, out of school, played ball in a swirl of dust. Mothers spread blankets over bare dirt for impromptu picnics or sat in the shade of the hutments and prefab houses, fanning themselves. Without being told, they knew something was about to happen. Lab windows were bright all night. With so many gone, the summer should have been quiet and lethargic. Instead, it was anxious, wide awake, as if everyone were waiting for forest fires to break out.