The Big Eye (10 page)

"Yeah," said Bernie. "If they hit us with a blast. But they won't."

 

 

"What do you mean?"

 

 

"The Russians are too smart for that. They got something else up their
sleeve. Radiation."

 

 

The proprietor was fascinated. "Radiation?"

 

 

Bernie nodded knowingly. "Radiation. That's it. That's the payoff. I
was reading a piece in the Daily News before all the papers folded up
in town," he said. "It was something one of these big-shot scientists
said, Sara. He said there's no place that's safe any more. Not even the
mountains. Nowhere. And all on account of radiation."

 

 

"How do you mean?" Sam was suddenly worried.

 

 

"Here." The man named Bernie took a torn sheet of newspaper from his
pocket. "I got the clipping right here." He spread it on the fountain
top. "Listen to what it says at the end."

 

 

Bernie paused for a moment, then read the final paragraph slowly.
"'In any case, there is no defense against these lethal particles, no
place of escape. There is no cave too deep to hide away, no mountaintop
too high or remote. As long as men must breathe air and Nature provides
winds, the hmnan being, no matter how fast he runs or to what destination,
is helplessly and pathetically vulnerable.'"

 

 

The man at the counter folded the clipping, his fingers trembling,
and thrust it into his pocket. The bald head of the proprietor, Sam,
was shiny with perspiration, and there was agony in the eyes behind the
thick lenses. It was easy to see what he was thinking. People breathe
air in the Catskills; the winds blow there too. . . .

 

 

"Christ," someone said, breaking the silence. "Christ, what a world!"

 

 

Amen, thought David, watching through the window.

 

 

The conversation turned to rumors. Everybody had heard a rumor. A fat
man with a mottled face said:

 

 

"I heard that they stopped the salt-water fishing fleets from going out
and won't let anyone sell any more deep-sea fish."

 

 

"Yeah?" Bemie wanted to know. "Why?"

 

 

"They think maybe the Reds dropped a lot of pills in the Atlantic and
the Pacific, near the coasts. Made the fish radioactive. Lights 'em up
inside like Christmas candles. Eat 'em -- and good-by!"

 

 

"That's a new one on me," said a man thumbing through a magazine on the
wall rack. "Remind me to eat hamburgers from now on."

 

 

"God," said the proprietor, finally joining the discussion again. "I
had fish last night -- mackerel."

 

 

The fat man laughed harshly. "I hope your wife doesn't divorce you, Sam."

 

 

"What do you mean, Paul? Why should she?"

 

 

"Once you get these radioactive particles in you, they tell me, you're
no good in bed. A lot of guys working around this here plutonium stuff
found that out. So did their girl friends." He grinned at the others
and turned back to Sara. "But I wouldn't worry about it, Sam. You're no
kid. You've had your fun."

 

 

No one grinned back. The would-be humorist said good-by and eased his
huge bulk through the door.

 

 

The proprietor was still worried. "How do we know what's going on right
now? Maybe we're all standing here and breathing in this stuff now,
without knowing it. How about it, Bernie? How do we know we ain't
radioactive right here and now?"

 

 

"One thing's sure," said the man with the magazine. "None of us have
any Geiger counters. We couldn't tell if we wanted to."

 

 

"Maybe you guys can't" said Bernie. "But I can."

 

 

They looked at him curiously, and he drew a small camera from his
pocket. It was the ordinary and popular type which developed film within
the camera itself, after a few moments of waiting.

 

 

He held up the camera to the others. "I got my own Geiger counter right
here," he said triumphantly. "If you did a lot of reading up on this
radiation stuff like I have, you'd know film can give you the tip-off."

 

 

They watched him hypnotically. The man called Bernie, now a savant,
savored his moment.

 

 

"Like to see whether there's any radiation around right now?"

 

 

They pushed in close to him without replying, their faces tense. David
moved in with the others, as interested as anyone else, already knowing
what the man was up to, knowing that the camera was capable of indicating,
at that moment, life or possible death.

 

 

Bernie did not touch the shutter. Instead, with the air of a demonstrator
before a spellbound audience, he pressed the developer button and pulled
out a paper tab. He ticked off the seconds on his wrist watch as the
developing reagent worked on the unexposed film within.

 

 

Finally, with a flourish, he opened the back of the camera and took out
the print.

 

 

The print was clear.

 

 

"Well, gents," said Bernie impressively, "we're still okay. There's no
radiation around. Y'see, if there was, it'd go right through the camera
like X rays and fog up the film. If this picture came out all fogged up,
brother, we'd be in trouble."

 

 

There was a moment of silence.

 

 

Then someone said: "You've got something there, mister. But won't you
find out a little late? What I mean is, if the picture's fogged, you'd
already be radioactive, wouldn't you?"

 

 

"Yeah," agreed Bernie. "No getting around that. The question is: how
much would you be lit up inside? They tell me you can take a certain
amount without dying. But the minute you see any fogging at all -- that's
the time to scram."

 

 

"Scram where?" asked Sam.

 

 

Bernie shrugged. There was no answer to that one. Still, the men in the
candy store seemed impressed. It was something to know whether you were
dying or not, even if it might be too late. Automatically their eyes
strayed to a case in back of the cigar counter, where there was a stock
of film. The proprietor took out a fistful of the rectangular yellow
boxes and stuffed them into his pockets. The others quickly bought the
rest of his stock.

 

 

David turned toward the window again, watching for the Army car.
Bernie's demonstration had been a simple but familiar one. Back at
Palomar he had seen the effect of radiation on sensitive film many
times. There were other ways to detect it, of course: by the comet's
tail of ionized particles in what was called a Wilson cloud chamber;
by the action of an electroscope in discharging; and of course by the
clicking of a Geiger counter.

 

 

But now, in David's mind, there was a serious doubt. Was the attack,
when and if it came, going to he atomic at all?

 

 

Back at Palomar General Hawthorne had been sure that it was something
else, something bigger, something perhaps on a cosmic scale. He had come
to Palomar to talk to the Old Man personally, so strong was his belief,
so determined was he to recruit Dr. Dawson, the greatest of them all in
the affairs of the heavens. He had been convinced that the Russians had
a secret weapon and that they were applying it when it suited them, as
a series of steps to resolve the cold war and break the American morale
without entering a full-scale atomic battle.

 

 

If the Russians had something new, thought David, their use of it in
this respect made sense, from their point of view. The United States
was a rich land, and if the Reds could bring it down and exploit it
without too much damage, that would be to their benefit. The trouble
with a victorious radioactive attack was that it left nothing to the
victor. It was fatal, not only to humans, but to livestock and animals. It
polluted the waters and the crops, the buildings, and bridges, the very
land itself, contaminated it all with a coat of death. And in the end
it left nothing but a vast, desolate, and diseased waste, of no good to
the Russians or anyone else.

 

 

Suddenly, through the window of the candy store, David saw what he had
been watching for.

 

 

The olive-drab Army car came in view. Its siren was silent now, providing
no warning. It cruised down Broadway slowly, and David saw the soldiers
in it scanning both sides of the street.

 

 

He shrank back from the window guiltily, and the vehicle went by.

 

 

The skin prickled along his back. He was hunted now, and Hawthorne would
be the hunter. He was a fugitive, and there would be harsher names the
general would call him, deserter, saboteur, traitor. The brief case he
held burned hot in his hands.

 

 

The thought occurred to him that if General Hawthorne were informed
of his disappearance early enough, he, David, might be stopped at the
airport before he had a chance to take off.

 

 

He began to regret the decision he had made, almost wished he had
disregarded the Old Man's order to return to California without attending
the meeting.

 

 

At any rate, it was too late to do anything about it now. He had to get
out to Idlewild, and get there fast.

 

 

David opened the door and was just about to step out on the sidewalk when
a cab drew up to the curb. The driver got out and walked into the store,
leaving his motor running. David saw that there were two other men in
the cab, and for a moment he found it impossible to believe his luck.

 

 

The driver was buying cigarettes from the proprietor when David asked:

 

 

"Got room for one more?"

 

 

"I might," said the man. "Where you going, buddy?"

 

 

"Idlewild Airport." David tried hard to keep the eagerness out of his voice.

 

 

"That's a long way out of town, Buddy," said the driver, his blue eyes
studying David greedily. "Clean out to the end of Queens, and these days
there ain't any fares coming back. It'll cost you some dough."

 

 

"How much?"

 

 

"A hundred bucks," said the man casually.

 

 

David nodded. He had no disposition to haggle. He had the cash, and it
was worth everything for him to get to the airport in a hurry.

 

 

The driver stuck out his hand. "In advance, buddy."

 

 

David paid him, and as the man stuck the money in his pocket he said:

 

 

"I've got a couple of other guys to drop off first. Then we'll get going."

 

 

David squeezed into the back seat beside the other two men, and they
started to move down Broadway. The others showed no inclination to talk,
and David was grateful. He had a lot to think about.

 

 

First of all, he wondered how the Old Man was going to protect him when he
got back to Palomar. The Old Man was one of the world's great scientists,
a Nobel prize winner, a power in himself. But even Dr. Dawson couldn't
countermand an Army order and get away with it. Not these days.

 

 

It would take some kind of special magic, thought David grimly, to keep
him out of trouble now.

 

 

And then there was Carol. . . .

 

 

The cab stopped at Columbus Circle, and one of the men got out. Then
the driver swung east on Central Park South, toward Fifth venue.

 

 

As they were rounding Fifty-ninth Street into Fifth, at the Plaza,
it happened.

 

 

It began with a noise, a low, deep, rolling ominous rumble.

 

 

The rumble blended into a subterranean roar, a throaty booming sound.

 

 

"Christ!" yelled the driver. "What the hell is that?" He stopped the
cab in the middle of the street.

 

 

The booming continued, grew louder, echoed and re-echoed like an artillery
salvo. David, in that terrible moment of panic, had a single objective
moment, a flash of light on the lens of his eye. He saw a few pedestrians
on the avenue, standing still, frozen, listening, their faces blanched
with terror.

 

 

And then it came.

 

 

The street seemed suddenly to undulate in a slow wave.

 

 

The taxi began to shiver, then shake, then do a crazy, awful, lurching
dance. It tossed from side to side, like a mechanical toy, as David and
the others clung to their seats for dear life.

 

 

"It's the Reds," shouted the driver. "The goddamn Reds! They've hit
New York!"

 

 

The roaring became louder and was mixed with sharp snapping sounds,
as though great blocks of stone were being torn and ripped apart deep
underground.

 

 

The buildings started to sway, and dance, and shiver.

 

 

David watched, fascinated, in sweaty terror, unable to move, unable
to breathe. He saw whole panes of glass fall from the windows of the
Plaza Hotel, the Savoy-Plaza, Tiffany's, Plummer's. They fell in sheets,
in a great glassy, deadly rain, crashed to the street. He heard people
screaming, saw them running for building entrances. One man fell, his
head a mass of blood, almost decapitated by flying glass.

 

 

It thudded and smashed on the roof of the taxi, crashed against the cab
windows. The shatterproof glass of the vehicle bent back and cracked
but did not break.

 

 

The man sitting next to David suddenly screamed: "Let me out! Let me
out of here!"

 

 

David grabbed him, tried to keep him inside. The man's eyes were bulging
with fear, they were mad; his lips were flecked with saliva, his teeth
bared in an awful grin.