The Big Eye (7 page)

 

 

As such, he was an irritant to the staff wives in the colony, and they
had tried their hardest to marry him off, at least in the beginning.
They had invited "friends" up from Los Angeles or elsewhere for week
ends and thrown them into David's company.

 

 

Even Emily Dawson, the Old Man's wife, had made a special effort to
marry David off. The Dawsons were childless, and when she learned that
both David's parents were dead she had taken him under a motherly wing.
She had a niece in San Francisco, and she'd brought the girl to Palomar
just to meet him.

 

 

But the experiment had failed, and finally she had told David almost
reproachfully:

 

 

"I had hopes for you and Ann, David. It would have done my old heart
good to have you in the family. Why, I was even dreaming of a big wedding
right here in my own house." Then she had shaken her patrician head and
sighed. "I'm afraid you'll just have to bring this young lady, Carol,
back to Palomar here, before we all burst a collective blood vessel!"

 

 

Now that he thought of it, he had spent most of his time with Dr. and
Mrs. Dawson. It had been monastic, almost like living in a lighthouse
without a woman. But there was blood running in his veins, good red blood,
and sometimes, just before dawn, when the domed roof finally closed over
the Big Eye like a great halved eyelid, his need of Carol had become a
gnawing hunger.

 

 

Carol came in carrying a tray on which there was a bottle of scotch,
soda, and glasses filled with cylindrical tubes of ice. David looked at
the frozen cylinders curiously, then remembered seeing them advertised
in magazines. They were a feature of the latest refrigerators -- individual
frozen ice tubes instead of the old and clumsy cubes. You merely pressed
an ejector button in the refrigerator, and the ice tubes popped out,
one by one. They fitted into a glass very neatly, one to a drink.

 

 

They think of something new every minute, thought David a little
cynically.

 

 

Carol sat down beside him, gave him his drink. "How's His Eminence?"

 

 

"Who?"

 

 

"Dr. Dawson."

 

 

"Oh," grinned David. "Working his head off -- on something big."

 

 

"What is it?"

 

 

He shrugged. "I don't know. The Old Man's keeping this one close to
his chest."

 

 

"Poof!" She laughed at him. "I thought Dr. Dawson told you everything!"

 

 

He grinned back at her. "He usually does. But this time he hasn't
seen fit to consult me and get the benefit of my vast experience. He
never does till the job's all over." He put down his glass suddenly
and looked at her. "But never mind the Old Man. It's been a long time,
Carol. Come here."

 

 

They were in each other's arms again, and as David held her he thought,
The hell with it all, the cold war, and the dark city outside,
everything. It was bound to come; they could conceivably be blown up
tomorrow, or now, tonight, at this moment, when he held Carol close.
The world outside was complicated; you could worry yourself crazy just
thinking about it, living in it.

 

 

This was the stuff, this was the idea, the way to live while living
was good. A warm and comfortable room, the feel of a woman against your
chest, and in your arms, and on your mouth, the touch of warm, throbbing,
living flesh under the thin dress, the scent of her hair against your
face, the sound of her tiny moans in your ear, the leaping, exciting
hope that tonight, maybe tonight . . .

 

 

The phone rang.

 

 

It jangled with a kind of obscene insistence. It was an intruder there,
unwelcome, coarse, inconsiderate. They did not stir, but it would not
go away.

 

 

It rang again, and again, and again.

 

 

"David," whispered Carol. "David, let me go."

 

 

He released her finally, and she arose a little unsteadily. She smoothed
her dress and walked toward the phone, and as she did, David thought
shakily, She's lovely, she's wonderful. Everything about her -- the way
she walked, the way she talked with that low, husky voice of hers, the
pale skin, the oval face, the way her jet-black hair was brushed up and
back over her head, and her mouth, luscious and full.

 

 

Carol lifted the receiver, said: "Hello." She listened for a moment,
and then:

 

 

"Dr. Hughes? Yes, he's here." She held the phone toward David. "It's
long distance. Palomar calling."

 

 

"Palomar?"

 

 

He rose from the couch, suddenly worried. What had happened at the
observatory? Why did they want him now? As he came to the phone Carol
asked:

 

 

"How did they know you'd be here?"

 

 

"I told the steward he could locate me at your apartment, and if I wasn't
here you'd know where to find me." He took the phone and said:

 

 

"This is David Hughes."

 

 

The operator told him to wait a moment. He heard a crisscross of vague
filtered voices. Someone was trying to locate someone else in New York;
someone wanted a St. Louis number. The voices were remote and mysterious;
they began and were cut off abruptly, like disembodied wraiths.

 

 

David waited a full minute, then jiggled the receiver.

 

 

"Operator! Operator!"

 

 

The operator's voice came on again, told him to wait again, and he hung on
impatiently. He glanced at his watch. One o'clock. That would be ten on
the Coast. If it was clear, if the sky and seeing were good, the Old Man
should be taking settings now, with Bill Forrester at the pulpit. . . .

 

 

The operator came on suddenly:

 

 

"Here's your party."

 

 

It was Francis, the steward. His voice sounded shaky, agitated; it
was trembling.

 

 

"Dr. Hughes, Dr. Hughes!"

 

 

"Yes, Francis? This is Hughes. What?"

 

 

"Come back to Palomar at once. On the next plane. Dr. Daw- "

 

 

Francis's voice was suddenly snapped off abruptly. There was a buzz,
and the phone went dead. David swore, jiggled the receiver. The instrument
buzzed again and then cleared; the phone was alive again for just
an instant.

 

 

An operator spoke somewhere, very faint and very far away.

 

 

"Rio is ready for you, Palomar. Rio is waiting. We'll hold the Amsterdam
circuit until -- "

 

 

The operator's voice cut off. The phone went dead again.

 

 

What in hell was going on? thought David. Why were they calling Rio,
Amsterdam, and God knows where, all of a sudden?

 

 

And why did Francis tell him to come back? Before his voice had been
snatched off the circuit he had said something to David about the Old
Man. But the Old Man had sent him on this mission; the Old Man knew he
had to be at that meeting tomorrow morning, or else!

 

 

He got the New York operator, asked her to try Palomar, He told Carol
briefly what Francis had said, and then he began to worry.

 

 

"I don't like it, Carol," he said. "Francis sounded like a scared
rabbit. Maybe something's happened to the Old Man. His heart isn't any
too good -- angina -- carries around nitroglycerin pills. Mrs. Dawson packs a
vial of pills in every suit he's got, in his desk, and there's even a vial
of the stuff up in the observer's cage at the top of the Eye. But the Old
Man's pretty absent-minded; he's left 'em home more than once. And when
he needs one of those pills under his tongue, he needs it fast!" He shook
his head. "I don't know, Carol. He's been working his head off lately,
and the generals have been running him ragged, and maybe his heart -- maybe
he's had a collapse. Otherwise, why would Francis sound the way he did?"

 

 

"David, you mustn't fret like that." Carol came over and twined her arm
into his. "Perhaps it isn't Dr. Dawson at all. Those calls to Rio and
Amsterdam you just told me about -- maybe they mean something."

 

 

David jiggled the receiver, called for the operator. "This goddamned
phone," he raged. "First they cut me off, and then I can't even get
an operator!"

 

 

"The trouble's probably at the New York end, darling," said Carol.
"They've only got a skeleton crew working. Most of the switchboard girls
have left, and you can't blame them."

 

 

Finally an operator came on. She was maddeningly cahn. She told David
the circuits to California and to Palomar were busy. He begged her to
get him through. She was properly sympathetic but very professional.

 

 

"I'll call you when we make the connection," she told David.

 

 

He paced up and down the floor, jittery, confused. He had to get through
to Palomar, to get more details.

 

 

Francis had told him to come back, to take the first plane back. But there
was that all-important meeting in the morning at military headquarters,
wherever that was. He had some very important data in his brief case,
and his presence would immediately be missed.

 

 

He was, in short, under orders to be there. From General Hawthorne.
Maybe the Old Man was big enough to defy the top brass.

 

 

But he was only David Hughes.

 

 

And he could be slapped down, and hard, for not showing up at that
conclave. It could mean a drumhead trial, a prison, a firing squad,
maybe. In times like these they weren't too particular. The area between
the civil and the military had faded into a nebulous no man's land.

 

 

No matter how much the Old Man protested that David had returned to the
Coast under his, Dawson's, orders, an Army court would be sure to take
the simple and disastrous view that General Matt Hawthorne, four stars,
had ordered him to be there.

 

 

There was also another, and far more important, consequence.

 

 

Suppose the data in his brief case was valuable, really valuable?

 

 

Suppose the figures, diagrams, and conclusions, all neatly itemized on
paper in his brief case, proved the key on which the men at the meeting
made their decision?

 

 

Suppose, on the basis of what he was bringing to that all-important
meeting in the morning, they decided to throw any further caution out
of the window and strike at Russia immediately?

 

 

It was possible. It was horribly, damnably, and obviously possible that
he, David Hughes, might be carrying the match for the fuse there in that
shiny leather bag on Carol's table. By his not going to that meeting,
by his failing to present that data and interpret it for the group,
they might make a mistake and start the inferno.

 

 

Or, failing David's presence with vital information, they might make a
different mistake and hold their attack, when the sound decision would
be to strike. They might hold it a little too long, and the Soviet might
beat them to it.

 

 

At this moment, David realized miserably, at this hellish moment, he was
an unwilling giant on a world stage, carrying a hot torch he didn't want
and couldn't handle.

 

 

It was too much, he thought. It was too much to ask of any one man.
Even if the Old Man himself had asked him to come back.

 

 

But had he?

 

 

David didn't know, he wasn't sure. He didn't know whether the order for
his return had actually come from the Old Man, or whether something had
happened to Dr. Dawson, and Francis had called David on his own authority.

 

 

He turned suddenly to Carol. "Can I send a telegram out of New York?"

 

 

She shook her head. "The telegraph offices closed two weeks ago, David."

 

 

Then the only way to reach the Coast was by phone. The instrument lay on
its cradle now, a black and shiny demon, grinning at him. The operator
hadn't called him back. He yanked the phone up in a sweaty hand and
tried again.

 

 

"I'm sorry, sir," the operator said. "All circuits to California are
busy. I'll call you when we have one clear."

 

 

There was a faint note of irony in the operator's voice. She gave the
impression that he'd be lucky if they phoned him back by morning. David
frantically tried to explain that it was vital, an emergency.

 

 

She was sympathetic, she was sorry, but there was nothing she could do.
What with the evacuation, with every relative trying to call every other
relative, with most of the circuits already given over to the Army,
there was nothing she could do.

 

 

She could only keep trying.

 

 

David slammed down the receiver.

 

 

"Sit down, darling," Carol said soothingly. "Sit down. Try not to
worry for a while, David. Whatever it is, I'm sure everything will be
all right."

 

 

She didn't know about the meeting, she didn't know on what kind of hook
he was impaled. And he couldn't tell her. But she sat there, looking up
at him and holding a fresh drink toward him.

 

 

He took the drink, had another. And another. Then he went to the phone
and tried to get Palomar again.

 

 

The operator was very sorry. The circuits were still busy, and there
was no way of telling when they would be free. There was no point in
David's calling every ten minutes; she would call him when the lines
were open again.