Day After Tomorrow

“Because he claimed he’d submitted the same formula to the same agency a full eighteen months earlier and they’d turned him down.”

“Had he?”

“Probably.”

Larry didn’t get it. “Then why’d they turn him down?”

Sam said, “Oh, the government boys had a good alibi. Crackpots turn up all over the place and you have to brush them off. Every cellar scientist who comes along and says he’s got a new super-fuel developed from old coffee grounds can’t be given the welcome mat. Something was wrong with Self’s math or something and they didn’t pay much attention to him. They wouldn’t even let him demonstrate it. But it was the same formula, all right.”

Larry Woolford was scowling. Science wasn’t his cup of tea. He said, “Something wrong with his math? What kind of a degree does he have?”

Sam grinned in memory. “I got a good quote on that. He doesn’t have any degree. He said he learned to read by the time he’d reached high school and since then he figured spending time in classrooms was a matter of interfering with his education.”

“No wonder they turned him down. He sounds like a weird to me. No degree at all. You can’t get anywhere in science like that.”

Sam said, “The courts rejected his suit but he got a certain amount of support here and there. Peter Voss, over at the university, claims he’s one of the great intuitive scientists, whatever that is, of our generation.”

“Who said that?”

“Professor Voss. Not that it makes a great deal of difference what he says. Another crackpot. A weird if there ever was one.”

Larry wound it up. “Okay. Thanks, Sam. Take care. You worry me with all the boozing you do.”

Sam snorted. After his less than handsome face was gone from the phone screen, Larry walked back to the bar with his empty glass and stared at the mixer for several minutes. He began to build himself another flip, but cut it short in the middle, put down the ingredients and went back to the phone to dial Records again.

He went through first the brief and then the full dossier on Professor Peter Luther Voss. Aside from his academic accomplishments, particularly in the fields of political economy and international law, and the dozen or so books accredited to him, there wasn’t anything particularly noteworthy. A bachelor in his fifties. No criminal record of any kind, of course, and no military career. No known political affiliations. Evidently a strong predilection for Thorsten Veblen’s theories. And he’d been a friend of Henry Mencken in his youth, back when that old nonconformist was tearing down contemporary society seemingly largely for the fun involved in the tearing.

On the face of it, the man was no radical, and the term “crackpot” which Sam had applied was hardly called for.

Larry Woolford went back to the bar and resumed the job of building his own version of a rum flip.

But his heart wasn’t in it. The Professor, Susan had said.

IX

Ilya Simonov entered the United States quite openly. He landed at the International Supersonic Airport, built in the ocean ten miles off the coast of New York. He was dressed in mufti and his passport was completely correct, up too and including both photograph and fingerprints, save that he used his second name, Alex, rather than Ilya.

It was a diplomatic passport, which, of course, was immediately noticed by the Immigrations inspector who said, “Welcome to the United States, Mr. Simonov. In what capacity are you assigned to your Embassy?”

“Military attach e,” Ilya Simonov said easily. “I shall clear my position, of course, as soon as I arrive in Greater Washington and complete my accreditation.”

“Of course.” The other stamped the Soviet Complex passport and returned it to its owner. “I hope you enjoy America, sir,” he said politely.

Simonov nodded his thanks. “Certainly. I have been here before, you know.” He didn’t bother to add that the last time he had spent some months in jail as a Russian spy.

He took the regular shuttle jet-helio to Long Island and then a jet plane to Greater Washington, without bothering to go into New York City, a place he loathed. The supersonic planes which crossed the Atlantic were not allowed over the mainland of the United States, the sonic bomb aspects of the craft having never been licked. It seemed a bit complicated, but it still saved time. One flew to England, took a ferry plane or hoverboat out to the supersonic airport anchored half way between England and France off Brighton. There one took the supersonic to the airport anchored off Long Island, and from there the jet-helio to New York, or, if one was going elsewhere than New York, to the airport. In spite of all the switching about, one still saved considerable time over the old transatlantic jet planes.

Ilya was mildly amused and a bit proud of the fact that the supersonic planes were Russian in origin. The United States had never caught up in the race for ultra-speed. But, for that matter, it hadn’t particularly tried.

At the airport of Greater Washington, he hired a hover-car and drove out to the Soviet Complex Embassy to the southwest of town, an area that accommodated most of the larger embassies. There was no difficulty anywhere along the way.

At the embassy entrance he received no more than a quick passing scrutiny on the part of the two American plainclothesmen stationed there. Such was fame, he thought wryly. Here he was, supposedly the most notorious operative of the Chrezvychainija Komissiya, penetrating the capital city of his nation’s most powerful rival as easily as if he had been a tourist. He wondered if it was equally as easy for an American agent of, say, the C.I.A. to penetrate Moscow.

At the reception desk in the large and overly ornate entrada, Ilya Simonov identified himself and asked to see the ambassador as soon as possible. Evidently, the clerk had heard of the famous hatchetman of Minister Blagonravov. He made quick motions with his hands and spoke into a phone screen.

He said, “Just a moment, Comrade Colonel.”

“Of course,” Simonov said patiently.

A nattily dressed embassy official came hurrying out. He introduced himself and said, “We received word of your arrival, Comrade Simonov, on the scrambler. You’ve been assigned an apartment on the third floor. Your bags…?”

“Bag,” Ilya Simonov said. “It’s out in the car.”

“I’ll send a man for it immediately. Would you like me to show you up to your quarters? I assume you’d like to freshen up?”

“I cleaned up in the aircraft,” Simonov said. “I’d like to see the ambassador immediately. I haven’t the slightest idea of how long I’ll be able to be here before my cover is blown, and I wish to get to work.”

“Of course, Comrade Colonel Simonov. Would you come this way? I’ve already notified the ambassador of your arrival.”

Simonov followed him down a hall for a short distance, to a heavy wooden door which the other rapped upon. It opened and Ilya Simonov strode through into the large office. The ambassador was behind a king-sized antique desk which looked as though it had probably been shipped over from Russia and probably went back to Czarist days. He came to his feet on the entrance of the secret police agent and came around the desk to shake hands energetically.

He was, Ilya Simonov had found out, Leonid Mikoyan, son of one of the few Old Bolsheviks who hadn’t been purged by Stalin. Leonid Mikoyan owed his position, which he reputedly was incompetent to hold down, to the fact that being the son of an Old Bolshevik in the Soviet Complex was a status symbol unrivaled. At the age of nine he had become a Young Pioneer, another status symbol in Russia; you were a nobody if, as a child, you had not been a Young Pioneer. At the age of fourteen he became a member of the Young Communist League, attaining more merit in the eyes of the elite. And at the age of twenty-six he was made a full fledged party member. One attains little in the way of position in the Soviet Complex, no matter how competent, unless he is a member of the Party. The