That mulish look was back on her face, that look which said Gard was talking trash Bobbi would just as soon not hear.
“Look,” Gardener said, “I'm with you on at least one thing, all the way. This is the biggest, most important, utterly mind-blowing thing that's ever happened. When it comes out, the headlines in the New York Times are going to make it look like the National Enquirer. People are going to change their fucking religions over this, do you know it?”
“Yes. I
“This isn't a powderkeg; it's an A-bomb. Do you know that?”
“Yes,” Anderson said again.
“Then get that pissed-off look off your face. If we're going to talk about it, let's fucking talk about it.”
Anderson sighed. “Yeah. Okay. Sorry.”
“I admit I was wrong about calling the Air Force.”
They spoke together, then laughed together, and that was good.
Still smiling, Gard said: “Something has to be done.”
“I'll buy that,” Anderson said.
“But, Bobbi, Jesus! I flunked chemistry and barely got through funnybook physics. I don't know exactly, but I do know it's got to be… well… damped out, or something.”
“We need some experts.”
“That's right!” Gardener said, seizing on it. “Experts.”
“Gard, all the experts do forensic work for the Dallas Police.”
Gardener threw his hands up in disgust.
“Now that you're here, I'll be all right. I know it.”
“It's more likely to go the other way. Next thing, I'll start having blackouts.” Anderson said: “I think the risk might be worth it.”
“You've decided already, haven't you?”
“I've decided what I want to do, yeah. What I want to do is keep quiet about it and finish the dig. Digging it all the way out shouldn't even be necessary. I think that once I-once we, I hope-can free it to a depth of another forty or fifty feet, we could come to a hatchway. If we can get inside…” Bobbi's eyes gleamed and Gardener felt an answering excitement rise in his own chest at the thought. All the doubts in the world could not hold back that excitement.
“If we can get inside?” Gardener repeated.
“If we can get inside, we can get at the controls. And if we can do that, I'm going to fly that fucker right out of the ground.”
“You think you can do that?”
“I know I can.”
“And then?”
“Then I don't know,” Bobbi said, shrugging. It was the best, most efficient lie she had told so far… but Gardener thought it was a lie. “The next thing will happen, that's all I know.”
“But you say it's my decision to make.”
“Yes, I do. As far as the outside world goes, all I can do is continue to not tell. If you decide you will, well, what could I do to stop you? Shoot you with Uncle Frank's shotgun? I couldn't. Maybe a character in one of my books could, but I couldn't. This, unfortunately, is real life, where there are no real answers. I guess in real life I'd just stand here watching you go.
“But whoever you called, Gard-scientists from the university up in Orono, biologists from Jennings Labs, physicists from MIT-whoever you called, it would turn out you'd actually called the Dallas Police. You'd have people coming in here with trucks full of barbed wire and men with guns.” She smiled a little. “At least I wouldn't have to go to that police- state Club Med alone.”
“No?”
“No. You're in it now too. When they flew me out there, you'd be right beside me in the next seat.” The wan smile broadened, but there still wasn't much humor in it. “Welcome to the monkey-house, my friend. Aren't you glad you came?”
“Charmed,” Gardener said, and suddenly they were both laughing.
When the laughter passed, Gardener found that the atmosphere in Bobbi's kitchen had eased considerably.
Anderson asked: “What do you think would happen to the ship if the Dallas Police got hold of it?”
“Have you ever heard of Hangar 18?” Gard asked.
“No.
“According to the stories, Hangar 18's supposed to be part of an Air Force base outside of Dayton. Or Dearborn. Or somewhere. Anywhere, USA. It's where they're supposed to have the bodies of about five little men with fishy faces and gills on their necks. Saucerians. It's just one of those stories you hear, like how somebody found a rat head in his fast- food burger, or how there are alligators in the New York sewers. Only now I sort of wonder if it is a fairy tale. But I think that would be the end.”
“Can I tell you one of those modern fairy tales, Gard?”
“Lay it on me.”
“Have you ever beard the one,” she asked, “about the guy who invented a pill to take the place of gasoline?”
The sun was going down in a bright blaze of reds and yellows and purples. Gardener sat on a big stump in Bobbi Anderson's back yard, watching it go. They had talked most of the afternoon, sometimes discussing, sometimes reasoning, sometimes arguing. Bobbi had ended the palaver by declaring herself ravenous again. She made a huge pot of spaghetti and broiled some thick pork chops. Gardener had followed her out into the kitchen, wanting to reopen the discussion -thoughts were rolling around in his mind like balls on a pool table. Anderson wouldn't allow it. She offered Gardener a drink, which Gardener, after a long, thoughtful pause, took. The whiskey went down good, and felt good, but he seemed to have no need for a second-well, no great need. Now, sitting here full of food and drink and looking at the sky, he supposed Bobbi had been right. They'd done all the constructive talking there was to do.
It was decision-time.
Bobbi had eaten a tremendous supper. “You're gonna puke, Bobbi,” Gardener said. He was serious but still couldn't help laughing.
“Nope,” Bobbi said placidly. “Never felt better.” She burped. “In Portugal, that's a compliment to the cook.”
“And after a good lay -'Gard lifted one leg and broke wind. Bobbi laughed gustily.
They did the dishes ('Haven't invented anything to do this yet, Bobbi?” “It'll come, give me time. “) and then they went into the small, drab living room, which hadn't changed much since the time of Bobbi's uncle, to watch the evening news. None of it was very good. The Middle East was smoldering again, with Israel flying air-strikes against Syrian ground forces in Lebanon (and hitting a school by accident -Gardener winced at the pictures of burned, screaming children), the Russians driving against the mountain strongholds of the Afghan rebels, a coup in South America.
In Washington, the NRC had issued a list of ninety nuclear facilities in thirty-seven states with safety problems ranging from “moderate to serious.”
Moderate to serious, great, Gardener thought, feeling the old impotent rage stir and twist, biting into him like acid. If we lose Topeka, that's moderate. If we lose New York, that's serious.
He became aware that Bobby was looking at him a little sadly. “The beat goes on, right?” she said.
“Right.”
When the news was over, Anderson told Gardener she was going to bed.
“At seven-thirty?”
“I'm still bushed.” And she looked it.
“Okay. I'll sack out myself pretty soon. I'm tired, too. It's been a crazy couple of days, but I'm not completely sure I'd sleep, the way the stuff is whizzing around in my head.”
“You want a Valium?”
He smiled. “I saw they were still there. I'll pass. You were the one who could have used a trank or two, last couple of weeks.”
The State of Maine's price for going along with Nora's decision not to press charges was that Gardener should go into a counseling program. The program had lasted six months; the Valium was apparently going to go on forever. Gardener hadn't actually taken any in almost three years, but every now and then-usually when he was going traveling-he filled the prescription. Otherwise, some computer might burp out his name and a psychologist picking up a few extra bucks courtesy of the State of Maine might drop by to make sure his head was staying shrunk to a suitable size.
After she was in bed, Gardener had turned off the TV and sat a while in Bobbi's rocker, reading The Buffalo Soldiers. In a short time, he heard her snoring away. Gardener supposed Bobbi's snores would also be part of a conspiracy to keep him awake, but he didn't really mind-Bobbi had always snored, the price of a deviated septum, and that had always annoyed Gardener, but he had discovered last night that some things were worse. The ghastly silence in which she had slept on the couch, for instance. That was much worse.
Gardener had poked his head in for a moment, had seen Bobbi in a much more typical Bobbi Anderson sleeping posture, naked except pajama bottoms, small breasts bare, blankets kicked into disarray between her legs, one hand curled under her cheek, the other by her face, her thumb almost in her mouth. Bobbi was okay.
So Gardener had come out here to make his decision.
Bobbi's patch of garden was going great guns-the corn was taller than any Gardener had seen on his way north from Arcadia Beach, and her tomatoes were going to be blue ribbon winners. Some of them would have come to the knees of a man walking down the row. In the middle of it all was a cluster of giant sunflowers, ominous as triffids, nodding in the slight breeze.
When Bobbi asked him if he'd ever heard of the so-called “gasoline pill,” Gardener had smiled and nodded. More twentieth-century fairy tales, all right. She'd then asked him if he believed it. Gardener, still smiling, said no. Bobbi reminded him about Hangar 18.
“Are you saying you do believe there's such a pill? Or was? Something you'd just drop into your gas tank and run on all day?”
