a widow, and Jake, beloved Jake, dead in space.
«Mrs. Jake Pemberton?»
«Yes, yes! Go ahead.» Another wait – had she sent him away in a bad temper, reckless, his judgment affected? Had he died out there, remembering only that she fussed at him for leaving her to go to work? Has she failed him when he needed her? She knew that her Jake could not be tied to apron strings; men – grown-up men, not mammas' boys – had to break away from mother's apron strings. Then why had she tried to tie him to hers? – she had known better; her own mother had warned her not to try it.
She prayed.
Then another voice, one that weakened her knees with relief: «That you, honey?»
«Yes, darling, yes! What are you doing on the Moon?»
«It's a long story. At a dollar a second it will keep. What I want to know is – are you willing to come to Luna City?»
It was Jake's turn to suffer from the inevitable lag in reply. He wondered if Phyllis were stalling, unable to make up her mind. At last he heard her say, «Of course, darling. When do I leave?»
«When – say, don't you even want to know
She started to say that it did not matter, then said, «Yes, tell me.» The lag was still present but neither of them cared. He told her the news, then added, «Run over to the Springs and get Olga Pierce to straighten out the red tape for you. Need my help to pack?»
She thought rapidly. Had he meant to come back anyhow, he would not have asked. «No. I can manage.»
«Good girl. I'll radiostat you a long letter about what to bring and so forth. I love you. 'Bye now!»
«Oh, I love you, too. Goodbye, darling.»
Pemberton came out of the booth whistling. Good girl, Phyllis. Staunch. He wondered why he had ever doubted her.
The Long Watch
«Nine ships blasted off from Moon Base. Once in space, eight of them formed a globe around the smallest. They held this formation all the way to Earth.
«The small ship displayed the insignia of an admiral – yet there was no living thing of any sort in her. She was not even a passenger ship, but a drone, a robot ship intended for radioactive cargo. This trip she carried nothing but a lead coffin – and a Geiger counter that was never quiet.»
–from the editorial
film 38, 17 June 2009, Archives of the
I
Johnny Dahlquist blew smoke at the Geiger counter. He grinned wryly and tried it again. His whole body was radioactive by now. Even his breath, the smoke from his cigarette, could make the Geiger counter scream.
How long had he been here? Time doesn't mean much on the Moon. Two days? Three? A week? He let his mind run back: the last clearly marked time in his mind was when the Executive Officer had sent for him, right after breakfast —
«Lieutenant Dahlquist, reporting to the Executive Officer.» Colonel Towers looked up. «Ah, John Ezra. Sit down, Johnny. Cigarette?»
Johnny sat down, mystified but nattered. He admired Colonel Towers, for his brilliance, his ability to dominate, and for his battle record. Johnny had no battle record; he had been commissioned on completing his doctor's degree in nuclear physics and was now junior bomb officer of Moon Base.
The Colonel wanted to talk politics; Johnny was puzzled. Finally Towers had come to the point; it was not safe (so he said) to leave control of the world in political hands; power must be held by a scientifically selected group. In short – the Patrol.
Johnny was startled rather than shocked. As an abstract idea, Towers' notion sounded plausible. The League of Nations had folded up; what would keep the United Nations from breaking up, too, and thus lead to another World War. «And you know how bad such a war would be, Johnny.»
Johnny agreed. Towers said he was glad that Johnny got the point. The senior bomb officer could handle the work, but it was better to have both specialists.
Johnny sat up with a jerk. «You are going to
Towers smiled. «We're not politicians; we don't just talk. We act.»
Johnny whistled. «When does this start?»
Towers nipped a switch. Johnny was startled to hear his own voice, then identified the recorded conversation as having taken place in the junior officers' messroom. A political argument he remembered, which he had walked out on ... a good thing, too! But being spied on annoyed him.
Towers switched it off. «We
«Huh? I thought he was on watch.»
«Kelly's watch-standing days are over. Oh, relax; he isn't hurt.»
Johnny thought this over. «Which list am I on?» he asked. «Safe or unsafe?»
«Your name has a question mark after it. But I have said all along that you could be depended on.» He grinned engagingly. «You won't make a liar of me, Johnny?»
Dahlquist didn't answer; Towers said sharply, «Come now – what do you think of it? Speak up.»
«Well, if you ask me, you've bitten off more than you can chew. While it's true that Moon Base controls the Earth, Moon Base itself is a sitting duck for a ship. One bomb –
Towers picked up a message form and handed it over; it read: I HAVE YOUR CLEAN LAUNDRY – ZACK. «That means every bomb in the
«The control frequencies?»
«Naturally. We don't want the bombs jammed before they reach their targets.»
«What? You said the idea was to
Towers brushed it aside. «There won't be a war – just a psychological demonstration, an unimportant town or two. A little bloodletting to save an all-out war. Simple arithmetic.»
He put a hand on Johnny's shoulder. «You aren't squeamish, or you wouldn't be a bomb officer. Think of it as a surgical operation. And think of your family.»
Johnny Dahlquist had been thinking of his family. «Please, sir, I want to see the Commanding Officer.»
Towers frowned. «The Commodore is not available. As you know, I speak for him. See me again – after lunch.»
The Commodore was decidedly not available; the Commodore was dead. But Johnny did not know that.
Dahlquist walked back to the messroom, bought cigarettes, sat down and had a smoke. He got up, crushed out the butt, and headed for the Base's west airlock. There he got into his space suit and went to the lockmaster. «Open her up, Smitty.»
The marine looked surprised. «Can't let anyone out on the surface without word from Colonel Towers, sir. Hadn't you heard?»
«Oh, yes! Give me your order book.» Dahlquist took it, wrote a pass for himself, and signed it «by direction of Colonel Towers.» He added, «Better call the Executive Officer and check it.»
The lockmaster read it and stuck the book in his pocket. «Oh, no, Lieutenant. Your word's good.»
«Hate to disturb the Executive Officer, eh? Don't blame you.» He stepped in, closed the inner door, and waited for the air to be sucked out.
Out on the Moon's surface he blinked at the light and hurried to the track-rocket terminus; a car was waiting. He squeezed in, pulled down the hood, and punched the starting button. The rocket car flung itself at the hills, dived through and came out on a plain studded with projectile rockets, like candles on a cake. Quickly it dived into a second tunnel through more hills. There was a stomach-wrenching deceleration and the car stopped at the underground atom-bomb armory.
