biosphere no more than twelve miles deep.'
Cheryl took Chase's empty glass and went to make him a fresh drink. He watched her clunk the ice in and pour the whiskey while questions skittered through his mind. As she brought the drink to him, one question zinged out at a tangent and found expression. 'This is happening because of the decline in phytoplankton. So what's causing that?'
Theo Detrick roused himself. 'Not one specific thing, but a combination of factors, some perhaps operating independently of the others. In my opinion--and it's no more than that--the cause is linked to the buildup of atmospheric carbon dioxide. This could lead to a global increase in temperature, bringing warmer oceans, and the warmer the ocean the less phytoplankton is able to thrive. Another factor might be that photosynthetic activity is inhibited by higher temperatures.' He shrugged. 'In short, Dr. Chase, I don't really know.'
Seawater and carbon dioxide: the reason he was here in the first place. Chase could hardly bring himself to ask the question.
'If this is the cause, Dr. Detrick, how would we know? What are the signs to look for?'
Theo nodded at Boris. 'Let's ask the expert,' he proposed. 'Professor Stanovnik has spent many years studying such causes and their effects at the microbiological level.'
Chase felt a tightening of the stomach. It seemed that the circle was closing, each event leading inexorably to the next, forging unbreakable links. He waited for the circle to be completed.
Boris smoothed his knees, rocking slowly back and forth. 'It so happens that a colleague of mine, Dr. Astakhov, was interested in this very problem and conducted many field experiments all over the world to discover where the excess carbon dioxide was going to. We've known for sixty years that the amount of C02 is increasing but have been unable to account for more than half of it. Dr. Astakhov's theory was that it was being absorbed in the oceans. However'--he raised and let fall his shoulders in a ponderous shrug--'Dr. Astakhov disappeared before his research was completed. We do not yet have the answer to the mystery of the missing carbon dioxide.'
Chase thought for a moment before he spoke, phrasing his question with care. 'Is it correct to assume, Professor, that
'Yes,' Boris answered without hesitation. 'Almost certainly. If it could be shown that the oceans had reached saturation point, then it would be a strong indication that the temperature of seawater is increasing. But as yet we do not have the research data to make such a claim. Had Dr. Astakhov returned--'
'From the Antarctic,' Chase said.
'Yes, he was based at Mirnyy Station, and the last report we have . . .' The Russian's dark pouched eyes narrowed and remained fixed on Chase. 'How do you know this?' His curiosity bordered on suspicion. 'You knew him, Dr. Astakhov?'
'No. But I talked with him. After a fashion.'
'In the Antarctic?'
'Yes.'
'You speak Russian?'
'No.'
'That is most strange, Dr. Chase,' Boris said with dramatic softness, like a detective about to trap a suspect by revealing a vital clue. 'Peter hardly knew one word of English.'
'He didn't know any words,' Chase corrected him. 'Under the circumstances I don't think his lack of English mattered. I imagine even you would have had some difficulty in understanding him. He was half out of his head, on the verge of coma, with a broken back. In fact it's bloody marvelous we managed any kind of communication at all, but we did.'
Boris was still watching him closely. 'He told you of his research-- what he had found?'
Chase shook his head. 'He wrote down a chemical equation.'
'What equation?' Boris looked at Theo and back to Chase again.
Everyone was watching Chase intently as if he were about to produce a rabbit out of a hat.
'Okay, you've got it,' Cheryl said, with a faint touch of exasperation. 'Our undivided attention. Tell us, for Christ's sake, what the hell was it?'
Chase told them.
Afterward it was his turn to listen while Theo Detrick narrated a horror story.
Theo had lived with the knowledge of what a return to the Precam-brian era would mean to the human race, had spent years brooding over it in his tiny island retreat, and now, without emotion, he gave them his scenario for the future.
The first victims would be the very young, the very old, and those
already suffering from cardiac and respiratory conditions. Anoxia--the medical term for a deficiency of oxygen to the tissues--would initially affect these three groups. Mortality statistics would show a gradually steepening rise as they succumbed to the impoverished atmosphere.
This Theo classified as Stage One.
Stage Two would begin when the oxygen level had fallen by several percent. Conditions then would be similar to those on a fifteen-thousand-foot-high mountain. Dizziness, nausea, and blackouts would become commonplace. There would be a sharply increased incidence of infertility. By this time the decrease in oxygen would start to have serious and widespread effects on all animal life-forms.
Stage Three. By now the composition of the atmosphere would be radically altered as the planet reverted to its primordial state. The ozone layer would thin out and disperse, allowing cosmic rays and solar radiation to penetrate to the earth's surface. This would cause severe burns, skin cancer, and leukemia.
Then would come the mutants: weird forms of life whose genetic structure had been warped in the womb. Whether such forms of life could continue to thrive and prosper on a planet going backward to its own past was doubtful; but for a time at least the earth would be inhabited by monsters. These, Theo believed, like the dinosaurs, would eventually die out.
Then what?
'And then,' Theo said, 'we come to Stage Four. The final act. The earth will have returned to the Precambrian. Defunct of all animal life and denuded of all vegetation. Not even the bacteria will survive. This planet will be biologically dead.'
'But it isn't inevitable,' Chase protested. 'Surely the process can be halted or reversed? It
'Must it?' Theo said gently. 'As I've made clear, Dr. Chase, we have no God-given right to survive. The biosphere doesn't owe us a living.' He gazed around vaguely, not seeing them. 'One thing is absolutely certain. It cannot be stopped, and won't be stopped, if the world refuses to listen and take heed.'
'Amen to that,' Cheryl breathed.
Which struck Chase as a fitting epilogue.
The moon floated serenely in a magenta sky, touching the peaks of the Rockies with a soft ambience like ethereal snow.
Brad Zittel had hardly moved in the past hour, gazing out of his study window, unconscious of time, of it passing or standing still; aware only of the moon's decaying arc across the night sky, looking down with a blandly smiling face on a dying planet.
The China tea had gone cold in the pot. But that was to be expected, Brad thought. The ineluctable law of the universe. Entropy. Everything creeping toward slow death: himself, family, earth, moon, sun, stars. The dying fall. Fall from grace.
He didn't hear the door open and close, nor detect the presence in the darkened room until it laid warm fingers against his cheek. 'Come to bed, darling. Please. You can't go on like this night after night.'
Why not? 'Entropy,' Brad said. 'Falling. Dying. End.'
His wife's nightgown rustled as she settled herself on the arm of the chair. She cradled his head, holding him close, as one might comfort an ailing child.
'I want to understand you, Brad. Let me help you.'
'They don't know. How can they when they've never seen the earth?'
