and especially whether I, as spokesman for the spokesmen, so to speak, have been guilty of misleading the public. Or, more bluntly, have I been caught lying in my teeth?’
Even Barrow hesitated. Formidable man though he was, he recognized another formidable man when he met one and he was aware of Benson’s reputation. He said: ‘Could this tremor have been triggered off by an atomic device?’
‘It’s possible, of course, but it’s equally impossible to tell. A seismograph is incapable of deciding the nature of the source of shock waves. Generally, almost invariably, we are in no doubt as to the source. We ourselves, the British and the French announce our nuclear tests: the other two members of the so-called nuclear club are not so forthcoming. But there are still ways of telling. When the Chinese detonated a nuclear device in the megaton range — a megaton, as you are probably aware, is the equivalent of a million tons of TNT — clouds of radiation gas drifted eventually across the US. The cloud was thin, high and caused no damage, but was easily detected — this was in November nineteen-seventy-six. Again, earthquakes, almost invariably, give off after-shocks.
‘There was one classical exception — again, oddly enough, in November of nineteen-seventy-six. Seismology stations in both Sweden and Finland detected an earthquake — not major, on the four-something Richter scale — off the coast of Estonia. Other scientists disputed this, figuring that the Soviets have been responsible, accidentally or otherwise, for a nuclear detonation on the floor of the Baltic. They have been disputing the matter ever since. The Soviets, naturally, have not seen fit to give any enlightenment on the matter.’
Barrow said: ‘But earthquakes do not occur in that region of the world.’
‘I would not seek, Mr Barrow, to advise you in the matter of law enforcement. It’s a minor area, but it’s there.’
Barrow’s smile was at its most genial. ‘The FBI stands corrected.’
‘So whether this man Morro detonated a small nuclear device there or not I can’t tell you.’ He looked at Hardwick. ‘You think any reputable seismologist in the State would venture a definite opinion one way or another on this, Arthur?’
‘No.’
‘Well, that’s the answer to one question, unsatisfactory though it may be. But that, of course, is not the question you really want to ask. You wanted to know whether we — I, if you like — was entirely accurate in locating the epicentre of the shock in the White Wolf Fault instead of, as Morro claims, in the Garlock Fault. Gentlemen, I was lying in my teeth.’
There was a predictable silence.
‘Why?’ Crichton was not a man noted for his loquacity.
‘Because in the circumstances it seemed the best thing to do. In retrospect, it still seems the best thing.’ Benson shook his head in regret. ‘Pity this fellow Morro had to come along and spoil things.’
‘Why?’ Crichton was also noted for his persistency.
‘I’ll try to explain so that Mr Sassoon, Major Dunne and the two policemen here — sorry, ex-policemen — will understand. For you and Mr Barrow it may not be so easy.’
‘Why?’
It seemed to Alec Benson that Crichton was a man of remarkably limited vocabulary, but he refrained from comment. ‘Because those four are Californians. You two are not.’
Barrow smiled. ‘A State apart. I always knew it. Secession next, is that it?’
‘It is a State apart, but not in that sense. It’s apart because it’s the only State in the Union where, in the back — and maybe not so far back — of the mind of any reasonably intelligent person lies the thought of tomorrow. Not when tomorrow comes, gentlemen.
‘Californians live in a state of fear or fearful resignation or just pure resignation. There has always been the vague thought, the entertainment of the vague possibility, that one day the big one is going to hit us.’
Barrow said: ‘The big one. Earthquake?’
‘Of devastating proportions. This fear never really crystallized until as late as nineteen-seventy-six — third time I’ve mentioned that year this morning, isn’t it? Nineteen-seventy-six was the bad year, the year that made the minds of people in this State turn to thoughts they’d rather not think about.’ Benson lifted a sheet of paper. ‘February four, Guatemala. Seven-point-five on the Richter scale. Tens of thousands died. May six, North Italy. Six- point-five. Hundreds dead, widespread devastation, and later on in the same year another ‘quake came back to wipe out the few buildings that were still left standing after the first earthquake. May sixteen, Soviet Central Asia. Seven-point-two. Death-rate and damage unknown — the Soviets are reluctant to discuss those things. July twenty-seven, Tangshan. Eight-point-two, in which two-thirds of a million died and three-quarters of a million were injured: as this occurred in a densely-populated area, large cities like Peking and Tientsin were involved. Then in the following month the far south of the Philippines. Eight-point-zero. Widespread devastation, exact deaths unknown but running into tens of thousands — this partly due to the earthquake, partly due to the giant
‘And all those earthquakes, with the exception of the ones in Greece and Italy, were related to the movement of what they call the Pacific plate, which causes the so-called ring of fire around the Pacific. The section that mainly concerns us, as everyone knows, is the San Andreas Fault where the north-east-moving Pacific plate rubs against the westward-pressing American plate. In fact, gentlemen, where we are now is, geologically speaking, not really part of America at all but part of the Pacific plate, and it hardly requires an educated guess to know that in the not- too-distant future we won’t physically be part of America either. Some day the Pacific plate is going to carry the western seaboard of California into the oceanic equivalent of the wild blue yonder, for where we’re sitting at the moment lies to the
Benson looked around him. No one seemed to find it a comforting thought at all.
‘Little wonder, then, that people’s thoughts started turning inwards. Little wonder that they increasingly wondered, “When’s our time going to come?” We’re sitting fair and square astride the ring of fire and our turn might be any time now. It is not a happy thought to live with. And they’re not thinking in terms of earthquakes in the past. We’ve only had four major earthquakes in our known past, two of them really big ones on the order of eight-point- three on the Richter scale, Owens Valley in eighteen-seventy-two and San Francisco in nineteen-o-six. But, I say, it’s not those they’re thinking of. Not in the terms of major earthquakes but of monster earthquakes, of which there have been only two recorded in history, both of the Richter order of eight-point-nine, or about six times the destructive force of the San Francisco one.’ Benson shook his head. ‘An earthquake up to ten on the Richter scale — or even twelve — is theoretically possible but not even the scientific mind cares to contemplate the awfulness of it.
‘Those two monster ‘quakes occurred also, perhaps not coincidentally, in the first place in nineteen-o-six and nineteen-thirty-three, the first in Ecuador, the second in Japan. I won’t describe the effects to you two gentlemen from Washington or you’d be taking the plane back east — if, that is to say, you managed to get to LA airport before the ground opened up beneath you. Both Ecuador and Japan sit astride the Pacific ring of fire. So does California. Why shouldn’t it be our turn next?’
Barrow said: ‘That idea about a plane is beginning to sound good to me. What
‘Assuming a properly sombre tone of voice, I must admit I’ve given a great deal of thought to this. Say it struck where we’re sitting now. You’d wake up in the morning — only of course the dead don’t wake — and find the Pacific where Los Angeles is and Los Angeles buried in what used to be Santa Monica Bay and the San Pedro Channel. The San Gabriel Mountains might well have fallen down smack on top of where we are now. If it happened at sea —’
‘How could it happen at sea?’ Barrow was a degree less jovial than he had been. ‘The fault runs through
