Hypersonic Thunder: A Novel of the Jet Age (8 page)

“How many satellites are going to be involved?”

Dennis hesitated again, sorting out what he knew to be classified from material that had been released.

“Ultimately there will be twenty-four, with backups, but it will take years to get them all set up. The Air Force will start launching satellites—they’re calling it ‘Block 1’—in 1978, and will do it for about seven years. Then there will be follow-on programs to get it up to its planned size.”

“Tell me again how it’s supposed to work?”

Irritation crossed Jenkins’s face. He knew Rodriquez was well versed in GPS, and realized he was being tested, but resented it being on such a fundamental level. Then he recognized that this was after all an interview, that Rodriquez didn’t know him, and that he was the interviewee. He smiled and said, “Well, I’m sure you know all this, so I’ll give you the blue-plate special version. Ultimately there will be twenty-four global positioning satellites in orbit, twelve thousand miles above the Earth. There will be three spares. Each one will circle the Earth twice a day, and at any given time, at least four will be available for ground receivers to interrogate. The GPS receiver locates three or four of the satellites, and figures out the distance to each one. This information is used to deduce its own location. In other words, it’s the old standby of navigation, trilateration.”

Rodriquez had sensed Jenkins’s irritation and its passing, and realized it was justified. The man knew his business; if he had known less he would have explained a lot more, trying to cover. Then an idea flashed into Rodriquez’s head.

“Are they going to be equipped with detectors for nuclear explosions?”

Jenkins’s voice was approving. “Not to my knowledge. That’s a great idea.”

“That might be our best way back into the program. Maybe you
and I can work on it a little. What do you think the biggest hazards are with GPS?”

Dennis smiled. “That’s easy. The budget. This thing is going to take millions of dollars over a lot of years—billions, ultimately—and it will be a long time before it proves itself. It is going to take real salesmanship to keep it in front of Congress until it’s operational. Once it’s up and running, though, it will be invaluable, not just for the military, for everybody.”

“What are the civil applications?”

“Again, that’s easy—game hunters will want them first, then when the equipment downsizes a bit, pilots will have to have it. They’ll be sticking them in cars in twenty years or less. It is going to be an immense market.”

Rodriquez shifted gears. “How about the Space Shuttle? Is it going to fly, literally and program-wise?”

Jenkins was cautious again. “It’s got a lot to prove. I’m worried about the glide tests, when they separate the Space Shuttle from the 747 carrier plane—that is filled with risks. But I’m more concerned in the long run about the sheer size and number of rockets they are going to use to lift an operational Shuttle from Cape Canaveral.”

“The Russians use even bigger ones.”

“Yes, and they blow up regularly, but no one hears about it because of the security. I wouldn’t worry if they were going to launch just one or two a year, but they are talking about making up to four launches a month. I don’t see how it will be physically possible.”

“Cutting to the chase, do you see any way we can make money in the program?”

“Well, certainly there can be some important consulting contracts. But I think the main money might come in creating some specialized firms that could handle the problems that are bound to come up with the launch equipment, with the foam covering, with the electronic suites in Houston—there isn’t any national infrastructure yet to cover this. If we—I mean if you—get in early, you can probably position yourself for the life of the Shuttle program.”

“ ‘We’ is the correct term, Dennis. You are hired, if you’re willing to work for the piddling salaries we pay here. Welcome aboard. We are going to get our share of those markets and more!”

“One thing you ought to know, Mr. Rodriquez.”

“Call me Bob, we’re informal here at ActOn.”

“I know that you and the Shannons were close friends, and that there was some kind of falling out. I don’t know and don’t care what it was. But I need to tell you that I was young V. R.’s instructor pilot when he was in basic flight training. It was only for about two months, but we got to be friends, and still are. It’s no problem for me, but I thought you should know.”

“It’s no problem for me either, Dennis. I consider the Shannons as friends, even Tom, who was never very happy with me. And I admire Tom, for all he’s done for his country. I like V. R., too, and I want him to remain good friends with my own son, Rod. So don’t worry about the Shannon connection.”

“Thanks, Bob. I’m glad to be on board.”

April 6, 1976
Palos Verdes, California

“
DID YOU SEE
the news?”

Tom Shannon looked up, weary-eyed from working at the same desk where his father had put in so many hours.

“About what, Harry?”

“Howard Hughes is dead. He died on board the airplane that was bringing him back to the United States. According to the stories, he was a physical wreck, skin and bones, hair long, nails grown out, the usual reports on him.”

Tom tossed a Cross pencil on the tabletop. He bought about ten of the chrome sets each year, managing to lose either a pen or a pencil about every two weeks.

“Did you ever meet him?”

“Yeah, one time early in the war I came home on leave, 1942, I think, and Dad had an appointment to see him. He asked me to come along, not to meet the great man but for protection.”

“Protection?”

“Yeah, Hughes insisted on meeting at odd places. This time he wanted to meet down by the waterfront at three o’clock in the morning. Dad didn’t want to get mugged waiting for him, and apparently he
was always showing up late. When Hughes saw me with Dad, he had a fit until he saw I was in uniform. Probably thought I was a lawyer. After that he was as nice as could be, very rational, talking about the Lockheed Constellation, getting Dad’s ideas on how the flight test program should be run.”

“I’ve heard he was like that—always pleasant but only willing to talk to experts in the field, and only about their special subject.”

“If there’s a heaven, I wonder if he and Dad will get together up there and talk airplanes.”

“If there’s a heaven, it will have to have airplanes and airplane talk in it for Dad. And he’ll be too busy talking to Wilbur and Orville to talk to Hughes.”

They were silent for a while, both knowing how much they missed their father’s advice.

“We could sure use him now.”

“We’d never have gotten into this fix, if he’d been alive and well.”

Tom shrugged. “It’s my fault, all the way. I never should have volunteered for another tour of combat. It was stupid, just ego and being pissed off about Rodriquez. If I’d stayed here, I’d have avoided my years in the Hanoi Hilton and maybe my wife wouldn’t have taken over our company.”

Harry didn’t comment. It was true. Tom had been foolish to go to war again, and even though he had done well until he was shot down, it would have been better for his country—and a lot better for his family—if he had stayed home.

“What are we going to do, Tom? We can’t just fire Nancy. She did a lot of good for the company, too, at a time when you were gone, Dad was sick, and I was preoccupied with keeping Anna sober.”

“Well, let’s review the bidding. We are in deep trouble now with her precious mall and with some of her other pet diversification projects. I don’t see that we can do anything but cut our losses there, just sell out for whatever we can get, pennies on the dollar, and eat the difference.”

“Nancy will never stand for that. That’s the whole problem, she’s committed to seeing it through, no matter what.”

Tom sighed and said, “The end of our fiscal year will be coming up in October, and we’ll have the annual stockholders meeting. I suggest
we put it to the board of directors that we get a new chairman and CEO and that we end our participation in the mall project.”

“You can’t do that. She’s your wife. It’s tantamount to a divorce.”

“I don’t think it will come to that. The stress of the mall situation is killing her, and she’s embarrassed that she placed the company in this position. I think she would actually be kind of grateful if we forced her hand in this. In any event, Harry, it’s got to be done, and it will be the best thing for her.”

“Have we got the votes to make it stick? You know she has the single largest amount of stock in the company. She has spent all her income acquiring it, and she never lets me forget it.”

“That’s what I’ve been going over. If the rest of us put our stock together, we have almost as much as she has. It’s a good thing that she insisted on separate holdings for you and for her, otherwise we’d be screwed. But the irony is that the key votes, the swing vote, in this will come from Rodriquez. That son of a bitch manages to be the worm in every rose, even when he doesn’t intend to. If we can get him to agree to vote with us, we can remove her as the chairman and CEO and get out of this godforsaken mall tragedy.”

Harry tipped back in the chair and snorted. “And why would he do that? He’s been snapping up our customers right and left for the past year. I thought the simulator business was just a fluke, but he’s going after all our customers.”

Tom shook his head. “I never thought I’d say this, but I can’t blame him. He sees what’s happening to us, and if he doesn’t take the contracts, somebody else will. Like they said in
The Godfather
, it is just business. Will you go and sound him out?”

“Well, it’s a cinch you can’t go; you’ve hated his guts for so long that he’d have to be a saint to do you a favor. I’ve always liked Bob, and always gotten along with him. And to tell you the truth, I’ll be surprised if he refuses to help out on this. He’s not that kind of guy. And O’Malley won’t refuse. He still idolizes you, just like he did when he was a cadet at the Academy.”

“They know they will be putting a rival back in business, for I swear to you, if—when—Nancy steps down, I’m going to make sure that you replace her. Then I’m going to make sure that Vance Shannon, Incorporated, gets back on top where Dad would want it to be.”

Harry smiled.

“The funny thing about that is that Dad would never have wanted his company to be this big. He’d have much preferred to have stayed small, doing the things he liked to do, testing new airplanes.”

Tom shook his head. “He did it to himself when he took Rodriquez in to look after the electronic end. That’s what screwed things up.”

“Naw, Tom, that’s just a parochial view. Dad had the best of his testing world when he was young, but as he got older, aviation matured. The world changed and he changed with it; the funny thing is that he changed faster than his kids. You and I haven’t caught up to his vision yet.”

“The problem was, his vision was Rodriquez, and Rodriquez took us too far too fast. Again, it’s my fault. If I’d been home, tending to business like he wanted me to, it never would have happened.”

“Time to stop moaning and bitching, Tom. Nancy is not going to take this lying down; we better get our ducks in a row before she suspects anything. It’s a hell of a note to tell you to keep this from your wife, but you’ll have to, or she will hit the roof.”

“I hope you are wrong, my brother, because I’m going to tell her tonight. I think she will fold if I tell her that we are united against her.”

“Not tonight, Tom. Don’t tell her a damn thing until I talk to Rodriquez. If you do, and she talks to him first, you and I might be out looking for a job. At our age, it won’t be fun.”

Harry shook his head for a moment, then laughed.

“Look at us, Tom. Nancy is about five foot four and weighs no more than 120 pounds, I guess, and we are both scared of her. We’ve both been in combat, you were a POW, and this little wisp of a woman terrifies us. What the hell is going on?”

“The problem is they condition us to love them and then it’s all over, they win every round. They are tougher than we are. Believe me, I hope I’m right and that she wants to quit. If she doesn’t we are in for one hell of a fight.”

“Well, let’s hope Rodriquez is willing to help.”

“I’ve got to find him first. He’s all over the map, between pushing the F-16 program, and this new thing, the Space Shuttle.”

“The sooner the better.”

CHAPTER FOUR

THE PASSING PARADE
: Mao Tse-tung dies, estimated to have caused deaths of up to 20 million; uprising in Soweto, South Africa; United States celebrates 200th anniversary of independence; National Air & Space Museum opens; President Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter engage in debates; Carter elected President; North and South Vietnam reunited; Israelis rescue hostages in Entebbe raid;
Rocky
wins Oscar for best picture; Soviets win 152 medals in Olympics at Innsbruck and Montreal; Cincinnati Reds defeat New York Yankees in World Series; Deng Xiaoping restored to power in China.

September 17, 1976

Palmdale, California

H
arry, I know you think I’ve been dodging you, but I haven’t. We’ve been swamped on this program, and I haven’t had a free hour, much less a free day, all year.”

It was easy for Shannon to believe him. Rodriquez was hunched over a portable typewriter, pecking away at a report, wearing a two-day beard and a rumpled suit, looking thin and desperately tired under the desert sun.

“I understand, Bob, and I wouldn’t have hassled you, but time is running out. We’ve got a board of directors meeting coming up in October, and I needed to talk to you before then.”

“I guess I know why. There are no secrets in the aerospace industry.
And since that short piece in
Aviation Week
, everybody is talking about the trouble Nancy is having. What can I do to help?”

Aviation Week
was the world’s premier aviation magazine, known familiarly as
“Aviation Leak”
for all the secrets it uncovered. It had run a half-page article on the problems at Vance Shannon, Incorporated. Nancy had been treated courteously, but they laid the facts out in a straightforward manner, and all the knowledgeable people in the industry made the correct inference: with Vance Shannon dead and Bob Rodriquez gone, the company was in trouble.