The Forge of God (12 page)

She replaced the phone and turned to Hicks. "Can I help you?"

"I didn't mean to interrupt. I was wondering about the coffee shop across the street. Is it recommended?"

"I'm not the one to ask," the woman said, standing.

"I'm sorry," Hicks said politely. "Why?"

"Because I own the place," she answered, smiling. She approached the counter and leaned on it. "I'm prejudiced. We serve good solid food there. Emphasis sometimes on the solid. You're English, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"On your way to Las Vegas?"

"From, actually. Going to Furnace Creek."

"Might as well turn back. Everything's sealed up that way. The highway's closed. They'll just turn you around."

"I see. Any idea what's happening?"

"What's your name?" the woman asked.

"Hicks. Trevor Hicks."

"I'm Bernice Morgan. I was just talking about my daughter. She's being held by the federal government. Nobody can tell me why. She writes to say she's well, but she can't say anything about where she is, and I can't talk to her. Isn't that crazy?"

"Yes," Hicks said, his neck hair prickling again.

"I've got lawyers all over the state and in Washington trying to find out what's going on. They might think they're tangling with some small-town yo-yos, but they're not. My husband was a county supervisor. My father was a state senator. And here I am, talking your ear off. Trevor Hicks." She paused, examining him more closely. "Are you the science writer?"

"Yes, actually," Hicks said, pleased at being recognized twice in as many days.

"What brings you out this way?"

"A hunch."

"Mind if I ask what sort of hunch?" Clearly, Bernice Morgan, for all her warm voice and hospitable manner, was a tough-minded woman.

"I suppose it could connect with your daughter," he said, deciding to go for broke. "I'm following a very thin trail of clues to Death Valley. Something important has happened there—important enough to draw your President to Furnace Creek Resort."

"Maybe Esther isn't hysterical," Mrs. Morgan mused.

"I'm sorry?"

"My store clerk. She says some men talked about a MiG crashing in the desert."

Hicks's heart fell. Was that all it was, then? Some sort of unusual defection? No connection with the Great Victoria Desert?

"And Mike, he's a young fellow who worked in our service station, he says some men came to the store in a Land Cruiser and talked to my daughter. They had something covered up in the back. Mike sneaked a look when they took it around the rear and he thought it was something green—dead-looking, he said. Then the government comes in here and sprays this awful stuff all over the inside of my meat locker, closes it off, and says we can't use it… We lost five hundred dollars in meat. They carted it away, said it was spoiled. Said the locker was contaminated with salmonella."

Hicks's intuition made his skin crawl. "Where were you when this happened?"

"In Baker visiting my brother."

Bernice Morgan gave not the slightest impression of frailty, despite her years. Nor did she appear leathery or "grizzled." She was the last sort of person Hicks expected to find in a small American desert town. But for her manner of speech, she might have been the elderly wife of an English lord.

"How long has your daughter been missing?"

"A week and a half."

"And you're certain she was taken by federal authorities?"

"Air Force types, I've been told."

Hicks frowned. "Have you heard of anything odd in the area—around Furnace Creek Inn, perhaps?"

"Only that it's closed off temporarily. I called about that, and nobody knows anything. The phone service went out this afternoon."

"Do you think that's where your daughter is?"

"It's a possibility, isn't it?"

He pursed his lips.

"I don't think they're holding her so she can talk to the President about business. Do you?" She raised a skeptical eyebrow.

An old, battered primer-gray Ford truck pulled off the road and into the parking lot with a spray of dust and gravel. Two young men in straw cowboy hats jumped from the back, while a third boy and a heavy-paunched, bearded man with oversized wire-framed MacArthur sunglasses stepped down from the driver's seat. They all came through the glass door. The bearded man nodded at Hicks, then faced Mrs. Morgan. "We've been out and back. Road's still closed. George is out there, like Richard said, but he doesn't know what's going on."

"George is one of our highway patrol boys," Mrs. Morgan explained to Hicks.

"Ron, here, thinks his Lisa is still in Furnace Creek," the bearded man continued. A doe-eyed, thin young man nodded wearily. "We're going to take the plane and fly over. Find out what the hell's going on."

"They've probably got the airstrip out there closed," Mrs. Morgan said. "I'm not sure that's smart, Mitch."

"Smart, hell. I never let no government folks push me around before. Kidnapping and shutting down public roads for no good reason—it's time somebody did something." Mitch stared pointedly at Trevor Hicks, surveying his suede jacket, slacks, and running shoes. "Mister, we haven't met."

Mrs. Morgan did the favor. "Mitch, this is Mr. Trevor Hicks. Mr. Hicks, Mitch Morris. He's our maintenance man and drives the propane truck."

"Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mr. Hicks," Morris said in a formal tone. "You're interested in this?"

"He's a writer," Bernice said. "Pretty well known, too."

"I have an idea something is happening near Furnace Creek, something important enough to bring the President here."

"President like from the White House?"

"The same."

"He thinks Stella might be at Furnace Creek," Mrs. Morgan said.

"All the more reason for us to fly over there and find out," Morris said. "Frank Forrest has his Comanche ready to go. We have room for five. Mr. Hicks, are you interested in coming with us?"

Hicks realized he was becoming much too involved. Mrs. Morgan continued her protest about the risks, but Morris paid her only polite attention. His mind was made up.

There was no other way to see what was happening in Furnace Creek. He would be stopped on the highway as everybody else had been.

"There's too many of us here, with a pilot, already," Hicks said.

"Benny doesn't fly," Morris said. "He gets terrible airsick."

Hicks took a shallow, spasmodic breath. "All right," he said.

"It's not far at all. A few minutes there and back."

"I don't like it. Don't do this just for Stella," Mrs. Morgan said. "I'm still trying other ways. Don't get foolish and…"

"No heroics, no daring rescues," Morris assured her. "Let's go. Mr. Hicks…?"

"Yes," Hicks said, following them out the glass door. Mrs. Morgan laid her hands on the counter top and watched them grimly as they climbed into the truck, Benny giving up his shotgun seat to Hicks and sitting in the back.

He had never done anything so stupid in his life. The Piper Comanche's wheels pulled free of the runway and the twin-engine aircraft leaped into the air, leaving the weathered asphalt landing strip and corrugated metal hangar far behind and below.

Mitch Morris turned to regard Hicks and Ron Flagg in the back seat. Frank Forrest, in his mid-sixties and as burly as Morris, banked the plane sharply and brought them around to an easterly direction, then banked again before they had time to catch their breath. Morris hung on to Forrest's seat with a huge, callused hand. "You all right?" he asked Hicks, with barely a glance at Ron.

"Fine," Hicks said, swallowing an anonymous something in his gullet.

"You, Ron?"

"Ain't flown much," Flagg said, his skin pale and damp.

"Frank's an expert. Flew Sabres during the war. Korean War. His daddy flew Buffaloes at Midway. That's where he died, wasn't it, Frank?"

"Goddamn planes were flying coffins," Forrest said.

Hicks felt the Comanche shudder in an updraft from the low hills below. They were flying under five hundred feet. A cinder-covered hill near Shoshone passed below them with breathtaking closeness.

"I hope you don't think we're impetuous," Morris said.

"Perish the idea," Hicks returned, concentrating on his stomach.

"We owe a lot to Mrs. Morgan. We like Stella just fine, and Ron's Lisa is a great girl. We want to make sure they're okay, wherever they are. Not like they've been spirited off to the Nevada test site to be used as guinea pigs or something, y'know?"

Whether Morris was suggesting this or dismissing it as a possibility, Hicks couldn't decide.

"So what do you think they've got in Furnace Creek?" Forrest asked. "Mike the garage boy says they've got a dead Russian pilot. That why you're here—to scoop everybody on a dead Russian pilot?"

"I don't think that's what they have," Hicks said.

"So what is it, then? What would bring ol' Crockerman out here?"

Hicks thought for a moment about the possible unpleasant effects of discussing visitors from space with these men. He could almost sympathize with any government efforts to keep such things secret. Yet Australia was loaded with men like these: tough, resourceful, valiant, but not particularly imaginative or brilliant. Why would Australia trust public reaction, and not the United States?

"I'm not sure," he said. "I've come out here on a hunch, pure and simple."

"Hunches are never pure and simple," Forrest shot back. "You're a smart man. You've come out here for a reason."

"Mrs. Morgan seems to think you're important," Morris said.

"Well…"

"You a doctor?" Flagg asked, looking as if he might need some medical assistance.

"I'm a writer. I have a Ph.D. in biological science, but I'm not an M.D."

"We get all sorts of Ph.D.'s in Shoshone," Morris said. "Geologists, archaeologists, ethnologists—study Indians, you know. Sometimes they come into the Crow Bar and sit down and we get into some real interesting conversations. We're not just a bunch of desert rats."

"Didn't think you were," Hicks responded.
Oh?

"All right. Frank?"

"Coming up on Furnace Creek shortly."

Hicks looked through the side window and saw tan and white sand and patches of scrub, HO-scale dirt roads and tracks. Then he saw the highway. Forrest banked the Comanche again. Hicks's stomach kept its discipline, but Flagg moaned. "You got a bag?" he asked. "Please."

"You can keep it down," Morris assured him. "Hold up on the aerobatics, Frank."

"There it is," Forrest said. He inclined the plane so Hicks was staring practically straight down at a cluster of buildings spread among rust-brown rocks, copses of green trees and low hills. He could make out a golf course spreading lush green against the waste, a tiny airstrip and an asphalt parking lot filled with dark cars and trucks, and rising from the parking lot, a green two-seat Army Cobra helicopter.

"Shit," Forrest said, pulling back sharply on the wheel. The plane's engines screamed and the Comanche swung around like a leaf in a strong wind.

The helicopter intercepted them and kept pace with the Comanche no matter what twists and turns Forrest executed. Flagg threw up and his vomit struck the side windows and Hicks and seemed to have a life of its own, hobbling about between surfaces and air. Hicks wiped it away frantically with his hands. Morris yelled and cursed.

The Cobra quickly outmaneuvered them. A uniformed and helmeted copilot in the rear seat gestured for them to land.

"Where's your radio?" Hicks demanded. "Turn it on. Let them talk with us."

"Hell no," Forrest said. "I'd have to acknowledge."

"Goddammit, Frank, they'll shoot us down if you don't go where he says," Morris said, beard curling up and then back with the aircraft's motion.

The helicopter's copilot meticulously pointed down to the road below. Green cars and camouflaged trucks raced along the highway.

"We'd better land," Forrest agreed. He peeled away from the helicopter, descended with astonishing speed, pitched his Comanche nose-high, and brought the aircraft down with at least four hard jounces on the gray asphalt airstrip.

Quietly heaving without issue, Hicks tried to control himself. By the time they were surrounded by what he took to be Secret Service men—in gray suits and brown—and military police in dark blue uniforms, he had his nausea largely under control. Flagg had bumped his head and lay stunned in his seat.

"God damn," Morris said, none the worse for wear.

Arthur, stooped even more than usual, walked down the inn's flagstoned hallway, barely glancing at the adobe walls and black, white, and gray Navajo carpets hung above antique credenzas. He knocked on Harry's door and stepped back, hands in pockets. Harry opened the door and swung his arm impatiently for him to come in. Then he returned to the bathroom to finish shaving. They were all joining the President for dinner in the resort's spacious dining room within the hour.

"He's not taking it well," Arthur said.

"Crockerman? What did you expect."

"Better than this."

"We're all staring down the barrel of a gun."

Arthur glanced up at the bright open doorway of the bathroom. "How are
you
feeling?"

Harry came out lifting one ear to poke the razor beneath it, his face lined with remnants of shaving cream. "Well enough," he said. "I have to leave in two days for treatment. Warned you."

Arthur shook his head. "No problem. It's scheduled. The President's leaving day after tomorrow. Tomorrow he confers with Xavier and Young."

"What's next?"

"Negotiations with the Australians. They show us theirs, we show them ours."

"Then what?"

Arthur shrugged. "Maybe our bogey is a liar."

"If you ask me," Harry said, "the…"

"I know. The whole thing stinks."

"But Crockerman's swallowed the message. It's working on him. Young and Xavier will have seen the site… Ah, Lord." Harry wiped his face with a towel. "This is not nearly as much fun as I thought it would be. Isn't it a bitch? Life is always a bitch. We were so excited. Now it's a nightmare."

Arthur raised his hand. "Guess who was captured riding an airplane with three desert types?"

Harry blinked. "How the hell should I know?"

"Trevor Hicks."

Harry stared. "You're not serious."

"The President is reading his novel now, which is trendy enough, and not quite pure coincidence. He obviously felt it was research material. The three desert types have been returned to Shoshone with a stiff reprimand and the loss of their plane and license. Hicks has been invited to dinner tonight."

"That's insane," Harry said, turning off the bathroom light and picking up his dress shirt from the corner of the bed. "He's a journalist."

"Crockerman wants to talk things over with him. Get a second opinion."

"He has a hundred opinions all around him."

"I last met Hicks," Arthur mused, "three years ago, at Cornell."

"I've never met him," Harry said. "I suppose I'd like to."

"Now's your chance."

Arthur left his friend's room a few minutes later, feeling worse than ever. He could not shake the sensibilities of a disappointed child. This had been a wonderful early Christmas present, bright and filled with hope for an unimaginable future, a future of humans interacting with other intelligences. Now, by Christmastime, the Earth might not even exist.

He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders, not for the first time hoping by physical effort to shake the gloom.

The waitresses and cooks behind the white walls and copper-paneled pillars of the dining room had come up with a formal repast of prime rib, wild rice, and Caesar salad, the salad greens a trifle wilted because of the halt in deliveries, but all else quite acceptable. Around a rectangular table assembled from four smaller tables sat the principals of the action at the "Furnace," plus Trevor Hicks, who acted as if he were taking it all in stride.

I have stumbled into a jackpot,
he thought as the President and the Secretary of Defense entered and took their seats. Two Secret Service agents ate at a small table near the doorway.

Crockerman nodded cordially at Hicks, seated beside the President and across from Lehrman.

"These people have really done a fine job, haven't they?" the President said after the main course had been served and the dishes cleared. By a kind of silent and mutual decree, all talk during dinner had been of trivial things. Now coffee was brought out in an old, dented silver service, poured into the owner's personal Wedgwood bone china cups, and served around the long table. Harry declined. Arthur loaded his coffee with two cubes of sugar.

"So you are acquainted with Mr. Feinman and Mr. Gordon," Crockerman said as they sat back with cups in hand.

"I know them by reputation, and met Mr. Gordon once when he was in command of BETC," Hicks said. He smiled and nodded at Arthur as if for the first time this evening.

"I'm sure our people have asked you what moved you to come to Furnace Creek Inn."

"It's an ill-kept secret that something extraordinary is happening here," Hicks said. "I was working on a hunch."

The President gave another of his weak, almost discouraged smiles, and shook his head.

"I am amazed I was brought here," Hicks continued, "after the way we were initially treated. And I am truly astounded to find you here, Mr. President, even though I had deduced you would be, by a chain of reasoning I've already described to your Army and Secret Service agents. Let us say, I am astounded to find my hunch proving out. What
is
happening here?"

"I'm not sure we can tell you that. I'm not sure why I've invited you to dinner, Mr. Hicks, and no doubt the other gentlemen here are even more unsure than I. Mr. Gordon? Do you object to the presence of a writer, a reporter?"

"I am curious. I do not object."

"Because I think we are
all
out of our depth," Crockerman said. "I would like to solicit outside opinions."

Harry winked without humor at Arthur.

"I am in the dark, sir," Hicks said.

"Why do you think we are here?"

"I have heard—never mind how, I will not tell—that there is a bogey here. I presume it has something to do with the Australian discovery in the Great Victoria Desert."

McClennan shaded his eyes with one hand and shook his head. "The unscrambled transmission from
Air Force One
. This has happened before. They should all be shot."

Crockerman dismissed this with a wave of his hand. He pulled a cigar from his pocket, then asked by an inclination of eyebrows whether anyone would share his vice. Politely, all around the table declined. He clipped the cigar and lit it with an antique silver Zippo. "I trust you've been cleared to enter military bases and research laboratories."

"Yes," Hicks said.

"You're not a United States citizen, however."

"No, Mr. President."

"Is he a security risk, Carl?" Crockerman asked McClennan.

The national security advisor shook his head, lips pursed. "Other than being a foreign national, he's got a good record."

Lehrman leaned forward and said, "Mr. President, I believe this conversation should end now. Mr. Hicks has no formal clearance, and…"

"Dammit, Otto, he's an intelligent man. I'm interested in his opinion."

"Sir, we can find and clear all sorts of experts for you to talk to," McClennan said. "This sort of thing is counterproductive."

Crockerman slowly looked up at McClennan, lips drawn tight. "How much time do we have until this machine starts dismantling the Earth?"

McClennan's face reddened. "Nobody knows, Mr. President," he said.

Hicks stiffened his back and glanced around the table. "Excuse me," he said, "but…"

"Then, Carl," Crockerman continued, "isn't the time-consuming, formal way of doing things counterproductive?"

McClennan stared pleadingly at Lehrman. The Defense Secretary held up both hands. "You're the boss, sir," he said.

"Within limits, I am," Crockerman affirmed peevishly. "I have chosen to bring Mr. Hicks into our confidence."

"Mr. Hicks, if I may say so, is a media celebrity," Rotterjack said. "He has done no research, and his qualifications are purely as a journalist and a writer. I am amazed, sir, that you would extend this kind of privilege to a
journalist
."

Hicks, eyes narrow, said nothing. The President's gentle, dreaming smile returned.

"Are you finished, David?"

"I may very well be, sir. I agree with Carl and Otto. This is highly irregular and dangerous."

"I asked if you were finished."

"Yes."

"Then allow me to repeat myself. I have decided to take Mr. Hicks into our confidence. I assume his security clearance will be processed immediately?"

McClennan did not meet the President's eyes. "I'll get it started."

"Fine. Mr. Gordon, Mr. Feinman, I am not expressing any doubts about your capabilities. Do you object to Mr. Hicks?"

"No, sir," Arthur said.

"I have nothing against journalists or writers," Harry said. "However wrong Mr. Hicks's novel has turned out to be."

"Fine." Crockerman mused for a moment, then nodded and said, "I believed we turned down Arthur's request for a Mr. Dupres, simply because he is a foreign national. I hope none of you mind a little inconsistency now."

"We do indeed have a bogey, Mr. Hicks. It released an extraterrestrial visitor we call the Guest. The Guest is a living being, not a robot or a machine, and it tells us it rode a spaceship from its world to this one. But…" The President told Hicks most of the story, including his version of the Guest's dire warning. Again, nobody corrected him.

Hicks listened intently, his face white. When Crockerman finished, puffing at the cigar and blowing out an expanding globule of smoke, Hicks leaned forward, placing his elbows on the table. "I'll be damned," he said, his voice low and deliberately casual.

"So will we all if we don't decide what to do, and soon," Crockerman said. All others kept their counsel. This was the President's show, and few if any were happy with it.

"You're speaking with the Australians. They know about this, of course," Hicks said.

"They haven't been told yet," Crockerman said. "We're worried about the effect the news might have on our people if it leaks."

"Of course," Hicks said. "I… don't know quite what to make of it myself. I seemed to have stepped into a real hornet's nest, haven't I?"

Crockerman stubbed out his cigar half smoked. "I'll be returning to Washington tomorrow morning. Mr. Hicks, I'd like you to come with me. Mr. Gordon, you also. Mr. Feinman, I understand you won't be able to accompany us. You have an important medical appointment in Los Angeles."

"Yes, Mr. President."

"Then if you will, after your treatment—and my sincere good wishes go with you there—I would like you to recommend a group of scientists to meet with the Guest, conduct further interrogations—that doesn't sound good, does it? Ask more questions. This team will be our liaison with the Australian scientists. Carl, I'd like you to arrange with the Australians for one of their investigators to be flown to Vandenberg and sit in on these sessions."

"Are we sharing with the Australians, sir?" Rotterjack asked.

"I think that's the only rational approach."

"And if they're reluctant to go along with our stance on security?"

"We'll climb that wall when we come to it."

A tired-looking young man in a gray suit entered the dining hall and approached Rotterjack. He handed the science advisor a slip of paper and stood back, eyes darting nervously around the table. Rotterjack read the paper, the lines around his mouth and on his forehead deepening.

"Colonel Phan sends us a message," he said. "The Guest died at eighteen hundred hours this evening. Phan is conducting an autopsy at midnight. Mr. Feinman and Mr. Gordon are requested to attend."

Silence around the table.

"Mr. Gordon, you are free to do so, and then please come to Washington as soon as you can," Crockerman said. He put his napkin next to his plate, backed his chair away from the head of the table, and stood. He appeared very old in the dining room's subdued light. "I'm retiring early tonight. This day has been exhausting, and there is much to think about. David, Carl, please make sure Mr. Hicks is comfortable."