Part 41 (1/2)
The three biggest lies in the USA today: 1) The check is in the mail.
2) I gave at the office.
3) (Big, cheery smile) ”h.e.l.lo! I'm from Was.h.i.+ngton. I'm here to help you!”
1~ -Anon.f
FOREWORD.
In April 1962 I received a letter from the advertising agents of Hoffman Electronics: They had a wonderful idea-SF stories about electronics, written by wellknown SF writers, just long enough to fill one column of Scientific American or Technology Review or such, with the other two thirds of the page an ad for Hoffman Electronics tied into the gimmick of the story. For this they offered a gee-whiz word rate-compared with SF magazines.
A well-wrought short story is twice as hard to write as a novel; a short-short is at least eight times as hard-but one that short. . . there are much easier ways of making a living. I dropped them a postcard saying, ”Thanks but I'm busy on a novel.” (True-GLORY ROAD) They upped the ante. This time I answered, ”Thanks and I feel flattered-but I don't know anything about electronics.” (Almost true.) They wrote back offering expert advice from Hoffman's engineers on the gimmick-and a word rate six times as high as The Sat.u.r.day Evening Post had paid me.
I had finished GLORY ROAD; I sat down and drafted this one-then sweated endlessly to get it under 1200 words as required by contract. Whereas I had written GLORY ROAD in 23 days and enjoyed every minute of it. This is why lazy writers prefer novels.
SEARCHLIGHT.
”Will she hear you?”
”If she's on this face of the Moon. If she was able to get out of the s.h.i.+p. If her suit radio wasn't damaged. If she has it turned on. If she is alive. Since the s.h.i.+p is silent and no radar beacon has been spotted, it is unlikely that she or the pilot lived through it.”
”She's got to be found! Stand by, s.p.a.ce Station. Tycho Base, acknowledge.”
Reply lagged about three seconds, Was.h.i.+ngton to Moon and back. ”Lunar Base, Commanding General.”
”General, put every man on the Moon out searching for Betsy!”
Speed-of-light lag made the answer sound grudging. ”Sir, do you know how big the Moon is?”
”No matter! Betsy Barnes is there somewhere-so every man is to search until she is found. If she's dead, your precious pilot would be better off dead, too!”
”Sir, the Moon is almost fifteen million square miles. If I used every man I have, each would have over a thousand square miles to search. I gave Betsy my best pilot. I won't listen to threats against him when he can't answer back. Not from anyone, sir! I'm sick of being told what to do by people who don't know Lunar conditions. My advice-my official advice, sir-is to let Meridian Station try. Maybe they can work a miracle.
The answer rapped back, ”Very well, General! I'll speak to you later. Meridian Station! Report your plans.”
Elizabeth Barnes, ”Blind Betsy,” child genius of the piano, had been making a USO tour of the Moon.
She ”wowed 'em” at Tycho Base, then lifted by jeep rocket for Farside Hardbase, to entertain our lonely missilemen behind the Moon. She should have been there in an hour. Her pilot was a safety pilot; such s.h.i.+ps shuttled unpiloted between Tycho and Farside daily.
After lift-off her s.h.i.+p departed from its programming, was lost by Tycho's radars. It was. . .
somewhere.
Not in s.p.a.ce, else it would be radioing for help and its radar beacon would be seen by other s.h.i.+ps, s.p.a.ce stations, surface bases. It had crashed-or made emergency landing-somewhere on the vastness of Luna.
”Meridian s.p.a.ce Station, Director speaking-” Lag was unnoticeable; radio bounce between Was.h.i.+ngton and the station only 22,300 miles up was only a quarter second. ”We've patched Earthside stations to blanket the Moon with our call. Another broadcast blankets the far side from Station Newton at the threebody stable position. s.h.i.+ps from Tycho are orbiting the Moon's rim-that band around the edge which is in radio shadow from us and from the Newton. If we h ”
ear- ”Yes, yes! How about radar search?”
”Sir, a rocket on the surface looks to radar like a million other features the same size. Our one chance is to get them to answer.. . if they can. Ultrahigh-resolution radar might spot them in months-but suits worn in those little rockets carry only six hours' air. We are praying they will hear and answer.”
”When they answer, you'll slap a radio direction finder on them. Eh?”
”No, sir.”
”In G.o.d's name, why not?”
”Sir, a direction finder is useless for this job. It would tell us only that the signal came from the Moon-which doesn't help.”
”Doctor, you're saying that you might hear Betsy- and not know where she is?”
”We're as blind as she is. We hope that she will be able to lead us to her. . . if she hears us.”
”How?”
”With a laser. An intense, very tight beam of light. She'll hear it-”
”Hear a beam of light?”
”Yes, sir. We are jury-rigging to scan like radar- that won't show anything. But we are modulating it to give a carrier wave in radio frequency, then modulating that into audio frequency-and controlling that by a piano. If she hears us, we'll tell her to listen while we scan the Moon and run the scale on the piano-”
”All this while a little girl is dying?”
”Mister President-shut up!”
”Who was THAT?”
”I'm Betsy's father. They've patched me from Omaha. Please, Mr. President, keep quiet and let them work. I want my daughter back.”
The President answered tightly, ”Yes, Mr. Barnes. Go ahead, Director. Order anything you need.”