Part 7 (1/2)

He described a family, and he made them the family next door. Mother, father, children, watching one another die, not prettily but with all the torture that the laboratories of the world could dream and put together. A family that watched each other go insane, knowing what was happening. A family that watched each other die, writhing and unknowing in insanity.

He took his pointer and he showed the growing perimeter of the quarantine. He traced the location of the center of the disaster.

Then he leaned again toward his audience. ”Listen, now,” he said, ”for the world cannot sustain this torture.”

He took a deep breath and he put the full force of his being into his words.

”Witches of the world, unite,” he said, ”to make it clean, clean, clean, Witch clean--NOW!”

The final word was out before the network censor reached the cut-off switch.

The President and his cabinet put the country on a double alert.

Russia had cleaned up Formosa, they knew, and would hit the United States with disease and ultimatums next.

The people of the world took the story with an unexpected calm. Like Hiros.h.i.+ma, it was too unexpected, too big, too unimaginable. There was a hooker somewhere, and they went about their business annoyed, angry, worried, but quiet.

The papers editorialized on the question of who cleaned up Formosa--who had the answers?--and left the subject of what the possession of such a clean-up force could mean to the world, to the statesmen. They turned as quickly as possible to other matters, for n.o.body was sure what to think, and n.o.body told them what to think.

Bill Howard was off the air, of course. It didn't bother him. He had a real problem now.

We've bought a little time, he thought. A little time to grow in.

We've bought a little time from the fanatics and their statesmen, from the eggheads and their politicians, from the military and the industrial and the just generally foolhardy.

We, the people of the world, have a little time now that we didn't have yesterday.

How much? He didn't know.

On this one, there'd been time to get together. On this one, there'd been weeks, while the crisis built and the world faced a horrible death. This crisis had been a lengthy one. There'd been time for a man to make up his mind and try a solution.