Part 5 (1/2)

'Duke Ellington. Released two years ago. The 1943 Ellington band, baby!'

His voice rose as the music began and Ace wondered why, if he so loved the music, he didn't just shut up and let them listen to it. But Cosmic Ray kept on spouting facts. 'Jimmie Hamilton on clarinet! And the great Ben Webster, 30recorded just before he left the band in August of that year! ”Jump for Joy” is the t.i.tle, cats. It's a hot little gem dreamed up by Ellington and Webster and some cat called Kuller. Originally written for a stage show which premiered at the Mayan Theatre in LA, City of the Angels, baby, on. . . '

He proceeded to detail the date in July 1941 when the song had first been aired. By now Ace was extremely irritated with his running commentary because it was preventing her hearing the music. Ace had always been partial to jazz, treasuring her personally autographed Courtney Pine CD, and responded to the Ellington tune immediately. She felt her hips sway and her feet begin to stir.

Ray finally shut up and began to listen to the music he had been espous-ing at such turgid length. And oddly enough, everyone else shut up too. A communal silence fell over the party, one of those odd synchronous moments when, as if by telepathic concord, the entire group runs out of things to say.

It was a comfortable, attentive silence, as the hissing, spinning disc gave up its music. The song had a sardonic swagger in the muted trumpets and an infectious, joyous swing. Ace saw the first stirring of movement among the party guests, as if they were on the verge of breaking out into communal, tribal dance.

The vocalist commenced singing on the record. She enquired in a voice rich with hip irony whether the listeners had seen pastures groovy. Several couples began to dance. Even the Doctor was swaying. Cosmic Ray had his eyes squeezed shut and was listening in stunned rapture.

With silky, syncopated cynicism the singer belted out in conclusion that Green Pastures was nothing other than the t.i.tle of a Technicolor movie.

Everybody in the room was dancing now with the exception of a sulking Fuchs, a dour and suspicious Butcher and, curiously, Ray himself. He stood utterly still as he listened. His eyes were shut, his countenance upturned as if the sun was s.h.i.+ning down on him. His fat, goateed face was glistening and as Ace bopped across the Oppenheimers' sun-faded Navajo rug on what had suddenly become the dance floor, the Doctor squiring her with some swinging moves of his own, she realised they were the wet traces of tears.

'Babies,' said Cosmic Ray. 'Little babies, dig this beautiful music. Like a big beautiful bubble blown by everything sweet and hip and groovy in the glowing heart of the cosmos. Dig the way that rainbow bubble s.h.i.+nes so beautiful. But know this cats and kittens, if you only knew how fragile that bubble is.'

The Doctor had stopped dancing. He stood staring at Ray like a hound trained for a very special hunt, who had finally spotted his prey.

'If only you knew, sweet groovers,' said Ray, 'how close this music came to not existing at all.'

The big man began to cry.31.

Chapter Three.

Cactus Needles The following day, Ace stood in front of a blackboard in a sunlit block of s.p.a.ce, chalk dust rising around her, sunlight falling through it in a luminous veil. The sunlight came from a high window in a cla.s.sroom in the old riding school.

She didn't know if the riding school had ever had much use for blackboards in its day, but the jokers using the premises now certainly did. The rooms were a.s.signed to groups of physicists, working in twos or threes, and the blackboards in every cla.s.sroom were crammed with equations.

This particular room was shared by Ace and a science geek called Abner Apple. The guy was a professor, despite his youth. But that wasn't so unusual here on the Hill where it seemed everyone had a doctorate with the possible exception of the Doctor.

In any case, Ace had never thought of the man as anything but Adam's Apple Adam's Apple since she first saw him, due to the scrawny, k.n.o.bbly jut of his neck. Professor Apple's big head swayed on top of that k.n.o.bbly neck, a s.h.i.+ning dome covered with just the finest fuzz of colourless hair. since she first saw him, due to the scrawny, k.n.o.bbly jut of his neck. Professor Apple's big head swayed on top of that k.n.o.bbly neck, a s.h.i.+ning dome covered with just the finest fuzz of colourless hair.

Apple was an egghead. A young one, but just as set in his quirks as the oldest, most irascible professor. He was standing in front of the blackboard with Ace, surrounded by the smell of freshly rising chalk. She hated that smell. The school smell.

The young physicist stood there, his big eyes staring down at her from his big s.h.i.+ny head, like a bird watching a worm. 'Well?' he said.

Ace returned her eyes to the blackboard. It was crammed from corner to corner with a complex tangle of scribbled equations. Numbers and abstruse mathematical signs were dotted everywhere. It was a big, complex chunk of a much vaster scientific calculation that was taking place here at Los Alamos, the unholy equation of maths and physics and chemistry that would determine the possibility, the probability, the feasibility of fas.h.i.+oning a doomsday weapon.

It meant nothing to Ace.

She stared up at the dense mess of technical squiggles on the blackboard, the scattered ma.s.s of numbers, clumped here and there, some big, some small.

And it meant nothing to her. Adam's Apple was staring at her as she felt her face get hot. Ace silently cursed herself. Why hadn't she listened to the 33Doctor? He was always banging on at her about her remembering to take the d.a.m.ned thing.

Maybe she had deliberately not taken it, out of spite, or out of some sub-conscious spark of rebellion. That's certainly what Henbest, the psychiatrist on the Hill, would have said. The goatish man had bored Ace at the party last night for what seemed like hours. He had kept asking, with bad breath and cigarette smoke floating salaciously from his mouth, whether Ace had any interest in hypnotism. Like she would let that creep put her into a trance.

She could smell his breath afterwards for hours.

Still, she would rather be with Henbest now than with this scrawny young man, here in this cla.s.sroom with the gleaming chalk dust floating around them. Apple was staring at her, waiting impatiently for an answer she couldn't give. Ace looked at the smeared, crowded figures on the chalkboard, hoping that the numbers would fall into some strange, numinous pattern rich with meaning.

It wasn't an entirely idle hope. It had happened before. But it wasn't going to happen now. 'Well?' repeated Apple. 'I thought you were supposed to be some kind of calculating prodigy. I'm not asking you to do any of the real labour, none of the actual physics. I just want your a.s.sistance with the donkey donkey work work, the raw calculation. The arithmetic.' He p.r.o.nounced the last word with outraged, venomous contempt. 'It's the sort of work anybody can do.'

'Look, I'm sorry, but '

He drew a circle around one group of numbers. 'It's the sort of work I could do myself if I had the time. If I didn't have more important matters to devote my attention to. That's the whole point. You are supposed to be the calculating prodigy. You are supposed to do this for me, to take the load off my back. That's the whole point of you. You're supposed to be here to help me.'

'I'm supposed to be here to help the Doctor.'

A tight, maniacal grin appeared on Apple's face. He was like the triumphant, voracious bird finally pouncing on the worm. 'But the Doctor isn't working here today, is he? He's seeing General Groves. For his security interview. So you're supposed to be a.s.signed to me. You're supposed to help me. But you can't, can you?'

Apple suddenly turned away from her and threw his piece of chalk across the room. It shattered in the corner with a vicious whip-crack sound. He turned back to her, wiping the chalk dust off his hands. 'You can't,' he said.

'Of course I can,' said Ace. 'But. . . '

'But?'

Ace silently cursed herself again. Why had she ignored the Doctor's warn-ings? She had meant to take it. She had fully intended to take it, immediately 34after breakfast. The problem was, Professor Apple had intercepted her the moment she left the table at Fuller Lodge. Breakfast had been pretty good, waffles and sausages and honey and white country b.u.t.ter. Ace had enjoyed it, with no premonition that doom was about to pounce. But doom had pounced, in the shape of Professor Apple. He hadn't given her a chance to go back to her quarters. He had marched her directly over here to the old ranch school and stood her in front of the blackboard.

'There's something I have to do,' said Ace. 'Back at my quarters.' It had turned out that the women's dormitory was full, so Ace had ended up moving into the WAC barracks, a very similar-looking soulless, long, low box of a building.

'What sort of thing?'

Ace had a sudden inspiration. 'Women's business.'

'What?' said Professor Apple. Then he fell silent as realisation dawned. His face darkened with embarra.s.sment. 'All right. But make it quick.' He didn't have to tell her twice. Ace was straight out of the cla.s.sroom, the door slamming behind her, her heels clicking and echoing in the hallway that smelled of lemon floor polish, walking past the other cla.s.srooms containing the busy, serious figures labouring over their own blackboards. She walked straight out of the schoolhouse and into the bright open air of the day and felt a tremendous thrill of relief.

Until she realised Professor Apple was following her. The relief melted away under a hot wave of shame. Ace knew she was a fraud and she knew she was about to be found out. Apple followed her down the curving road, making no attempt to conceal his presence. Ace began to feel irritated by his gooney pursuit and with the first stirrings of anger came a small return of confidence.

What could he do to stop her? There was nothing. He couldn't follow her into the women's dormitory, to her bed, to the bag she had so carelessly left behind. (Or perhaps deliberately, to annoy the Doctor. That was what Henbest would say.) But in any case Professor Apple couldn't follow her and he couldn't stop her getting her capsule and taking it. And if she took the capsule she wouldn't be exposed as a fraud and everything would be all right. Ace had just firmly decided that everything was going to be all right when, around a bend in the road and striding directly towards her, came Major Butcher.

Butcher's eyebrows jerked up as he saw Ace hurrying along the road with Professor Apple in pursuit. She dropped her head shamefully and hurried past him. If only she could get back to the WAC building. . . Butcher kept walking right on past her and she felt a moment of grat.i.tude but then she heard him falling into step with Professor Apple. She didn't dare risk a glance back at them, but she could hear their footsteps and s.n.a.t.c.hes of what they 35were saying.

' be working with you at the school?' said Butcher.

'She certainly should. But it's becoming evident she actually can't can't ' said Apple with venom. Ace kept hurrying towards her quarters, towards sanctuary She didn't look back. She increased her pace and tried to force a casual, carefree expression of innocence onto her face. It fell like the rictus of a cadaver. ' said Apple with venom. Ace kept hurrying towards her quarters, towards sanctuary She didn't look back. She increased her pace and tried to force a casual, carefree expression of innocence onto her face. It fell like the rictus of a cadaver.

' going now?'

'Back to her quarters on some sort of women's matter,' Professor Apple's voice dropped into inaudibility as he conferred briefly with Butcher. Ace kept walking. Then Apple's voice rose again, with a note of vicious anger in it.

'Calculating prodigy? She can't calculate two and two. He hasn't brought her here for that. She's just his, you know. . . '

Ace flushed and increased her pace.

'She's pretending she can perform complex mathematical calculations,' said Professor Apple. 'When in fact she only has one use. She's letting him put his hairy little hands on her and. . . ' Apple's voice sounded about to break, like that of an adolescent boy. It was rising towards incoherence, growing ragged with spite and anger behind Ace as she hurried towards the WAC barracks.