Shadow of Heaven

Chapter Twenty

Sometimes, during the long night, Stirling would awaken with the knowledge that Melissa was not asleep. He would touch her forehead and find it as cold as dewed marble. On those occasions he always got up to brew coffee; and they would sit together in the darkness, drink the bitter liquid and talk about inconsequentials. In the morning, by tacit agreement, they never referred to what has passed during the hours of darkness. There would have been no point.

When you’re up, you’re up, the words of an old nursery rhyme drummed in Stirling’s mind. And when you’re down, you’re down.

The letter had been in Stirling’s pocket for three days. He took it out, for perhaps the hundredth time, and read it while Melissa fixed breakfast in the cooking alcove of their apartment. It was an official invitation for Mr. and Mrs. Victor Stirling to visit Administrator Mason Third in his private suite in Government Mile, Boston. The appointed time was three o’clock that afternoon.

Melissa, carrying plates, came into the room. “Victor!” Stirling put the letter away guiltily. He folded the bed up into the wall, pulled a table leaf out into the same space from another wall, and shook it to release the spring-loaded stools.

“Sorry, honey. I was dreaming again,” Stirling said. “But why does he want to see me? What’s behind it?”

“Perhaps he wants to say thanks.”

“Third would have made Administrator without my help. Anyway, it’s been so long, he must be cooking something up.”

Melissa set the plates on the table and wrapped her arms around his chest. “You’re tightening up again, Victor. Remember what we agreed? Won’t you find out all about it this afternoon?”

Stirling nodded and gratefully buried his face in the black battle-plume of her hair. She had shown a surprising degree of strength in the four months they had been living together in his ten-foot-by-ten-foot apartment—even when there had been the possibility of a prison sentence. Luckily, the courts had decided that only the Council members who bore arms had been culpable; and none of them had survived the fall. Now that he really knew her, Stirling suspected that Melissa could have handled even a Compression prison; but there were times when her eyes were like those of his mother. Intent, sorrowful, sniper’s eyes.

“That’s right,” he said. “We’ll find out all about it this afternoon.”

The vac-tube express whisked them to Boston in fifteen claustrophobic minutes, and they walked the rest of the way to Government Mile. Once they were inside the administrative block itself, Stirling presented their two appointment cards to the inspection unit in an elevator car; then they were taken on a five-minute ride which involved several horizontal interchanges. When the car finally stopped and opened its doors, Stirling had no idea how far he had traveled or in what direction. They stepped out into a silver-and-turquoise reception room which was almost spacious, and a door opened automatically in the opposite wall. Beyond it were living quarters, comfortably and informally furnished.

“I hope I look presentable,” Melissa said nervously. She was wearing a creation which seemed to consist of light, mist, color, and very little else.

“You look more than presentable,” Stirling replied, “but I’m keeping you to myself just the same. Remember that when you meet our host.”

“Oh? You make him sound like someone who would expect droit de seigneur.”

“It’s a bit late for that, isn’t it? Let’s go in.”

Mason Third met them in the doorway. He looked more like a youngish British colonel than ever, but slightly grayer than Stirling had remembered him. He shook hands with them both, retained Melissa’s for a beautifully calculated period beyond what was required by convention, ushered them into the long room, and offered drinks. Melissa accepted a glass of synthejuice, and sipped it dutifully.

“Now, Vic. As far as I remember from our first meeting, you’re a whisky drinker. Try this.” Stirling tasted malty radiance from a cut glass decanter. “This tastes like …”

“Real Scotch,” Mason said delightedly. “One of the privileges of office.”

His boyish pleasure with one of the trivialities of power was an effective disguise for the real Third, Stirling thought. The speed with which he had reached the top of the political ladder had been equaled by the ruthless energy he had shown on taking office. Thanks to the debacle over He 23, the Food Technology Authority’s stock had been low when Third was voted in to replace Raddall; and Third had seized his chance to cripple its political machine. Already there were rumors of two attempts on his life, but he still continued on his chosen path as he wielded broadsword and stiletto with equal facility.

Over the second drink, Mason Third said, “I guess we’ve reached the point where I’m supposed to say, ‘I expect you’re wondering why I brought you here’.”

Stirling nodded. “I’ve seen those movies too.”

“Here it is then, Vic.” Third sat on the edge of his desk. “It hasn’t gone before the Chamber of Representatives yet, but I’m scrapping the whole land extension program. The East Coast has eighteen He’s which cost as much as a defense program to maintain—and the money can be better used elsewhere.”

“I guessed you’d do something like that,” Stirling said. “Where do I fit in?”

“This is something that has to be handled just right, Vic. There are a few radical aspects to my proposal, and I’m looking for a good press officer, who will have special responsibilities for seeing to it that the public is kept supplied with the right sort of information.” Third twinkled at Stirling over the rim of his glass; obviously he was enjoying himself.

“It doesn’t sound like my sort of job.” Stirling knew he was being offered a salary perhaps ten times greater than he could earn with the Record, but he was unable to feel grateful.

“I disagree. An experienced journalist with first-hand experience of the subject!”

“I’ve never done any P.R. work. I’m sorry if that sounds surly, but there it is.” Stirling glanced across at Melissa to see how she was reacting. To his surprise, she was sitting bolt upright in her chair, eyes alert.

“Administrator Third,” she said quickly. “What are these radical aspects you mentioned? There’s nothing very startling in the idea of scrapping the He’s?”

“Nice going,” Third said admiringly. “I could offer you a job too.”

“She already has one,” Stirling cut in.

“I remember something else from our first meeting, Vic. I told you never to go into politics—and that was good advice.”

“I’m grateful, but I’ve no interest in politics. Or public relations work either.”

Third got to his feet and lifted a sheaf of photo-prints from his desk. “All right, Vic. I’ve been indulging myself in a little cat-and-mouse with you. Let’s talk seriously now. Before you start making your mind up about this job, let me tell you something about it. Okay?”

“Okay.” Stirling felt uncomfortably like a schoolboy being mollified by a clever teacher.

“Fine.” Third handed him a grainy, high-magnification print showing hundreds of irregular blotches. “Do you know what that is?”

“Virus? Bacteria,?”

“You’re on the right track. This micro-organism is a specially developed strain of the blue-green Nostoc algae. It doesn’t look like much, but that little fellow is a world champion.”

“What at?”

“Well—to put it in a rather large nutshell—it’s a photo-synthetic, nitrogen-fixing, oxygen-evolving, temperature-resistant, aerial micro-organism. The only one we know of, as a matter of fact. And it has to be a world-beater—because that’s the job we intend it to do for us on Venus.”

“Venus!”

“Yes, you’ve heard of the place, haven’t you?”

“I’m sorry. Go on!”

“The trouble with Venus is its greenhouse effect: too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The sun’s infrared waves get in, are modified by the carbon dioxide, can’t get out again; and the heat builds up, making the planet unsuitable for human life. That’s bad, but one answer we have come up with, is to reduce the carbon dioxide by photosynthesis. And the only way to achieve this is by seeding the atmosphere with a fairly permanent aerial population.

“We—my scientific team, that is—believe that Nostoc R here is the ideal first colonist. He is small enough to remain aloft in the Venusian atmosphere almost indefinitely; he can stand three hundred degrees Centigrade; he can keep himself alive by fixing free nitrogen; and he produces oxygen like mad.

“If we can successfully dust Venus with large quantities of Nostoc R, the outcome will be a fall in the carbon dioxide ratio, a lessening of the greenhouse effect, and a lowering of the surface temperature. Provided we do it on a massive scale, it won’t be too long before the surface temperature drops below the boiling point of water. Next there would be rain, the accumulation of a few inches of surface water, a further drop in temperature, and …

“Need I say any more?”

“Yes.” Stirring’s heart was pounding slowly and strongly. “You started off to tell me what you plan to do about the He’s, and you didn’t do it. Or did you?”

“You know I did, Vic.” Third handed Stirling another photograph. “Your brother had the germ of an idea when he suggested taking He 23 to the Moon. Those floating anachronisms have a future ahead of them as factories for the production of Nostoc algae.

“I’ll get them to Venus somehow—that part is comparatively easy—but I need people to run them once they’re in orbit. A special kind of people. Men and women who could live on the edge of space, Vic, right up there on the edge of space … “

Stirling glanced at Melissa—her eyes were luminous with tears, shining like twin planets—and the whole weight of the Compression lifted off him.

“About this job of press officer,” he said slowly. “Where would my office be?”

“Take your pick,” Third replied. “I’ve got eighteen lies, and you can have first choice of orbit, too. I should warn you, though, that this is a long-term project. There’ll be no colonization of the planet in our lifetimes. You’d be getting your mail forwarded to Venus for the rest of your lives.”

“What do you think, Melissa?” Stirling touched her fingers with his. “Venus.” She looked at him without speaking, and he knew what she was thinking.

I always think a good address is so important, don’t you?