Eric C. Williams
The existence of human life on the Earth depends entirely upon one vital factor—the stability of the Sun, Any major change in its structure would mean the end of mankind. Eric Williams uses this theme to depict the thoughts and actions of the few astronomers who discover that the Sun is to die— and the difficulty of changing their normal habits!
* * * *
On the broad top of the mountain the Observatory domes and towers loomed above the encircling brush and trees like giant silver Martian shapes immobilized by plague. Although it was midday, the sky was of such a deep blue it seemed a pewter or graphite-like black in colour lying against the aluminium domes. The Observatory site appeared to be deserted, but every observing slit was open and every instrument pointed to the Sun, and this unprecedented concentration of forces (most of which had not been designed for Solar observation) revealed the station to be fully manned to record some rare phenomenon.
In the concrete chamber beneath the largest Sun tower, a hand groped for the telephone in the dark. “D’s gone,” reported the spectroheliograph operator.
“Get a record of everything,” was the reply. “Let us know how it goes.”
The Director in his office put down the phone and told the three men with him, “The D lines are gone now.”
The four men were Launcelot Weiner, Director of the Observatory, Leonard Smith, Head of Solar Research, Bernard Tom Willoughby, Senior Solar Physicist, and Thomas Gran from University of California. Weiner was the youngest of the four, an almost offensively boyish forty-five for such a position. He was small, plump-cheeked, slick-haired and immaculate. Behind his simple face was a fine theoretical brain and clever administrator. For the past two months he had been involved with Professor Gran in an almost non-stop mathematical exploration of some minute alterations found in the Sun’s spectrum, and as the importance of their answers broke on him there came additional work setting up new research programmes for the Observatory, and ensuring that his staff scented nothing of the true nature of the awful thing they were measuring. He had not slept at all over the last three days and nights. His poor, baby face was blotched with yellow, his eyes dark circled and the skin wrinkled at the corners by his continual frown; his prim set mouth had lost its old control. However, he was still in control of the room, and while the others stood, or paced or leaned, he sat at his desk with the telephone to hand and spoke with as quiet and steady voice as he could produce.
“If the D lines are gone, I’d put the end no more than forty-eight hours away; I’m afraid we’ll never have time to find out why this is happening to us.”
Smith, the Head of Solar Research at the Observatory, looked out of the window across miles of rolling mountain-tops and endeavoured to concentrate his thoughts on the hour of mathematics he had just listened to. He had the sort of mind which prefers pictures to figures.
“It’s as though damper-rods were being pushed into the Sun’s furnace, one moment you’ve got a chain reaction— the next it’s gone!”
“It’s not quite like that, Leonard,” said Willoughby with his usual asperity. “You wouldn’t get this vanishing of the elements one by one. It’s more as if the elements had been completely consumed.” He turned his intent blue eyes on the others. “I think ...”
“As I said, Bernard,” interrupted Weiner, “we haven’t got time to find out what is going on. Our measurements show the cut in short-wave radiation from the Sun, and all that is certain at the present rate of loss in power is that the Sun will go out in a couple of days. What we have to decide now is what to do about it: do we break it to the world, or do we stay quiet?”
Professor Gran pulled his bent length from the only armchair in the room and took up a position by the table. He was a laughable sight in belted Norfolk tweeds and knickerbockers, a latter-day Bernard Shaw, with a small bald head and pince-nez spectacles; his caricature of learning included a bent-knee shuffle and a gaze usually directed at his feet.
“The thing’s been too obvious to be missed for two weeks now,” he said. “With the sodium lines gone any schoolboy will be able to deduce the extinction of the Sun.”
The telephone rang and he waited patiently while the Director listened and said, “Thank you.”
“K,” Weiner told them, and looked at Gran.
“We’ve got to tell what we know,” went on Professor Gran making a flopping gesture with his left arm. “If we don’t give the information, some ill-informed lunatic will. Of course, every Observatory in the world worth the name knows what’s going on and like us they’ve been checking and rechecking before saying a word—you don’t go telling a thing like this without being sure. Now we are sure. It’s our duty to inform the President without delay.” He gave one of his famous snorts, “Though what good it will do him, I don’t know. I advise you, Weiner, to lift up that phone now and arrange an interview. If you hurry, you can be in Washington by tomorrow morning.”
Willoughby, who had been prowling up and down the room behind the group near the desk, now exclaimed contemptuously, “Great God! Protocol at a time like this! The President first, then the Vice-President, then the Senate, I suppose, then by various stages to the people. This is the last chance Science will ever have to act without some damn Government Department clamping down and you want to dump it right in their laps. The people will never know what’s hit them. Be damned to the President. Give it to the newspapers straight away, I say.” Something amused his inflamed imagination and he laughed loudly and quoted, “Sun goes out Sunday night.”
“Nothing will be gained by panicking the public,” said Weiner. He opened a bottle of tablets and swallowed a couple. “You mustn’t entertain the thought, Willoughby, it’s going to be terrible enough without riots and pillage— which is what would undoubtedly break out if you spread doom over all the papers.” He picked up the telephone.
Willoughby sat down heavily in the armchair recently occupied by Professor Gran, he spoke with an hysterical note in his voice. “I don’t think any of you realize what is going to happen. We’re dead men. Two or three weeks and we’re dead, every last one of the human race, nothing in die Universe can save us.”
Weiner spoke softly to the operator and put the phone down again.
“We’ve all of us been doomed from the moment we entered the world and no power in the Universe has ever been able to save a single one of the human race from dying. What’s so dramatic about dying a few years sooner than the normal span?” remarked Smith.
“Platitudes!” snarled Willoughby.
“We mustn’t squabble, gentlemen,” said Professor Gran. “It’s up to us to think. We have been given the privilege of knowing the destiny of the human race before most of our fellow beings and we must take every advantage of that privilege.”
“Oh, Poppycock!” shouted Willoughby. “It’s no privilege so far as I’m concerned—it’s bloody anguish. Do you realize it’s my daughter’s twenty-first on Monday!” He rose from the chair. “By God, I’m going to live these last couple of days. You carry on if you want—I’m off!” He reached the door. “And if you won’t, I will tell the Press.”
Smith started forward to stop Willoughby, but Weiner said sharply, “All right, Smith, let him go.”
The telephone rang. Weiner lit a cigarette, then picked up the instrument. His name and position soon got him connected to the President’s Secretary.
“I want to arrange a private interview with the President tomorrow morning,” he said. “No, I’m very sorry, I can’t tell you what the subject would be. Yes, I realize that, and believe me, as an administrator, I have every understanding of how valuable the President’s time is...Yes, Yes.” Weiner listened and drummed his fingers on the desk. “Look, this subject is so much dynamite I can’t risk telling you over this line. You must believe me that I wouldn’t think of requesting an interview and at such short notice if this was not a matter of paramount interest to our country. If this interview is not granted tomorrow, news of what we have found may leak into the Press before the President has had time to consider his action. If it does leak before he’s been able to organize, then he won’t be able to control the panic. No! No! I told you I can’t reveal what it is. Yes, I’ll wait.” Weiner did not look at the others as he stubbed down his cigarette and waited. “Hallo, yes. Good. Thank you. I’ll be there at eight-thirty tomorrow.” He hung up.
“I’d better get going,” he said in a worn-out voice. He looked at Smith. “Tell my wife I will be back tomorrow if I can make it. Don’t upset her if you can help it.” He looked at Professor Gran. “Can I run you down to the airport?”
Gran jerked his shoulders back in surprise. “Good Lord, Weiner, one of the most sensational events in the history of Astronomy and you expect me to leave this place. No! Give me charge of one of your instruments and I’ll see it out to the last second up here, where the air is clearest.”
“You have it,” said Weiner with a faint smile.
“What shall I tell the others?” asked Smith.
“Tell them the lines will come back in a couple of days—you dream it up.” He gathered up the papers from his desk and stuffed’ them in a brief-case. He opened the desk drawer and put a few things into his pockets. “Well,” he said, “I hope I shall be seeing you again before ...” He did not complete the sentence. They shook hands silently, then left the room.
Smith stopped on the brick terrace outside the administration building and wondered what he should do first. As Head of Solar Research at the Observatory he realized he should be hastening back to the instruments that continued to record the death of the Sun, but now that it was a settled matter he felt very little curiosity about the details of the turns and twists of the death throes. It was a shade too early to be ringing up Weiner’s wife. He wandered to the stone balustrade at one end of the terrace and stared out over the steep drop between the mountains filled with clear, dry air. He flicked his eyes momentarily at the Sun, it appeared no different. Ah well, he supposed he must go to the heliograph dome where he had his office. He turned from the beautiful view and made his way along the concrete paths between the domes, until he came to his own headquarters.
Swanson, his deputy, came in the other door leading to the dome, almost as soon as Smith closed the outer door.
“Thank the Lord you’re back!” he said. “Leonard, you’ve got to put your foot on Mugeridge: he’s forecasting the end of the world and the Lord knows what else! He’s been ...”
“Just a minute, Will,” interrupted Smith. “Shut the door and sit down.” He took up a comfortable pose in the swivel chair behind his desk. “The world’s not going to end just yet. You know Weiner and Gran have been working on the theory of the disappearing lines. I’ve just come from Weiner’s office—it’s too mathematical for me, but the long and short of it is that these line disappearances are a false effect, a sort of obscuring owing to a peculiar state of the reversal layer, and they will be reappearing in about two days. Weiner’s gone off for a couple of days to confer with Palomar, but he’ll do the explaining when he returns. In the meantime, we go on collecting data. You can tell Mugeridge that much and no more!”
Swanson, stared at Smith almost too amazed to speak. Smith gazed calmly back, desperately hoping that the bigger the lie the more likely it is to be believed.
“Is that all he told you?” asked Swanson, “Just that mumbo jumbo!”
Smith forced himself to become angry. He banged his pipe down on the desk. “Look here, Will, I’m giving you as much as I understood from a half-hour’s solid nuclear mathematics. You know it’s not my field at all. You’ll have to wait until Weiner comes back if you want it in figures— in the meantime get hold of Mugeridge and send him in here if you can’t handle him yourself.”
“I’m sorry, Leonard,” apologized Swanson. He gave Smith a momentary sideways look containing too much thoughtfulness for comfort, then turned to the door. “I’ll tell Mugeridge,” he said, and went out.
“Hell!” swore Smith. He sat for some moments savagely thumbing one corner of his moustache. He picked up the telephone and began to dial Weiner’s chalet, then changed his mind and dropped the instrument back into the cradle. After some more thought, he dialled his own residence and spoke to his wife.
“Mildred, Weiner’s had to fly off to Palomar for a couple of days; didn’t even have time to phone Helen. He’s asked me to let her know. I was thinking it might be a good idea to invite her to dinner tonight, because you know, I’m not so sure I shall be able to get home until late and you could keep each other company. What do you think?”
Mildred was puzzled by all the activity in the Observatory that sent astronomers off without a word to their wives and kept Sun observers at work during the night, but, yes, he could ask Helen to come to dinner.
Smith then spent an awkward five minutes breaking the news of Lancelot’s departure to Helen Weiner.
“Well, I don’t know what came over him,” she said, “that he just couldn’t lift the phone and say ‘goodbye, be back tomorrow’.”
Smith explained that in a garbled way which left Helen cold.
“I don’t care if it was the biggest discovery since telescopes began ...” She checked her temper and gave a slight laugh. “Anyway, Leonard, it’s nice of you and Mildred to invite me over and I’ll certainly be glad to come. I must confess I don’t like lonely nights on the mountain.”
“What a way to spend your last few days alive!” raged Smith as he put the telephone down. “Fixing up the boss’s wife: keeping the staff quiet; lying to your friends.” He took out his tobacco pouch. It was empty.
* * * *
Willoughby drove fast down the concrete road leading to the foothills where the half-dozen family houses were spread out. The road had been constructed fifteen years before when the Observatory was built, and some of its steeper sections were cracked and crumbly. Willoughby, with his mind filled with the awfulness of events and raging at the cold inhuman inevitableness of the end of light within two days, hit a patch, skidded, jammed on the car brakes, hit the edge, bounced and went off the road into a gnarled cactus. The cactus thorns burst one of his front tyres and a rock did something noisy to the differential. Willoughby recovered his breath and climbed swearing from the silent car. His left knee was badly jolted where he had stamped stiff-legged on the brake and had then taken the weight of his sudden halt.
“Yow!” he gasped at the pain. He limped round the car and saw that there was no hope of moving it. The houses were at least two miles away in a direct line, but the road made several loops down the spurs of the mountain, and the total distance would be about five miles. High up the mountain he heard Weiner’s car emerge from one of the innumerable cuttings and then damp out to inaudibility again. Although he wished he could tell Weiner to go to hell, he knew he was in no position to do so. It was unlikely, in view of the intensive watch on the Sun, that anybody else would be leaving the mountain-top before sunset.
Willoughby cursed his way up the slope down which he had crashed and stood waiting for Weiner. The pain of his knee was growing and the knee was rapidly swelling into one rigid block. “Come on, bloody Presidential Agent Number One!” he shouted up the empty road. He hobbled round impatiently in painful circles. When Weiner eventually pulled up alongside him, Willoughby wrenched open the door and snarled: “You drive like you were going to a funeral, not going to see the President in his damned White House!” He slammed the door closed.
Weiner drove the car carefully. “I should put cold compresses on that when you get home,” he advised.
Willoughby looked at him with mockery and disgust. “You don’t realize it yet, do you? What’s the use of doctoring a corpse?”
Weiner did not reply. They pulled up before Willoughby’s house and Willoughby manoeuvred himself out of the front seat.
“Good-bye,” said Weiner.
“Give the President my best wishes,” called Willoughby sarcastically. Weiner drove off. It was only then that Willoughby remembered that his wife, Mona, would be out shopping with Sally in San Diego for most of the day. He could have cried with the futility of it. Here he was, damn near crippled for need of a bit of attention to his knee, and his wife and daughter were out with the other car buying stuff which they would never have time enough to consume! In intense pain he made his way slowly to the house, let himself in, and flopped down in an armchair by the telephone. Raggedly he dialled for information and asked for the Editorial Offices of the Los Angeles Times. While he waited he reached out and pulled bottle and glass to him.
“Hallo!” he shouted impatiently into the phone, and when he was finally connected, “About time! This is Willoughby of California State Observatory. I ... yes, well you can check up on me later on ... will you shut up a moment! I’ve got a bit of news you might find mildly interesting, the Sun goes out in two days.” He took a quick gulp from the glass. “After Sunday, no more light, everything gets colder and colder. Give it a month, and life on Earth will be in deep freeze.” The man at the other end said something pithy and Willoughby gave a shout of laughter. “No, seriously, you can check this with Palomar or any other Observatory—for the past two months spectral lines have been disappearing from the Solar spectrum. Weiner and Gran have been working on the theory of this and today they reached the unanimous conclusion that the Sun will cease to emit visible light within two days. What d’you think of that, hey ? No, no—it won’t mean immediate death, but unless you can find yourself a deep warm hole within a week, you can wish everybody a fond farewell for keeps. Where’s Weiner? He’ll be arriving in San Diego in a couple of hours headed for the White House. All right, put me on to your Science Editor. In the meantime, you get somebody down to San Diego airport to give Weiner the third degree before he gets the plane to Washington.”
Willoughby then lay back in his chair and chatted lengthily between drinks to a very knowledgeable Science Editor. He then put down the telephone and stood up with a groan. He stood looking down at his betrousered knee. “What the hell’s a cold compress?” he asked irritably aloud.
* * * *
Weiner drove fast once he was off the mountain and within two hours came to San Diego airport. He put his car in the long-stay park and strode quickly towards “Bookings”. As he approached the east-bound counter, a well-dressed young man rose from a seat and said, “Excuse me, Professor Weiner.”
Weiner experienced a momentary shock as the all-pervading stream of his thoughts was invaded by this outside distraction.
“Can’t stop,” he apologized and pressed onwards as fast as his short legs would carry him.
“Is it true that you are on your way to see the President?” asked the young man, pacing alongside.
Weiner stopped in momentary amazement.
“I represent the Los Angeles Times. A Mr. Willoughby phoned us,” explained the young man, looking important and apprehensive at the same time.
“No, I am not going to see the President,” said Weiner crisply, “I’m going to my normal half-yearly consultation with the Board considering Scientific Expenditure in the U.S.A., having its office as you may know in Washington, DC. As regards Mr. Willoughby, I would simply say that he is known to have a strong liking for a strong drink. Will there be anything more?”
The young man looked red, but doggedly asked the key question. “Is the Sun going out in two days’ time?”
Weiner managed to smile, then went to the counter without saying a word. The young man followed. “Mr. Willoughby said ...”
“Please,” interrupted Weiner patiently. “Do you have to pester me with all Mr. Willoughby’s jokes.” He turned away and asked the counter attendant for a ticket on the first plane to Washington.
“Sorry, Professor,” said the young man and he went off.
“The first plane available with space is the 23.30 tonight from Los Angeles arriving Washington 07.15 tomorrow,” said the attendant pleasantly. “There’s one seat left on that.”
“Seven hours to wait!” ejaculated Weiner. “What about the afternoon plane from here?”
“Full up hours ago,” said the attendant sympathetically. “I could ring San Francisco and ask them if they have any vacancies on their New York flight, you could connect back to Washington. That would save you some hours. Of course you would have to take the plane up to San Francisco, cost you more.”
Weiner controlled himself.
‘Yes, yes, do that,” he said. Perspiration burst from his forehead as he stood waiting while the attendant went to an inner office and put through a call. A large man with a wide-brimmed felt hat, a loose-fitting suit and an open-necked shirt came up, dumped his bag and stared irritably at the empty section, then put his finger on the buzzer and kept it there.
“Where the hell they all gone?” he demanded of Weiner.
“He’s fixing a ticket for me,” answered Weiner. “He’ll be back.”
“You want Washington, sonny?” asked the man bellicosely, ceasing his buzzing.
Weiner nodded briefly. He suddenly felt as if all his nerves had become charged with electricity. The sweat poured down his face, his arms and legs trembled. In heaven’s name did he have to stand here in the company of this boorish slob waiting for clerks to exchange pleasantries and to consult diagrams, while the minutes ticked off to the end of all this for ever!
The attendant was still behind the glass partition grinning and cracking away to San Francisco. He looked up and saw Weiner glaring at him. He gave the thumbs down sign and went on talking.
“What’s that mean?” demanded the big man suspiciously. “He ain’t going to tell me he ain’t got no tickets because I’ll pin his ears back if he does. I got to get to Washington tonight.”
The attendant came out.
“Sorry,” he began to Weiner.
“Look!” roared the big man, shouldering Weiner’s slight body to one side. “I’ve been waiting here for some service while you’ve been in there gabbing. Get me to Washington, and fast! Don’t give me any talk about no tickets: I got cash that buys tickets.”
The attendant shrugged at Weiner and backed from the wad of notes thrust towards him.
Weiner felt sick with rage and humiliation. Not since he had been in school had he felt so annihilated by the fact of his small stature and baby looks. He fled away from the scene and stood looking without seeing from one of the huge windows, mopping his face and fighting his nerves. Damn! Damn! Damn! Why hadn’t he fixed his flight before he left? And why had he let that red-faced bully bluster him out of the last place on the 23.30! He turned about determinedly and went to “Enquiries”.
“Where do I charter a plane?” he asked.
After a lot of form filling and phoning and precious minutes thrown away, Weiner was led down the corridor and out on to the inner road. A few minute’s walk and they entered a brick hut. Weiner was handed over to a grizzle-haired fellow who was still worming his way into a flying suit. Snatching up a flying officer’s cap, the silent pilot led the way to the twin-engined plane standing at the edge of the flying-field. Weiner was settled in the small cabin, the pilot busied himself in his crowded compartment. The minutes passed away. Owing to the much smaller power and fuel capacity of this plane compared to the trans-continental services it would not arrive much before 07.00 in Washington, and his interview was timed for 08.30. Not a minute could be wasted here. Weiner felt his control slipping again. And then a young man came up on the run. Papers were passed across. Hands were shaken, the engines roared, the wireless squawked instructions. They were away.
* * * *
Smith spent an embarrassing afternoon casually walking round the various domes engaged on Solar work and answering in a variety of manners the questions put to him.
He went around the place telling his big lie, thinking jerkily on the utter futility of passing one’s last hours in putting down truth, and yet of the world-wide panic if the truth got out, and then of Mildred and what he could possibly tell her, and where the hell he could get some tobacco. In the small coronagraph dome he came on Professor Gran pottering about on his own, loading photographic plates into a camera.
“Oh, hallo,” Professor Gran said cheerfully. “All your chaps seemed stuck on spectral observation, so I thought I’d do a bit of visual work. It would be a crime if we never had a record of the last minutes of old Sol.”
“Old Sol!” thought Smith. “You Norfolk-suited fool! Why don’t you grow up!”
“Have you got all you want?” asked Smith.
“I think so, I think so,” answered Gran busily.
Smith left him and went out into the late afternoon. The sun was poised high above the mountains to the West and over there the colours were washed out and detail lost in the general brightness. In the East, however, the first beautiful colours of evening were tinting the rolling panorama— clear water blues, violets and purples and rich chrome-filled greens. He stood with his hands in his pockets studying the scene with much sadness. When the Sun went out, all this magic would vanish and never reappear; only dim starlight would come down through the slowly freezing atmosphere.
One of the young students employed by the Observatory to study and do odd jobs came hurrying up.
“Mrs. Smith rang up for you, sir. She says it’s urgent. Will you ring her back right away.”
Smith hurried to the nearest office and dialled his home.
“Hallo, Mildred,” he said. “Leonard here. What’s wrong?”
“I’ve had Mr. Willoughby on the telephone. He was terribly wild, Leonard, drunk I suppose. He kept going on about the end of the world. He wanted me to go over there to comfort his last hours.”
“Did he,” said Smith flatly. “Where was he speaking from?”
“His home. But, Leonard, I’m not annoyed or anything. Please don’t get upset. It’s just that he sounded so peculiar I feel sure he’ll do something terrible to himself if he’s not stopped. I thought you might be able to send somebody down to look at him.”
Smith terminated the conversation, then walked over to the car park and got into his open-top car. For a few seconds he cursed Willoughby for further complicating these last days. Instead of taking all his money out of the bank and setting off with Mildred on a round-the-world air holiday, here he was endeavouring to keep up a front before his staff, and on his way to wet-nurse a drunk in case he did any more talking.
Smith drove the car down the mountain, passed his own house, and down to Willoughby’s chalet in the foothills. As he drew up, he could hear Willoughby smashing things inside the chalet.
Smith opened the front door.
“Bernard!” he called. “Bernard, it’s Leonard.”
There was a momentary pause, then a brief scurrying sound, then a tremendous explosion.
Smith heard a body fall. For a second of shock he thought Willoughby had committed suicide, then he banished the thought, simultaneously developing a towering rage at Willoughby’s adolescent behaviour. He threw open the door leading to the back room which looked out on to the mountain. Willoughby was sprawled on the floor with the side of his head gone.
Smith had an impulse to run out of the chalet—the sight on the floor was so horrible—but he turned his eyes away and mastered himself. He then picked up the telephone and asked for Dr. Manorelli, the Observatory physician. He explained what had happened. “Stay there,” ordered Dr. Manorelli. “Mrs. Willoughby and her daughter may come back at any moment. She must not be allowed just to walk in and discover him. I’ll be down in a few minutes. Don’t touch him in the meantime.”
When Manorelli arrived, his first words were, “I’ve notified the police. They’re sending somebody out.”
“Before you’ve seen him!” ejaculated Smith. He instantly saw the endless examinations and the awkward probing. “Why did Willoughby shoot himself? Don’t know. What was he doing at home at this hour? Sleeping for night duty? For what, then, did you, Smith, come down here disturbing valuable sleep? Oh, just wanted a chat. In the middle of sleep period ? What did you want to chat about that couldn’t wait?” No, that was all very implausible.
Dr. Manorelli, examining the body, said, “Suicide or attempted suicide, one way or the other it’s a police matter. Why wait?” He looked around the room. “Looks as though he was wrecking the place. Did you hear him ? Wonder why he was doing that. Of course, obviously disturbed state of mind, but what was he disturbed about? Go into the bedroom and bring me a sheet, would you please.”
Smith was glad to get out of the room. The bedroom was a mess. A framed photograph of Mona Willoughby was smashed, all her clothes dragged from the wardrobe, some of them torn, the dressing-table had been swept clear, bottles and powder on the carpet.
Smith opened a cupboard and found sheets. As he left the bedroom he heard car wheels crunch on the pebbled drive. He gave the sheet to Dr. Manorelli, then went to meet Mona Willoughby. She entered running, with Sally a few steps behind.
“Hallo, Professor Smith!” she exclaimed. “I saw your car.”
Smith moved so that she was intercepted in her intention to go into the back room.
“Dr. Manorelli’s here,” he said.
Her young face flashed into terror. “He did it!” she cried.
Smith hated every moment of the next few hours. He had to bear her first shrieks and sobs, then her heart-rending account of the telephone conversation she had had with Bernard. (He had rung every store where she was a regular shopper and they had put out calls for her. She had eventually rung him back in a panic wondering what had occurred, only to hear him drunkenly calling for her and saying the end of the world was coming. She had let loose at him. He had cried and sworn he would kill himself. She had told him to do just that.) After this the police arrived and he had to hang about while they questioned first Dr. Manorelli, then Mona. His own interrogation was quite brief. He told them about the call Mildred had had and how he had come down to see if he could help his associate.
Finally, he volunteered to take Mona and Sally back to his house where Mildred could look after them. All in all, it had been a gruelling few hours.
Night had come down over the mountain. Smith paid a last visit to the Observatory to have a word about Professor Gran with Hartwing who would be running things that night.
“I’ve seen the old coot already,” said Hartwing. “What goes on ? He’s burbling about photographing the end of the Sun. What’s he getting at?”
“He and Weiner have got an answer on the business of the disappearing lines—you’ve followed it over the past month—the Sun stops shining in about twenty-four hours’ time. Weiner’s gone off to see the President. Gran’s dedicated himself to seeing the end here. It’s your job and mine to see the story doesn’t break on the Press until Weiner’s seen the President.”
Hartwing’s face showed his incredulity. He stood silent, staring at Smith, obviously waiting for him to explain his joke.
“It’s true,” said Smith sombrely. “I don’t question conclusions reached on their level—you’ll see sunrise tomorrow and sunset, but probably no more. The world will go mad when it finds out. A lot of terror may be averted if the Government has a few hours to think and act. God knows what they will do—send troops to guard power-stations and the lie, I suppose—but it will all go wrong if the Press gets hold of it too early. We’ve got to pooh-pooh any enquiries that reach us.”
“You can’t be serious!” said Hartwing. He laughed breathlessly. “They must have been joking. Why, it’s impossible !”
Smith shook his head.
Hartwing made one or two confused gestures.
“No. Look here! Look, you don’t expect anybody to believe you, do you? I think Weiner ought to have better taste than to start a ridiculous hoax like that. A man in his position—and you, Leonard. I don’t think it’s in the least bit funny.”
“It’s not meant to be funny,” suddenly shouted Smith, then choked on a mouthful of tobacco smoke and fell into a fit of coughing and gasping.
Hartwing grinned and banged him across the shoulders.
“You won’t see the night out at this rate,” he jibed.
Smith knew that he would not now be able to convince Hartwing that he was not joking. He had a drink of water. “Well, if any newspapers get through, asking when the Sun goes out, don’t ass about; just tell them it’s a hoax and shut them up.”
Hartwing smiled and Smith realized that far from scotching any rumour he would in all probability amplify it, regarding it as all good fun.
When Smith got home, both his wife and Helen Weiner were away upstairs closeted with Mona and Sally Willoughby. He only saw Mildred for a few minutes when she came downstairs to heat some milk. He went to bed about midnight, and fell asleep reading some feeble novel.
* * * *
Weiner had never before realized how vast America was. He had flown from East to West when he had joined the Observatory, but that had been in a high-flying Coast to Coast jet. Now he was able to examine every mile of the way, see every gully of the desert mountainscape, pick out the threads of trails—Arizona seemed never ending.
Ted Mass, his pilot, so hard-bitten and laconic on the ground, had grown more and more boisterous the farther they flew. He sang, he pointed out landmarks, he shouted back incomprehensible comments and progressively turned what should have been a time of introspection and sorrowful farewell into a torment of simmering rage.
Two hours’ flight saw them dropping steeply down out of the sunlight over the mountains into the long shadows beginning to shroud Tucson Municipal Airport, The time was 19.15 Mountain Standard Time. Ted Mass taxied the aircraft off somewhere to get it refuelled. Weiner sat patiently over a coffee working out a probable ETA. His figures comforted him a little, but he vowed he would keep the pressure on at each stop so that the pilot got the plane into the air again with the minimum of delay.
On the trip to Midland with the land below in darkness, the eastern sky before them was impenetrably black while, behind them, the glow of the set sun sadly illuminated the clear air. Ted Mass began a series of meteorological reminiscences interspersed with periods of thoughtful humming. He tuned the radio into Midland and listened to the weather report.
“Rain,” he shouted back to Weiner. “Buckets of it. Come over from Tennessee. Unusual. Bit of headwind.”
Weiner watched the opaque blanket approaching, thinking of the curtain that would be drawn for ever round the Earth.
“It won’t hold us up, will it?” he called.
Ted Mass shrugged doubtfully.
“It mustn’t! You’ve got to get me to Washington on time.”
“I’ll get you there,” bawled Mass without much enthusiasm.
The windscreen suddenly ran with water, while the plane rocked, then dropped and rose.
Approaching Midland, the plane suddenly soared upwards and they found themselves in clear air with the stars above and a thousand blurred stars below.
“Oil wells,” announced Mass. He burst out singing, then patted the framework of the plane affectionately. “Good old bird!” Weiner heard him say, and wondered if they had come through worse perils than even his mind had created.
They were a half-hour later in arrival at Midland than Weiner’s estimated time.
During the seven-hundred-mile flight to Memphis, Weiner switched off the cabin light and tried to relax in his chair. Ted Mass took the hint, and apart from an occasional noisy yawn or an expletive at some navigational problem, was silent. Weiner could not sleep. In the dim light that came from forward in the pilot’s compartment, his imagination was able for the first time to build on the calamity shortly to kill the world. Would he ever see Helen again? Perhaps for a few hours, if he was able to leave Washington and return to the Observatory before the last sunset. If he delayed his return longer and the news got out no doubt travel would be impossible. They might see the last sunset together, then everlasting night with only electric light until the fuel supply for the Observatory ran out. Perhaps they could then drive to San Diego or maybe the oilfields he had just left where fuel might last longer. He saw the fleeing multitudes searching for fuel to give light and warmth, increasingly lawless, forests aflame, oilfields and coalfields looted. Lower and lower the temperature. Packs of wild animals and humans each hunting the other. Towns deserted; life only in the deepest mines and caverns —and then even this frozen into extinction. There was not a thing anyone could do to avert it.
He switched on the light. Ted Mass looked round. “Can’t sleep?” He held out a sandwich. “Get outside this,” he advised. “Memphis in an hour. Sun comes up soon after.”
Between Memphis and Knoxville they ran into the dawn. Straight into their eyes as the plane floated high over Tennessee came an orange flash of light instantly warming to flesh and feelings. Weiner was momentarily appalled to see the redness of the light, but then realized this was normal dawn light. His wristwatch showed him the time to be 3.40 and he was interested to see how an elevated horizon could give such an early dawn.
“Grand day,” prophesied Ted Mass. His face which had been pale with the strain of eleven hours’ flying, took colour from the warm dawn. He hitched his shoulders and began singing again. Despite this Weiner dozed until they landed in Knoxville.
During the last leg, Ted Mass with the aid of a favourable wind, pushed the plane to its safe limit, and as Washington appeared in a thin ground mist he was able to announce that they were on schedule. Weiner’s heart began to thump with the imminence of his interview. Two hours in which to get himself cleaned up, have a bite to eat and to drive the five miles into Washington. Just right!
The plane landed smoothly and the nerve-drilling roar of the two engines stopped. Ted Mass conducted Weiner to the arrival office and after a few minutes Weiner was free to go on his way. On the way to the airport toilet he glanced at the lobby clock. 09.30! He looked at his watch. 06.30! His legs almost buckled beneath him. He, an astronomer, of all people to forget the necessity to change from Pacific Standard to Mountain Standard Time, to Central Standard Time and then to Eastern Standard Time. He was an hour late for his interview already!
For a half-minute, Weiner was incapable of coherent thought and he stood trembling in the busy lobby staring at the clock. However, a species of rage directed against himself rose up and he jerked himself towards the line of public telephones. One booth was disengaged and he soon discovered it was out of order. When he did get another booth, he spent some futile minutes searching the directory for the White House number, and then with his control nearly gone, he asked the operator to put him through.
There was a long pause, and then a voice identifying itself as Public Relations asked him his business. Weiner rapidly explained that he had missed an appointment with the President and wanted to arrange another. “I’ll give you the President’s Secretary,” said the voice, expressing disapproval. There was another long pause. Weiner fed in more coins.
“Hallo, Professor Weiner,” said the Secretary, “what happened?”
Even with death only a few days away Weiner was not able to explain that he, one of the foremost astronomers of the world, had forgotten the three-hour difference between East and West coast. “I’m afraid we had trouble over Tennessee. Look! I must see the President without delay. Can you arrange it? I’m not exaggerating. I’ve got to see him within the hour.”
The Secretary blew into the phone. “He’s on his way to New York. Has to keep a tight schedule.”
“Can’t you reach him there?” pleaded Weiner.
“Not without knowing what you want to discuss with him.” The Secretary softened that: “I just can’t ring him and say drop everything, Professor Weiner wants to talk to you. Anyway, he won’t arrive until another hour.”
Weiner writhed in indecision, then said, “I can’t tell you over the phone. I’m coming to the White House right now. Will you see me as soon as I arrive?”
“Certainly, I’ll advise the gate-keeper.”
* * * *
Weiner shook hands with the Secretary and dropped into the offered chair. He felt exhausted, sick and dirty, and he knew he looked dishevelled and wild. He ran a shaking hand over his smooth hair.
The Secretary asked if he had had any breakfast, and immediately picked up the phone and asked for some coffee to be sent in. “These long trips at high speed are a strain—I know it well, Professor—it’s essential to keep up with meals, especially on coast-to-coast trips when it’s difficult to know what time of day it is.” He offered Weiner a cigarette. “Now, Professor, what have you to tell me ?”
Weiner drew a deep breath. Sitting before this well-dressed, well-shaved and very alive-looking man, he knew how small and insignificant he looked. Could anybody believe such a fantastic announcement from such a foolish-looking scarecrow ?
“What I want to tell the President,” he began, “can be fully substantiated by Professor Gran who is staying at the Observatory for the next few days. My heads of staff are also aware of the discovery we have made and they, too, can be called as witnesses if you require.”
The Secretary bowed his head politely. Weiner clenched his hands out of sight below the desk-top.
“In short, what we have found is that certain changes are taking place in the Sun which make it positive that within twenty-four hours it will cease to radiate visible light. The Sun will set over America tonight and will not be visible again.”
The Secretary stared hard at Weiner and groped for the cigarette he had placed in the large ashtray.
“You mean it will go out?” he queried. Automatically he glanced over his shoulder at the window, then stared again at Weiner. He visibly donned his air of composure again.
“That’s a terrible thing to say, Professor. What makes you so certain?” Weiner knew the Secretary had already decided he was a crank.
As Weiner opened his mouth to reply, the Secretary held up his hand and said, “Just a moment, Professor.” He picked up the telephone. “Can you get hold of Mr. Cano-witch and ask him to see me at once. Thank you.” He replaced the telephone. “Mr. Canowitch is a scientific consultant the President keeps on the staff here to advise him on technical subjects. I think it would be better if you explained in his presence. You understand, I hope. Well, Professor, this is a shattering thing. If you are right, what will it mean for the world?”
The door opened and a servant brought in a tray and placed it before Weiner, then went out. The Secretary poured coffee and handed Weiner a steaming cup. Weiner’s hands shook so much, the cup rattled in the saucer.
“It means death to all life on Earth within a matter of a few months. We shall freeze to death.” He trailed off. His mind felt too weary and dizzy to visualize farther.
The Secretary picked up a pencil and prodded the point into the blotting-pad on the desk-top.
“They have, what? Six months’ night in the Arctic regions, but the Eskimos survive. Wouldn’t it be like that?”
Weiner gulped a mouthful of coffee and immediately felt more sick.
“Even Arctic air receives some warmth from the sunlit regions,” he said. “If the whole planet is dark, the store of energy in the air or the ground will soon radiate away— you know how quickly the temperature drops on a winter’s evening—and there won’t be any more energy coming to Earth to keep the level up. Eventually, the temperature will go down to near absolute zero.”
Canowitch entered and was introduced. He said he had met the Professor during a tour round the Observatory some years ago. Weiner did not recognize him. “I had hair then,” said Canowitch with a laugh. He drew up a chair and looked attentive.
“Professor Weiner has just told me that they have discovered at the Observatory that the Sun will cease to shine in twenty-four hours. He is going to outline the scientific side of it and I want you, Mr. Canowitch, to be here so that we can put it in plain language to the President if need be.”
Canowitch said, “What!” and his forehead wrinkled up into his bald scalp.
“Just listen, Mr. Canowitch,” said the Secretary. “Now, Professor, will you tell us on what grounds you base your conclusion.”
Weiner opened the small brief-case he carried and took out photographs and typed sheets. He began from the first observations and worked through, showing Canowitch successive spectrographs and explaining the significance of each of the minute differences. He produced a graph showing atomic excitation levels and the calculated and actual time of extinction of each element. He pointed to the end of the down slope and silently traced across to the Time axis. He sat back, leaving the papers scattered on the desktop.
Canowitch was flushed with the effort of following Weiner. He looked at the Secretary significantly in silence. “Have any other Observatories confirmed this?” he asked.
“The first detected disappearance was made only two months ago. We checked with Hurstmonceaux immediately and got a negative answer. A difference in location and instruments without doubt. But three weeks ago the effect accelerated and this time Hurstmonceaux contacted us. Correspondence has been going on, but Professor Gran and I only completed the mathematics two days ago. I doubt whether any other group have explored the whole thing yet.”
“It’s unbelievable!” said Canowitch in a shocked voice. “Mr. Secretary, there’s no doubt, though, of that I feel sure. My God! The Sun going out after billions of years! But why, Professor. What is happening?”
Weiner mutely looked his ignorance.
The Secretary roused himself.
“I’ll get the President,” he said. “You’ll stay here, Professor, of course.” He picked up the telephone and obtained a line out. He dialled, spoke, waited, spoke again, waited and said finally, “Hallo, sir. Black Alert. Can you come back immediately? Yes, sir, I’ll arrange it all.”
He replaced the telephone.
“He’ll be back around five this evening.”
Weiner for some reason he could not explain began to weep.
* * * *
Professor Gran was up before dawn on the last day. It took mental driving to do it, even with his enthusiasm, as he was seventy years old and a sufferer from rheumatism. The night on the mountain-top had been very cold, and he had slept in the dark room attached to the dome wrapped only in a laboratory coat and a length of matting. About 1 a.m., feeling frozen, he had wandered out beneath the wonderful starry night and made his way to the “big” dome. Here he was able to scrounge a cup of coffee and a sandwich from a lonely mechanic, which cheered him up for a time, but, returned once more to the Coronagraph dome, he felt all his fingers stiffening and aching and fancied he could hear his knees creaking. About 2 a.m. Hartwing found him and insisted he rested on the couch in his warm office. At 4.30 a.m. Hartwing woke him again. “Sunrise in forty-five minutes,” he said, and went out again.
Professor Gran raised himself from the couch by hard use of “self-scorn” and the enticement of a flask of coffee Hartwing had left on the desk. He eased his feet to the floor and sat rubbing his face trying to drag his wits together. His mind, so keen in the day, swirled around now, and try as he might, he could not fix his thoughts on anything higher than the foul taste in his mouth, the aches in his bones and the rumbling of his stomach. He shuffled over to the table and poured himself a cup of coffee. He half sat on the table edge and clasped the hot cup in both hands easing the rheumatism away. He hadn’t smoked for ten years (ever since his doctor had warned him about the worsening of his bronchial condition and the strain it was beginning to put on his heart), but he wished Hartwing would come back so that he could get a cigarette from him. The desire to smoke welled up into his saliva glands. He went round the desk and opened the middle drawer. Delighted, he grabbed the pack of cigarettes he found there. There were no matches. Swearing softly in his affected voice he pulled open the other drawers, keeping his ears alert in case Hartwing should return.
Suddenly he straightened himself with a gasp and then sat in the chair behind the desk. “What the devil are you up to, Gran?” he asked himself aloud. He gave himself a gentle slap on the cheek. “You don’t smoke, you silly old fool!” He held his hand up and watched it tremble out of control. “You’re getting old,” he sneered at himself. He threw the pack of cigarettes back into the drawer and slammed it close. “The world ends today and you wrestle with a gnat you killed ten years ago! Well, it just shows you what are the really important things in life.”
He looked at his huge vest-pocket watch, then painfully walked to the door and stepped out into the chill drifting air of pre-dawn. With his hands plunged into his trouser pockets he hurried back to the Coronagraph dome as fast as his uncertain knees would allow. His jaws chattered together with the cold. The yearning to smoke returned intensified. He clenched his teeth together and halted in a conflict of mind—one part arguing that surely on the last day he could smoke, and the other that if he was going to die it might as well be with his mind in full control of itself. The two parts of his mind sparred together while he stood with his hand on the knob of the dome door.
He looked round as the sound of a car cresting the top and entering the car park came to his ears. He saw headlights swing then blink out. He didn’t think, “I wonder who that is?” He thought, “I wonder if they’ve got a cigarette?” He hurried back down the path.
The newcomer was Smith, coming on early as the better alternative to lying awake and listening to the soft sounds of doors opening and closing as the women exchanged visits to comfort each other.
“Hallo, Gran,” greeted Smith. “Thought I’d come and help you catch the dawn.”
“That’s very good of you, Smith,” said Gran perfunctorily. They walked back towards the dome.
“The last one,” said Smith. “I couldn’t miss the last one.”
For some obscure reason these words said quietly in the dark transmuted the whole thing for Professor Gran from a unique fascinating astronomical event, to a tragedy that was shortly to overwhelm not only Earth but also the entire Solar System. He forgot he wanted to smoke. They walked quietly into the dome and commenced to make everything ready for dawn. When they were ready, they stopped and stood at the mouth of the slit watching the first elusive tints in the eastern sky. Smith pulled out his pipe.
Gran looked sideways. “I suppose you haven’t got a cigarette?” he asked.
“Never touch the things,” said Smith. “Why? Thought you didn’t smoke.”
“Oh, nothing,” answered Gran.
“I can get you some,” offered Smith.
“No, no,” snarled Gran. “No time now.” He rushed away to fiddle with the camera slide-loader.
They observed the same dawn as Weiner had two thousand miles eastward, but whereas he found relief in its apparent normality, they were able to see in a moment that overnight the Sun’s corona had greatly declined. Smith rang up the spectrograph chamber and listened to the call off of vanished lines.
“I’m going over to have a look,” he told Gran. “By the sound of it, the spectrum’s looking almost bald. I can’t visualize what he’s told me.”
Gran grunted, then added, “Don’t forget those cigarettes when you come back.”
Smith swore silently to himself as he went out. He had better things to do than act as messenger boy for the old goat at a time like this.
At 11 a.m. he took the car back home hoping the ladies would have sorted themselves out and that he would be right for breakfast, also that he would be able quietly to break the news to Mildred. He found the kitchen filled with unwashed crockery and a note from Mildred pinned to the kitchen door: “Couldn’t find you at the Observatory. Helen’s had a telephone call from Launcelot in Washington. He wants her to catch this afternoon plane and meet him there. Gone with Mona and Sally to see her off. Be back about 6 p.m. Don’t forget to eat up the jelly.”
Smith had an impulse to run out to his car and to set off in pursuit of Mildred, then he literally rushed backwards and forwards between the dining-room door and the telephone as he was torn between this idea and the idea that he should phone the airport and ask for her to be paged. Then he was deflected by noticing a newspaper folded in one of the room’s armchairs. He hurriedly scanned every page but could find no intimation that the news had leaked. Another idea presented itself and he quickly switched on the radio. Everything was proceeding normally. Somehow, this made the impending disaster less imminent and he was able calmly to ring the airport, get through to the right person, make his requirements quite plain and, thinking ahead, ask that Mrs. Smith should ring his office at the Observatory. He went back to the kitchen and made himself a breakfast, then drove back to the Observatory.
Professor Gran pounced on him when he passed by the Coronagraph dome. “Got those cigarettes, Smith?”
Smith, with his mind filled with anxiety for Mildred and growing terror at the plainer and plainer face of death, exploded, “For Christ’s sake, no!” He hurried on, but Gran called, “Self, self, self, that’s all some people think of!”
Smith seemed to feel a blow beneath his heart; thought left him. He turned and ran back to the startled Professor, grasped him by the lapels and shook him. “You dried up old fool,” he shouted. “What do you know about it? What do you know about it?” He pushed Gran away and the Professor staggered back then sat down on the step of the Observatory and was sick.
Smith knelt and put his arm round the old man’s shoulders.
“I’m sorry, Tom. I lost control.”
Professor Gran moaned softly and feebly wiped his lips with a handkerchief. His forehead and cheeks were white. “Nothing,” he muttered. “Let me rest a minute.”
Smith felt drained of anger and filled with contrition. A headache had started to throb between his eyes.
“Have you had breakfast?” he asked.
Professor Gran shook his head.
“Come on, then. I’ll take you to the canteen and get them to cook you something.”
Gran groaned at the idea, but nevertheless allowed himself to be assisted to his feet. Half carrying the exhausted Professor, Smith set off towards the canteen at the far edge of the site.
After seeing the Professor fed, stocked up with cigarettes and matches and returned to the Coronagraph dome, Smith hurried to his office and checked with the airport that Mildred had not phoned in the meantime. She had not, and he knew the four women were engaged on a store crawl before going for the afternoon flight.
He phoned the underground chamber of the Solar telescope and asked Swanson to come to the office. Swanson arrived irritated at being called away from the sensational developments going on. “Yes, I know, Will,” said Smith. He tugged at his moustache, which felt untidy as he had omitted to trim it that morning.
“Have you guessed what it all means?” he asked.
Swanson stared at Smith, said “No!” carefully, and waited. .
“The Sun’s dying,” said Smith. In an unemotional voice he went through the conclusions reached by Weiner and Gran. “I called you here because I want you to tell the rest. It’s only fair. By now Weiner will have passed it on to the President and I guess it doesn’t matter any more. If anybody wants to go off, let them. I’m sorry I had to hold it up so long.”
“My God!” said Swanson. He continued sitting, his eyes on the bright-lit sky outside. “We guessed, of course, but we didn’t believe it. Who could?”
He went out like a man in a trance. Ten minutes later Smith heard cars leaving the car park.
At two-thirty the phone rang and it was Mildred. Tears came into his eyes as he heard her voice. “Listen, dear,” he said, “don’t argue with me. Leave Helen there and come back immediately with Mona and Sally.” She attempted to break in but he over-rode her. “No, listen, dear, listen. Weiner’s gone to Washington to break the news about a terrible disaster that’s going to happen today. I want you back here ...”
“What disaster?” she thrust in. He heard the fear in her voice. “Leonard, what are you talking about!”
“Now, now, dear,” he soothed. “You’ve got plenty of time to get back. I’ll tell you when I see you. Now just go out and say good-bye to Helen. Tell her I’ve been taken ill. Bring the other two, and be careful how you drive, dear. Come straight up to the Observatory.” He cut across her appeals, repeated his instructions, then hung up.
He went outside and walked to the end of the terrace to stare out over the beautiful bowl between the mountains. The Sun had a peculiar pink tinge about it. So this is how the world ends, he thought, all a mess of trivialities, secrecy, cigarettes, shopping wives, headaches.
* * * *
After phoning Helen in the morning, Weiner spent an hour talking to Canowitch, then had a simple lunch in the staff dining-room. After lunch he was taken back to the Secretary’s room and they began to discuss what might be done to avert panic among the people. A telephone call came in from London and it appeared the news had been passed to H.M. Government who were cautiously checking the validity of the evidence. Other transatlantic calls came in as the hours ticked off.
Weiner felt himself going to pieces. Helen could not possibly arrive until nightfall, by which time, panic would be everywhere. He longed to be away from this quiet haven and to go to the airport where, at least, he could comfort Helen and plan something with her. But the figure of the President loomed over the house and nothing could move until he arrived to press his magic finger on the button marked “go”.
Afternoon coffee was served.
About five-thirty Canowitch came in looking white. “Have you seen the Sun?” he asked. “It’s red.”
Weiner rushed to the tall windows overlooking the lawn at the rear of the house. The Sun, still high, was a fierce orange colour. All three men stared at it in stricken silence.
The Secretary turned away and sat abruptly into his chair. “Somehow I hadn’t believed until now,” he said in a hushed voice. He picked up the telephone: “Get me a connection to the President’s plane at once,” he ordered. He waited while the other two men stood at the window. Eventually the telephone rang and he grabbed it. “Hallo, sir.” He listened. “Yes, sir, it’s about the Sun. Yes, I’ve got Professor Weiner here. It’s to do with the Black Alert. It’s imperative you let nothing delay you, sir.” The guarded interchange went on. “I’ve had to make emergency civil arrangements. Can I release them before you arrive? Yes, I’ll do that. I’ve already alerted Pentagon. Yes, sir. Right, sir.” The Secretary replaced the telephone, and immediately asked for another connection.
“Black Alert!” thought Weiner. “How prophetic!”
The Secretary was speaking to somebody, referring to the pages of notes they had made that afternoon. “At once,” he concluded. “This has the President’s top priority. At once. Yes, at once.”
He put down the telephone and for a moment held his head in his cupped hands. He suddenly picked up the telephone again and asked for a number. He ignored the two men and stared at the portrait of Washington hanging on the wall facing his desk.
“Hallo, dear,” he said softly. “I’m afraid I shan’t be able to get home tonight. Something’s blown up. Yes, yes, I know. I’m terribly sorry. Don’t forget to wish Mary good night from me, will you.” He forced a chuckle. “I’ll try to get in tomorrow morning. Good-bye, dear.”
The Secretary turned to Weiner. “The President asked if you would mind stopping until he arrived. Can you do that? I don’t like to ask it, but I think your help in working out the release to the Press, Radio and Television will be invaluable. The President needs all the help he can get at a time like this.”
Weiner nodded. The Secretary went on hesitantly, “Is there any hope we can offer the people?”
Quite sincerely Weiner said, “Only prayer.” He wandered tiredly back to the desk and sat down again. “As for the News Services, I can tell you what is happening but not why it’s happening. The President can only ask the people to face death with resignation and courage.”
The Secretary turned a pencil over and over between his fingers.
“He’ll be here within the hour. Will the Sun last out that long?”
The telephone rang. It was Public Relations asking if there was any information he could give the newspapers who were bombarding the office with calls.
The Secretary hesitated. “Tell them a news release will be put out in an hour’s time.”
He put down the telephone. “I expect they’ll find out soon enough from the Observatory,” he remarked to Weiner. He seemed to have forgotten his previous question.
They went again to look at the Sun. It was a deep red as if seen through high fog. Even as they looked the light took on a subtle purple hue.
“If he doesn’t hurry,” said Canowitch hysterically, “it will be too late!”
“Too late for what?” asked the Secretary sharply. “You can’t expect the President to stop it, can you.” He turned away and opened a cabinet. Solemnly he poured drinks and handed them round.
“Oh, Helen, Helen!” thought Weiner. His chest ached with a hopeless sorrow.
Again the telephone gave its sharp ring. The Secretary went and took the call. “Right,” he said. “The President’s car has left the airport,” he announced. “Let us get out of this infernal room and meet him on the porch.”
The room was red like an inferno.
The President’s car came up the drive with its headlights on. Weiner saw the white head duck out of the car and the tall figure commence to mount the steps. As the President approached in the gloom he called, “Well, Charlie?”
The Secretary went down a step and greeted the President with an urgency showing his held-down panic.
“This is Professor Weiner,” he said, turning.
The President extended his hand.
The Sun went out.