Stephen Leigh - Card Sharks

About ten o'clock on Saturday night I was dozing on the couch in my room at the BOQ, too tired to function, too lazy to go to bed. "Have Gun, Will Travel" was on the TV.

There was a knock at the door. Margaret, still in her nurse's uniform. "Come with me," she said. It never occurred to me to do anything else.

She was unusually silent — tired, I thought — as we pulled out of the base on our way to Pancho's. But we went right at the gate instead of left. I said, "If this is a kidnapping, I insist that you have your way with me…."

"All right."

"Where are we going?"

"It's a surprise."

Moments later we drove through The NACA facility without stopping. I was disappointed. "I was sort of hoping you were going to sneak me into the 11A cockpit."

"This is even better."

It was still a bit of a drive … out to the Mohave Highway, then east again, finally turning south onto Rich Road. Then, at Leuhman Ridge, she pulled off on a dirt road trail.

"Isn't this the restricted area?" I asked as she got out.

"Yes." She left the door open, the headlights on, and the radio playing loudly, some hillbilly music out of Bakersfield.

In front of us stood a concrete bunker. Between our car and the bunker was a chain link fence with a padlocked gate. "I hope we're not supposed to climb."

She produced a pair of keys. "Now that shows initiative," I said.

Moments later we were opening the steel door to Baby 's tomb.

The surroundings were unimpressive. This was nothing more than a concrete and steel bunker, the kind originally used to store explosives. A row of bare lightbulbs provided the illumination.

There, in the middle, sat Baby .

I was surprised at how small it was, probably half the size of the X-11A. And where the spaceplane was sleek and winged, Baby looked like a seashell. Its skin was rough to the touch, like that of a shark. I ran my hands over it … almost unable to believe that it had traveled here from another world, another star system.

"Like what you see?"

"Yes," I said. "Thank you." Only then did I turn and look at Margaret. She had slipped out of her uniform and stood there naked and, even in that ghastly light, golden. She glided up to me and brushed her lips against mine.

"You have nothing on," I said.

"Don't be silly," she said, unzipping my pants. "You forgot about the radio…."

We made love right there on Baby .

It was, I suppose, final proof that I was no longer the boy who lived the Tak World novels.

***

On the morning of Tuesday, May 4th — launch minus one day — I arrived at the control center as usual at seven. Margaret had again had late duty at the medical office, so I had spent the night at the BOQ, the better to make my ritual early morning call to Deb and the children. (The more enmeshed I got with Margaret, the more faithful I was about calling. Strangely, I was looking forward to seeing them in as little as a week's time.)

A delta-winged F-106 from the Tomlin test force roared overhead on takeoff, and I stopped to watch it climb into the sun. My ears were still ringing when I heard a man say, "Beautiful."

George Battle stood behind me. In his mirrored sunglasses he looked like a demented Teddy Roosevelt. "Don't you love the smell of J-4 in the morning? I'd have given anything to be a pilot. Eyes."

"Aviation's loss."

Battle, from my brief encounter with him, was clearly one of those people who pride themselves on having a sense of humor — and don't. "In three days this place'll be swarming with reporters. Bastards."

"I haven't noticed a lot of them so far."

He gave a tight smile. "Thank you."

"Well, this will be the first manned space flight in history. People will be interested."

"I encourage people to be interested in the rocketry and such. My worry is that some of these reporters will cover the human angle." I didn't know what he meant, so he prompted. "What do you really know about Margaret Durand?" he said, straining to keep things casual.

"I know all I need to know," I said. "Since you've obviously been spying on us — "

"I'm in charge of security around here — "

"— Maybe you should just tell me what exactly — "

"— It isn't as though either of you've been a model of d discretion."

Both of us stopped. We realized we were shouting. "Look," I said, "I realize it looks bad — "

"— How it looks isn't the point — "

"— But we're all under a lot of strain — "

"— Oh, that excuse!"

We were talking over each other again. This time Battle took the lead and I tried to restrain myself. "Her background checks out fine. Medical school in Texas, ten years as Navy nurse until hired by the Committee. Never married. Church goer." He added the last item with a certain relish. "It's perfect. Too perfect, maybe. I'm just warning you — all of you — that once your rocket goes up" — he was oblivious to the double entendre — "your lives are going to change. You're going to be under a microscope. And you'd better be ready. Dr. Rowe." Battle made the transition from warning to greeting so smoothly I was late in catching it.

Rowe was just getting out of his car. "Good morning, George. Don't arrest Thayer until after tomorrow. I need him until then."

Battle, still oblivious, cleared his throat. "We were just talking about the weather."

"A personal conversation? Well, don't let it happen again." Then Rowe gestured toward me. "Ed, come here a second." Dismissed, Battle slunk away. Rowe opened the trunk of his car and pulled out what looked like a magazine wrapped in plastic. "Recognize it?"

Inside the plastic was a gray pamphlet published by the Smithsonian Institution and dated December 1919. I didn't need to open it to know what it contained. "Goddard's paper on multi-stage rocketry and flights to the Moon."

"'A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes.' The very paper ridiculed as 'absurd' by The New York Times ." He handled it as if it were a priceless artifact. Which it was, to the two of us. Then, a bit too casually, I thought, he tossed it to me. "I want you to put this in Woody's personal pack."

"For the flight?"

"It should get into space, don't you think? After all that was said about it."

Rowe walked over to the fence and leaned on it. From our vantage point we had a clear view into Hangar Three. The tech crew was hard at work preparing the X-11A for its big day.

"Battle says everything changes tomorrow."

"Everything changes every day."

"You don't think the world will be different once Enloe lands?"

He had a distant look in his eye. "I suppose." He stepped back from the fence. "Maybe I'm just looking at the end of an era and not liking it much. Because it's my era. When rockets were toys for bright children and crazy adults."

"It has to grow up sometime. If we're ever going to get to the Moon. Have cities on Mars."

"I know." He smiled sadly. "I just wish it didn't have to hurt so much." He clapped me on the shoulder and nodded at the package in my hand. "Don't forget."

I had a few moments before the seven-thirty briefing, so I decided to drop by the suiting room. I found Major Meadows there giving a tour to some ten-year-old boy. "I told you not to touch the helmet!"

The kid just rolled his eyes. "This looks like airplane stuff. Where's the spaceman things?"

"These are the spaceman things," Meadows explained patiently. "My son, Mark," he said, by way of introduction and apology.

"Pleased to meet you, Mark."

He ignored me. "Come on, Mark. I'll drop you at school."

I held the door for the two of them.

It's funny, when I think back. If I hadn't held the door, I wouldn't have seen Margaret come into the building with Enloe.